Budgeting

NAME: Lily
STATUS: Irritated.
GOAL: Wealth.
PEEVE: Sucking at math.
GLEE: Payday is this week.

No matter how I envision it, the conversation just doesn’t go well:

Me: “Mom, I really need $200 for a new phone so I can post videos of Otto on YouTube.”
Mom: “Two hundred dollars?!? Your phone works perfectly fine – and you never should have gotten that stupid cat, either – you need to get a full-time job.”
Me: “If I had a full-time job do you really think I’d be calling you and begging for money?”
OR –
Me: “Mom, do you think I could borrow $200? I really feel like I need to update some of my tech stuff and –“
Mom: “Two hundred dollars?!? Update your what? Are you kidding me? No, what you need is to get off your duff and get busy finding a full-time job.”
Me: “If I had a full-time job do you really think I’d be calling you and begging for money?”

[funfacts]

Then I’d slam down my iPhone. Wait, do they have an app for that? Because they totally should. Meanwhile, I don’t have an iPhone, or any kind of phone that takes video and lets me update online. And I do not have $200. And I guess I can’t pass go. Because the bottom line is, degree or no, I do not have a job and yet I can’t stop myself from spending as if I had one.

Well, I have a sort of job, part-time clerking at the Med Center, but it isn’t exactly the kind of scratch a girl needs to support herself in the manner to which she’s become accustomed. Seriously, I’m young and single, I need to keep networking (thus the tech upgrades; cat videos are a mere bonus), I need to look good, I need to be out there.

[post_activity]

And if there’s a sale at Muse I need to be able to buy that green dress. And if I go shopping with friends I need to be able to go out to lunch. And if we’re having girls’ night out I need to get my pedicure on and I need to be able to buy my own drinks instead of letting some lecherous loser buy them for me.

I need, I need, I need. I need money. Or a winning lottery ticket. Or a full-time job in my area of expertise, hello.

Hmmm. Maybe I’ll call Dad instead…

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All above information has been reviewed and approved by this week’s expert, Lisa Barber.

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