The Writer’s Coin

So my article about a quick and dirty formula for writing showed up in the Just Write Carnival over at the Incurable Disease of Writing. There’s some fun, lighthearted articles over there that are worth checking out. So if you’re into writing, whether it’s creative stuff like fiction and poetry or freelancing/business aspects, then make sure to check it out.

One of the first links I bookmarked that is still in my Favorites toolbar when I began blogging was Problogger’s page titled 31 Days to Building a Better Blog. I remember reading it in a frenzy, trying to absorb as much knowledge as I could. Some of the tips I had seen in other places and so I figured I “knew them” already. So I didn’t pay much attention to those. But others were brand new and it was exciting to feel like I would soon be trying new things to make my blog a better blog.

But it’s just one of those things that you eventually fade out of. I stopped doing a lot of those things (or never tried them) because I felt like they “didn’t work.” Which was a mistake, of course.

Today I saw the link again in my Favorites and decided that, hey, why don’t I just systematically follow the advice the way it was meant to be followed—in 31 days? So that’s what I’m launching today. I’ll be doing one of the tips each day and trying to measure (traffic-wise) what kind of effect it has on the blog. I figure this gives me some good content to work with that will help this become a better blog, no matter what.

I’m not expecting this to turn my blog into a blockbuster or to cause thousands of readers to start subscribing, but I know it’ll be a good experience either way. Sometimes you have to just trust in the advice and blindly follow it. And who better to follow than the person behind Problogger?

So today’s tip is “Email a New Reader.” This is pretty straightforward and it’s easy to slack off on. But it’s important to put as much as possible into each task. Otherwise, what’s the point? So I found a really insightful, helpful comment on a recent post and am sending a nice email saying thank you. It may not sound like much, but at this point I don’t care about that—I’m just treating it like practice: work hard and don’t expect much. In the long run, I’m positive it’ll pay off one way or another.

Coming up tomorrow: Running a first-time reader audit

Tags: , 31 days to building a better blog, Blogging, email a new reader

I’m pretty good at staying under budget and under control. It’s actually kind of fun to see how much lower than my budget I can come in at when the month is over. But lately I’ve been really bad. It’s not because I’ve lost my frugality or because I’ve gone on a spending binge—it’s because I haven’t mastered the art of being prepared for the unexpected.

The last few months have been really bad with wedding-related stuff that just had to get paid for and I have let myself get caught unawares. Up to know I’ve been dealing it by simply taking money out of my ING Account and making up the difference. But that’s terrible because it means my savings aren’t growing and I’m not saving up as much as I can for our down payment. My ING account has only one sub-folder for Travel, but the rest is just piled up in one folder called “Savings.” I think I haven’t broken it up further into more folders because I like to look at one big number and say to myself “Wow, good job saving this much.”

But I know I need to change this. The only solution I have so far is to create more of these sub-folders. One for the down payment, one for “unexpected” expenses, one as an “emergency fund.” This way I never touch the down payment and I’m prepared. Maybe I’ll treat this unexpected folder as a micro-emergency fund folder. Not necessarily to deal with emergencies but just things that always pop up over the course of the month that demand to be paid.

Another idea I’m kicking around is getting creative with my accounting. I’ve done this before and it’s basically taking a large charge and breaking it up into different “budget chunks.” I’ll pay for 1/4 of it this week, then another 1/4 the next week, and so on until I pay for it all this month. The problem with this system is that sometimes charges are pretty large and this still won’t get covered by my monthly budget.

Or I can just spend less and charge myself a bill for “the unexpected” to be covered every month by my paycheck. But settling on this amount might be tricky. Scrounging an extra $100 a month “just in case” is fine and dandy—I can always just save it if I don’t spend it. But when a $600 expense comes up, then what? Is that emergency? It is for my budget.

If nothing unexpected happens, I’m awesome at sticking to my budget. But how often does nothing happen over the course of a whole month? A year? So I need to find a way that works. Any ideas/suggestions?

Tags: budget, dealing with the unexpected, emergency fund

I’ve mentioned before that M and I are getting married pretty soon (two and a half weeks!) and one of the things that we’ll be doing that is relevant to this site and to personal finance is joining our bank accounts. We’ve already created a joint ING account that simply shows up via both of our existing accounts, so that’s about as painless as it gets. But for the bank account it’s a whole different animal.

First of all, I like my bank (Bank of America) and have had my account there since I was in college (nine years) so I’d like to keep it. Besides, have you seen their new ATM machines that take checks and cash without an envelope? You don’t even need to count the money before giving it to the machine in one big was — it does the rest of the work.

There are a whole bunch of other considerations too:

• Convenience: M doesn’t have direct deposit so right now she has to go to the bank every Friday and deposit her checks. Not convenient. Luckily, there’s a Bank of America in her building so it’s actually more convenient if she comes over to the dark side (We already opened a joint account with them).
• Fees: This has been a real nightmare because some accounts are fee free as long as you promise to direct deposit consistently into the account. Which is fine, I’ll do that, but not until after we get married. And then I’ll have to worry about the existing account I have.
• Minimums: A good thing that has come of this is that I realized BofA has checking accounts with minimums of up to $25 (which is what we opened). My current account has a minimum of $750 in checking and $300 in savings. That’s $1000 I can drop into my ING account when we make the switch. Nice move!
• Free Checking: This is pretty standard at most banks so that’s a good thing. BofA came through with that too, so no worries.

But I still need some help from people that have done this in the past: what’s the best way of combining our budgets now that we will have a joint account, our own individual accounts, and one budget for the both of us?

I was going to write a clever post about my solution and how great it would be, but honestly, we haven’t even started so I don’t know what to expect. My only suggestion so far was to wing it for a month and take notes, pretending that we were a “new person” that didn’t have a budget previously.

The idea was to jot down what we spend our money on, how much we spend on both of us, on our own, etc. That shouldn’t be a problem because bills and stuff are easy. What might get a little sticky is the saving. I’m pushing for a huge amount of savings per month (for our down payment) and it might make things a little weird.

“Oh, you’re going out with your friends to dinner? Again? Oh… Well I guess we’ll live in a studio then…”

You know what I mean? So my idea was to just keep living the way we’re living in terms of spending (we are pretty frugal, so not going over the budget should be easy, especially once the wedding bruhaha is over). Then analyze our habits for a month to see how much we’ll need to dump into our individual accounts for discretionary, “I have my own money” spending, which I think is important.

Any tips out there for people who’ve done this before? M’s budgeting is all cash based (something like the envelope system) and mine is card based — I put everything on my credit card, pay it off in full at the end of the month, and rack up the points. This is what works for both of us and I don’t think we should have to give it up.

Help us out people.

As for my alternative income, I don’t even want to think about how we’ll deal with that.

Tags: bank of america, Budgeting, getting married, individual accounts, joint accounts, spending money

Check out some great posts over at the Money Hacks Carnival, hosted by Save and Conquer. My post, Going to the Game is Expensive, was chosen for the Economy section of the carnival.

I’m also over at the Carnival of Twenty Something Finances hosted by The Locomono Website. My story for that one is about getting your Dream Job. One of the posts in this carnival got me thinking about my own investing and how I rarely write about it here. I have to change that and I’ve been kicking around a “getting started guide to investing” type series of posts, but I haven’t quite got it all figured out. When it’s a larger undertaking like that I get a little overwhelmed and skip it altogether. But I’ll get’er done.

Both carnivals are filled with a bunch of valuable stories for saving and making money, so it’s cool to be included in them.

I’ve been sending my stuff out to a bunch of Carnivals lately and it makes me wish sending fiction out to literary magazines was this easy. That’s the difference between fiction and finance and online and print.

Oh well, I’ll be sure to make a huge announcement here when I get my first story published somewhere.

Tags: money hacks carnival, Save and Conquer, Writing

Earlier this week I wrote about a writing formula I discovered that works for me and I think can help other writers, as well as any creative types. Well, today I went out for a run and had an epiphany: there was more to say about the formula.

Reading + “Quiet Time” = Creative Writing Ideas

Today I went for a morning jog and realized that this was excellent “quiet time.” I had my music pumping, the sun was rising over the lake, and there was nobody else around except for me and my thoughts. The music definitely helped, but I found my mind wandering and my creative juices flowing.

My mind was all over the place. First it was thinking about the lyrics to the songs, what they meant, what the artist was feeling when he/she wrote them, and all that stuff. Then my brain realized that jogging out there in the early-morning hours was very similar to sitting in the car and staring out the window. Then my mind started thinking about this story I’ve written. It’s almost finished, but I’m slowly realizing that the 12–13 pages I’ve written are all wrong. That there’s a better way of writing, the right way. It almost feels like the story is telling itself.

Then I see some seagulls flying around and thrashing in the water. The sunrise is shining on the lake and I’m struck with how beautiful it is to be out here running, all by myself. And the story starts to tell me where it wants to go. I don’t push it, I give it time. I’m not going anywhere, I’m not watching TV or worrying about picking up the phone. I’m out here in the middle of nowhere with nothing to do but keep on jogging and looking out at the lake, listening to the music.

I recommend this to anyone who’s looking to squeeze some creativity out of their unconscious. The keys? No distractions that distract your mind. That means no email, no phone, no TV, no Internet, nobody else around, nothing. It also means putting yourself in a space where you can take what your unconscious gives you and run with it.

If anyone else out there has their own method of doing this, I’d love to hear about it.

Tags: inspiration, writer's block, Writing

I was tagged by GradGirl for this and so I’ll dutifully pass it along.

What was I doing 5 years ago?

In May of 2003 I’m pretty sure I was in Paris, having one of the greatest times in my life. I had French class every day from 9–1, and then I’d just walk around different parts of the city, read, and write. It was my first taste of an actual “writer’s life.”

Five things on my to-do list today ( or things I did today):

1. Set up posts in advance for the coming week. That way I can write fiction instead of blogging.
2. Register M and I’s new joint bank account, the wedding is coming up.
3. Called my buddy.
4. Watching the Cubs kick the Cardinal’s ass.
5. Get my baseball stuff ready for tomorrow’s practice.

Five snacks I love, regardless of cost or nutritional value :

1. These buffalo chicken flavored pretzel bits. Oh god they are so good.
2. Grapefruit, healthy and tasty.
3. Twix.
4. The Hershey’s Sundae Pie from Burger King.
5. Slim Jims.

Five things I would do if I were a billionaire, assuming I had to spend it on me:

1. Buy a place on the Seine in Paris.
2. Buy a place in Chicago, on the lake. Top floor.
3. Buy a place in California or Arizona.
4. Travel between all my new places.
5. Buy a ridiculous, unnecessarily advanced computer.

Five bad money habits I have:

1. Checking my accounts every single day. All of them.
2. Trying to find out ways to cut costs every minute of the day.
3. I’m horrible at dealing with unexpected expenses. Just not ready. Ever.
4. I don’t have enough of it to relax.
5. I think about it too much.

Five (four) places I have lived:

1. Guatemala
2. Chestnut Hill, MA
3. Chicago
4. Paris

Five jobs I’ve had:

1. Newspaper reporter
2. PR part timer at a bank
3. Blogging about investing
4. Copywriting and editing at a Publishing company
5. Intern at the Boston Globe

Five PFers I am tagging:

1. Brip Blap
2. Frugal Dad
3. Lazy Man
4. Trent at The Simple Dollar
5. JD at Get Rich Slowly

Tags: gradgirl, This Writer's Wallet

I just read this piece on ESPN and I couldn’t believe it. Here was a couple that didn’t know how they would pay for their next mortgage payment and still they would not sell their season tickets to the Dodger games.

Huh?

I was shocked when I got to the end of it because it felt like the writer was trying to get across the nostalgia of the game, the friendships that evolve between regulars that attend game after game, and so on. I get all that.

But paying for season tickets when their home might get taken away? It just goes to show you that, in life, it’s not all about the math. In other words, money (and even security) isn’t always at the forefront of people’s minds.

You’d think with the economy the way it is and people nervous about losing their jobs that it would make sense to sell those tickets and put together a plan to save your house and not have such an unstable future.

But instead, this couple decides to keep going to games. They help defray the cost by doing a lot of work after the games, collecting cans and bottles to later take to a recycling center. It’s crazy, but that’s how they make it work.

I’m torn on this. Part of me wants to grab these people, scream at them and say, “Listen, I get it. Baseball is bigger than life. It can make you feel like nothing else can. I understand you. But you need to have a place to live before you can indulge in what is fast becoming a very expensive sport to be a fan of.

But another part of me understands. This is their passion. It fulfills them the way nothing else does. They’ve done if for so long and the bonds they’ve formed with the other regulars at games. This seems to be their “one thing” that they aren’t willing to give up.

The only way we can understand how they feel is for us to think of our own “one thing” and what it would take for us to give it up. For some it’s sports (either playing it or watching it) and for others it’s things like traveling, shopping, or books. Some of them are expensive and some of them aren’t.

I think my “one thing” would probably be writing. I’ve gotten to the point where I write for so many different reasons that I can’t imagine being forced not to do it. I’m lucky it’s inexpensive in terms of money, even though it’s highly demanding of your time. But still, the only thing that might threaten my “one thing” is lack of time, and you can always make time for things you love to do.

I’m just lucky that I don’t have to pay exorbitant amounts of money to do it. If I did, who knows how stupid my decisions might look to others, but I would probably do what it takes to keep it.

Tags: ESPN, foreclosure, mortgages, season tickets

I got locked out of my apartment on Thursday night and it cost me $25 to get them to open up my apartment. I felt like such an idiot. You scrimp and hustle and save and everything you can, you take lunch to work every day and don’t buy unnecessary stuff and then this stuff happens and it just really got to me.

I know it’s only $25 but still…

I guess it happens to everyone so I’m kind of over it. But it’s crazy how a measly $25 can get you down.

I haven’t done this before, but I think it’s a cool way to recap some of the stories I’ve written over the past month. Usually after I publish a story I just put it in the back of my mind and stop thinking about it. But going back and looking at some of my favorite posts reminded me of things that interested me this month and compelled me to write.

Another interesting thing is that I’m getting better about splitting my posts 50/50 between money issues and writing issues, so that’s a good sign. It was something I was concerned about when I hit my turning point, so I’m glad it’s actually getting done.

• Someone Else’s Money: When it’s not “just money.”
• Looking Back: I’ve Come a Long Way: Things have changed drastically in my life.
• On Reading Great Books: Some of my favorite books I’ve read lately.
• Tips to Getting Your Story Published: Follow these and you’re ahead of the game.
• Financial Statements and Baseball Stats: I still think this is a great idea to educate people.
• Am I Still Frugal? After getting a new TV I had my doubts.
• What Scuba Diving Can Teach Us About Money: Who knew?

Tags: best posts of march