38000 Dollar Challenge. Day 1
17 Nov
Well, here we are. Day 1.
Yesterday was probably the hardest day as I finally owned up to the fact that things need to change with the credit cards. Now. Today. Not Tomorrow, or the next day. Today.
So now the fun begins: Each day, I hope do a few things with this site:
- 1. Learn more about personal finance.
- 2. Share the mistakes I’ve made on this journey to 38k worth of debt
- 3. Share what I’m doing to correct it. Mostly, I’m selling a whole bunch of my stuff. My DVD collection is way too big, for starters.
- 4. Deal of the day. Part of the reason I’m in this mess is I like to shop. Old habits die hard, so I want to share some deals I come across.
- 5. Make Friends through this site. I know, sounds kindof corny but really that’s what has most value. Money just passes through you. (Literally, in my case)
Stupid Purchase of the Day
Let’s go way back in time to Feb 2003. I bought a pizza. On VISA. $28 x 11.9 percent interest gets us to $52.37 for my pizza some six years ago. My balance in Feb 2003 for VISA was $2148.36. Now it’s ten times that. This is just a start. There’s more to come.
Sacrifice of the Day
This isn’t much of a sacrifice, to be honest, but it’s a start. I’m selling a Blackberry Bold 9000 I’ve had sitting in a closet since the summer and have been meaning to sell for some time.
It’s for sale on eBay. As I write this, bids are up to $26. Which is a very good start and it doesn’t matter what I paid for it – it’s 26 bucks towards the debt/savings
If I had your money..
I’d pick up a
ASUS Eee PC Seashell 1005HA-PU17-BK 10.1-Inch Black Netbook – 10.5 Hours of Battery Life (Windows 7 Starter)
So I could work from starbucks, or a cafe. I don’t need this at all as I have a perfectly good MacBook Pro but for years I’ve been a lover of electronics and this looks like a great way to work remotely from pretty much anywhere. The weight, or the lack of – is what intrigues me the most. The power transformer for my MacBook Pro weighs as much as the Laptop itself (or so it seems) when all that weight is on your shoulders. The battery life looks awesome. The bummer: it’s windows, but if you’re in wordpress or a text editor 95% of the time I guess it doesn’t really matter what the OS is.
But, I’d rather get credit card debt off my shoulders first. So this will wait. Until I can pay cash. Welcome to the new regime. 
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