Robert Manners

Oh, My!

We seem to have been somewhat improvident with our finances...in fact, "prodigal" is not too strong a word to describe my recent expenditures! One might even go so far as "babylonian." Since December 11th, I've run through $2,747.65! I know that's not a terribly impressive number, but since I only bring home an average of $2,160 a month after taxes, and my savings and balance-forward are never very impressive, this left something of a (gasp) deficit in my bank accounts.



When I took Miss Paycheck over to visit Miss Bank of America, there was a scream and an echo as the former fell far, far down the deep hole in the latter. It was an unpleasant moment. Fortunately, I'll get another paycheck in two weeks, and so long as I'm careful until then, I'll be fine. So, no online sprees, no new-shoe orgies, no dining out every night in favorite restaurants.



Oh, well, they say the best things in life are free (there They go again, those sanctimonious bastards). I'm sure that's true, in a sense, but I do prefer the things that cost money. Like my daily lunch at the Cuckoo's Nest (today an excellent baked whitefish with rice pilaf, and homemade-by-Jeff cherry pinwheel pastry for dessert), new clothes or shoes or jewelry (I don't need them, in fact I have too many of each, but I just love new things), books and magazines (it will probably take me the next few weeks to get through The Lord of the Rings, and I have a couple more readers in reserve), going out to dinner (don't tell her I said so, but Grandmother isn't a very good cook, and I'm much worse...yet I do love a good meal...so it's off to the restaurant, the more expensive the better, to get my grub on), and oh, so much more!



So I guess I'll have to just wear the same old clothes, flip through the same old magazines, eat at home more often, maybe bring a box lunch to the office, peruse the same old porn, gloat over the same old jewels...for the next couple of weeks, anyway. I know it's temporary, but I feel like I'm being led to the tumbril, with Madame Defarge knitting away in the front row, screaming "Off with her Check Card! Off with her Check Card!"



Ah, well...they say the guillotine doesn't hurt. But They say lots of things I don't believe.



Pray for me...