Knyteguy's Finances: More harebrained schemes than a sitcom dad

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Ask/Tell > Business, Finance, and Careers > Knyteguy's Finances: More harebrained schemes than a sitcom dad

Haifisch: Nov 13, 2010; Objection! I object! That was... objectionable!; Taco Defender

Knyteguy posted:

Some of you guys are being a little ridiculous. "You actually saved quite a bit of money this week!? Well... why did you buy that video game console 2 weeks before you started this thread huh!? And how dare you think about buying something and telling us about it!"

Like what the hell? How about you give me poo poo if I actually gently caress up going forward? Because since I started this thread that hasn't happened. Someone said that you all aren't dwelling on the past, but some you are right now.

I think a lot of the ragging is coming from the fact that people's habits don't change overnight, and this thread hasn't even been around for a month yet. They see your posts about previous impulse buys, so they view your "hmm, what if I saved up and bought this/oh, I want this(but I'm not buying it right now)" posts with more suspicion than they would for someone who went several months without making a $100+ impulse purchase. Give it a few months without loving up & people will harp on you less because they'll trust you when you say "I want this, but I'm not buying it right now".

# ¿ Dec 3, 2013 18:50

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# ¿ May 2, 2024 11:12

Haifisch: Nov 13, 2010; Objection! I object! That was... objectionable!; Taco Defender

MickeyFinn posted:

Having never lived in an area with snow I have to ask. Is the bold part a problem? You can't just take a sick day or something?

Generally if the weather's bad enough that people legitimately can't get to work, the employer will understand. The flip side is that it doesn't get that bad very often, because places that get snow will have plows and road salt at the ready & everything is generally cleared away within a day. Wherever Knyteguy lives sounds a bit extreme if it really does get multiple feet of snow often enough to worry about, but trying to drive in several feet of unplowed snow seems like a bad idea no matter how much clearance your car has.

# ¿ Dec 4, 2013 23:58

Haifisch: Nov 13, 2010; Objection! I object! That was... objectionable!; Taco Defender

Make chili. Cheap, freezes well, some wiggle room with putting different meats in, lets you use up those beans too. (Just be careful who you tell about the beans, because chili people get very defensive about what counts as a proper chili recipe :v:

)

There are also plenty of sites like this one that have shitloads of crock pot recipies in them. Make stuff, eat, refrigerate a day or two of leftovers, freeze the rest.

# ¿ Dec 8, 2013 22:27

Haifisch: Nov 13, 2010; Objection! I object! That was... objectionable!; Taco Defender

Knyteguy posted:

Well a lot of our expenses are going to be determined by the gender. My wife's family has 5 baby boys in it with the oldest being 5 years old, and we're likely the last couple that will be giving birth for awhile. If we have a boy we'll have a ton of hand me downs and cheap options for stuff. Also a lot of the expensive stuff family members have already called dibs on like a crib, a stroller, a car seat, and a little more. If we have a girl then yea it'll be more expensive... but wife's family is already tearing at the heels to buy little girl clothes because this generation hasn't had a girl yet.

Your baby will not give a poo poo whether its clothes/toys are blue or pink for several years. I understand that people like to match baby girls with pink and sparkles and unicorns, and baby boys with blue and sports motifs and whatever the gently caress, but surely you can find hand-me-downs that would be gender neutral enough for your purposes(if you do have a girl). I wouldn't expect you to give a theoretical girl nothing but hand-me-down boy stuff, but don't snub girl-suitable free stuff just because a boy had it first. On that note, it's helpful that your wife's family is prepared to buy a bunch of little girl clothes, but I wouldn't rely on them for more than a year or so's worth of clothes(the excitement of :sparkles:

the first girl in your generation will wear off sooner or later) - and getting hand-me-downs past that would be a real boon.

All of this is moot if you end up with a boy, of course. :v:

# ¿ Jul 4, 2014 06:47

Haifisch: Nov 13, 2010; Objection! I object! That was... objectionable!; Taco Defender

Knyteguy posted:

one business venture that I think would be great to start, is getting a mobile BBQ pit and running a weekend mobile rib business. We saw this one girl in college doing it with a coffee business. She made coffee out of a trailer attached to her truck, and she'd go all around town selling gourmet coffee. I'd like to do the same for ribs, because I make a mean rack of ribs. We have some connections from my wife's previous jobs so we have places we could start going to on weekends.

Inverse Icarus: yes let's cook the cats. They are pretty lazy bastards the world won't be much worse off.

Hey, you can use the cats to test out your BBQ methods! Solving two problems at once is true frugality. :v:

On a more serious note, pretend I quoted this 100 times:

a worthy uhh posted:

I completely support entrepreneurship, I just think you're not even close to a safe place to try it. Keep the 9-to-5, kill your debt, stock up cash, and have a safety net in place for your family first.

# ¿ Sep 25, 2014 16:52

Haifisch: Nov 13, 2010; Objection! I object! That was... objectionable!; Taco Defender

Quantum Finger posted:

Do this. Take fifteen minutes a day for you and Janus Owl to go through your clutter room and be utterly ruthless in getting rid of things. Don't take MORE than 15 minutes--use a timer and time it. That way you won't burn out. Believe me, I know how it can get. My mom and my husband's mom are constantly trying to unload their clutter on us, and for a long time we took it. However in the past few years we have reduced a clutter-filled room to one medium-sized box of mementos for each of us. If you do not LOVE something, don't keep it. And feeling sentimental about something is not loving it. DO NOT let your kid grow up thinking clutter/hoarding is a part of life. No judgment, that's how I finally got my butt in gear about it: my kid was on the way and I couldn't let him be born into a clutter-filled house. Everything about your kid's brain is enormously plastic for the first five years, and making an ordered environment for him is incredibly important.

On this note, I recommend Unfuck Your Habitat if you have trouble keeping an orderly place in general. Even if you think you don't need it now(and you might not - I don't know what your place looks like other than the existance of the clutter room), it might help once you're dealing with your new son. Their biggest piece of advice is to do things in managable, habit-forming chunks instead of doing exhausting cleaning marathons. They suggest 20/10s(20 minutes of cleaning, 10 minutes of break, then repeat cleaning if you're still up to it), but do whatever timeframe fits best for you.

quote:

And... are you still drying your stuff in front of fans? Have you thought about drying them on a line on the porch? You live in Reno, it should be dry enough/warm enough to suck the water from your clothes fairly easily.

Or with a drying rack. This has the bonus that, on the odd chance the weather is bad, you can dry your laundry inside. (Without using fans. You can just keep them drying overnight, it doesn't hurt anything.)

Haifisch fucked around with this message at 16:24 on Sep 26, 2014

# ¿ Sep 26, 2014 16:22

Haifisch: Nov 13, 2010; Objection! I object! That was... objectionable!; Taco Defender

They do sell ones that tiny, but they're typically sold as food choppers. They're supposedly great for small routine tasks(mostly involving chopping, as you'd guess), but are definitely not a replacement for a proper food processor.

# ¿ Oct 3, 2014 01:59

Haifisch: Nov 13, 2010; Objection! I object! That was... objectionable!; Taco Defender

Knyteguy posted:

I've actually never lost anything beyond a mandatory cleaning fee on a deposit.

I'm not sure if the landlord's going to pull this on your current place, but get familiar with your state tenant laws. In general your deposit shouldn't be hit for anything falling under normal wear and tear, and routine cleaning between tenants should fall under that. Even if the landlord claims it's mandatory, it may not be legal to do that(or only legal for certain categories of cleaning - carpet cleaning came up in one state when I did a brief googling of it). Whether it's worth fighting is another matter, but a lot of this stuff goes unchecked because tenants don't know their rights.

Of course, for all I know you've looked into it already and it happens to be legal where you live. :v:

But I figure it's better to bring it up and possibly help you save some money.

# ¿ Oct 24, 2014 17:49

Haifisch: Nov 13, 2010; Objection! I object! That was... objectionable!; Taco Defender

Knyteguy posted:

Girl's clothes are way cheaper. You guys can buy like 5 shirts for $20. A man's shirt is like $20+. I bought 2 pairs of good fitting Levi jeans that'll last me for years instead of buying cheap generic clothes again that tear or the button falls off. And they aren't as fitted.

Pragmatism.

Girl's shirts are also made of tissue paper when they get that cheap. Good girl's clothes(that won't fall apart in a month) cost about the same as men's clothes. So I understand wanting to buy decent clothes that will last longer, but...

quote:

I did need new clothes right then. Like I said I blew out my last pair of wearable pants/shorts.

I know this is another thing people have been harping on forever, but you don't get down to your last pair of wearable pants and not notice it. You had plenty of time to realize "I need to start hunting for new pants" so you could find a good pair on the cheap. With more time to shop for them, you could have gotten the Levi's on sale, or found some used pairs at Goodwill or something.

# ¿ Nov 25, 2014 19:20

Haifisch: Nov 13, 2010; Objection! I object! That was... objectionable!; Taco Defender

DogsCantBudget posted:

I would do some quick research...some utilities will actually give you a programmable thermostat for free, and potentially even install it! Check with your electric/gas provider...

Caution: This thermostat may not be a good thermostat.

(Source: My apartment had one of those when I moved in, but it turns out that it couldn't keep temperature worth poo poo. Would fluctuate from mid-60s to 80+ when it was set at 72 day/70 night. Apparently the management got a ton of free thermostats from the power company and a lot of them had that problem. Still worth trying, just be ready to put the old one back in if you have to.)

# ¿ Feb 7, 2015 07:37

Haifisch: Nov 13, 2010; Objection! I object! That was... objectionable!; Taco Defender

Shats Basoon posted:

nice, probably can get 10K for the kid on the black market. use that to finish the emergency fund and pay down the car a bit

That's short-term thinking. The better long-term bet is sending it to work in the salt mines for a steady income stream.

Congrats, KG!

# ¿ Feb 21, 2015 06:49

Haifisch: Nov 13, 2010; Objection! I object! That was... objectionable!; Taco Defender

You know what you remind me of? Those people who really want to lose weight, but instead of sticking with one sensible diet, they bounce around to a new fad diet each month. AKA "making a big show of watching what they eat and changing their diet, but doing neither one consistantly & long-term." Then they wonder why they can't make any weight loss stick.

Those people would benefit from making a sensible diet plan and sticking with it for a few months. You'd benefit from cutting out these weird financial shell games & big shows of how much you're watching your spending, and just sticking to a single budget for a few months.

Inverse Icarus posted:

You're the one doing it. The entire thread has been shouting "MAKE A BUDGET AND STICK TO IT FOR THREE MONTHS" for about a year now, and every month it's like you're discovering how to make a budget all over again, shifting things around in a shell game to make yourself feel better about the numbers.

Make a budget. DON'T CHANGE IT. Roll you overages into the next month and spend less to make it up. DON'T CHANGE IT. Live within the budget, even when family asks you out to dinner. DON'T CHANGE IT.

# ¿ Apr 4, 2015 18:41

Haifisch: Nov 13, 2010; Objection! I object! That was... objectionable!; Taco Defender

Knyteguy posted:

I disagree that's how adulthood works because how many hosed up adults are there in the world. I do agree this is how a fiscally responsible person would operate, but I also think refusal does come with a social price that isn't to be disregarded. Bachelor parties don't happen all that often this may be the last chance I get, especially with friends I've known for 20 years. It's kind of moot because my discretionary should cover most of it.

I've been reading some tips to stick to budgets better, and more tips to stick to grocery budgets better. Maybe this'll help.

KG, I've noticed a lot of "this might be my last chance to...", "it's been X years since we've been able to...", and "I know it's last minute but everyone in my social/family circle expects me to..." reasoning for these sorts of last-minute expenses.

If something comes up and it really is your your last chance to do something, or if it really is something you haven't been able to do for years, it's also something you probably should have known about at least several months ahead of time. Which means you should have been able to save for it. If you honestly didn't know about this month's bachelor party until the end of March, then that's poor communcation from everyone involved. That's the point where you have to be strong enough to go "sorry guys, but this is really too last minute for me. I don't have a lot of money right now with the new baby and all, and I can't do stuff like this on short notice anymore." (E: Or else talk with them about only being able to do the cheap parts, which it looks like you're doing)

Yes, there's a social price for refusing, but at some point you have to learn how to refuse social invitations or else your budget will forever be in the shitter from them. Life is a balancing act - we're not asking you to completely sacrifice your social life, but you also can't completely sacrifice your finances in an attempt to please everyone.

# ¿ Apr 7, 2015 18:48

Haifisch: Nov 13, 2010; Objection! I object! That was... objectionable!; Taco Defender

Droo posted:

In the event that you are sued, I think you would be able to just put any emergency money into your car loan and it would be protected. Your first $15,000 in equity in each car is protected from judgments.

If this happened I'd advise talking to a lawyer about it first, because I have a feeling stuffing all of your money into equity after you got sued wouldn't go over too well with a judge.

(emphasis on after, because I don't want to discourage you from paying off your car loan now.)

MrEnigma posted:

But selling things, getting a windfall, bonus, etc. Would not prevent you from busting your budget. Otherwise the thought could be, oh if I buy this, I can always sell it later. So you start the hedonic treadmill of buying and selling and thinking you are remaining on budget. I don't think the sand rail was that case here, but just a reminder that you don't want to get into this mindset.

Agreeing with this. Selling stuff is good, because it gives you money, reduces clutter, and gives you perspective on how attached you are(or aren't) to your possessions. But you need to be able to meet your budget without selling things.

# ¿ Jul 20, 2015 17:27

Haifisch: Nov 13, 2010; Objection! I object! That was... objectionable!; Taco Defender

Knyteguy posted:

I've been wanting to reply to this post for awhile.

Well I'm not much into figurines. I could open a restaurant in a terrible location?

Open a restaurant decorated in star wars figurines, and only take payment in bitcoin. Maybe add a scorpion mural somewhere.

# ¿ Sep 1, 2015 18:26

Haifisch: Nov 13, 2010; Objection! I object! That was... objectionable!; Taco Defender

I have no idea what you're feeding your pets now, so disregard if this doesn't apply:

It's somewhat counterintuitive, but feeding pets decent quality food isn't necessarily more expensive than feeding them the cheapest poo poo in the store. They'll eat less of the better stuff because it's more nutritionally & calorically dense, and they'll have fewer vet expenses because they'll be healthier overall. They'll also poop less since they're eating less. :v:

It's not going to solve your dog's current health problems, but it can help prevent more in the future.

# ¿ Jan 26, 2016 19:52

Haifisch: Nov 13, 2010; Objection! I object! That was... objectionable!; Taco Defender

n8r posted:

I think you should consult a doctor before engaging in using any sort of sleep aids. Stuff like avoiding screens before bed, and having a consistent bed time can make a huge difference in how well you sleep.

Seconding this. It's generally a bad idea to regularly use sleep meds for more than a week or two - you can get dependant on them & get rebound insomnia if you stop taking them. Better sleep hygeine is more effort than popping a pill, but is more sustainable in the long run.

# ¿ Apr 10, 2016 00:00

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# ¿ May 2, 2024 11:12

Haifisch: Nov 13, 2010; Objection! I object! That was... objectionable!; Taco Defender

The furniture golden rule: If it's going to provide support to your fat rear end, don't cheap out on it. That goes double if you're sleeping on it or sitting on it a lot.

# ¿ Apr 18, 2017 23:00

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