New beginnings

I don't write a lot and I have decided not to stress about that. The only people that read this blog are friends anyway and it's my blog. Plus, I don't need the extra stress.

So let's start fresh. It's a new year, a new decade. Good things are bound to happen.

In the most exciting news, from my perspective, I finally found a legal position. And that will be all the job talk you'll see.

I will be moving, hopefully, by the end of the week. I say hopefully because M and I went to look at apartments over the weekend and I found the perfect one. I asked a lot of questions, because that's what I do, and M poked around and asked some questions as well. I didn't think it was anything special: "the bath doesn't have any caulk, is that going to get fixed?" "Are you re-caulking around the kitchen counter?" "Does the A/C unit need to be weatherized?" Called the building manager back later that day to say I would like the apartment, she sounded enthusiastic and told me she was dropping information into the mail for me that afternoon. I mailed in my application and hold fee today. This afternoon she called to say that she wants me to come look at the place again because she's not sure it can live up to my expectations. She's never had anyone have so many complaints. Um...she was already fixing all the issues I asked about. Grrr. It's a two hour drive and I was coming down on Friday to sign and pay for everything. I had canceled my viewing at another apartment later this week because it she told me yesterday that I just needed to get my application in and all would be well.

Can you tell I'm a bit annoyed?

Moving right along. I've decided to try an experiment. I'm going to wait until March for this particular experiment because the move is guaranteed to cause issues with it. I'm going on a spending moratorium. I know that thousands of others have done this before but I'm curious how I'll do - plus it can't hurt the budget.

So here's what I'm allowed to spend money on:

• Rent
• Groceries
• Gas
• Insurance
• Utilities
  
• Internet/phone/cable (not sure if I'll have cable when I move or not)
• Personal care basics (shampoo, conditioner, toothpaste, toilet paper etc)
• Birthday gifts

That's it.

I wonder how many of my friends have tried this sort of thing and with what results...