On this entry, I am going to focus on one main event that happened this week: an already planned and paid for trip. This event can drive you nuts and can make you waste more money than you should.
So lets begin in chronological order. On Tuesday, I got on a plane and returned on Wednesday. This trip involved airplane tickets, hotel room, car rental, food expenses, and game tickets. Most of these had already been paid for in advanced. When I began this experiment, I knew I had this trip, but if I kept postponing the challenge, I was sure to never accomplish what I wanted. Life does not stop for us and I saw this as an advantage.
What if I lose my job after having planned and paid for a vacation? What if things get shaky at the company and there is unpaid time off and I already had a vacation planned? What ifs... in this economy, these are really probable what ifs. What is someone to do... oh, chucks! I had planned this trip and paid almost everything, but now I can't go; not only because I can't spend a lot of money, but, also, because people of my financial state are not "supposed" to be making these trips. I'll just cancel it, even though I will not get all my money back. Sounds ridiculous, doesn't it? That's exactly how I felt this week. People near me, who knew of my experiment, made similar remarks to the ones mentioned above; they expressed it as cheating. It was then that I knew just how important it was that this trip took place. People with a minimum wage salary should be able to plan a trip, pay for it and have fun. People who are now making less than they were (because of any situation) and already had plans, should be able to keep them and not feel judged because of their decision of sticking with them.
I am glad I made this trip. I was not alone, so some of the expenses were shared as I will detail below. There were some expenses I did not want to take part on, since they were more of a luxury than a necessity. I did not pay for those, you will understand below.
| Expense | Expected | Extra |
| Airport Parking | $44.75 | |
| Car Rental | $7.13 | $70.77 |
| Food at Airport | $0.00 | $4.46+$3.00/ $9.00 |
| Lunch/Dinner | $8.47 | |
| Goodies/ Souvenirs | $8.72 | |
| Game Parking | $0.00 | $40.00 |
| Food at Game | $0.00 | $14.00 |
| Breakfast | $0.00 |
Okay, so here's the breakdown: in the above table we have the expenses that had not been covered beforehand and needed to get paid. The Expected column is how much we spent without any upgrades or added commodities; the Extra column refers to the money we spent or could have spent because of upgrades or luxuries.
First, the airport parking cost was divided into 2 people, so I ended up paying $22.37. For the car rental, it had been decided last year that my partner would take care of this since he had a free day with the Rental Car company. He would have only paid $7.13 of taxes, but he decided to upgrade to a cooler car and ended up paying $70.77. I did not think this upgrade was necessary so the payment was up to him. I did love the cooler car and had a lot of fun in it, don't get me wrong, but it was an expense I would have not made. Because of our choice of car, we needed a safe place to park the car when assisting the basketball game that we had planned the trip around. Go Spurs! So, my partner ended paying $40 worth of parking. There were parking spots that were cheaper and others free of charge, but those were considerably farther and solitary; hence, unsafer for us to leave the car in and walk to the stadium.
Next, the food... my favorite topic. I made breakfast Monday night and packed lots of snacks to make sure we didn't go hungry and had to spend money on things we could get at a lower cost. Yet we cannot go past the TSA with liquids, so Mr. Complicated needed something to drink. He offered me a drink on him, so I gave in; that's where the first $4.46 on extra food expenses come in. When lunch time was approaching we decided to go to Chili's, and Chili's had an awesome lunch special that included a starter and an entree. I chose a delicious chicken enchilada soup and for the entree a chicken Mexican bowl, pure deliciousness. Since I had a starter, I did not finish my entree and asked for the remaining of the meal to go; there I was able to score dinner: WIN! I snacked before the game to make sure I did not need to buy anything at the game, food there is really expensive. I was not hungry, but we all know who was; $14 was spent on this (on him, of course... I just had a small bite). The hotel included breakfast, so we were good on breakfast again. On our return flight, he bought a bottle of water, I did not fuzzed because the airline we were flying in this time offered no drinks unless they were paid for; so the $3 spent here were understandable. Now, the last $9 we did not actually spend but we did consume so I am including them here. The person who sat next to us in the flight was a really jolly spirit, he befriended us and wouldn't stop talking, telling us about his family, life, and so on. When the lady passed with the refreshments advertising, he offered to buy Mr. Complicated a beer and a bottle of water for me. He would not take no for an answer, so we accepted. Another WIN!
Lastly, my goodies/souvenirs expense. I wanted to get something for my daughter, so we went to Target and I got her a small Dr. Seuss book that was on sale and some candy; give me a break, it was St. Valentine's week! My sisters were taking care of my daughter these two days, so I bought them chocolate. I spent a total of $8.72. I spent a total of $39.56 on this trip counting as entertainment.
Now, for Saint Valentines day: I cannot speak a lot about expenses made on this day. All I spent was $6 on chocolate covered strawberries. I always buy my daughter's valentine cards on the day-after-Valentines-day sale. Something that will probably not happen this year. Also, I had purchased my partner's gift last year during Amazon's Thanksgiving lightning deals. I enjoy taking advantages of deals. Something I have to be very careful nowadays. We went out to eat but my partner took care of the bill; we spent $24 between the three.
Below I present the expenses up to this week and the money I have left to survive before payday.
| Expense on February | Cost (monthly) |
| Internet Bill | $37.20 |
| Daughter's school | $200.00 |
| Cellphone Bill | $27.88 |
| Electricity Bill | |
| Water Bill | $23.71 |
| Rent | $300.00 |
| Gas | $35.00 |
| Food | $79.71 |
| School miscellaneous | $2.00 |
| Entertainment | $39.55 |
| Church | $2.00 |
| Emergency | |
| Other | $112.99 |
| Actual Total | $860.04 |
| Actual Money Saved | $244.09 ($107.13 is the goal) |
Things that still need to be taken care for: gas for the remaining weeks of February, electricity bill (which I think will come pricey, will expand on the topic when it comes at the end of the month), and groceries (mainly breakfast and snacks). As you can see, I am a bit tight; I'm hoping no emergencies arise. But that's why they're called emergencies... we'll see. Hope you didn't die of boredom. If you have any suggestions or comments please let me know below.
See you next week. By the way, sorry for the one-day-late entry, but, again, it was Valentine's day, gimme a break. :)
-Michelle <3
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