The First Month
Well...we can call this the baseline month. In a way I'm glad that I'm off to a horrible start. This would be a boring blog if I didn't improve, after all. Let's just get right to it.
Finances
I spent $4516.33 this month. That's a lot of money. In the interest of full disclosure, I should state that my base take home is $4433.28 a month. This month my take home was closer to $5500 thanks to some extra money coming in from elsewhere so even with such a crappy month spending wise, even considering the fact that I would have spent above my means on a standard month, I still managed to put $700 in savings this month.
But I'm not happy about this. Not at all.
Now, granted, the number's skewed somewhat. I spent 705.60 on travel costs (hotel and rental car). My eating out bill this month totaled 465.67 but 180.75 of that was also spent during LA. I also had a comic convention this month which meant eating out and buying a lot of comics...$100 worth, in fact, on top of my monthly comics bill which came out to around $46 this month.
My groceries came out to 206.97 this month. Fair. I can't help but imagine how much less it would be if I didn't insist on buying produce, meat, and dairy at Whole Foods but, honestly, I don't see myself going out of my way to shave that bill.
$55.84 in what I'd deem entertainment spending, which is awesome, but a $172.20 bar tab. I think I need to shave that one a bit. I think that one explains my lack of weight loss, as well.
$2225.55 in unavoidable bills. Rent, cable, etc. Only $5.25 in ATM fees but I usually manage my cash pretty well in order to avoid them. $137.55 in car expenses is a bit high this month but I filled a tank of gas three times - once while out in LA and once at the beginning of this month and once a couple of days ago. The refills just landed weird, as did my paying gym memberships twice this month, totaling $170.
My most embarrassing bill? What I categorized as "extra food". This is the food stuffs I didn't really need to buy but did anyway. A little over $170. This is, primarily, my coffee, bottled water, and mints bill. There are other things thrown in there of course but the bulk of it is coffee, bottled water, and mints. I can definitely shave this one down.
$204.23 in purchases - most of which was comics and a new pair of jeans.
Oh, and pathetic: $31 to charity.
I think I need to focus on my bar, eating out, and extra food bills. They totaled $774.34 this month which is completely unacceptable. The total should be AT MOST half that number. So that's a goal, right there. $350 in eating out, bar, and extra food. Hell, I'm inclined to say $250 but let's take it slow for now. With the travel bill dropping significantly I can easily cut my total monthly spending down by $1100 bucks this month - that's what I'm shooting for.
Food
I ate well this month. A couple of mishaps here and there, the nastiest thing I ate was certainly a chili dog with chili and cheese fries and nothing else really even came close to that level of gross. It's the beer, though. I had 70 servings of alcohol this month and even that's cheating since a serving is considered an 8 ounce can of beer and I only drink pints. 16 ounces. Two servings of beer each pint.
So...I think 10 of those 70 servings I tallied up were wine. Which means I had 130 servings of alcohol this month. On average, a little over four servings a day.
Four. Servings. A. Day.
That's close to alcoholism, I'd imagine.
So, here's the deal. One serving a day average this month. If this means I want to save it all up and have 7 servings (3.5 pints) on a weekend night - awesome sauce. If I don't...well..it'll be a dry weekend. I'm never going to lose weight drinking this much beer. It's impossible.
Workout
I'm very happy with my working out this month. I worked out 21 times and there's a noticeable improvement in my physique. Robin likes touching my chest now...that's hot. I also lost 7 pounds, despite the whole beer thing. I just need to keep improving, that's all.
_______________________________
It's amazing that I actually thought I was doing well this month. Crap. My goals for this month are to trim $1100 off my spending, average a serving of beer a day, and to keep up with the exercise and try really hard to do push ups and sit ups every day. Holiday season is coming up...this should be fun.
Finances
I spent $4516.33 this month. That's a lot of money. In the interest of full disclosure, I should state that my base take home is $4433.28 a month. This month my take home was closer to $5500 thanks to some extra money coming in from elsewhere so even with such a crappy month spending wise, even considering the fact that I would have spent above my means on a standard month, I still managed to put $700 in savings this month.
But I'm not happy about this. Not at all.
Now, granted, the number's skewed somewhat. I spent 705.60 on travel costs (hotel and rental car). My eating out bill this month totaled 465.67 but 180.75 of that was also spent during LA. I also had a comic convention this month which meant eating out and buying a lot of comics...$100 worth, in fact, on top of my monthly comics bill which came out to around $46 this month.
My groceries came out to 206.97 this month. Fair. I can't help but imagine how much less it would be if I didn't insist on buying produce, meat, and dairy at Whole Foods but, honestly, I don't see myself going out of my way to shave that bill.
$55.84 in what I'd deem entertainment spending, which is awesome, but a $172.20 bar tab. I think I need to shave that one a bit. I think that one explains my lack of weight loss, as well.
$2225.55 in unavoidable bills. Rent, cable, etc. Only $5.25 in ATM fees but I usually manage my cash pretty well in order to avoid them. $137.55 in car expenses is a bit high this month but I filled a tank of gas three times - once while out in LA and once at the beginning of this month and once a couple of days ago. The refills just landed weird, as did my paying gym memberships twice this month, totaling $170.
My most embarrassing bill? What I categorized as "extra food". This is the food stuffs I didn't really need to buy but did anyway. A little over $170. This is, primarily, my coffee, bottled water, and mints bill. There are other things thrown in there of course but the bulk of it is coffee, bottled water, and mints. I can definitely shave this one down.
$204.23 in purchases - most of which was comics and a new pair of jeans.
Oh, and pathetic: $31 to charity.
I think I need to focus on my bar, eating out, and extra food bills. They totaled $774.34 this month which is completely unacceptable. The total should be AT MOST half that number. So that's a goal, right there. $350 in eating out, bar, and extra food. Hell, I'm inclined to say $250 but let's take it slow for now. With the travel bill dropping significantly I can easily cut my total monthly spending down by $1100 bucks this month - that's what I'm shooting for.
Food
I ate well this month. A couple of mishaps here and there, the nastiest thing I ate was certainly a chili dog with chili and cheese fries and nothing else really even came close to that level of gross. It's the beer, though. I had 70 servings of alcohol this month and even that's cheating since a serving is considered an 8 ounce can of beer and I only drink pints. 16 ounces. Two servings of beer each pint.
So...I think 10 of those 70 servings I tallied up were wine. Which means I had 130 servings of alcohol this month. On average, a little over four servings a day.
Four. Servings. A. Day.
That's close to alcoholism, I'd imagine.
So, here's the deal. One serving a day average this month. If this means I want to save it all up and have 7 servings (3.5 pints) on a weekend night - awesome sauce. If I don't...well..it'll be a dry weekend. I'm never going to lose weight drinking this much beer. It's impossible.
Workout
I'm very happy with my working out this month. I worked out 21 times and there's a noticeable improvement in my physique. Robin likes touching my chest now...that's hot. I also lost 7 pounds, despite the whole beer thing. I just need to keep improving, that's all.
_______________________________
It's amazing that I actually thought I was doing well this month. Crap. My goals for this month are to trim $1100 off my spending, average a serving of beer a day, and to keep up with the exercise and try really hard to do push ups and sit ups every day. Holiday season is coming up...this should be fun.
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