Big News and New Feature!

Wow. I need to be flogged with some sort of flogging device. I've missed an important milestone and have not posted about it.

The Budget Clan is 1/3rd of the way done with our challenge!

I'm very excited by this. 1/3rd is a pretty hefty chunk of a year. Four months down and eight to go. I think that in this spirit of revelry that I should rededicate myself to keeping current on all things by starting a weekly feature:

The Weekly Budget Ronin Financial Showdown.

The Showdown will be where I stand and face my current worst financial anxiety with you, my audience and try to make some sense of it. I'll also be recapping any things I might have missed during the week, but I'll try to keep the Showdown about tough decisions and what the Clan and I are doing about them.

I'll be posting by the end of Friday, so hopefully that should add some consistency to the blog as well (warm, thick, sugary frosting like consistency - yum!).

Let me knock out some old expenses here. It seems on 8/4 I missed $29.03 worth of gas for something. Shopping on 8/25 netted me the following:

Bananas $1
Tortillas $2
Cheese $3
Eggs $2
Salsa $2
Chicken $2
Beans $4
Tomatoes $1
?? $2 <- I can't read the receipt on this. Serves me right for not entering it promptly.
=total $19

The great thing about this trip is that I took the tortillas, cheese, beans and salsa, mixed it with some rice and ground beef we had at home and cooked up a weeks worth of burritos for lunch. I froze a good chunk of them and doled them for maintained deliciousness. So for like $10, I got a weeks worth of lunch. Not too shabby and something I'd like to do more of.

Shopping on the 29th sent me scrambling for gas first ($38.00 worth). At the normal grocery and bulk warehouse store(s), respectively, I stocked up on the following:

Cat food $11
Apples $3
Cat litter $4
Snack crackers $5 <-For work. !Yay snacks!
Goldfish $2
Yogurt smoothie (for the Budget Edamame to snack on) $1
=total $26

Bulk toilet paper $16
Bread $5
Peppers $6
OJ $10
Butter $7
Milk $7
Potatoes $9
Cheese $6
Ground Turkey $12
Chicken $15
Cereal $8
Bisquick $4
Fruit $14
Sugar $4
=total $132

Ok... almost there. On 8/30 we made one more run to the store:

Peas $2
Carrots $2
Lettuce $1
Ketchup $3
Syrup $2
Napkins $2
Mac & Cheese $1
Grits $2
Pasta $2
Cat Litter $4 <-The last time out, I got small sizes of both, so I got more.
Cat Food $7
=total $29

Whew! Ok. So now that I've gotten all those receipts filed, I can tell you about the resurrection of the Budget Truck. We sprung $40 for a battery and replaced it. We deemed it a necessary evil for occasionally making our schedule work now that we have our wonderful Budget Edamame attending tiny-person pre-school during the week. During the swap, I, your normally quick fingered Ronin, dropped and lost a nut for one of the retaining bolts. I had to buy a pack at the local autostore for $2. But it works and I've driven it and for the short while, it is of no further problem.

Hottub update: None. No more answers from the online ad either. I'm trying to restrategize this. Please let me know if you have any ideas.

I'm actually going to try start off on a good foot and pen a quick Financial Showdown here in a few minutes, so you may get two posts today.