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Over-scheduled

: Image via Wikipedia

Wow. I’m having a hard time believing it’s August already. Every year seems to slip by a little faster, but this summer has truly flown by, somehow without anything to show for it. I haven’t gotten any of the yard work or household projects finished. I’ve taken on so much that I can’t do anything but the side hustles.

This summer, I’ve been busy. I teach classes one Saturday each month, I’ve picked up a couple of web design jobs, I’m the webmaster for a nonprofit, and I’ve taken on an affiliate marketing project. Oh, and I can’t forget my 50-hour-per-week day job or the ebook I’ve promised to help prep and launch. With all of these projects, my cash flow situation is better than its been in a while, but my time is seriously crunched.

That’s not even counting the family activities. We’ve had swimming lessons, birthday parties and family reunions…all in the last month.

Our family is seriously over-scheduled. It seems like there is no downtime, which is a situation I’ve always tried to avoid in the past. Somehow, I’ve lost the ability to say “no”. Because of that, I’m now left with the impossible task of trying to scale back. While I can’t abandon my commitments, I need to work towards resolving them all and not taking on more.

[ad name=”inlineleft”]It’s time to scale back through attrition. In a month or two, I should be down to a sane schedule again, and able to tackle the things I really want to do that have been indefinitely delayed.

Everybody takes on too much at times. How do you avoid over-committing?

Learn to say no. It is okay to refuse to take on more projects. You probably aren’t the first person to turn down the project and you probably won’t be the last. Don’t assume its your responsibility. It is fine to leave it for someone else.
Prioritize. Don’t prioritize your projects, prioritize yourself. Know what you need to accomplish. Know what you want to accomplish. Deny the things that other people want you to accomplish if the new tasks don’t fall into the first two categories. You need to feed your family. You need to pay your bills. You don’t need to take on the soccer team’s newsletter or volunteer to make 1000 cupcakes for some fundraiser.
Know your commitments. Most people overestimate how much available time they have while underestimating how long a new project will take. This leaves them double-booked. Take a realistic look at what you are currently doing, even if it means keeping a log of your day for a few weeks. You’ll probably be surprised by what you are already doing.
Stay organized. If you aren’t keeping track of what you need to do, you’ll end up running around crazy trying to get it all done. Keep a calendar and leave yourself notes. I get daily reminders of what is on my Google calendar each morning.
Know your limitations. If you aren’t technical, don’t volunteer to build a website. Do your strengths, let someone else deal with the things that are your weaknesses.

It’s entirely too easy to do too much. When every moment of your day has two of more things that need to be done, you’ll do them all poorly. How do you avoid taking on too much?

Saturday Roundup

Misc

: Image via Wikipedia

Last weekend, we had 2 birthday parties. In two weeks we are having our biggest party of the year. I’m going to try to get our yard done this weekend, while my wife and a couple of her friends decorate inside the house. October is still nuts at Casa del Myhouse.

Today, I found out that I accidentally made a huge extra payment to my car. $650 too much. I thought I had deleted the auto-payment series from the bank’s site, but I only deleted September’s payment. Hopefully, I can find enough slack in the bills to make up the difference, instead of hitting the emergency fund.

Don’t miss a thing! Please take a moment to subscribe to Live Real, Now by email.

The best posts of the week:

J. Money’s doing a series on side hustles. The latest one is about chicken farming. If I lived in a more reasonable city, I’d have some chickens of my own.

Self-improvement is always good for you, kind of by definition. Here are a few ways to pick up some interesting certifications.

Lifehacker posted on Squaretrade. I can tell you that, without a doubt, I’ll never again get an extended warranty in-store.

Getting Back on Track

Life

Have you ever set a goal…and failed?

At some point, it happens to all of us. After all, our reach should exceed our grasp, right? That doesn’t make it easy to admit failure, or to correct it. Did you let a New Year’s resolution lapse, or slip off of a diet? Have you started shopping indiscriminately again, or stopped going to the gym?

It’s okay if you did, but it’s time to fix it.

How can you get back on track after failing a goal?

1. Pick a day to start over.

Just like when you first started towards your goal, you have to decide when you’re going to get back on board. If you can’t decide, just pick the beginning of the next month. A new beginning is a great time to tackle your new beginning.

2. Recommit.

You failed once. Accept it and move on. Past behaviors don’t have to be an indicator of future performance. Just do better this time.

3. Announce it.

Somebody has noticed that you aren’t on the wagon. Your coworkers are seeing you eating candy, or your spouse has noticed you buying things you don’t need. Talk to these people. Tell them you’re going to redo the things you’ve undone. You’ll change the world, but you have to start with yourself.

4. Don’t be ashamed of your lapse.

Unless I have seriously misjudged my audience, you are human. Humans sometimes make poor decisions. Being ashamed won’t help you, but take the opportunity to learn from the past. Do you know what caused you to fail? Are there triggers to your behavior that you can avoid this time around? When I quit smoking, I tried to avoid rush hour, because I smoked heavily while I drove and I wanted to avoid being in car for as long as possible, minimizing one of my triggers. What cause your lapse, and can you avoid it?

5. Don’t do it again.

This one should be the most obvious, but the fact that it’s a problem means it’s not. Do whatever it takes to not make the same mistakes and uphold your goals. Don’t smoke. Don’t eat garbage. Exercise more. Whatever you’ve decided to do or not do, do it….or not.

Have you missed a goal? How have you picked it back up?

Don’t Cheap Out

Finance

How do you answer a question like “What are things you never go cheap on and why?”. Think about it – the question cuts with mischievous delight into your personally held biases towards common purchases. Not only does the question force self-reflection, it’s really asking you, “What are you purchasing that you know you can save money on, if only you tossed your biases out the window?”. Devilish indeed!

A little about myself. I’m a software engineer in Silicon Valley (an area of land roughly defined as San Mateo and Santa Clara counties in California), married, no kids, and a home-owner. I also write for (and run) the web site Don’t Quit Your Day Job… when my day job is through for the… um… day.

How to Spend Money You Don’t Really Need To!

I have a confession to make: when it comes to dress shirts, I never go cheap. Dress shirts in general aren’t closely associated with my industry, or California in general – you’re more likely to find college t-shirts and flip flops than dress shirts and cap toe bluchers. However, growing up outside of Boston, Massachusetts, I think I had a fair amount of Puritan formalism instilled in my dress style!

In my closet I have approximately 25 to 30 dress shirts. The most common label you’ll find is Brooks Brothers, followed by Joseph A. Banks (JAB runs yearlong sales, so it’s best to wait for the shirts to be marked down). I’ve got a few shirts from the Jermyn Street shirtmakers. I also have some MTM (made to measure) shirts – the highlight of my wardrobe, but I’m ashamed to admit their cost is in the triple digits after shipping. Wearing one of those also means my wife cracks yuppie jokes all day.

Here’s even more about me: I’m 5’10” and have a 42” chest and a 31” waist. If you know men’s clothing, you know those are silly proportions for buying off the rack clothing, but a 17-32 ‘fits’ me (the shoulders are in the right place). To translate – that shirt has a 17″ neck opening and 32″ sleeves, measured from the middle of the back. Even with a cheaper shirt, I could just pay $12 to my Tailor to bring in the waist and pull up the baggage in the chest area and under the arms. Of course, that’s how I justify the MTM portion of my wardrobe – the stitches are perfect when the shirt is made for your actual proportions. Even the ‘slim’ fits sold in store don’t come close to fitting someone like me.

Justifying An Expensive Habit

If there is anything to be said about the labels I pick – they last. Every MTM shirt I’ve had made for me is still going strong. The Jermyn Street, Brooks Brothers and Joseph A. Banks shirt also last a long time. When I have bought cheap shirts in the past, they rarely last longer than a year – and I am meticulous about hanging the shirts to dry. By that measure, the expensive shirts I wear are only expensive when it comes to initial costs – but by the end of their useful life their cost per wear is much less than the inferior quality shirts. Also, since I’m getting it tailored anyway (like I said, a fixed cost), I want any shirt that I bother tailoring to last as long as physically possible.

Of course, my line of reasoning requires my proportions to stay the same. I do build in a tiny bit of extra room when I get shirts tailored, but a significant shift in weight means a (expensive) new wardrobe.

Where to Economize if You Want Quality Shirts

It’s pretty obvious where you can save money (short of tailoring shirts yourself or finding a cheaper Tailor – I’ve had mixed results with those options). In fact, the most important quote is staring us in the face – “If there is anything to be said about the labels I pick – they last.” Yes, they last long enough that a used shirt isn’t a significant decrease in quality from a new shirt. That means, if you’re like me, you can buy used shirts on eBay, Craigslist, or in a Thrift Store. Wash it well and your Tailor won’t even know the difference!

So, what do you think? I’ve never considered myself part of the frugal crowd so I turn the mic to you: Should I cut out my expensive habit, or did I somehow convince you I’m not burning my money?

PKamp3 is a writer for Don’t Quit Your Day Job… Enlightened Discussion of Personal Finance, Economics, Politics and the Offbeat for the Night and Weekend Crowd. He also loves expensive shirts to the consternation of a certain subset of his readers.

Mortgage Race

Finance

I spent last week at the Financial Blogger Conference. Saturday night was the big debauch, a 90s themed hip-hop dance party.

Yeah.

Instead, Crystal, Suba, and I hosted a super-secret pizza party to let some of the less “dance party” inclined attendees discuss things like the sanitary concerns of group body shots, sex toys, and horror movies.

During the course of the party, Crystal and I decided to race to pay off our mortgages.

Her balance is just under $25,000.

My balance is $26,266.40.

We both technically have the cash to pay off the balances right now, but we are both dealing with secondary housing issues. She’s building a new one, and I’m updating an inherited house. Neither of us is willing to use our cash reserves to pay off the balance right this moment.

Now that my credit card is paid off, I’ve moved that money to an extra interest-only payment on my mortgage, effectively doubling my mortgage payment, which puts my projected payoff date as about the end of next year. Crystal’s aiming for June, so I’ll have to hurry.

We do have tenants lined up for February, and all of the non-expense related rent will go to the mortgage.

I think I can win.

Update:

I forgot to mention the terms of the bet. The loser has to go visit the winner. When I win, Crystal’s going to fly to Minnesota to experience snow.

How You’re Finding Me

Misc

Every once in a while, I like to dig through Google Analytics and see how people are finding this site. Some of the search terms are interesting.

“father of three” mid life crisis

Here’s a free piece of advice. As a father of three, you don’t get to have a mid-life crisis. It’s not allowed. Rather, it’s allowed, but you aren’t allowed to act on it. At a minimum, until your children are out of the house, you need to man up and provide all of the support you possibly can. No sports cars you can’t afford and no 22 year old hardbodies. Be there for your kids.

“payday loans” which accepts guest posts

Payday loan marketing. Just go away. You aren’t running a guest post here.

“slow carb” hungry all the time

You’re doing it wrong. If you are hungry, eat more bacon. Or beans. Beans fill you up longer.

$1000000 business idea

Ideas are the easy part. Execution makes you a millionaire.

articles on why appearance shouldn’t matter?

Appearances do matter, and always will. Your appearance is what makes the initial impression when you meet someone new. You don’t have to be a model, but basic grooming and fashion sense is necessary. Take this with a grain of salt. I’ve got a week’s growth of a beard and I wear a different plaid, button-down shirt every day.

are push ups supposed to be hard

Only the first 50. After that, I kind of go on blissed-out autopilot. If you can do 100 pushups, you can probably do 200.

acceptable place to put tattoo

If you wear clothes there, you can put a tattoo there. Visible tattoos are called “job stoppers” for a reason. If you put a tattoo on your face, the only job you qualify for is “drug dealer’s girlfriend”. Or possibly prison janitor.

burning bridges with toxic people

If you must burn bridges, filling them with toxic people first isn’t a bad idea.

candied pork butt

Rule 34: If it exists, there is porn of it. Interesting side story: while double-checking the rule number, I stumbled across My Little Ponies doing things they never advertise on the box.

cut my wife’s hair

I did this once. Pro tip: In the back, at the bottom, cut small chunks and leave them longer than you think they should be. You can always cut more, but uncutting hair is really hard.

f***** on the roadside by your mechanic

He probably deserves a tip for that.

girls fart for money and girls live farts

See the bit about the pork butt, remove the funny, and…ewww.

how to be a successful debtor

I recommend starting by paying your bills. When the debts are gone, you win. Success!

i ate bacon on slow carb diet

So did everyone else, sweetie. It’s the biggest draw to the slow carb diet.

in memory of pets tattoos

When I get a pet, I get it with the understanding that I’m going to outlive it. The day I bring it home, some small part of me is preparing for the day when I have to dig a hole in my backyard. Tattooing that day? Not gonna happen.

thickening felt behind testicle

Why are you on google? Go to the doctor. Please?

Interesting. Between girls farting and my post about being well-trained, there is a significant amount of fetish traffic coming through here. Maybe I need to explore a new advertising strategy.

Search Results for: three-alternatives-to-a-budget/budget-lesson-part-5/debt-burnout/budget-lesson-part-3/budget-lesson-part-1/travel-expenses-why-i-splurge/573/brown-bagging-your-way-to-savings/contact-me/budget-lesson-part-2/one-year-later