Now, for Dani and I, when we get down about things, we'll make a rap music video or find some other creative ludicrousness through which we can vent our frustrations.
Sometimes, however, you just gotta let it out. So here's my top 10 reasons why I hate saving money.
1. I AIN'T GETIN' ANY YOUNGER
 |
| A screenshot from our trip to Cedar Point video. |
2. I AIN'T THE OUTDOORSY TYPE
I don't mind a nice hike from time to time. I enjoy family picnics and bike riding, camping, and boating, but my real passions are indoors—art, writing, movies, books. Sometimes it's not easy to enjoy the indoors for free when there's three new blu-ray movies that just came out or the next installment of George R.R. Martin's Game of Thrones series to read.
3. SPEAKING OF MOVIES
I love the whole movie-going experience. The audience reaction. The surround sound. The dark. The smell of overpriced popcorn. Sadly, my theater-going excursions have drastically diminished over the last couple of years. I don't mind being more selective about which movies I go see, but, dang it, sometimes I just want to BE at the movies.
4. THE LUNCH DATE
Back before I knew how much money I was wasting on eating out, I never gave it a second thought to have dinner with a cousin or my dad or call up my mom and say, "Hey, how 'bout lunch!" Now I have to plan weeks in advance for these sorts of things, if I can afford them at all!
5. I NEED MORE USEFUL STUFF
Not useLESS stuff. UseFULL stuff. Dani and I budget for everything—well, we try to—but even still there's some things that there's just no way to budget for right now. Stuff like bicycles, kayaks, power tools, and games for entertaining friends, are just impossible to find money for when you're trying to break free of debt.
6. WHEN I FEEL LIKE BENG ALL ROMANTIC
When the wifey and I were dating, it was fun to buy her flowers and chocolates and cards and things like that. Now that we're married we find that although that stuff isn't as essential to building intimacy and romance as it once was, it's still fun every now and then. With such limited flexibility in our budget, however, it's hard to justify spending $30 on a bouquet of flowers.
7. TREATING OTHERS TO SOME FUN
I would love to have extra cash to treat my little nephews to some ice cream, or take some friends out for a round of mini-golf. Assuming the financial burden on behalf of someone else so they can have some free fun is, personally, a lot of fun! And I miss being able to do that.
8. MR. FIX-IT, I AM NOT
At the very mention of something breaking down I get this hot little knot in my chest. I hate engines. I hate plumbing. I hate repairing things. I'm not good at it. I would much rather pay someone else to do the fixing and make sure the job is done right than waste hours of my own time bumbling through something that a professional can do in 10 minutes. Dealing with stressful repairs while on a tight budget means finding ways to bury that hot little knot and fix it myself.
9. FOOD IS MORE COMPLICATED ON A BUDGET
Sometimes I have a tiring day at work. Sometimes the wife does too. Sometimes, when we're both exhausted and it's 90 degrees outside and neither of us feel like making anything I want to just make the executive decision to bring home a pizza. Mmmmm yea.... no. Not in the budget. Sigh.
10. "GET ME OUTTA HERE!"
There's a hilarious scene in the movie "Happy Gilmore" where Adam Sandler's character Happy is bringing his grandmother to a nursing home.
"This place is perfect!" Happy says as they roll up the driveway. "You're going to make friends in no time."
Suddenly a crazed-looking woman throws herself onto the hood of the car and screams desperately, "Mister! Get me outta here!"
And that's kind of how I feel sometimes when all this penny pinching starts to get on my nerves. One eye kind of goes askew. My face contorts. And I'm tempted to run up to total strangers and beg them to help me get free.
And now, if you don't mind, I'm just going to pick my tongue up, hop off my soapbox, and wander to a small little corner to weep.
Keep pinchin' :-)
Oh, wow! You too? You have your finger on the pulse of my own grumblings while working Dave's plan. My wife and I seem to blow back and forth during the year. For a few months we'll "scrimp and save" and do really well making extra payments on the mortgage, but then we'll fall out of Gazelle intensity and have a few months where we make budget, but don't have much in the way of saving or paying down debt.
ReplyDeleteI agree about "just being at the movies". We probably buy only one or two blu-rays a year (we have a GREAT library with a GREAT DVD collection that is FREE!) but being at the movies is just about the experience. And sometimes we used to go just for the overpriced popcorn. When we were dating before marriage, we were famous for being at the theater every weekend! Not so anymore. Though, to be honest, I become less impressed with Hollywood's offerings every year, so maybe it isn't such a loss. But How to Train Your Dragon 2 was fantastic! :)
I too am no "handyman". I wish I would have paid more attention to dad showing me how to do things when I was living at home! I too would rather just pay a professional to fix broken things. I guess we are just too "artsy". :P
Keep pinchin' :- )
That's too funny, Todd, because I have said the same exact thing to Dani: "I wish I had paid more attention to dad when I was growing up." My dad could fix anything. lol
DeleteI think everyone ebbs and flows with this whole budgeting process. From what I've seen that's perfectly normal, but the people who succeed are the ones who keep moving forward, especially after a fall.
Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming...
Dude, I am so feeling your pain right now! My husband and I just got back from a needed vacation, but it kinda sucked the life out of us since we could not really do anything.
ReplyDeleteInteresting read, thanks for sharing
ReplyDelete