On a personal note.

This past weekend I went out of town for Labour Day. It was fantastic! A friend borrowed a car and we went camping for one night out in the wild west of Auckland.

The first day was full of a visitor's center visit, a waterfall hike, road trip around the area, and lots of beach exploration. It was SO NICE to leave Auckland! I'm always so happy to do so. Particularly when the first day of wearing shorts since very early this year was possible.

Picture perfect weather

The view west

Karekare Falls

Karekare Beach

Karekare Falls

Karekare Beach

We spent the evening eating canned food cooked in pots over a camp stove. I really miss real fires when camping! We spent the night at a very crowded and noisy campsite (holiday weekend, after all--even though the pics above show no one on the beach!). The next morning I found out that one of the 37 other campers was someone that I knew! I think I'm finally settling into NZ and becoming a local, though my accent doesn't convey it. 

Day 2 involved about 15 km of hiking on gorgeous trails. They were part of the Hillary Trail, and really fun and beautiful. The first went up to the highest point in the Waitakeres and then down through a bog, huge sand dunes, and through a tunnel before spitting us out on the beach at low tide to complete the walk. 

on the way up

overlooking Karekare Beach

Beaches and mountains. They are everything.

I love tree fern patterns!

a clear stream

Wetlands

Stunning

the tunnel

Hello Sir Hillary!

Back to the beach

That hike took about 4 hours. While I was tired afterward, we decided to drive to another area and check out a place I'd never been. We checked out the beach and had a milkshake and kumara fries to refuel. We randomly decided to do another hike we had noticed while driving there. This one was about 3 hours and involved hiking through a stream alongside a verdant pasture on one side and huge sand dunes on the other. Back on land, we traversed around a lake to a waterfall on its furthest-most end before looping back around the other side of the lake and returning through the stream again. It was really fun to hike in water.

start of the hike

the trail

my hiking shoes

juxtaposition

the route less taken

the falls

route back

a very NZ welcome back to Auckland

Expenses:
$30 gas
$14.50 kumara fries and shake
$3.50 bought my friend a coffee
$6 campsite fee
$13.98 water and drinks
Total: $67.98

I love my camping gear! It has paid me back in spades in saving on lodging since buying it in 2007.

Money Issue Solved, I guess!

So I looked at all my bank accounts, fixed the issue that seemed to prevent my $600 monthly deposit from going through since June, and somehow have come out on top, thanks to being able to use my 'Slush Fund' to make up the difference. Highlights:

• I've finished my $2K fund dedicated to buying more Vanguard funds in a taxable account, bringing it up to $5K NZD. 
• I'm 11% of the way to a house down payment of $50K NZD. (Huzzah?)
• I'm a happy 43% of the way to a grand European vacation! I have a few ideas about this. Either I go for one long trip and see everything in a packed trip, or I take my friend in London up on his offer to let me use his guest bedroom for a year, get a random job, and do short trips out to various places, like he does all the time. If the former, I'm hoping to do this by the time I'm 40, or when my mom gets the cash to travel with me. It would be nice to go with her, but we have very different ideas about what travelling is about. She'd rather go the safe route and spend endless days in museums. I'd rather chance it and adventurously climb mountains. Ideally I'd go with a partner, however, obviously, the guy thing is not going so well so I can't count on that. Late 60's Mom as travel partner it is!
• My credit card bills from my trip home seem to be in-hand. 50K more airpoints for me, without paying any interest or fees!

So things are good. With a week left in the month, I can spend $400 more before I'm in trouble. I've spent a lot in the past few weeks--nearly $80 in alcohol alone due to spending time with a lovely group. It is always tricky to navigate frugality with new friendships, and booze seems to be the bond of choice for most folks. 

I am also trying to make opportunities to get to know a very decent guy, but with little luck (that costs money, too!). It is fascinating because I was interested immediately upon seeing him for the first time--one of those, "WHO is THAT?!" reactions--and then later, by pure chance, was thrown into a situation with him and was lucky enough to make his acquaintance. From there, I've done everything I can to get to know him, and in the past two weeks, I've actually gotten to chat about some pretty deep stuff with him and am even more impressed than I thought possible. Normally my immediate interest would be a red flag, and I'd expect, at best, to be interested fleetingly as his appeal waned as I got to know his personality. Instead, he is even better than I could have ever predicted (so far). It is kind of like winning an even bigger bonus on a lottery. I am getting no indication that he thinks the same of me, however. The problem with me being so precise, logical, careful, and thoughtful about decisions is that when I finally figure out what I want, I go after it with everything I have. Nothing stops me. That trait has made me really successful in all areas of my life except romantic relationships. You can't full force/cold-turkey/gusto a relationship, even though I am 100% clear about what I want. And that is where I'm having trouble here, too.

So: $400 to last 8 days. The good news is that we found someone to rent our garage for the last week. That helps a little bit. The bad news is that I'm planning on going away for the long weekend (Labour Day) here if it is nice. That will eat up a lot of cash: gas, food, lodging, transport. So far it is looking like this:

Gas: $?? Guessing $100

Transport: $35

Lodging: $70

Food: $100

The activities we're doing are free: mostly hiking in the beautiful NZ landscape. 

Could just be a bust if the weather is bad, though! I guess I'll just play it by ear. In any case, I should be able to make it through the month intact, barring any emergencies (but that is what the EF is for!).

Living a double blogging life

So, this site is all about remaining anonymous, pretty much unread by the masses. It has turned into a financial and personal journal of sorts, since money affects every part of my personal life.

On the other hand, I've started another blog, which IS meant for the masses. I WANT lots of people to read it. I WANT them to know my face and name and listen to me.

This is the "easy" blog. I don't edit the content really, I stream-of-consciousness-it. Posts are done in a matter of 10 minutes. For the other one, posts take up to several weeks of all my free time to fact-check and pull together so that they are perfect. It isn't because I care less about this blog, it's because the info on the other blog is going to be taken as advice, and is much more serious in the subject matter (though I have to present it light-heartedly). I know, right?--what could be more dry and boring than finance to people other than ourselves? Well, I've found it, and I'm blogging about it now, as an 'expert.' I'm not getting paid to do it, but I'm hoping I become a little more known for it and eventually that will start happening. A random twitter follower found me via that other blog and said it was her new favorite. How cool! And I've already been asked to contribute to another highly trafficked/well-known site based on my other blog (and no, it's not Biology-Online, though I followed that story closely and fully agree with DNLee's stance on valuing yourself and your time). That post was well received, and I have an invite to contribute more as my time allows. So that's something for the resume.

In any case, I'm living this odd double life as a blogger. Secretive here, out in the open in the other. Crazy.

(...I still have to figure out what I'm doing about the money that didn't get deposited into my savings account since June! Hope to figure that out before going to bed tonight.)

The Difference

Oh, the difference that time makes.

I get a new roommate tomorrow. She seems cool, but as with any change, I know it will be an adjustment. New ways to deal with cleaning, new traditions, a new group of people coming over (her friends), a bit of a new schedule and way of interacting/sharing the bathroom.

Change is good. Right?

Also I had dinner with a fine fellow (and his friend, sigh) last week. We'll see how this goes.

Either way, I'm going to be spending way more than usual in October to maintain the illusion that I actually know how to have fun. Unfortunately, everything takes money. Saying you can't eat out AND go out for drinks more than once a week is a social killer here. It just isn't acceptable in the early stages of getting to know someone to be super frugal. At least with the roommate we can hang inside and chat over our home-made dinners, but for the dude, I am not willing to let any more chances slip by.

Oops, Mistake

Oops. My online savings bank has not been honouring my transfers for whatever reason..SINCE JUNE. They go out, but then get 'dishonoured' and boomerang right back into my checking account. So all that "saving" I thought I was doing? Nope. The weird thing is, I didn't notice that my bank account was all that high...weird. AND I didn't notice that my savings bank balances were too low. Doubly weird.

So I guess there are some flaws in my budgeting and spreadsheet mania. I really don't know how it happened. But there it is.

September 2013 Budget Report

Whaaaaat the heck happened to me in September?! I spent so much it made my head hurt. It really did. Tallying up all my receipts was a nightmare the one time I let 3-4 days go by without doing it.

I spent a grand total of (wait for it) $3,879.12 USD.

HOLY. (BLEEP!)

I didn't even go anywhere (by plane). Mostly, I shopped, for things that I didn't buy in NZ all year.

I spent $186.39 on eating out.
I spent $10.50 on cell phone minutes, text, and data for my smartphone.
I spent $856.95 on medical issues and appointments (including a back up pair of my $1,000 contacts (for $300) and my dental, medical, and eye insurance).
Finally, I spent about $2,800 on ...stuff.

Misc purchases:
$18.14 on a bottle of alcohol I didn't even drink a sip of (it went to my college cousin)
$8.53 on entertainment (redbox movies and a museum entry fee)
$26.14 on gifts (stuff for my sis and mom)
$191.63 on transportation (gas for car, mainly)
$10 on travel (flight from San Fran to the East Coast, flight from East Coast to San Fran in December)
$2,574.26 on clothes, shoes, food, a new laptop, other items I can't buy in NZ

Yep, I went crazy. The good news is that I saved up for all of it, and had already transferred the money over before I left for the US. That money is sitting in my bank account ready to be pulled out to pay off my credit card. Lucky for me, that credit card also gave me 50K points, allowing me to take another free return flight home and back next year (I have about 90K airmiles now).

That was my additional spending for September. I was also paying rent and stuff, so my NZ budget looks like this:

	Sept 2013 Budget
Category	Spent	Budgeted Amount
Rent	$840.00	$840.00
Groceries	$0.00	$400.00
Internet	$73.22	$60.00
Electricity	$77.65	$75.00
Eating Out	$0.00	$125.00
Charity	$0.00	$25.00
Cell phone	$20.00	$50.00
Medical	$0.00	$100.00
Misc	$0.00	$275.00
Savings	$600.00	$600.00
Total	$1,610.87	$2,550.00

I earned $2816.54 in September, so I can save $1,205.68 to my various funds, plus the normal $600 I always save each month. Each of my short-term funds gets $602.84. Everything is still going swimmingly, even though I went completely insane for six whole weeks this year. Not bad at all.

A Wee Update

So, I've been slacking here. Just general lack of motivation during my US vacation, and then extreme fatigue returning as I adjust to the cooler weather here in NZ. It is astounding the affect that warm vs cold weather has on my energy levels. It is getting un-ignorable.

The Bad news:  once I got back I found out that my roommate is moving out. She got a new job in Sydney. I have to find yet another one. That will be 4 in 5 years (excluding the XBF).

Good news: I found a new roommate in basically one day. I returned to NZ last Thursday, saw 5 people on Saturday. Of the 5, 4 people wanted to move in. The even better news was that my top choice agreed to move in less than 24 hours after we met. She and I hung out for a whole hour when she saw the place. Good vibes. It almost makes up for the dude who keeps texting me asking me to change my mind and let him have the place. NOT the way to get your way, man. That kind of pushy, annoying behaviour is commonly displayed when dating. No wonder I avoid it like the plague!

Work is good. Pretty slow, considering how long I was gone. I worked the whole time I was home, so I don't have that much to catch up on. It is really good that it is slow because my mind is elsewhere. I'm constantly procrastinating and my old focus is gone. Mainly because my dad was extremely tired the entire time I was home. He didn't even accompany me to the airport as I was leaving--he's always made it before. He was also in a lot of pain. It hurts to say so, but I don't think he has much longer. I want to go back home so badly to be with him... I will be going back for Christmas, but honestly, I'm not sure he is still going to be there. I don't know what to do.

I think it may take a few weeks before my laser work focus is back. I feel it slowly creeping in, but I'm not sure I want to go back to my old ways. At home, there were tons of people to talk to, hugs everywhere, and just a lot of love. Now that I'm back in NZ, I realize how lonely it is here for me. That is why my job is so important to my life in NZ--it is the only place I feel needed, wanted, and happy. No matter where I live, that has to change. Work can't be the only place I feel that I belong. I just have to find the energy to do my work and something else, which is hard when I am so tired all the time. Maybe the summer and warmer weather that is coming to NZ will help change that.

Finances for Sept are next.