Budget Boogaloo

February is quickly coming to a close - now if it would only take the brutally cold air with it!! One of the thousands of things I like better about spring are the reduced utility bills. With this February shaping up to be THE COLDEST ON RECORD then my heating bill is likely to be THE HIGHEST ON RECORD!!

The Lowlights and Highlights of February's Budget:

• Lowlights - I underestimated my heating bill and electricity bill by $24; considering how cold it's been that's hardly surprising. I took the extra out of my misc budget and sucked it up!
• a few things have gotten more expensive: my monthly internet bill increased by $3, the hot water tank rental increased by $1, property taxes are increasing by approx. 2.5% but I don't have the new amount yet. That's it for lowlights - nothing broke down, nothing had to be fixed, we stayed warm, ate well and indulged in lots of wine and chocolate!!
• Highlights - I stayed on budget!! AND I had leftover money in all three variable budgets (gas, food and misc)
• a decrease in car/home insurance means that the little increases in other bills were mostly covered
• I have $24 left in the food budget :) ... $85 left in the gas budget :)...and $53 left in the misc budget!! so.....I made an extra payment on my mastercard towards my trip in Sept. and put a little extra into savings to round up the numbers. I'm leaving the $53 in my account to cover gong out to breakfast, going out for coffee, a purchase at Home Depot etc.
• Savings increased by $664 this month!! $350 of that is from my pension and the rest is from interest payments from accounts and RRSPs. 
• Misc purchases this month included: 2 little trips to the thrift shop, some new music for my iPod, a guidebook for a possible trip in 2016, a yoga app, new camera batteries, a new toaster, a special Valentine's party for me and 2 girlfriends, a book for my iPad (or two), a new charge cord for my laptop; ...I went to a movie or two, went out for lunch, breakfast and multiple coffees and I went to the Bryan Adams concert!! Which was fabulous!! (and actually paid out of January's misc budget). 

February's budget was a great success! But then it was only a 28 day month! March will be slightly more challenging I'm sure. Having a trip to work towards does help me squeeze my pennies though - it really helps to have a goal. 

Re Gofundme - I think it only makes sense that you really check out what you're contributing towards. Since Nate was Kazi's friend I had no qualms about donating money towards bringing him back to Canada. I would never donate to someone's "sad story" unless I checked into it and made sure it was REAL. 

I'm HOT STUFF!!

Just in case you didn't know...I'm hot stuff! Usually that's due to the occasional hot flash but today we have HEAT!! From the furnace!! Woohoo! (Let's not go into the fact that I'm super pissed that I have to even TURN ON the furnace in the frickin' middle of September!!)

I prayed for an easy fix and it couldn't have been any easier. Well, it could have been easier if I had just gone ahead and changed the batteries in the thermostat myself....doh!! I wondered about the batteries but since the fan worked and the furnace didn't (on the same thermostat)  I figured it had to be something else. Something big and expensive!

But...when the guy said how about a new thermostat I replied - let's try changing the batteries just in case...maybe they're too weak for the furnace but juicy enough for the fan. Who knows? Well, I gave the guy two new batteries and instantly the furnace kicked in! So now I have to pay a guy in the neighbourhood of $100 for changing two double A batteries for me. I could kick myself...in fact I think I will!

However, let's not lose sight of the fact that I HAVE HEAT!! And not the kind I generate myself :)

Dear Diary:
Oh my it's dark outside yet again. And it rained while I was out but at least the weather gods were nice enough to make it rain while I was in Walmart. Tonight Kazi, Steve and I are going to Kelsey's - I have a gift card :) And then we're going to see Phillip Seymour Hoffman's final movie "A Most Wanted Man" - that will be sad - and I have another gift card! :)

I packed my suitcase and my backpack but need to measure the backpack to see if it's ok for a carry on. Sure hope so, I'm running out of options. I checked the long range forecast and it's supposed to rain my first day of walking but not again after that for the whole trip. Obviously this is subject to change at the whim of the weather gods.

Gotta print off a map of Heathrow airport and also a map of all the bus routes as there are many free routes in the area and 2 that go right by my hotel. That should be fun:) getting from my terminal, get my suitcase, go through customs, find the bus depot, find the right bus, get on and hope for the best!! 

Little surprise in the mail today - a book called "Get by in Spanish"! Yes, I'm going to learn some rudimentary spanish as I hope to walk the Camino some time in the future and I'd like to be able to understand a wee bit of spanish. And it's supposed to be good for "mature" brains - help to keep dementia away :) 

Me

Birthday Blahs

It doesn't seem like too many years ago that I used to put a lot of planning into Kazi's birthdays - gifts, homemade birthday cake, parties, dinners with relatives, more gifts. Decorations, go to the fair, visit grandparents etc etc...

But now she's 24, today actually, and I haven't even seen her. Oh, we texted back and forth all afternoon but she was just too tired to move her butt and come home. Our dinner plans have been moved to tomorrow night. She and her boyfriend, Steven, went to Toronto on Friday to some big concert, stayed over, shopped Saturday morning for her gift, then drove back to London. She was in and out of the house while I was visiting with cousins in Alymer. I know because I saw the evidence in the washroom :( Then last night she went out with lots and lots of girlfriends - lots of eating and drinking and music and dancing.

Six cousins: Doug, my brother Gord, Joyce, Brian, Gordie Wayne and me.
I think my cousin Gordie Wayne (whose knee I grace) and I look like brother and sister!

So today, her actual birthday, she is laying low and getting her strength back. Ah to be young again!

My gift to her this year was paying for her teacher's college application (she didn't go) and I helped her pay for her car repairs, it does go. Exciting eh?

I'm gearing up for my trip, leaving this Thursday. Did up the laundry today and had my last big hike (10km) this morning before I leave. I'll have lots more hiking to do once I arrive in merry Olde England :) It was a bit of a muddy hike today with lots of fallen trees to crawl over and many many hills to slide up and down. Luckily I was one of the few who didn't do a face plant or a bum plant on the slippery muddy hills. We've had a LOT, I repeat a LOT of rain lately. I've never seen the Thames quite so high as it is these days. I had to spend some time cleaning the muck off my hiking boots and water proofing them. They are ready to go and so am I!!

 Isn't that idyllic?

Stonehenge? or inukshuks? You be the judge!

 Down down down to the swollen river!

 Oh yay another hill to climb up!

 Oh this is better...cross country for awhile...look!! Blue sky...bits of it anyways...

 ...going down is actually harder and more dangerous than going UP! One person falls and it's like a stack of dominoes!!

 NOT poison ivy though we had several PIAs (poison ivy alerts!)

 Just beyond the tree branches is a huge swath of beaten down and drowning tall grasses that used to be along the shore of the Thames but are now flattened by the strong currents in a flood zone.

 Our sculptural moment of the day.

Time to go and scrounge something edible out of the fridge. I'm using up leftovers and creating some unlikely combinations. Maybe I'll discover something new!

By the Numbers

I love "By the Numbers" posts, I don't know why I don't do them more often....

• this is post #853
• I have been home and living more gratefully in London for 30 days - PEI seems like a distant sweet dream
• speaking of that Crofters Lane is up for sale for $10,000 more than what I originally paid for it
• 7 - the number of days til I begin winging it across the big pond!!!
• 6 -the number of flights I'll be on in total
• 144 - the number of kms I'll be walking through the Cotswolds
• +8c - the temperature in London!!
• +19c - the temperature in the Cotswolds right now!
• 5 - the number of times I've turned on the furnace this morning and heard nothing!! sigh....
• 32 - the number of gigs in my new camera memory card = 1,000s of photos!!
• 8:02am - the time I got up today...somehow I slept through my first alarm at 7:00am
• 24 - how old my daughter will be on Sunday!
• 20 - how old our cat is
• 0 - the number of times I've dreamed about school since my "night before the first day of school dream"  :)
• 1 -the number of Council of Canadians meetings I've gone to (first one last night!)
• 2 - the number of times I've exercised in the last week - BOOOOOOOOO!!!
• $350 - the amount of money I've spent this week on trip-related stuff & some groceries

Dear Diary: 

Went to my first meeting of the Council of Canadians last night - they are a politically active group that protest government bills that adversely affect the environment. My concerns relate to global warming and the loss of animal/bird habitats plus I'm going to join Julie in her efforts to rid London of plastic bottles of water.

Tomorrow I'm getting together with my brother, my sister-in-law and some cousins for a mini reunion in Aylmer. And then on Sunday I have a major hike - fast paced and a longer distance than usual. Today I'm thinking about going to the fair. A good old Canadian band "Glass Tiger" is playing. Several acts have been rained out this week but no rain today! 

But first I have to google "furnace won't start" to see if there's anything I can do before calling in the experts. Rats. Well, at least it's not snowing. Grrrrrrrrrr! That also means I'm going to have to clear the clutter out of the furnace room:(

Finished the book Kim gave me by Alistair MacLeod. WOW. Sometimes my brain gets stuck in the past - Kim and I have talked about that as it's a common trait in the family - we are a sentimental soppy bunch (most of us, not all). Anyway the book he gives me is about the MacDonald family who settled on Cape Breton Island back in the 1700's and their lives until the present. Talking about living in the past! My take away from this book is that remembering the past is important, an oral tradition that has been a way of connecting the many generations of a family and I shouldn't feel badly about "what was". "What was" informs the present. 

Many characters have the same name over the generations: Alexander MacDonald - there are about 10 Alexander MacDonalds over the many generations. One "live" Alexander even takes the place of an Alexander who dies. There are many messages in this book which I will go into more here. Kim knows how to pick a book that supports and helps to explain the way I am feeling. I have great brothers. And sisters. Family.

Now off to google :(