Old School Coinage

If you want to be fast, study sprinters.  If you want to be strong, study strong people.  If you want to be rich, study PF bloggers?  Maybe.  The point that I'm trying to make is that I'm unashamedly copying some other PF bloggers out there (namely MMM ) and decided to look back at what I spent in 2014 and on what.  It may not be the best representation and I realize there will be some odds and ends that I have to tie up, but 2014 was the first FULL year of using mint and tracking expenses for the old school family. Here we go. HOME: $8,788.00 ....... Per month: $732.33 Out biggest expense was our house next year.  We are probably not alone and I believe most Americans spend the most money in this category.  We went a little house cray cray last year and slowed down after February.  We just have to keep telling ourselves that projects happen over time, not ALL AT ONCE! I do expect the total $ to go up on home this year, but that will prima...

What up, for the first time in 2015!!!!  Comin' atcha' like a freight train, or maybe like a train wreck, is Old School's breakdown of how December went. First I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas and New Year.  I know in the Old School family we kept it pretty lighthearted and fairly non-consumeristic.  I think that even though we do a good job next year I would like to cut out presents all together from most of my family.  I still want to get my mom and dad something, but as for the siblings, cousins, and grandparents we are done.  I don't mind giving small appreciations of our affection that we make, but I personally don't want to receive any food presents next year.  SERIOUSLY!  I probably ate my weight in candy and chocolate and this is not good for my body at all! NET WORTH UPDATE: Mint says my net worth is currently... $ -130,673.77 That is a difference from last month of... + $ 819.23 That is not a huge number, but it is a number...

What up readers?  It is I, Old School, back and feeling refreshed from a weekend retreat to the windy city (although it was pleasantly calm while I was there).  The Mrs. and I took a short vaca to Chi-Town this past weekend and spent 3 days walking around the city.  I was bundled up pretty warmly as I tend to get cold, but the weather was pretty mild for this time of year.  The following will be a short trip breakdown.  You can even skip to the bottom for a very brief highlight reel if you don't want to read this whole article. Start: We drove north to Aurora Illinois and hopped on the Metra, which is a commuter train to Chicago.  It cost about 1.50 per day to park, so we spent $4.50 to park three days.  Not bad considering the cheapest parking I saw in Chicago was $20.00 a day!  Then we hopped on the train for $14.00.  Total, that's only $18.50 in transportation, not counting the gas to and from Aurora.  Not bad, and I didn't even hav...

* Despite the cutesy name of this post and the picture below, this blog post is going to be pretty fired up.  Shoot I may even regret writing it some day, but I doubt it.  It may offend you, and it may contain cuss words so deal.  I usually don't set out intentionally calling anyone out in my posts, but today I just don't give a flip.  MMM offends people with his blog, and I figured what the hey so without further adu let the face-punching commence.                                                               Image courtesy of Yahoo That's right world.  I'm hear to let you know that I don't owe you JACK SQUAT.  I am writing this because I fear that ou...

Pull up a log round yon fire and unbuckle your pants from over indulging in yet another glutenous Thanksgiving.  I am about to regale how a hard November for the Old School family ended well. Mint says my net worth is now... - $131, 493.00 This is a difference from last month of....  - $ 952.22 Hmmm....well how that number wasn't supposed to go down!  Well it did, so let me explain why. Firstly I had an unexpected surgery on a decaying tooth.  OUCH!  Well actually the surgery was pretty painless, it was afterwords that kinda sucked. Secondly The bill from my wife's ex-doctor showed up this month finally and we payed it.  It did not show up in last months mint statement so I believe it kind of screwed up our net worth. I lost a little traction in the month of November due to a couple of other things as well.  Mint seemed to be giving me hick-ups within the budgets and I could never get them to line up with what I had set them up for....

Was today black Friday?  I think that as a kid I just used to think of it as the day after Thanksgiving and I knew I didn't have to go to school! I guess today was black Friday.  I guess I did go out and shop, but not an extremely early hour and not to score some great deal.  I just went to my local Ross to browse the inventory for items to buy and resell.  I also happened to be looking for Christmas presents for the wife.  (This year we have set a $25 spending limit on each other).  I also happened to be out eating lunch with my wife who still had to work today, so it wasn't a trip just to go to Ross:/ I had the day off and really took advantage of the quiet time around the house.  I cleaned, did some laundry, read, and fixed myself some delicious meals of leftovers from yesterdays feasts. Even though I was out and about, the store that I went to wasn't overly crowded.  Maybe it was because there wasn't a "doorbuster" or maybe all the crazy...

As a quick aside, I recently passed 1000 cumulative views on my blog.  WOOHOO!  It may not be much, but I always enjoy tracking my progress, and blog views let me know someone out there is reading or at least looking at my blog:) S u c c e s s, that's the way we spell success.                                                               Photo found on yahoo images What is wrong with Success? I get the feeling that many people in America tend to only try for a little while.  When they can't hit their goals they fall into a very mundane lifestyle, following the masses to work everyday, spending most of what they make, not planning for the future, and in the end lo...