I like everything about me!

This kid has the right idea, 3 cheers for daily affirmations and feeling good about your own life!

Weekly Check in Fri May 20 - Thurs May 26

Fri May 20
$15 Lunch
$9 Pasta sale at work
$45 Hair colour
Total $69

Sat May 21
$24 Drug Store (purchase was $34 but I cashed in $10 of points) bought bronzer lotions
$25 Night out
$28 Credit card purchase from Night out... I bought two rounds of drinks for my friend and I. Very odd behavior on my part since I never use my cr card at a club.
Total $77

Sun May 22
$47.65
$26
Total $74

Mon May 23
Money Free Day!

Tues May 24

Money Free Day!

Wed May 25
70 Spa
$30 Dinner Date - He paid for the driving range, I insisted on paying for the drinks and nachos
Total $100


Thurs May 26

Money Free Day!

Weekly Total $320
I also made an extra $40 this week designing and making my coworker's wedding earrings and necklace.

Again I have to say the best thing to do is to write all purchases down. I was sure I had a cheap week, but then I forgot my beutification treatments oooops!

I joined Match.com and ended up with a disappointed heart

Oh how I jinxed myself with this Post

I finally thought I was about to meet THE ONE and then I thought I did.
But in fact, I did not.

The one will be able to get through my hard outer shell and be actually willing to crack the 'hard nut' that I am.
Yes I have walls and yes I don't wear my emotions on my sleeve. That's who I am and it took me a long time to understand myself and thus it will take you longer than ONE date to figure me out. I am not someone with a few easy breezy layers, the woman I am runs deep and with every layer you get through you will realize there are 10 more and 11 after that.

So now, I am planning a dating detox.

Yes, as my friends have pointed out, yes I do say this all the time. But now it is real. I am not interested in looking, talking or engaging in any other activity with members of the opposite sex. (my male friends are of course not included in this as they are not part of the 'male' population to me, they are just wonderful souls). I am done.

In the past 3 years that I have been 'single', I have always been either talking, meeting, knowing, about to meet, about to talk to and looking for men. And even if I have had a day or two of no such activity, that is when it is most likely that something will jump into my life. And likely it won't be one something but at least three somethings.

So now my friends, I will not walk into a room and immediately scan it for prospects, I will dance on a dance floor without seeing the men staring at me calculating their next move, I will not check my phone like a maniac and most importantly I will give myself peace.

And don't say, things happen when you least expect them, because my friends I have been least expecting to find love for a long time!


as a side note, I have lots of material for my 'book' based on this last experience!

Weekly Check in Fri May 13 - Thurs May 19

Fri May 13
$30 Winners - Decorative/storage boxes for my bookcase
$40 Jacob - Two summer sweaters for work
Total $70

Sat May 14
$90 Pier 1 - $40 clock and $40 heart shaped book ends
$31 Walmart - Flowers for my balcony, facewash
Total $121

Sun May 15
$56 Groceries

Mon May 16

$20 Laundry card refill

Tues May 17
$8 Lunch - the soup I had frozen looked really nasty and I couldn't make myself eat it
$28 Dinner with my vball team
$23 Shirt from SmartSet
Total $59

Wed May 18
$54 Gas
$11 Drug Store
Total $65

Thurs May 19

$45 Some frozen pizza, sunscreen, vitamins

Weekly Grand Total $436
Less the $80/month I put aside for random spending, ie the home decor items

Weekly Grand Total $356


I thought that I actually had a pretty good week, until I added it up and now it is not making me feel good at all.

The grocery bill challenge...

Since I have been spending crazy money on my groceries, I am going to start tracking and figuring out what is behind the $95/ week bill. And because I am a geek deep down to the core, I have a handy dandy Excel chart going ;)

This week I didn't buy any ingredients for cooking since I am going to use meals I have frozen in the last few weeks for lunch. For dinner it will be grilled chicken and salad for most part. This week's bill was $58. My goal is to be around this number weekly.

Goal Keeper

Have you notice my handy dandy Goal Keeper section?
I can now visually track my progress! I just updated the totals with

+$250 School Savings
+$94 Emergency Fund Savings

I like to see the little numbers grow!
Even though I have a chunk of dept weighting me down, it is nice to also have a mini chunk of change going positive!
Who am I kidding, nice... IT'S FANTASTIC!

Right now, instead of transferring the monthly contributions into a savings account, I am keeping track and depositing them into my credit line. This way I am saving on interest, since the interest saved is higher than the interest earned would be. At the end of the year I plan to transfer the School portion into my RRSP where the rest of the money is sitting. I may make a few lump sum transfers during the year, but I have decided yet. For right now it makes sense to me.

Goal keepers to come:

% of debt repaid
Travel Fund

Spending Recap Fri May 6 - Thurs May 12

Fri May 6

$15 Grocery

Sat May 7

$29 Second City Show
$20 Drinks and Parking
Total $ 49

Sun May 8
$95 Grocery
$11 Wine
Total $ 106


Mon May 9

Money Free Day!

Tues May 10
$25 Lunch with work group
$37 Grocery
Total $ 62

Wed May 11
$10 Cat Food
$7 Lunch with work group
Total $ 17

Thurs May 12

Money Free Day!

Weekly Total $ 249

Again over budget :(
But do you notice ... no Starbucks!!! I actually went 3 times this week but did not buy coffee! Instead drank the work version.

I had to have lunch out with my work group twice this week. The $25 lunch should have been max $15 as I selected a sandwich, but they decided to split the bill evenly between all of us. This is not acceptable since most people had fantastic salmon and I had a dry veal parm sandwich in an attempt to keep my bill low. Because it was work I couldn't raise a stink about it.
That grocery bill is out of hand. This week, I scored a whole bunch of food from work when they cleaned the sales fridges and also have a week's worth of lunches from food I have cooked in the last few weeks. Hopefully I will be buying just salad and snacks for this week.

New Workout Schedule.

New Workout Schedule.
Sadly Volleyball league is over and my team is not available for the next session. I am really hopeful that we start again after this break. I am getting exponentially better and don't want to loose momentum.

New Schedule:

Monday - Hot Yoga - Remember that Dealfind.com coupon I bought months ago, I am still using it and will probably for another 2 mos. Because I go regularly they will let me use it for longer than the 3 mos limit!

Tues - 6am weights

Wed - Yoga (my gym is also organizing a beginner running club which will be right before this)

Thurs - 6am weights

Fri - Boot camp cardio

Sat - Circuit

Sun - Rest

This will be my schedule until I come back from Europe and/ or come back from taking care of my Sis after her surgery end of July.

Error Error!

Must remember when I put something on my credit card I don't count it towards my spending limit as I don't immediately see it!

Must add $60 to Fri April 29 for Match.com ....how can I forget... after all I should have fallen in love already....

$229+$65= $334 and yes I can't remember if it was $60 or $65... lets not discuss this point.

Weekly Check in April 29 - May 6

Friday April 29
$7 Starbucks
$15 Night Out
Total $22

Saturday April 30

Money Free Day!

Sunday May 1
$95 Grocery
$58 Gas
Total $153


Monday May 2
Money Free day!

Tuesday May 3
$7 Starbucks
$8 Lunch
Total $15


Wednesday May 4
$8 Grocery
$4 Starbucks
Total $12

Thursday May 5
$11 Jacob
$15 Dessert
Total $26

Weekly Total $228

$28 Over budget. I partially blame the gas prices, the same tank of gas cost me $38 3 months ago.
I also did a bit of shopping and proudly walked out with only $11 worth of items!
Yes I should be watching that Starbucks bill, but I need to escape from the office and going for a coffee is a good excuse.
Also my grocery bill for one person is through the roof, $95! I have to figure out how to lower this.

Enough already!

It doesn’t end!
I received my Bell bill that for the period ending May 31st yesterday and today I called them to figure out how much I owe them so that I don’t overpay. I imagine the headache of getting my money back will be even more horrendous.

After 45 mins on hold before I could speak to the Billing department, I finally got through to someone who told me my services were not canceled. WHAT. Not until this Sat and there is a 30day notice period. THE CABLES ARE GONE FROM THE BUILDING, YOU CANNOT CHARGE ME FOR SERVICE YOU CANNOT PROVIDE ME WITH.

Count to ten slowly and breathe.

They didn’t have a record of it since it is another department that dealt with it. But aren’t you Billing?

After a long back and forth, they told me not to pay the bill until I get the final bill next month. At that point whatever I had agreed to with the other agent should show up there. I am sure I will be on the phone with them for hours and days again. I can’t think about it anymore. In the famous words of Scarlett O’Hara “feedly dee I will think about it tomorrow” or in my case in a month.

I discovered yesterday that one of my issues with helping myself to unsecured internet will be doing my banking. I really should not trust that kind of transactions to random networks. This is key for me and I don’t feel comfortable doing it at work either.

So, I cracked and called Rogers.

They were very nice and quick. My appointment is for this Sunday and the appointment window is from 11-2 instead of 12-5 with Bell and a 3 week wait for a weekend appointment.

I ordered the Express. It will be $46.99 + $5.50 for the box. 5% bundle discount on both my internet and wireless! And it is free for the first 3 months with a 1 year contract. Woop!

Now, should I sign up with NetFlix?

It’s a bit funny that my new TV is string at me like a giant black hole now that I have nothing to use it for, apart from a giant computer screen.

So to NetFlix or not to NetFlix?

I joined Match.com and fell in love...

Well no!
hahaha got you!

After a few Sundays on my couch watching a brain wash of girly TV, well more like girly commercials, I decided to check out Match.com. Before I knew what was happening, I had my credit card in my hand and boom bam I clicked submit. 3 months for $60. It is almost cheaper than a night at a club.

If you have read my review of internet dating sites you know that I prefer paid sites over the free ones, it keeps the rif-raft out. For the same reason I would rather pay $25 cover at a club than walk in for free.

I decided on Match.com over eHarmony.com this time around, mainly because I have been on eH for a few years on and off and the results have been semi ok at times. Again the perfect eH date of all night gigles does not mean you also want to jump across the table and tackle the person. Let's be honest I am kind of looking for that.

Lately my dates have been either great convo no jumping or jumping no convo.
Now will the man that can balance the two be on Match.com?

No idea but lets see how this shakes out, shall we?

Extra $93/month

How can I spend an extra $93/month, let me count the ways! And of them is definitely not paying Bell Canada for their horrendous internet and cable service.

5 days without service, 5 days of being on the phone with them for over 1.5hours each time, I had enough and cancelled my services with them.

Now, the challenge begins!

The cable will be easy, paying about $50/month for the random 5hours a week that I may watch TV is useless. I think I will survive without it!

The internet, well that's a whole other story. I spend entirely too much time on my computer. This will actually be really good for me. 8 hours a day at work followed by 3 hours at home on a computer can't be good for me.
Here is the plan:
All coffee shops have internet. I can plan my use and go to one to download my work, etc.
There is a unsecured wireless network in my building, which I have been using for the last 5 days. I can occasionally pop in on it, like now.

I want to see if I can do this until the end of July. That's about $200 of savings! At that point I may connect my internet again. It will definitely not be with Bell.

Wish me luck!
Many friends don't believe I can last more than a few days. I can do it, I have my sneaky ways!

I feel like I am going back into medieval times!