Sunday, March 26, 2006

None For Me Thanks, I'm on a Diet

Mike and I are on a diet. Not a traditional diet, although we are doing that as well, we are on the Debt Diet. Oprah's new personal mission is to teach all of us poor folk how to get out of debt. Does anybody else see the irony of a women worth 400 gazillion dollars teaching us how to live on a budget? Oprah must have recognized it herself because she actually has financial experts on the show coaching three families through their debt crisis. Oprah just hosts the show she doesn't actually offer up any money related advice herself and I think we all thank her for that. They've been following these families for about a month now and they all have some hard core debt. I'm talking in excess of $100,000. Isn't that a scary thought? A lot of the strategies put forth are great ideas whether you have a little debt or a lot of debt.

So since I just do what ever Oprah tells me to. I read the books she suggests. I get excited about my life.... no wait that's what Dr. Phil tells me to do. What does Oprah tell me? Oh yeah to live my best life. Well I figured I better hurry up and get on this debt diet. Mike and I sat down this afternoon and planned out a monthly budget. Well who are we kidding? I sat down and planned out a monthly budget. We've never had an actual budget before, deciding where to spend our money before we had it in the bank. One great idea we got from the show was to take your grocery money out of the bank and put cash in an envelope. Then do your shopping with a calculator and a list. That way you can't overspend your grocery budget. We're going to do the same thing with the gas money. We're also going to start giving ourselves an allowance for treats like taking Abby bowling or to the movies. It was actually a good feeling to sit down and take care of that. After the hassle the past month with my maternity leave pay we've had some money concerns. Now that it's been straightened out and we're back on track it feels great to be pro-active about the future.

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