By George I Think She's Lost It! | How Much Did I Spend Last Week? August 5-11, 2024

aka Back on my Bullshit, part iv

A couple of weeks ago, when I received a payment for sales of my book – it’s coming out in the US in January, and if you are US-based and haven’t yet read it, now would be an amazing time to pre-order your copy and help boost sales in America (which I’m imagining will be lacklustre because no one in America has ever heard of me and as far as I can gather the press and promotion push behind the launch is going to be minimal) – I decided to pay off most of my credit cards, because I told myself I was headed into a more mature phase of my life where I would prioritise financial solvency over stuff.

And whaddya know?! Almost immediately, my credit score – which has never gone over 650, thanks to my “credit age” being very low (they really encourage you to start getting into debt young over here) and the percentage of available credit I was using being quite high (that is to say, three out of five credit cards teetering on the verge of being maxed out) – shot up to 730! (The maximum credit score is 850.)

I was thrilled! Delighted! So smug, a feeling I haven’t experienced much of since abandoning the super healthy lifestyle I managed to maintain for two years or so circa 2016-2018 (content warning for intentional weight loss and dieting), wherein I ate ground beef fried with cumin for breakfast, drank only still water, and used the words “clean eating” with gay abandon whenever I could shoehorn them into conversation.

But alas, I failed (yet again) to hold on to that feeling of smug, and soon began to load up those credit cards with God knows what (I actually do know what: tiny baby clothes, large baby things, overpriced runners for the boys, endless Doordashes) and my credit score has now sunk back down, not quite to its lowest point, but to 660… which is not great.

That is to say: I had a few weeks, I think you may have noticed, where I seemed to get things together. Kind of. A BIT. But those days are over. We’re back to credit chaos, kids. Enjoy it while it lasts.

Monday

Atlas has OT this morning across town but Brandin, having abandoned us for the whole weekend to play games with his little friends at GenCon, took today off work to recover, so he brings him today.

Don’t even get me started on how, firstly, he doesn’t need time to recover from a long weekend of playing board games where not a drop of alcohol passed his lips and, secondly, he needs to preserve all of his days off for when baby #2 arrives and I need him to have more than one week off; when Atlas was born, Brandin stayed with us in the hospital for the full week – I was there from Monday night until Friday morning – but was back to work the following Monday.

Anyway, bringing babser to OT is the least he can do, and as he’s doing that, I get to take a leisurely shower, wash, style and dry my hair, and go to meet my friend Stephanie for breakfast at Liberty Grill (coincidentally, right next to where OT is taking place, but I couldn’t quite figure out how to piggyback the two).

I have an omelette with spinach and feta, which comes with hash browns (American hash browns are different to Irish hash browns; American hash browns look like this while Irish hash browns look like this) and pancakes on the side, which seems unnecessary but do I leave a single crumb?! I do not. ($23.87)

We end up having a very leisurely breakfast and by the time we’re done I don’t really have time to go home before my OB appointment at 1pm, so I just drive there and read my book in the car park until it’s time to go in.

It’s anatomy scan day, where they do the ultrasound that shows you all the bits of the baby’s anatomy and check that everything’s developing as it should, and everything they can see is looking more or less fine – except that the baby is very disagreeable and keeps wriggling away from the ultrasound tech, with the result that they can’t get exactly the good look they were hoping for, so I’ve to come back in four weeks for another one.

I pay whatever total is outstanding; I’ve received a few bills that keep telling me to pay online, but when I go online, I’m then told I owe nothing… and while the total she tells me today isn’t exactly what was on the last bill, I just figure it’ll all even out in the end. See? Fiscally responsible! ($234.80)

When I get home, I have a little over an hour before we’ve to go back out, this time to pick the boys up from their mom’s and then to head to Garrett for Finn’s soccer practice. I’d considered staying home with Atlas, but then thought we may as well be out in the fresh air as at home on the couch either watching TV or crying because we’re not watching TV.

We grab the boys and then go to BurgerFi for food ($50.35) before football, which we actually enjoy from the air conditioned interior of the car, which may slightly negate the whole “fresh air” theory behind us going in the first place. It’s just very muggy outside and none of us – not even the baby – seems to want to run around.

When we get home, it’s time for baths and then bedtime for Atlas, while the older two head back downstairs to watch TV for a bit and have a snack.

Once everyone’s in bed, I sit down at my desk to catch up on emails, work out my plan of action for work this week and, er, order some bits from Next ($212.93) for babies new and old, despite the fact that neither one of them needs another thing. (Would you just look at the doteyness of this tracksuit though?!?)

Daily total: $521.95