Otherwise Indisposed
I remember a few months ago, I thought to myself, it’s nice to have everything in a rythym (spelling?!). The money was coming in, and more was being saved than I’d managed to the previous 24 years of my life, I was embarking on some exciting new work prospects, and I was writing on this page over twice a week.
What the hell happened?
Falling into a rythym, out of rythym
As I said, for a period (probably a lot shorter than I actually remember), I felt like I was getting things done, and working towards some goals. The last 2 months has shattered this, and I’ve now managed to fall into a new rythym or being completely out of the previous beat I was following. I shouldn’t blame myself too much, there’s been a lot of time consuming, money draining things going:
- the Wedding (enough said),
- the quasi HoneyMoon,
- the 3 different visits of different groups of family and friends, spanning now over the past 6 weeks; and
- the 4 holidays (of various lengths coming up to Paris, Southern England and of course Russia)
With all the interruptions, I’ve managed to lose a fantastic work oppurtunity (don’t ask, big project, stake in company, yada, yada….), eat and drink (badly) constantly and quite frankly waste a metric f$#kload of money. And with things not paid for, such as the holidays I mentioned above, I can’t see any easy way out of immediate debt.
Planning…
So here I am, preaching to Google crawl bot (possibly this posts only audience, given its less than exciting nature), and getting my thoughts down on paper (we’ll call it, the interscroll), to come to a quick as possible solution to the problem.
I’ve spent the last hour updating the C&S Income/Expenditure budget (yet another thing, I’ve lost track of), and whilst things ain’t as glum as I thought they might be, it seems something has to give:
- stop on the spot purchases (easy, I’ll stop scouring internet shops in downtime at work)
- cut back on drinking/going out (should be fine, now that the visitors have moved on)
- borrow more money (read debt) from the bank, not a good idea. The way things are going at the moment, I’m probably one of their favourite small-time customers.
- cut back on one of the holidays (kind of hard as it was booked months in advance (not with our money, at the time).
I find myself in the money pickle again, something I’m no stranger to. I’m comfortable enough that I know I can be clear and mostly debt free again by say… September, but its the now that I can’t handle.
Completely off topic, but the book I’m reading at the moment, Tripwire (my 6th novel since April!), starts with a CEO of a faltering U.S electronics business going to a loan shark for a large loan. In borrowing 1.1 million dollars, he falls into the trap of paying back a high interest rate, and giving a rather large proportion of his fledgling companies shares to the shark who sells them all instantly for nothing causing the banks to freak and dump his enourmous loans off on a large mortgage recovery operation (ftonted in the Cayman islands, by the loan shark himself). This has nothing to do with my situation at all, but geez, show’s what debt and stupidity can do in times of desperation.
Recoupling on the rail to success….
I’ve got a 7 point plan to rectify this little situation of mine, firstly:
- enjoy the holiday to Russia, no point in stressing about that
- get all debts on the way to be being repaid by September 2008, this includes costs for the wedding, the previous personal loan, and credit card debt
- write at least two posts a week to HD911, content is the key
- continue reading novels, but branch out into some different authors, 4 books by one author (Lee Child) and 2 by another (Harlen Coben) is proving a little too much
- continue good things at the office
- get off my ass and get this work started and flowing again; and
- and keep exercising as much as possible, the 15 mile week (counted 4 trips from the office to Waterloo station (3.5miles) and smaller trips between work and Trafalgar Square) was a step in the right direction.
Let’s do this thing…. Yea!
Tags: Work
June 4th, 2008 at 6:49 am
Go hard!
When are you heading to Russia?? That’ll be mad! Sarah said that Moscow was great, by St Petersburg (sp?) was a bit dodge.
I know what you mean on the Money side - for me all it takes is a trip to someonwhere other than canberra, with better shops, and it all takes a dive for the next couple of months.
doesn’t help that for the promotion I got recently, I have to go back to a lower amount until all the e-paperwork goes through the right committees.
Don’t worry mate, you’ll get there!
June 4th, 2008 at 1:34 pm
Russia in early July, Moscow for a few days, then bus ride (guided tour) down to St Petersburg. I’m looking forward to it, but its just so ridiculously expensive. For what we’re paying for 6 days in Russia, I think we could stay the better part of a month in Spain/Greece etc.
Looking back on it now, I can see many over the top weekends and over spending on stupid things that with a little forethought could well have been avoided.. But who’s got the smarts to look ahead a week, let along 3 months?
June 5th, 2008 at 6:15 am
True that.
Yeah, I’ve decided recently that my next holiday (that’s not a trip back to Perth) is going to be to somewhere hella cheap like Thailand or Bali. I like the idea of spending a couple of weeks sitting on a beach reading a book and sipping a beer!
I really want to go somewhere I can get tailored suits made for like $50 too.
June 9th, 2008 at 3:48 pm
That’s the way, relax and enjoy the holiday with ridiculously cheap food and alcohol. Spain and that was good for the relaxing, but I haven’t found anywhere anywhere near as cheap as Bali over here (to be expected). Most places have been horrendously expensive so far.