Truthful Tuesday, Back to the Future
I reworked my Mint budgets today, for the 4th time since I bought a car and moved into a more expensive house. My last 3 reworks didn’t serve me much good and I’ve been overspending for about 6 months now.
I’m a very money-conscious person, in every positive and negative sense of that term. I’m not above shady moves to make an easy dollar or get something for a low price, but I’m also not below savings and thinking about the future. So, continuously overspending hundreds of dollars over my monthly income for 6 months straight has been absolutely grinding on me. Thank god for credit, right?
Anyway, I kicked into budget overdrive today. No more spending outside of my budget without doing something to replace that overspending.
Back to the drawing board scheming.
Truthful Tuesday
I keep thinking today is Tuesday.
Truthful Tuesday
Every Tuesday I start to type a story about something in my life that wasn’t too publicly known. However, the bulk of my stories are about illegal activities I was a part of. See, I wasn’t your standard teenager who got blasted and partied with Dave Matthews or what the fuck ever. While you were out partying, I was doing something stupid.
So every Tuesday I start to write about a story from my past. Tonight I started writing about the Construction Thrash Cowboys and our adventures with stolen bulldozers and stuff. I deleted it. Than I started writing about graffiti and cops showing up at my apartment with video camera print outs of me. I deleted it. I contemplated writing about a 3am blockade that I set up on Sardis Road while I was drunk (and then subsequently having to run from the cops who pulled their cars onto McAlpine Creek Greenway). I deleted it.
I’m too wordy. I try to put in crucial elements while removing anything too condemning and my stories just lose their umph. So I delete them.
Every Tuesday I start to write.
And then I delete.
Truthful Tuesday: I miss my record collection. I moved back to Charlotte in February of 2007 and I made a LOT of large life decisions in a short amount of time. I was determined that I was in this rut (which was partially true) and I was determined that I knew why (which was fully untrue). I made a handful of my biggest life regrets in a short amount of time, starting with the biggest regret: breaking up with my girlfriend of around 3 years. From there it just went downhill for a year and a half.
While not as substantial and life-changing as some others, the selling of my record collection was among my top 5 regrets. I amounted a buttload of debt in a short amount of time between 2002-2007 due to tickets and just bad decisions all around. When I moved to NC, I didn’t have much, but I did have several thousands of dollars worth of records. So, I sold them. One by one they all went on Ebay.
In 2007, I had around $5-6k of debt and a large portion of that debt was in the form of collections (with the other portion being unpaid court and ticket costs). I had 7 collections items on my credit report and a poor understanding of credit overall. I could see a small light at the end of the tunnel, but it felt like it was about 10 years off. After all, negative accounts stay on your credit report for 7 years after payment date and I had no idea when I’d even be able to pay them. Plus, court and ticket costs were higher on my list as I couldn’t get my license back until after I paid the last dollar to Pennsylvania.
So, I sold my records. The bulk of them sold off on Ebay and I became very very familiar with the local post office. A bunch of records went for $1 a piece while some fetched as much as $200 a piece. Whatever I couldn’t sell went to the local record store and I would take whatever they would give me. Overall the final total ended up being a bit higher then I had estimated.
Originally I planned to keep my Cursive collection. Cursive has been my favorite band for around 11 years now and ever since I started collecting records, I have been snagging every Cursive record I could. One of my happiest record collecting moments was when Crank! Records announced that they found a box of Cursive’s Such Blinding Stars LP and Mineral’s End Serenading LP stowed away that they never knew about. Despite both albums being out of print for 4-5 years and fetching $50+ a piece regularly, Crank! put them up for sale at their regular list price. Over the years I had amounted 1 copy of every single record Cursive had ever put out and I even had every pressing of a lot of their records. When I first started selling my records, the local record store landed a copy of Cursive’s Sucker and Dry 7”, which was the only record I was missing from my collection. With the first batch of Ebay sales I went in and purchased the record.
Eventually my monetary pains and personal life bullshit led me to even sell off my Cursive collection.
The light at the end of the tunnel came sooner than I thought. Through some research, some luck and a lot of steadily made payments, I had fixed my credit report in 3 short years. All but 1 negative account has been removed from my report and my debt is gone. It’s been almost a year since I sent my last check off to any form of debt collection. I have a laughable amount of credit cards now, especially for someone who has had a poor financial history. However, I’m on top of them all and don’t make any more stupid financial decisions. I’ve also seen my credit score go up over 100 points in the last 2 years alone due to diligently attacking my poor score to the point where I have no doubt that I can secure a nice low interest loan when I buy a car in the upcoming months.
I still have my regrets about some choices I’ve made, but I wouldn’t be a fraction of the person I am today if I didn’t make a single one of these choices. I still miss my record collection though.
(photo via lomokev)
Truthful Tuesday
I always thought I’d be married by this age. I’m the type who loves company and I’ve gone from long-term relationship to long-term relationship for most of my life. In the last 2 years, I have come to a lot of self realizations that have moved me away from wanting to commit to anyone unless I am 100% sure. Is anyone ever 100% sure? I doubt it, but I can’t break that need.
Anyway, this all brings me back to the point: For the last year, I’ve had a growing desire to have a kid some time in the not-too-distant future. Last night I even had a dream that I had a kid and I was happy in my dream. I was raised by an incredible father and I believe I’d pass that along to a child of my own. I can’t wait until that day finally comes.
Okay, back to posting content that would scare away the average girl.
Truthful Tuesday
I use women’s deodorant. I have ever since high school, when I borrowed a girlfriend’s deodorant. I don’t know what the difference is, but I know that my underarm sweat has been reduced to the point of practically not existing ever since I switched. I’m the type of person who gets hot when the temperature goes above 65 degrees, and yet this deodorant keeps my armpits from overly sweating and smelling like ass. I tried many men’s deodorants before making the switch around 10 years ago. So, if you ever see me buying Secret Shower Fresh deodorant at the store, now you know why.
Last Minute: Truthful Tuesday. I’m wearing a sleeveless t-shirt. That’s not me, but that’s sort of what I look like right now.
Truthful Tuesday
83% of the words that form from my mouth are either lies or truths that will lead you toward a lie.
Truthful Tuesday: I had to blow a guy to finally get a second monitor at work. Life in the porn business is hard.
