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Nigella Lawson and the High Cost of divorce

Celebrities

Nigella Lawson Eats A Banana
Nigella Lawson Eats A Banana (Photo credit: Kaptain Kobold)

Heartache and heartbreak are hard enough to endure but imagine having to go through the loss of a relationship while the world looks on. Such is the high price of celebrity divorce and the latest victim is the beautiful and talented television chef, Nigella Lawson. Shocking photos of Nigella apparently being choked by her husband, Charles Saatchi, surfaced in the media following the June 9th dinner at Scott’s restaurant in Mayfair, London, where the incident occurred. Saatchi’s advisors urged him to humble himself and admit a public apology for the assault. Saatchi denied any wrongdoing, saying he never assaulted her and in fact, was actually removing mucous from his wife’s nose. Nigella was stunned by the admonition of “nose-picking” and his refusal to apologize. She left Saatchi and their family home in Chelsea.

The two sides continued to disagree about the pictures; Saatchi claiming it was just a “playful tiff” and Lawson hurt and humiliated by the public’s assumption of her as victim of domestic violence and her husband as her tormentor. Insult was added to injury on July 7th, when Saatchi announced his intent to divorce his wife in the media instead of directly to her. Lawson, who had been waiting for a public apology, was blind-sided by his cruel divorce announcement. Lawson and Saatchi have been married for 10 years; Saatchi has claimed that the couple had become “estranged” the last few years. Saatchi claims that he had no choice but to act publicly since his wife “failed to defend” him with a statement to the media. In fact, Lawson has remained silent at the advice of her publicist so as not to further affect their children. Lawson (53) and Saatchi (70) have three teenage children from previous marriages that they were raising together.In addition to the “he said, she said” controversy, Lawson and Saatchi will have to fight over $150 million in shared assets, including their $12 million Chelsea, West London home. Both brought substantial assets into the marriage. Charles Saatchi is worth $100 million from the high-profile, highly-successful New York advertising firm, Saatchi and Saatchi. Nigella Lawson is a celebrity chef, bestselling author and television star with a net worth of $15 million. By the time lawyers for both sides duke it out in court and attempt to untangle the shared assets, those net worths will be considerably less.But it’s not just a monetary cost to this celebrity divorce. Saatchi had grown increasingly resentful of his wife’s high-profile career that he helped established. It’s a common theme in celebrity couples; one partner becomes the higher earner or the more recognized celebrity and the other gets bit by that green-eyed monster, jealousy. In Nigella’s case, there is the public humiliation at the hands of someone she loves to endure. It seems that Saatchi is determined to do whatever he can to make her suffer in the media. And then there are the children; children always suffer in a divorce. It can be lessened when parents work together to keep it private and amicable. But it’s incredibly painful to have your lives dragged through the media. In this case, it is Nigella and Saatchi’s children that are paying the ultimate price.

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Fat guy running

Life

As part of my effort to improve every part of my life, I have decided to get back in shape. Twelve years ago, I worked in a factory during the day and cooked in a resaurant in the evening. I didn’t have a car, so I biked 5 miles in between my jobs. Fast forward 3 kids, a desk job, and 100 pounds later. I don’t enjoy getting winded on three flights of stairs and I like running while my daughter rides her bike. I’m going to get back in shape.

As a part of that effort, I recently bought a bike. I thought I was getting it for a steal, until I took it out. The chain kept slipping, the shifters were difficult, and it was too small for my frame. I took it back. A bike that would work well for me would cost $200-300, more than currently fits in my budget. Running is cheap, right? It is, unless I go for the runner-geek purchases. Every hobby and activity can become expensive if you let it. I may invest in some running shoes, but that will be the extent of my runner-geek shopping.

My plan was to run according to this this schedule, running every other day. Run one day, rest the next. The first day in week 3, I got petellofemoral pain, or “runner’s knee”. I went to the doctor and got x-rayed. There is nothing even hinting at major damage, which has always been a fear of mine, due to my barometer knee pain. The doctor gave me a sheet of stretching and strengthening exercises to do and told me to put running on hold for a bit. I will be doing the exercises every day this week. Next week, I’m starting over with my running schedule. I will be giving my knees an ice massage after each run and doing the exercises on the off days.[ad name=”inlineleft”]

I am writing this in October and have been running for half of September. Hopefully, the city will keep the roads plowed enough that I can run all through the winter. The schedule may slow down a bit, depending on weather, but I’m hopeful. By the time this posts, I will have a lot more information about how well I am doing.

Update: Mid-November.  Where did the last month go?  It’s amazing how fast time slips away if you aren’t watching it.  My barometer knee pain has been back, and life has been hectic.  I need to get his habit going again, before it freezes to much to start.

Be Prepared or Be Me

Finance, Life

Hail clouds often exhibit a characteristic gre...
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We had some nasty storms roll through over the weekend. There was a lot of tornado-ish activity, 70 mile-an-hour gusts of wind, hail, and an electrical blackout.  For almost 24 hours, we were living in the stone age, with nothing but smartphones for internet, and high-lumen flashlights being used to see.   With no cartoons for the girls, we were forced to read them bed-time stories, while my son and his friends were forced to use their imaginations to entertain themselves.

Every time we called, the electric company added 12 hours to their estimated repair time.   Amazingly, they came in 7 hours ahead of schedule, if you don’t count the first two revisions.

By Saturday afternoon, we were out shopping for things we should have already had ready.

For years, we had discussed buying a generator.  For some reason, it never became a priority.  We have a large freezer and refrigerator full of food.   With no electricity, a generator was suddenly prioritized.   All of the places near us were sold out of budget-priced generators when we decided it was better to drop $400 on that than to lose $600 worth of food.   We did find one, eventually, but it would have been better to take it out of the garage than have to shop for it when we needed it.   Naturally, 10 minutes after we got it home, the power came on.  Do yourself a favor:  if you own a home and have a small corner available for storage, start shopping for a generator. Pick one up on sale instead of waiting until you have no real choice.

We have a ton of batteries.  It’s one of the things we stock up on when they are on sale.  Unfortunately, our broadest-beam flashlight takes a 6-volt battery, and we don’t keep a spare.   By the end of the night, it was getting pretty yellow and dim.  Another night would have killed it completely.   This wasn’t a widespread blackout, so there was no shortage of batteries, but it would have been nice to have the spare already at home.  Check your emergency supplies and make sure you have replacement batteries that fit everything you need.

The one thing that would have improved the night most is a good lantern.   We had our 5, plus two of my son’s friends all trying to play board games by flashlight.  A lantern could have been set on the entertainment center and lit most of the room.

For everything we were without due to the blackout, the one thing I truly missed was the air conditioner.  When the storm died, so did the wind.  Completely.   Opening all of the windows didn’t help at all.   Other than that, it was nice to have everyone forced to interact.   Nobody was whining about being bored and we were all having fun.

I want to schedule a pseudo-blackout more often.

Cheap Conference Calls

Business

Sometimes, a conference call can make you thousands of dollars.  Whether you’re pitching a product, or planning a new service to offer, sometimes you need to be able to talk with a team.

Business owners rely on many technological tools to conduct business day to day. Online business conferencing is one of the more popular services that owners have come to rely on. There are lots of online websites that provide free conference calling services that will save the small business owner some cash. Some of these sites offer permanent free calling for life and others offer free calling for a limited time only.

 Free Conference Calls

There are a number of free conference call services out there.  For most, you can use the site and get unlimited free conference calling 24 hours a day and seven days a week. This is a permanent full time offer and no credit card is needed with the best of the service. You can often conference with up to 96 different users at the same time and spend at least six hours on each call. That is more than enough time for the average business owner to conduct all of their all business with fellow participants.

 Skype

Skype is another company that has a free business conferencing service for all Skype users. There is no fee for conference calls as long as all of the users have downloaded Skype. Anyone that wishes to use their mobile phone to join in can be added by purchasing Skype Credit. Payments can be made online or through payment processing services like PayPal. This is a cheap way for a small business owner to connect with team members via conference call.

 Go To Meeting

GoTomeeting.com is the most well known of the companies providing conference calling services. The company offers its GoToMeeting, GoToWebinar, and GoToTraining that provide unlimited usage for business owners. Basic plans start at $15 a month which is a bargain for owners that have frequent conference calls with employees and customers.  At the high end of their offering is GoToTraining at $150 per month.  GoToMeeting has a lot of features including the recording and playback of all meetings. This is a useful option for any attendee that misses a meeting and needs to catch up.

These are just a few of the options available to the business owner who is on a budget and looking for a way to stay connected with his employees.

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Mortgaging a Rental Property

Finance

English: Offering subprime mortgage.
English: Offering subprime mortgage. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Now that we’re down to the last ten grand on our mortgage, we’re starting to look into getting another rental property.  The one we’ve got has worked out pretty well over the last two years, giving us about $800 extra  each month.  We broke even on all of the repairs we had to sometime in the spring.  That’s almost $5000 in pure, almost-passive income.

With numbers like that, if we can get a similar property and keep the mortgage under $800, we should be golden for getting another property and avoiding having it as a new drain on the budget.

However…

There’s always a however.

Our current tenants are moving out at the end of the month, which means the passive part of the income is over while we either find a renter or hire a property manager to do that for us.  Since that came at the same time I got the opportunity to be unemployed, there was a bit of panic at my house.

The idea of having a mortgage, no job, and no renter scared us into waiting to buy another property.

It’s not stopping us from getting ready for the next property, though.

We live in a fairly high-cost area.  Our house is on an eighth of an acre and is valued at around $250,000.   Our rental is on a slightly larger lot, but is a smaller house valued at around $200,000.   We don’t have a quarter of a million dollars laying around waiting to hatch into a new house, so we’ll be getting a mortgage.   A mortgage for a business property is a bit different than one for a home you’re planning to live in.

First major difference? You need a 20% down payment, with a 25% down payment getting you a much better rate.    We don’t quite have that, but if we pushed, we could have it in 6 months, I think.   And then we’d have no cushion if anything bad happened in our lives.

The next thing is that we’ll need a reserve that covers all of our expenses–personal and investment–for 6 months.  That can be home equity, savings, cash, or retirement accounts.  We’ve got this one covered.

We don’t qualify for a standard mortgage plan right now, but there are options:

  1. Live poor and save hard for a year.  We could make it happen in 6 months, but I will still want an emergency cushion just in case a job or tenant go away.
  2. Buy as an owner occupant.  This would mean we buy a new house, then move into it and rent out our current house.  We’d have to stay there a year before we’d be allowed to rent out the new property.
  3. Compare mortgages online.   The internet is a wonderful thing, full of the complete knowledge of the human race.  There is no better way to try to find an affordable mortgage than hopping on the net.  Just make sure you’re looking at a reputable site and dealing with a legit mortgage company.
  4. Live comfortably and save slower, then buy the property in 2 or 3 years.

Honestly, of all of the options, we’re probably going to do a combination of 3 and 5, but 2 is a serious consideration, since we’ve talked about moving out of the suburbs a bit anyway.

Did I miss anything?  How would you fund a rental property?

 

Five Signs You Don’t Need That

Finance

Everybody occasionally buys things they don’t need, from DVDs to luxury cars.   There are signs that what you’re buy may not be an actual necessity.

Here are five signs you should put that back:

  1. You’re buying that sweater or video game for the endorphin hit, you’re shopping for the addictive high not to fill an actual need.  It’s a habit that’s as hard to break as smoking, if not harder.  You can’t, after all, stop shopping altogether.
  2. You already have one.  Or 10.   A relative can’t turn down a sale and she buys for life.   She regularly buys 3 of whatever useful gadget is available on the shopping channel.    Her house has turned into a sad story of compulsive hoarding.
  3. The rationalizations for your purchase include “It’s cool”  or “My friends all have one.”  If you are buying something just for the bragging rights, it has become an ego purchase, which is something to avoid.   The insidious part of an ego purchase is that you have to keep topping your last purchase and the last purchase of your social circle, or the purchases lose value.  It’s a vicious circle.
  4. It doesn’t have a “place”.  Where are you going to put it?  Is it going to go in the corner, or is there a drawer or shelf it can live on.  If there’s no play to consider “away”, you’re just buying clutter.  If you must have it, go home and toss, sell, or donate 2 things to make room. If possible, do that before you actually by the new toy.   If it’s important, you’ll come back for it.
  5. You didn’t know you needed it 10 minutes ago.  If you actually need it, it’s on your list, right?  Impulse purchases have been the biggest budget-killer in my house.  That’s why we use Alice for the household goods.  If we don’t see the it, we can’t throw it in the cart at the last minute.    We no longer shop with the debit card, so we have to watch what we buy.  It’s embarrassing to have to undo a purchase at the checkout because I didn’t bring enough cash.

What did I miss?