December 2009 Budget Update (with real numbers)

I actually don’t predict those numbers. For me, budgeting is more of: get rent, food, utilities and basic stuff out of the way, and pretend it’s spent.

Then whatever is left over up to $1000 in the money pot, I spend on junk food, eating out.. whatever.

It’s like budgeting but …. not really. I like it because there’s more flexibility, and if I have a dentist’s appointment that month, I schedule it in as an upcoming expense of around $150, which comes out of my spare money pot.

On the months where I have no appointments or things to pay for, then it’s just free money… makes you kind of never want to go to the dentist

That’s $21.85 for 2 months, so it’s really $10.92

We’re quite lucky for 3 reasons:
1. Heat and water is free. The heat comes from the hot water heaters and heats up the entire building. We also don’t pay for water in Quebec.

2. We put everything on these little power bars we had lying around. So we shut them off each time we sleep (or at least try to remember to), even our microwave is on a little power bar!

I’m the power hog in the home, because I always forget to turn off my Mac.

3. We have huge huge huge windows which let in a lot of light, so for most of the day, our lights are off. It’s only at night when they’re on, and only for a short while.

All of the basic living stuff is handled under BF, and he just writes down the amount of 50% with my category breakdowns (he budgets too) and I just write a cheque

Hence why I am sort of always thinking: Er.. I THINK it’s $200? And I’m usually (thankfully) wrong, because it’s usually less.