Tightwad Kitty's $$$ Stretching Blog

My health is a little better in the past weeks and the cardiologist report came back, that I have just aortic value problem which will be monitored yearly and almost no cholesterol in my arteries but one small area. My medication is being stopped for now to see how things go as I have been on them too long.
As for my blood pressure it’s at normal reading for now and will need to have it read on the opposite arm from now on as that one read higher.

I am feeling much better now, so I hope to keep on improving over the next few months.

I have not been on my computer as much lately, so have been not posting as much.

Money wise this has been an expensive 4 weeks with all the bills and medical expenses that I have laid out. Medical bills were over $1075 less any refunds over time about half that amount. Car and house insurances were paid along with power bill so the bills out goings were around $3500 before anything else but budgeting the way that I do the money is always there. So now I need just stop spending to save a little more to cover the medical costs.

First off the rain has stopped but flood waters is still flow down all the rivers some a 1000 miles long will take months as these are slow flowing rivers. The Murray and Darling River system which starts in Queensland and ends in South Australia but area flooding now is the Riverina area.

NSW and Victoria are now

flooding; a few weeks ago the water coming from Queensland is now flooding outback NSW down the Darling River. It’s rain again in central NSW and Victoria with low ridge coming from NT all the way to Tasmania. This toft is slow moving and heavy rains so that it’s now flooding areas closer to the great divide range this water will end up in the Murray River system in which the Darling River will flow into a few weeks. 75% of outback NSW is under water, area the size of France and now the main dam for Sydney flood gates were opened for the first time yesterday in 14 years.

It’s this weather pattern that causes flooding on wide scale here. So if you don’t believe in climate change and our weather patterns are changing then revisit the idea as we have had 10 years of drought then 3 years where this weather pattern end in flooding on a grand scale. As Australia runs downhill from north to south all water will end up in the southern ocean that doesn’t get used all the way. Some areas need to have free flowing rivers which the Darling River head waters are part of that system.

As for Victoria there is mainly flooding around the Murray River areas again with more rain flood water to come from the flood in NSW and another 100 mm is forecast this weekend.

This system will move into our area over the next week as its slowing moving east to the coast.

Dam overflow turns into spectator event

Northeast Victoria braces for more floods

My visit to the Cardiologist on Friday, confirmed what I knew that there is something wrong with my blood pressure going by that article below. I have to have more scans done next week and see the Cardiologist the following week again.

The next step along this path is finding whether I have high or low blood pressure. One arm is reading low to normal blood pressure and another is reading high pressure. As I have always had reading low to normal blood pressure as this the arm all doctors read. The Cardiologist got a difference of more 20 points when she read both arms too!

Cost of today visit $278 out of pocket gap fee $126.

Next lot of scans will be paid by Medicare bulk billing as I am a pensioner.

Blood pressure 'should be measured in both arms'

Sorry that I have taken so long in posting this.
I see a heart specialist on Friday but as it’s private visit I will be paying a gap fee of over $100 and all other visits will have a gap fee of $75 or there bouts. They found a problem with dilated aortic boot with traces of regurgitation. So this problem would have never been checked if not for the unusual readings that I got with my blood pressure and this article.

Blood pressure 'should be measured in both arms'

Time to post my monthly, before others things did get in the away again.

I only just updated my Excel so here are the figures for last month. This period is from Mid-January until Mid- February.

As I work on 28 day cycles, my dates may be out to a calendar months so here are the figures for my last period.

Reviewing my monthly daily living allowance
These are the categories for this challenge.

Items === Approx. Budget===Spent
Eating out===$35.00=====$22.65
Groceries===$135.50 ==== $63.97
Non-Food===$15.00=====$29.60
Clothes ====$35.00
Grooming===$15.00=====$20.00
Gas======$25.00
Pets====== $50.00=== ==$49.39
HH items===$40.00====$7.50
Fares== ====$15.00
Entrainments=== $15.00 ====$15.00
Garden =====$15.00
Gifts & Donations ====$35.00===$36.00
Medical & Diabetes Expenses ===$70.00====$31.78
Misc ======$10.00
Personal Allowance =$90.00 ====$106.31

Note only one amount is a no spend

Budgeted for this period $600 spent $381.90 so under budget by $218.10

No Spending days over the 28 days = 14 days in total.

Personal allowance covers confectionery, lotto, books, stamps, craft & hobby supplies.
Eating out including meals out with family and friends, we all go Dutch.

As for Medical & Diabetes Expenses - this is the extra out of pockets amounts that came up this month just on medicine that is not covered be refund claims.

My credit cards are still paid in full each month.

Spending on books and papers $93.32 for the month including 5 papers. I hit online bookstore for some books complete my set of one author that I am reading.
I do keep my bill money separated from this summery.

This year I will be budgeting around $650 per period month to cover all my bills. My bills over this period came to $612.68.

Most of my social outing are dining out this is part of my social outings money and spending allowance.
As for food out, I dined out three times this month twice costing $9 each time as I can no longer eat at fast food outlets. That $9.00 meal’s at Casino is still looking the healthiest and best deal in the city for now. Another time breakfast at fast food outlet.

My grocery bill came in under budget for this month.
My clothes and grooming budget was on target this month as I had my hair styled.

If any changes to my spending habits will need to come out of my daily living allowance categories of my budget as my bill categories are very tight now.
Still need to work on a few categories as you can see but over all I had expensive month.

Strategy: - Track your daily spending down to the cent by writing it down daily.

Car insurance $552 .00 is paid for another year and I got the cost of my house insurance that is to be paid early next month. Which is good for the flooding we had last year, some have got up by 500% I think mine one has only gone up by 18% but then I wasn’t flooded. There is an increase in the amount insured too!

This insurer does cover for all flooding and before Christmas had all last year’s insurance flood claims back in their homes, all 42000 of them. A lot of policies were not covered for flood with other insurers.

I have been getting chest pains on and off for a while now! Told that it was muscular pain and have x-ray to say that too! Here we are getting news that doctors should be checking both arms for blood pressure and not just same one each time if they are not doing this then ask for it to be done.

Blood pressure 'should be measured in both arms'


There can be a difference in the reading which could prove that there is something wrong and needs to be checked out. I have a wrist blood pressure machine which I check myself if I don’t feel too well.

As I can’t tell I am having a heart pains or just muscular pains in the chest. Taking my blood pressure on same arm that the doctor’s always use my blood pressure is normal to low most of the time. Last weekend I tried both arm tests to see if there was difference in readings. I did it twice once at rest and once after walking around and sitting on the bed. The difference was over 30 points between both readings so I planned a visit to the doctor as soon as possible but first getting my blood test done as I had the form to do that. The blood tests came out normal and diabetic lower than last time. But my blood pressure reading on both arms was 10 points difference between both arm and 10 points is the start point for something amiss.

Doctor sent me for a Stress Test Echo and result came out that I have clear heart arteries but a problem with part of aorta tube which leaking back into the heart and need to be watched. So much for muscular chest pains.

So $599 later less a refund which I will get later in the week that I will have out of pocket expense for about $260, I will now have to make up from somewhere.

It’s luck that I can afford to paid these bills out of floats and bill account without need to worry and Daily Living Allowance which I do monitor here. The money I need to save is too put back the float in my medical float.

So a stretching that dollar again until it the target of $2000 float so that I have extra there as I will need more of these echo sound tests done in the future.

Have you have been following News from this part of the world! A monsoon front has come through last week down centre of Queensland and NSW. A number of towns have been flooded and one St George has had to be evaluated only leaving about 400 people in the town mostly they are working on the levee banks in the town and security. After last year 90% flooding our state has mandatory evacuation orders in place. Some people didn’t have time to get things before being put on planes or put into cars before the roads closed. The water is higher than last year which was the record peck then. The flood levee is 14.7 metres and water is at 14 metres last night and still coming down the river. It should peck today almost at flood levy height if it holes then most the house will ok.

This water has to get down into Murray River catchment and then out to sea in South Australia. So all the towns in between will be flooded in turn like Burke NSW. Some of this rain did fall in NSW so water is heading west to meet up with the Queensland water too!

St George holding as river nears peak

Now we wait and see.

Brisbane is safe for now and Dams are at safe level at 86% but last year was 190% full when they let the dams open full. But we are having a flood inquire into last year’s dam release.

I had to go up the street today to get a haircut; I had put $50.00 in my wallet but never used it. When I got to last place I was planning to go to it was gone! I phone both places that I went to but no luck I will have to put this down to a lesson learnt. If it not the only note in the wallet then don’t put with them if you are not planning on using it. What is annoying about all this I didn’t need the $50.00 at all as I had enough money on me!

My menu for the week

Monday - Chicken Kebabs and Rice, Fruit
Tuesday - Bacon and Egg with Tomato
Wednesday - Lentil Stew
Thursday - Pumpkin Soup and Toast with Salad
Friday - Tuna Pasta
Saturday - Potluck Meal
Sunday - Fish and Salad with Grapes

I had lunch with my friends at Casino, the meal was Fish with salad with chips but I asked and got green vegetables instead along with a vanilla slice and coffee all that for $9.00 for members and $14.00 if not! As I was in the city I got around and paid a few bills like Rates, water bill, my Credit card in full and another for my DF-M. I also got a top up on my GO CARD that I use for bus fares.

Would you believe I got all the bills paid and go card top up all within 45 minutes before I went to lunch so that I could be home on the early bus.

The places that I had go to were in four blocks of each other one place in each as I had to go to the bank first. It’s lucky that I know my way around the city as I was able use some of the short cuts to do this in time. It like go around in a maze I am reading a novel at the moment that has Mazes in it.
City trip all up costed $650.00 including bills.

Strategy - Don’t spend your forward bill money on trivia, it’s been put aside for a purpose and keeps you stress free.

Another milestrone past 800000 views

I need to review habits when it comes to food, I think I am getting a bit lazy at times.

Groceries ----$1755-------$1601.08-------under target by $160.42

I have allowed $33.75 per week for grocery but I should with want I have in stockpile this should be able come down to below $27.00 per week or under $1404 for this year.

I have nearly used up want is in my downstairs storage area in food. Only very bulky things will be store there in the future.

I do need to do a stock take of what I actually got in the way of food. I do have some gaps but I should I be able to last for few months without worrying about them. Just use something else instead in meantime.

The strategies for this challenge are to list and menu plan my way through until I use a lot of stuff I have already have bought. While I still have protein in my freezers and beans and lentils in fridge with over 5 kilos of rice and a number of packets of pasta still to get through.

I have a lot of flavouring and sauces that I have bought or got in sample bags that I should be able to come up some different and interesting meals.

I will trying to limit my food spending to a very small list of basic items and any food for my diabetics that I need. Some of those items are fruit and vegetables in season, eggs, bread, milk, cheese, margarine, and yoghurt including some fresh fish and chicken, with some red meat when my freezer stocks are lower. I should be able to go about seven weeks without buying too much other than fruit and vegetables in season, eggs, bread, and milk.

I think will need to go back to writing my menus on here.

Menu for this week

Monday - Fresh Fish with Salad and Cob of Corn
Tuesday - lunch out - Dinner Fruit and Milk Only
Wednesday - lunch out - Dinner - Noodles Chicken with Vegetables
Thursday - Satay Chicken with Salad
Friday – Fresh Fish with Vegetables and Fruit
Saturday - Curry Mince with Rice and Fruit
Sunday – Pasta with Lentil Sauce

Strategy - Do remember what you have stored before you go and buy more of the same.

I think I could find some spare money in my budget if I focused on my food spending for a while.

These will be my target area to work on for now!

Non -Food ---$221--------$184.52---------under target by $36.48
Pets -----------$650------$547.26--------under target by $102.74
Eating out ----$455--------$560.05--------over target by $105.05
Groceries ----$1755-------$1601.08-------under target by $160.42

So money that I have to work with $3081 using 2011 target budget amounts.

In 2011, I came under by [$3081 -2893.10] = $187.90 so I would like to see a bigger drop in this figure this year. Without changing my lifestyle that much knowing that I can cutback harder if things change around here. So it’s to focusing and planning what I intend to do here.

So what strategies do I plan to use to reduce this further with cost of living going up here and my income is only age pension.

I will start with the easiest on first Non-food, this is area mainly covered by items that I can’t eat like Toilet paper, paper towels, and some cleaning items that I need to buy. If do a stocktake of these items, I may find that I will only need buy toilet paper this year. By looking online and some in of my books I will find replacement for other cleaning items.

Next easiest one is Pets this includes cat food and litter for them. As they are old cats I will not be retraining them with new ideas but focusing on any wasteful habits and paying more attention to what they eat. They flea and vet treatments are covered in the bill area of my budget so are not included here. But will try to find ways of reducing these as well.

Now time to think about my food out as I like to call it! This area I can control to a degree but not all the way. I have 12 planned lunch dates each year which I just go along with cost can between $9.00 and $26.00 each time at current prices. Then you have 5 birthday dinners or lunches that can cost around $30.00 each time at current prices. But will not go if it gets above this unless it’s a wedding which a once in blue moon event. Now the other lunches I can reduce or not have depending on my time schedule when out. I do try to keep these to under $12.00 where possible.

So where does that leave my food out budget, thus having budgeted for $350 outing with family and friend as socialising and form of entertainment. I do keep a float aside of $35.00 so that if asked out I can go will out worrying if I can afford that week. I am trying to get the family to eat at home more but it’s an uphill battle.

I will review my grocery shopping in my next post.

While looking at my annual figures another tally is noted there.

For 2011, I had a total of 148 days of no spending days that money wasn't changed hands at all in any form. So 216 days some money did find its way into someone else hands.

So I hope to improve on last year’s figures!
So I am planning a new strategy so that I can maximize my no spending day for 2012.

To do this will take some planning and a lot of blinkers on my part as when I shop for my friend.
Multiple tasks spending days is in order I should think, so days that I spend money must be days that all other spending is be done that I know that I need to do! e.g. Pay bills, credit card, buy paper if its Wednesday, medical scripts made up, fill the car with gas/petrol. As many of these tasks that can be done in one day the better thus leaving a number of days that I need not spend money at all.

This will take some will power as today I had to shop for my friend, this is what I faced, buying a loaf of bread now we don’t eat the cheap stuff and the bread we buy is between $2.49 and $4.49 per loaf depending what on special that week.

When she ask to buy 2 loaves of bread it’s a little easier. Why because of the way the supermarkets sell their bread, the best deals are 2 loaves for $6.00 ones the same bread that you would buy at $4.49 each but you have to buy two loaves at the same time to get that deal. So today I bought one for myself so I could get the deal, also one special of noodles that couldn’t find on my last shop plus some white grapes that I had planned to buy. So in I spent $7.00 saving around $3.00 off RRP plus the loaf of bread for my friend.

Eating out ----------$560.05--------over target by $105.05
Groceries -----------$1601.08--------under target by $160.42
Non -Food ----------$184.52---------under target by $36.48
Clothes -------------$308.84.--------under target by $146.16
Grooming -----------$145.41--------under target by $49.59
Gas -----------------$193.80--------under target by $131.20
Pets ----------------$547.26--------under target by $102.74
HH items ------------$808.13--------over target by $255.63
Fares ---------------$100.00 ------- under target by $43.60
Entrainment----------$59.95--------under target by $96.05
Garden---------------$70.45--------under target by $59.55
Gift & Donations------$674.95---------over target by $219.95
Medical --------------$473.71 -------over target by $278.21
Diabetics-------------$ 43.47 --------under target by $6.29
Misc. -----------------$114.05--------under target by $2.50
Personal Allowance----$999.09--------under target by $105.91

Daily Living Allowance allotted amount for 2011 was $6940 and I spent total $6884.71--under target by $55.29

Even with being over in four categories, I still just manage to come under my budget allotment for 2011.

This does give me the idea that I am subconsciously set myself amount to spend then holding back on some things if I think that I have to cut on my spending because I spend a lot one area that was needed like the medical.

One thing this summery proves that averaging out over whole year is better than worry if you go over month as you can try to cut on other months.

By viewing with this year’s one I am defiantly a subconscious budgeter.

Ok this Daily Living Allowance is the area that I will be working on to stretch and find any extra money I can. I also am looking at cutting back other on bills where I can. We will have a very large hike in household insurances this coming year as I haven’t received the bill, I don’t know how much it will be as yet!

Strategy - Review your bills every six months that you are still saving money with your changes that you made since renewed or changed bill companies. Change your habits if you can’t change the company.

These are my 13th period monthly totals as I have 28 days month budget (13x28=364 days)

I only just updated my Excel so here are the figures for last month. Tomorrow I will post my annual summary for 2011.

As I work on 28 day cycles, my dates may be out to a calendar months so here are the figures for my last period.

It’s time to start again on reviewing my monthly daily living allowance.

These are the categories for this challenge.

Items === Approx. Budget===Spent
Eating out===$35.00=====$20.05
Groceries===$135.50 ==== $88.54
Non-Food===$17.00
Clothes ====$35.00
Grooming===$15.00
Gas======$25.00 ======$19.10
Pets====== $50.00=== ==$33.32
HH items===$42.50=====$20.99
Fares== ====$9.00
Entrainments= $12.00
Garden =====$10.00
Gifts & Donations =$35.00===$169.75
Medical =====$15.00
Diabetes Expenses====$50
Misc ======$9.00
Personal Allowance =$85.00 ====$79.63

Note only one amount is a no spend

Budgeted for this period $580 spent $431.38 so under budget by $148.62
No Spending days over the 28 days = 12 days in total.
Personal allowance covers confectionery, lotto, books, stamps, craft & hobby supplies.

Eating out including meals out with family and friends, we all go Dutch.

My credit cards are still paid in full each month this month I paid half of next month bill so I am ahead here.

Spending on books and papers $63.03 for the month including 4 papers. I spent on Sara Douglass novels as this is my reading challenge for 2012.
I do keep my bill money separated from this summery. This year I will be budgeting around $650 per period month to cover all my bills. This month bills were around $2286.15 so no balance banked this month. This included Annual Medical Fund payment. This fund does cover all my fixed bills for the year if I can stick to this schedule as I have done for the past ten years or so. This fund does cover replacements when needed. My next replacement due is a new washing machine the money is already saved. On my budget excel modelling chart I can pay the full amount this year. This amount includes the cat’s trip with the Vet.

As for food out, I dined out 4 times this month costing between $20 & $9 a time most were around the $9 mark as I can no longer eat at fast food outlets. That $9.00 meal’s at Casino is still looking the healthiest and best deal in the city for now.

My grocery bill came in under budget for this month.

Most of my social outing are dining out this is part of my social outings money and spending allowance.

If any changes to my spending habits will need to come out of my daily living allowance categories of my budget as my bill categories are very tight now.

Strategy: - Track your daily spending down to the cent by writing it down daily.

I went shopping yesterday, to get something’s for DF-M my elderly neighbour, so had I have get a few grocery and pet food for myself too! So this shop is what I nicknamed a cat shopping (More cat food than human food.)

It’s funny how you get into habits when buying things, anyone cart snooping into my cart / trolley. Do you do it? Would wonder what I ate at all.

There was between us
12 cans of cat food
2 packets of dry cat food
40 rolls of toilet paper
750g of white grapes
5 packets of satay Asian noodles
2 litres of skim milk
5 bags of Rustic Bread rolls
1/2 stick of celery
4 knobs of Australian garlic
6 packets of pasta
2 pack of Christmas cards @50c
2 packets Christmas jelly candy @50c
Local paper

I would love to see someone try to make a meal out of that lot.

Between us we spent over $70

Today is a no spending day

I have had a No spending day yesterday, but I still went out.

My brand new Laser eReader didn’t work as it should so I had to return it, after 30 minutes fiddling with it, in the end I ask if they still store display stock one so you can compare between the two, to see what is missing off my one. In the end they replaced it and got the new one working for me. So now I need to find how to keep it going and start when it’s not connected to the power point. No wonder I don’t like any new technology it still gives me the creeps at times.

There are over 200 free ebooks loaded on it. But learning to read more than one page is the problem and then the screen will go blank and need to put the changer again to restart. I changed it for 15 hours so it should work. Trouble-shooter FAQ say if it does this the battery is flat and need to be recharged again. It’s a problem I will have to work in next few weeks before I start to download any more ebooks on to it.

I said that we would have a heatwave here in my last post. Well while we were having a heatwave down south in Victoria, they were having snowstorms and Western Australia is having a Cyclone this morning. We just can’t win with this weather.

This week is one year on since the floods and the mud army some people are still in their homes yet and may never be.

I had my Air Con two days out of the three for about 8 hours non-stop. It used up power here normally I can get away with around 8 kWh per day plus 2 kWh from solar panels an selling back to the grid 1 or 2 kWh per day, both days I used 22 kwh plus 4 kWh from solar panels to run the Air Con on both day. I try to read my meters each day to see how I am going an note something I am doing different that normally here. I do chart it in excel over the years.
I drop down 8 kWh on line power since I installed Solar panels and 4 kWh in Hot water since installing solar hot water.

So I try to keep my utilities as low as I can.

As I knew that today would be on the hot side. Over the weekend I tried to do all the outside jobs possible. I did my washing and ironing too! I mowed lawn and water the garden as much as I could at least 24 hours so that ground is moist but not wet before the temperature will climb to 35C plus around here. That’s about 6 degrees above normal. In the southern states it was much higher in the 40’s C and a very dry heat too! It was around 50C in the outback around Birdsville. Once the temperature gets into the 30’s C, I will put my Air Con on for the first time this year. My feet are swollen so as this is what I bought Air Con for in the first place, my friend I am worried about her but she will not come up to visit me, I will not sit her hot house for too long either! Another three days of this heat.

I spent the day reading with my feet.

37C equals 100 F

No spending day here.

Today I had to go to the city again, which is want I didn’t what to do this week!

Well I must sense some things when I wrote “Today I went to the city again for my annual eye test and new glasses. This pair will cost some money around $185 extra as I am getting the works done on it.
Bifocals, transitions lens etc. as well a new frame. I should have them by end of the month if I am lucky, as last time something went wrong and had to be done again. I have pick out next year’s frame that I like so they put the code on my file.” in

This & That.

On Christmas day I drove my car to my son’s place and felt that I was driving a little to the left for my liking, and the same when I was walk I had to keep myself aware of this but could see why only that I had my new glasses on. I do know that I have extra sensitive eye site and certain part of my glasses can’t be changed. There is nothing wrong the subscription as this hasn’t changed in the last 5 years.

Same with transitions lens, and bifocals, but the degree of centring of the bifocals on the left eye was out by 3 degrees enough to cause the problem like double vision of streets and the ground coming up at you when you walk as I have this before and more than once over many decades I knew what I was. All this was a lesser degree that before so I tried to work with for a while, so last Monday I went for a walk at different time of day, and I could look up at the streets around the places found that I couldn’t see signs 5 metres that I could with the other pair that I own. Oh I could make out want written but in double. I was still walking to the left. In the afternoon I wore the pair that these new were replacing the ones I got in 2007, now I could see 200 metres down the road to the second lot of street lights even being able read the ambulance at the distance. Now I knew that something was wrong with the other part and not to wear then again.

So after a phone call Tuesday and went to the city to see what was wrong with them. I always go the same place as they know how I am a problem with my eyes. Yes the glasses are out 3 degrees on the left lens and would have to replaced I did take a number of old pairs with me. So I have wait for them to be fix. This will be about the eighth time that this has happen, once it was 3 months and three goes at it before I got then the glasses fell off my face at 100km hour on the highway. I often wonder how many car accidents is cause with faulty pair of glasses on the driver. I was lucky that time as I was able to catch them and put them back on before fell the floor of the car. By the way I can’t see past the steering wheel with no glasses on.

Any way I can say, I only bought my local paper for the TV program week. $1.10

I did walk around some stores but didn’t buy anything other than paper not even any food or a drink I just went home for lunch.

I would like to wish everyone a Happy New Year and may it be a good one. Over the past 40 years our national TV channel has broadcast the Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo each New Year Eve and my family have watch it most of that time and for the last 20 years I watch alone. So this New Year Eve was no different, I put it on an watch it for 90 minutes nonstop as that station has no advertisements at all! All ABC channels don't any advertisements. After that finished I went to bed to read my latest novel by Sara Douglass and read until midnight when the fireworks went off on the river 6 km away. Before I could see them from my street but now we only can hear them as the all new high rise buildings are blocking our view or the trees if there is a spot that you could see the city. Now the fireworks are lower than before. We are not allowed to have fireworks at home because of the risk of fire and it's the bushfire season. There are illegal fireworks being bought and a few people were injured and

one man was killed this year in Victoria. Now they have bushfires again in that state and a heat wave. I remember having Guy Fawkes nights 5th November as a small child and bonfires that went with them. Now that is no more and the city councils, some state governments and business pay to have large firework displays (Something like 10 million AU dollars went up this year around Australia) on our rivers and harbours, and the Sydney one is televised nationwide, now they think it is now the best in the world. May be come down to Sydney Australia one New Year Eve to find out if it is the best world over 1 million watch it each year. This post marks my 800th entry.

I had a few things to do today, pay one of my credit cards off now in credit. Buy the group’s lotto ticket for Mega Jackpot on Saturday and I got this job for 2012. It would be nice to win something!

I walked past the departments stores and all retail stores with their Boxing Sales on and everything at 20 -70% off their regular price that may be the case with leftover Christmas lines that I do not need anytime in the next ten years. As for clothes I just don’t need any, only a pair of Black flat court shoes with decent soles on them still can’t find any in my size. I did see two styles that were right again not in my size so I walked on to the bank.

So what did venture into the shopping centre yield today something that I would have brought at my local shopping today paper for the TV weekly shows it a lot cheaper and you get more Free to Air channels in it than the Sunday paper. Cost $1.10.

I saw that our transport fares are going up again on Sunday so will be stay with my Go Card that’s for sure as paper ticket one way trip is now $2.00 cheaper to have a Go Card for the same trip. My normal fare will be going up 11 cents I think I can live with that one.

I had lunch with my Ex work colleagues today, we have been meeting up since we all were made redundant over 13 years ago, all of this group are retired.

We had lunch at the casino our $9.00 member’s meal deal of main meal, cake or fruit salad and coffee. I had Fish with Salad, piece of vanilla slice and coffee. No main meal for me tonight.

I spent only $4.00 playing the pokies as I like to play a little each time so to keep my membership card active.

So how much did I spend today, Boxing Day Sales Zero and Lunch Paper and pokies grand total of $14.10 and paid my Credit Card off.

I am a very late in putting up my monthly, others things did get in the away at times.

I only just updated my Excel so here are the figures for last month. Next update will be that 13th period included in my annual totals update in Mid-January.

As I work on 28 day cycles, my dates may be out to a calendar months so here are the figures for my last period.

It’s time to start again on reviewing my monthly daily living allowance.

These are the categories for this challenge.
Items === Approx. Budget===Spent
Eating out===$35.00=====$41.70
Groceries===$135.50 ==== $96.84
Non-Food===$17.00=====$17.29
Clothes ====$35.00=====$38.45
Grooming===$15.00
Gas======$25.00======$29.50
Pets====== $50.00=== ==$52.68
HH items===$42.50
Fares== ====$9.00=====$20.00
Entrainments= $12.00
Garden =====$10.00====$39.90
Gifts & Donations =$35.00===$86.45
Medical =====$15.00======$46.15
Diabetes Expenses====$50
Misc ======$9.00
Personal Allowance =$85.00 ====$129.90
Note only one amount is a no spend

Budgeted for this period $580 spent $592.87 so over budget by $12.87.

No Spending days over the 28 days = 8 days in total.
Personal allowance covers confectionery, lotto, books, stamps, craft & hobby supplies.

Eating out including meals out with family and friends, we all go Dutch.

As for medical this is the extra out of pockets amounts that came up this month just on medicine.
As for my medical visits out of pocket expensive if they are related to Diabetes then I will class them as Diabetes Expenses will come under this new category.

Diabetes Expenses - A most will be one off items or once per year expenses. But I need to track these items on my small budget and pension. Each time I pay for some things in this category I will need to cut something in other categories. I will start using this more next year when I start seeing more diabetic trained personal.

My credit cards are still paid in full each month this month I paid half of next month bill so I am ahead here.

Spending on books and papers $88.55 for the month including 5 papers. I hit a online bookstore for some books for a birthday present in January.

I do keep my bill money separated from this summery. This year I will be budgeting around $650 per period month to cover all my bills. This month bills and home improvements were around $1532.92 so no balance banked this month. This included buying a TV Antenna, New glasses and pest control check. This fund does cover all my fixed bills for the year if I can stick to this schedule as I have done for the past ten years or so. This fund does cover replacements when needed. My next replacement due is a new washing machine the money is already saved. On my budget excel modelling chart I can pay the full amount this year. This amount includes the cat’s trip with the Vet.

As for food out, I dined out 4 times this month costing between $20 & $9 a time most were around the $9 mark as I can no longer eat at fast food outlets. That $9.00 meal’s at Casino is still looking the healthiest and best deal in the city for now.

My grocery bill came in under budget for this month.

My clothes and grooming budget was on target this month I bought some underwear.

Most of my social outing are dining out this is part of my social outings money and spending allowance.

If any changes to my spending habits will need to come out of my daily living allowance categories of my budget as my bill categories are very tight now.

Still need to work on a few categories as you can see but over all I had expensive month.

Strategy: - Track your daily spending down to the cent by writing it down daily.

I had breakfast with the family Christmas morning, BBQ sausages, Bacon, Hash Browns, & Eggs with Coffee and 2 Chocolate centred biscuits but true to form they cooked too much food for four adults. So I was given the 8 cooked sausages and 3 small slices cooked bacon to take home. It was still hot when I got home too! As we gave out our presents before we had our bunch so it was almost 10.30am before it was started to cook it.

On the way out my DIL ask if I would have some custard too! Then she came out with the end of the roast ham that they had in fridge too! They are only going away two days but too lazy to cut it off the bone and freeze it. I took that as well all 3lbs of it. The bone will make a great pea & ham soup come winter. Out of the sausages I got 4 servings and 1 serve of bacon which will be tomorrow breakfast and 15 servings of ham which I have frozen for now. Some of it will make salads and other will go into different dishes that I will make over the coming weeks along with what meats I bought in the last week I now have a full freeze again.

But my son works at the fruit markets and was given a tray of mangoes so I got 6 mangoes to top it off.

Tally of foods

6 Mangoes $2.00 each = $12.00
8 sausages uncooked = $5.50
3 slices of lean bacon = $ 2.00
1.5 kg Ham of the bone @29.95kg = $45.00

Waste Not, What Not Total $64.50

These prices are what I would have paid yesterday for the same things had I bought them!

The cats & I had a wonder nibble on the ham scraps while I cut it up for freezing.

Have a Merry Christmas
...or whatever other end-of-year holiday you might celebrate at this time.
I am having a quite one this year with exchange of gifts and bunch about 10am then the family are off on weekend away at the Gold Coast with the in Laws.

I had to call the roadside assist while out Christmas grocery shopping today.

I opened my door because something was wrong with my foot pedals in the car so I thought. But I had trigged the door lock when got in and didn’t know it. This set off the car alarm which I had forgetting how to stop it. Now I was in a pickle with my DF-M 82 year old with me and all her groceries. Lucky that I had my mobile with me so I could phone roadside assist as I have been member for as long I have had my car licence now!

I ask some other ladies in the car park if they knew how to start the car now that had immobilise it and had on full set the lights across the dashboard and one I had never seen before a car with a key on it. Do you know what that one is? I never knew that my car had a car immobiliser and I had it for the last 5 years. The ladies couldn’t help but had this problem once before and no men were about either to ask. So it a job for road side assist, the lady on the other end couldn’t tell me over the phone how to restart the car as it just wouldn’t start. The service man will have to come out in the next 60 minutes.

Lucky we were in the underground car park and not in full sun. I had to get across to my friend that she couldn’t sit in the close car while we waited, I don’t speak Italian so this took a while in the end she decide get a taxi home instead of waiting with me. As I couldn’t stay with the car as I had to go to the meeting point in the car park. I had to fix up getting that taxi as she past calling for one herself, luckily it came quickly and I was able load most her groceries in the taxi and send her on her way. I sat on the taxi rank seats until I saw the mobile roadside assist car at the traffic lights and was able to direct him to my car.

With all the moving of the groceries and opening the door and locking the doors getting my friend to the taxi the car had reset itself and I didn’t need him after all. It started when I put the key in the lock again like normal. We had a chat about what happen and what does happen with these car immobiliser at times. All I needed to do was push the button on key ring and unlock the car then relock then unlock and drive away. Simple! I was told never to park under Fluorescent lighting in shopping car park or a power transformer in the street as this can them set it off too!
I got home about 15 minutes after my friend and she was still bringing in her groceries and I gave she the tray of mangoes still in my car.

Well I did have a learning lesson after all today of sort. Just uses that button on the key ring it may save money and time in future. My seventy dollars per year membership was worth it. I try to be as stress free as I can.

You can tell I don’t drive it that much!

Strategy - Park your car in a spot that you will get your daily walk done too!

Years ago I went to a pre-garage sale that a church group was clearing out a property for a nursing house inmate. She has died since at 90. The lady was a nursing tutor sister of the white veil and starch uniform kind in 1950's. Sister Bourne was a Miss and kept anything and everything. Under the house were five cardboard containers full of newspaper clipping on cooking, medical, gardening, craft, hint's and tips from late 1960's to 1980's. That they were going to dumper that day so I offered $2.00 for the lot. Five years ago I went thought most of these clippings and dumped what I would never use and filed in order things that I could use. Mostly a lot of magazines pull-out booklets on anything. I had some in my own collection of that time too! So this week I started to tidy some boxes downstairs and found another box that belonged to Sister Bourne so my kitchen looks a mess just now with all these clippings and I did find a recipe for my picked pork file so all was not lost after all. The cheapest meat you can buy per kilo here is Picked Pork at $2.99 kilo. One of my hobbies is to collect recipes using just one common ingredient in all recipes. I have found very few recipes on picked pork so I was happy about that.

I only had a few things to get as I don’t give that many present out now. My family is small and don’t give a large expensive gifts to anyone. I believe in the thought that count side of gift giving, if you can afford to give a lot then do!

I always give to some charity or medical research but only what I can afford. This year I have given to the Salvos and Hospital search team asking for one more doctor for the team in Liver research.

PA Research Foundation Liver Appeal

Liver Appeal brochure PDF

This Christmas the PA Research Foundation needs your help: Dr Elizabeth Powell and her team are addressing the toughest form of chronic liver disease; fibrosis or cirrhosis of the liver - which more often than not results in end stage liver disease where the only treatment option, if available, is a liver transplant. To achieve this urgent research the PA Research Team desperately needs $90,000 to be raised to engage a specialist researcher to support this project.

I think this will be doable!

This research may save lives in the future around the world because there sure aren’t lot of donated livers around.

Want is it with some other charities; I keep getting requests for money with free items in them. I keep the free items because they have my name on them mainly address labels but thanks but no thanks. I don’t give to this kind of charity because they are run by businesses and give a percentage of the earning to the charity whom name they used and it’s quite small amount. Tick this box for a monthly donation of $50, $100 what who can afford this kind of donation when living below the poverty line in their country I sure can’t.

My son finely came to mow my lawn as it was getting too long for me to do it myself! It has been raining since it was time to mow! This will be the last time this year too! He did get to move a few items on the lawn that were in the way but I was just mowing around them the best I could. He also was dismantling the old TV antenna so it could be put into the rubbish tomorrow.

I did prune a few weed trees out before they got too big. We have the problem trees next door.