Frustration

Arghh! I lost my $142.50 TransPass somewhere between the train and work this morning. Sorry to use harsh letters, but WTF?!

I can only hope that with my receipt (which I kept since it's a write-off for a contractor) I can get a replacement, or at least one at a discount. If I can't... I'll just kick myself all month long.

An important lesson in public transit riding here. It's worth the 2 bucks for a lanyard and pass holder!! What's worse is that I know I have a lanyard and holder at home somewhere from my previous job.

The level of personal frustration I feel about this is very high, almost to the point of being disproportionate to the problem. While "technically" I have enough money for another pass, what a waste of $142.50! Especially at a time in my life when every penny matters to me. There was a time when I would have shrugged it off and ate the loss, but in my present financial condition this is a major setback.

Hope everyone else's day is going better than mine...

Day One Success

The day is nearly done, and the only money I spent was on a necessary monthly transit pass.

I'm not going out again, so there is relatively little chance of spending any money! As you may notice from the title, I am embarking on a Steve Pavlina-inspired set of 30 day trials. While I won't be detailing much about them here, I'm keeping my personal log and giving some low-hanging (but still challenging) trials a shot.

Another financial success today - I lowered my car insurance by 6.2%! I now have a $1000 backstop (and have for over a month) so I increased my deductible to save some cash. And since I'm not driving every day, I have less chance of being in an accident. I'm looking forward to the day that I'll make my insurance policy payment in one lump sum every 6 months, but I'm not yet there. (This will save about $48 / year.) Another option, depending on what happens in the next two months, is getting rid of the car all together. That would save around $500 / month but severely limit my options for part-time work. And it may be quite expensive for me to get out of my lease. Yes, I leased. And it was probably the best option for me at the time. And I'm glad I got the "new car" thing out of the way. It was nice to do once, but probably not again. Even if I have the means, "new" matters less than "awesomeness".

Working in a downtown metropolitan area makes it VERY difficult to not go out to eat for lunch. There are so many options, and so many interesting people... but you pay dearly for all of that. Today I stayed in - I hope I can continue this good start.