In typical reforming spendthrift fashion, last diary’s awesomeness could only be followed by sub-par frugality last week.  I ate out three times and bought groceries from the small, high-brow grocery store that’s conveniently located as opposed to the large one about a twenty minute walk away. Here’s where my money went:

Basketball for date night

Monday

I brought alcohol back into my life at the start of February so took way pasta and bread to counterbalance that. I’m not sure whether this was related but I was insanely hungry on Monday and devoured a lot of Walkers crisps and Jacobs mini cheddars (£2). I also paid for the accommodation for my trip to Malta – substantially under budget at £35 for 4 nights.

Tuesday

I got suckered into a team lunch to celebrate a new engineer’s first week. The food was average and the bill got split equally even though I didn’t have a side or a drink. Argh! (£17.65). My company hosted a networking coding event which I attended and then popped over to my mate’s birthday where we celebrated with homemade pizzas and the most divine tres leches cake. I took a bottle of wine with me in lieu of a card or present (£14.49).

Wednesday

I worked from home and my friend came over for some [boxing] sparring (£0). I didn’t have food that she liked in so we went to the local grocery store – a Budgens priced like a Waitrose – and got some delicious stuff like smoked salmon and avocado (£18.31). I then went out to see the fabulous Hannah Gadsby show, Nanette, and stayed to dissect it with my mate over some glasses of wine (£10.50)

Thursday

The cyclescheme chaps emailed me to inform me that I needed to make some ownership decisions with regards to my bike. I opted for the deferred ownership which meant that I paid a one-off fee (£58.73) and get to call the bike mine in 3 years. I happened to check out the price of flights to Madrid for my mate’s wedding randomly. The wedding happens the same weekend as Madrid pride so ticket prices and Airbnb rates were relatively high. I bit the bullet and paid for flights and accommodation (£236.13). I might get £50 of that back if my friend decides to join in for the trip.

I also picked up some groceries – bread, rice, eggs, cheese, hot chicken and garlic sausages – which cost a rather pricy £13.66. This is my year of wee interest. I got another +£0.03 on one of my savings accounts.

Friday

My mate got made redundant and popped into town to lunch with me. He’s had financial issues the last couple of years – most recently because he has a rather demanding wife – so I got his lunch (£6.75). The person of interest got us tickets to go to watch London Lions play Worcester Wolves at the Copper Box. I paid for our dinner before – delicious spicy pizza from Franco Manca (£11.45) – and some hot chocolate for her to drink at mine after (£2.39).

Saturday

I had yet another perfect Saturday. The person of interest and I went for a walk in Hampstead heath then had a millennial brunch of cheese on toast with smashed avocado and soft-boiled eggs. She paid for the avocados because I didn’t have cash but I’ll reimburse her this week. I ran on the treadmill (£0) and my mate came over to watch a movie and binge watch some episodes of The Bold Type (£0). We were too lazy to cook so we tried the amazing Indian from round the corner (£19.30 for my share).

Sunday

I didn’t have a league or cup game so popped along to my kick about team and played nearly 90 minutes of glorious football (£0). I really should go more to this session since it costs nothing but can be a great workout. I hung out at the pub with my mates who I haven’t really seen much since I’ve been injured and since I have gone back to not drinking and a couple of other people were generous enough to get me a tea and some fries for the table, it cost nothing.

Wrap up

I succumbed to laziness a couple of times and bought convenience food. I also hadn’t anticipated that I would need to pay for Madrid this week but thankfully, that’s what my travel fund is for. I’m glad that I’ve gone back to not drinking as it’s nice to socialise without the additional calories and cost.

• Total budgeted for the week: £75.04
• Total spent: £174.01 (excludes the £236.13 for Madrid as that comes out of my travel fund)

You can catch up on Money diary #1, Money diary #2, Money diary #3,  Money diary #4 and Money diary #5 too.

NB: All the diary entries are only my discretionary spending and exclude savings, housing, utilities and other more fixed costs.

NB2: All the things in green were budgeted for / in budget and the stuff in red was unplanned (for this week) or higher than budgeted.