I spend a lot of time thinking about my options. I think before I create the options. While I’m creating the options. After the options have opened themselves up. Even after I’ve made a gut-based decision I still umm and ahh for as long as I have to. I know I do this because generally once I have committed to a path, I’m immutable. I might decide that path is the wrong path eventually but usually I follow through on my decisions. A few weeks ago I got called by a member of the recruitment team at a publishing company. I don’t care much for their flagship product but I respect the brand so I googled the company to get a sense of their culture and thought there were far too many power suits for me to ever be comfortable. My initial instincts, this is not the job for me.
Author Archives: luxuriouslythrifty
“Great comfort and extravagant living”
That’s Google’s definition of luxury. 6 months ago I would have associated a cost with that. Perhaps you had to be wealthy or you had to spend a lot, like I used to. I would have thought about restaurants like Locanda Locatelli for a luxurious special night (£100+ per head) or Hawksmoor for a budget special night (£50 per head). I might have thought about 5 star hotels with beautifully turned down beds, the fluffiest towels and £15 burgers. I would think chauffeur driven cars and free champagne in first / business class train and plane seats. Continue reading
Weekly spending – W/C 19/09/16
Enchiladas for double date night with the housemate
In a week dominated by hosting far too many joyful expenses and unexpectedly expensive stuff to deal with injury and illness, I still managed to stay on budget. Continue reading
Draft 1: liberty within 12 years
I’m obsessed with personal finance at the moment. The first thing I do when I wake up in the morning and the last thing before I go to sleep is check up on my favourite personal finance blogs to see whether there’s anything interesting to learn. There usually is. I’ve read so much information and learnt so much in the last few weeks. Some of the ideas are fairly common and most of the different articles offer similar opinions on what the best way to tackle debt is. As far as I understand, most people suggest that one follows Dave Ramsey’s baby steps. As I have no mortgage currently, this is what my version looks like: Continue reading
Weekly spending W/C 12.09.16
It’s not been as easy as I would like to track my spending the last couple of weeks, mainly because of a couple of deferred spending scenarios – TFL I’m looking at you – that make it difficult to look at my accounts on Monday morning and know that every penny in them is actually mine. This week, though, because I didn’t get charged for travel on Sunday (weekly travel cap for the win), I’m in a much better place today. Continue reading
I was totally influenced by an advert
I can’t remember what stations I’ve seen them in but I saw Hache burgers on the tube quite a lot last week and had quite the hankering for a gourmet burger – as opposed to the Big Tasty I had in a wee drunken haze last week. I had plans to meet a friend of mine on Monday night for cocktails out in Clapham since we both live there but usually hang out in central or North London. However after the shenanigans of Sunday we decided to watch Freeheld at mine instead with burgers & rum cocktails.
I went grocery shopping (Tesco to use my newly acquired club card) with a clear idea of what I wanted to get: Continue reading
Weekly spending W/C 05.09.16
Last week was quite difficult to keep track of because I had money moving in and out of everywhere and I didn’t always have the opportunity to track daily.
Monday
- Provisional driving license £34 (gift from a friend)
- PAYG transport (£6.50)
- Snacks at second job (£1.20)
- Groceries (£3.73)
FIRE – I feel it in my fingers, I feel it in my toes…
I’ve been trying to learn Italian for a few years. My first trip, after I’d got a graduate job and felt entitled to start seeing the world (in style), was to Rome. I went with a work friend and we picked Rome because at the time we were obsessed with Dan Brown books and Angels and Demons had just been released. We wanted to see all the places that were mentioned in the book plus who doesn’t love Italy? I fell in love with the people, the culture, the food, the ambience, the weather (in March), and most of all the language. I don’t think I made any serious efforts to learn how to speak though until 2009 when I met my kick-ass friend FL who I girl-crushed on and wanted to impress with my language skills. Continue reading
Weekly spending WC 29.08.16
Monday
- Bus fare £1.50
- Return ticket to Milton Keynes £23.50
Tuesday
- Savings (life fund AKA new bike fund) £100
- Loan pay off £173.33
Chicken and vegetable pita pockets
The person of interest watched their first ever episode of the Great British Bake Off (GBBO) last week as a favour to me but enjoyed it so much that we now have a weekly GBBO standing date. Yesterday we decided to make something summery and different from our usual frugal options of pasta, rice or potato based meals. We looked in my cookbooks and couldn’t agree on anything so in the end we made up this dish – chicken pita pockets with potato salad and coleslaw. Continue reading
Diary of a reforming spendthrift 