Step 1 of a Bazillion

I’ve become addicted to Farm Heroes Saga. Somebody help me.

While I wait for my lives to replenish, I figure I might as well do something productive. That something is calling my credit cards, staying on hold for a long long while, but then finagling some numbers to cut down the obscene interest I’m drowning in. It’s time to tackle debt! (Cause lord knows tackling diet has been failing miserably)

Here are the numbers I started with, spread out over all my credit cards.

DEBT and APR% – BEFORE (approx)

• $12,461 @ 16.24%
• $2,281 @ 13.24%
• $7,988 @ 1.74% (good thru 4/2015)
• $7,667 @ .99% (good thru 4/2015)
• $4,112 @ 0% (good thru 4/2015)

So over 1/3 of my debt was at my highest interest rate. And due to magical credit card number crunching I’m still confused about, it’s also the figure that is being paid down the slowest. Now, I get it. Credit cards make their money off that interest rate. But it helps me none in my quest to become debt-free. And when money is tight due to unemployment or whatever life throws at you, it’s  so very disheartening to know you’re eating top ramen to pay for things you purchased 5+ years ago.

I had never really looked at my credit card statements closely before. I just figured if I pay more than the minimum, then I get my debt down. But I noticed on my Citibank statement this month that my balance with a lower APR was being paid now much faster than the balance at 16.24%. So even though I’m trying to pay more, I’m still stuck with additional interest that’s making me feel like I’m treading water instead of going anywhere. Well….crap.

Ok, so I have to wait 20 minutes before I get another life on Farm Heroes. Let’s make some calls! First up: CITIBANK. I’m constantly getting offers to transfer balances to that card for 0% for a year or more, but the purchases that are currently on that card are stuck at 16.24%. So I called them up to see if there’s anything they can do. Turns out that they can’t lower it, BUT they can give me an offer where it goes down to 11.99% for a year. I’ll take it!

Next up: CHASE. I already had a Chase card at 13.24%, but then a friend recommended their SLATE card to me. And I have to tell you…this card rocks!!!! When you sign up, it’s 0% for 15 months on all purchases AND any transfer balances in the first 60 days is also 0% with zero transaction fees. Um…yes, please. I had signed up for that card last week and was approved for $2100. But get this. Chase allows you to combine credit limits. So I was able to transfer from one card to the other, so now the 0% for 15 months card has a limit of a little over $5000. I hate math, but these are numbers I can get behind. Once I got my limit higher on the Slate card, I went ahead and transferred as much as I could from my Citicard to the new one.

Next up: BANK OF AMERICA VISA. They offered me a 0% transfer and while I did have to pay a small transaction fee, it was worth moving the money. My plan is to pay the minimums on the low interest cards and really try to make a dent in the Citicard (highest balance/highest APR% overall) before it goes back to 16.24%.

I know that come 4/2015, I will probably have to figure out another shuffle. But it’s a really empowering feeling to have a little more control. I’ve always been a little passive when it comes to paying down my debt, but I really, literally, can’t afford to do that anymore. Now if only I had the same will power to avoid potato chips.

DEBT and APR% – AFTER (approx)

• $1,598 @ 13.24%
• $7,561 @ 11.99% (good thru 11/2015)
• $7,988 @ 1.74% (good thru 4/2015)
• $7,617 @ .99% (good thru 4/2015)
• $9,773 @ 0% (half good thru 4/2015, other half thru 11/2015)

And with that sense of accomplishment, it’s time to get back to my cropsies game…

My Own Worst Enemy

I’m sitting here with about five hours worth of sleep in me. Though, to be more accurate, it’s not five hours of complete sleep. It includes 2 pee breaks, a lawn mower alarm and a text message alarm. So there’s a chance I’m not going to remember typing this. Or, I fall asleep in the middle of writing it.

It appears that I have officially moved on from making bad decisions in my love life to making bad decisions in my diet life. The bad boy musician has been replaced with sugary sodas. The not-ready-to-commit-but-still-DTF* dude is now nachos. And my will power is weak. SO. WEAK. I couldn’t resist the idiot boys when I was in my 20s. I can’t resist the idiot foods now that I’m in my 30s. The two simplest rules to follow, when trying to lose weight, is 1) Eat better foods. 2) Get sleep. But in my glorious, lazy wisdom, I decided last night that Taco Bell was the best idea ever. I had put in a few hours of manual labor (I’m helping my sister and her fiancee renovate their house: painting, landscaping, etc, etc). It had been several hours since I had eaten a goddamn spinach and banana smoothie, so I was feeling particularly hungry and deserving of “real food”. Not wanting to cook anything, there are a number of better choices I could have made at a drive-thru window. I could have gotten a salad, or a grilled burger or chicken sandwich and nixed the bread. I could have stuck with water. Maybe a baked potato. But nooooooo. Oblivious me got a Nachos Bell Grande and a giant Dr. Pepper.

Around 4am, as I’m staring at my bloated belly and cursing the caffeine coursing through my veins, I see a link posted on facebook titled: “This is why you are broke, depressed, overweight.” The short answer/aka the first line in the post: “You’re undersexed.” Now wait a damn minute. Could it be the other freaking way around?? I’m broke, depressed and overweight, so I don’t go out. When I don’t go out, I don’t meet anyone. When I don’t meet anyone, I can’t have the sex. Are you kidding me, stupid online link?! Oh, you’re trying to sell me on a teleseminar on how to have better sex by making me MISERABLE over my current state of being? I’m not depressed enough yet to fall for that shit. Now, I’m sleep-deprived, still hungry, trying to think of unemployment as summer vacation because optimism is supposed to be good for you, AND irrationally angry at 4am when all I wanted was 8+ hours of normal-people sleep.

After the text message alarm, I decided to just try to stay awake. Hopefully, the plan is to spend the day as a walking zombie and then pass out from exhaustion as a decent hour. This is all because I chose to have nachos and a soda for dinner. Maybe zombie me will make better decisions today.

-Sleepless in LA

*Yes, I googled DTF the first time someone ever wrote that to me. It’s internet slang for “down to fuck”. Classy.  Also, on the New York Stock Exchange DTF Tax Free Income. But I’m 99% sure the guy who asked me if I was DTF didn’t want to trade stock tips.

Feeling Blue…

In a flash of inspired confidence (aka taking my Pinterest boards too literally), I decided I should color my hair blue. I figured it’d be dark enough to still look professional in a creative office, but a bold choice to take control. Take control of what, who knows? But dammit, I’m dying my hair blue and that’s that. Who says only skinny models and rich celebrities and hipsters get fun hair? Take that, society! Nice girls can try rebellious hair color too!

Soooooo….. Here’s the thing….

I’m not a total newbie at having colored hair. If anything, I don’t think I’ve seen my real hair color since 2001. I know to expect to not wash your hair for a week if you want your color to last longer. I know to expect stained towels and pillowcases in the beginning.  I did NOT know to expect a stained head.

Yesterday, I pull into the parking lot of a job interview (Halleluh! They are few & far in between). I do a quick check in my car mirror and noticed a streak of blue by my ear. As I go to try to scrub it off, I notice it’s more than a streak by my ear. It’s all over my neck. What the hell?!? Wait…is that hair dye on my FOREHEAD?! Ohmigawd, ohmigawd… THERE IS BLUE EVERYWHERE!!! I AM A BLUEBERRY!!!

The only thing I have on me is my Starbucks iced latte cup, which had some condensation on the outside. Ok, it’ll do!! Because I have no idea if I can find a bathroom on the way to the interview, and I sure as hell can’t show up with a blue head. Apparently, if you want to keep hair dye ON your hair, be prepared to not sweat or move. In the 30+ minute-drive it took me to get there in JULY, I had melted enough to drip bright hair dye onto my neck and face. Suddenly, instead of calmly preparing questions about my best and worst attributes, I’m literally rubbing a Starbucks cup on my face to try to clean up. But now I’m staining my fingers blue too. Mother of hell, this is already the worst interview ever and I haven’t step foot out of the car yet.

I finally, FINALLY get to a point where I’m more of a scrubbed red than a Smurf. I throw on a cardigan and pull the sleeves down in 1000 degree weather. I walk to the office, praying for low lighting and maybe a near-sighted HR person.

I don’t remember much of the interview, aside from the fact that I possibly sat like Quasimodo in a pathetic effort to hide any blue remnants on my neck and hands. I’ve now washed my hair twice today in an attempt to go outside without a giant hat and scarf. Of course, now my bathtub looks like I’ve murdered The Blue Man Group. I don’t know if there are enough Mr. Clean Magic Erasers to clean it up, or if it would be cheaper to just remodel the damn bathroom.

The blue hair dye, in case you were wondering, is starting to fade already…and turning green. Well, shit.

Chocolate Guilt

I stumbled on this video from Gizmodo today (one of the perks of unemployment being stumbling onto a lot of videos online)

It’s a video of so many feels. Grateful to have the privilege of getting chocolate anytime I want. Awe to see the joyful looks on the men’s faces with their first taste of chocolate. I laughed out loud at the question of whether chocolate made the guest’s skin lighter. I sobered at the reality that these men connected chocolate with being healthy.

Chocolate is not the enemy. Chocolate is not evil. It’s not chocolate’s fault I can’t fit into my jeans. It’s my fault. I’m the enemy. I never stopped to take in the joy of sweets, I just overindulged. I was content to never working out, I just sat there. To witness what a miracle chocolate is in someone else’s life, it makes me all the more determined to get back to a balance – to be able to accept a small peace of candy with the gratitude and humility shown here. It sure beats having to say, “NO! Get it away from me, that demon food. I’ll just be here sipping on carrot juice because that’s what’s important.”

I think I gravitated towards Precision Nutrition because it doesn’t saying eating or food is bad. It’s about moderation, finding the right balance for your goals – whether it be fat loss or bulking up. Time will tell if I can have a healthy relationship with food…and a piece of chocolate without being in a bad mood.

The Hell That Is Grocery Shopping

Yesterday I went grocery shopping with the express purpose of buying healthy food…on a budget. This was me, walking into the store:

You know what’s cheap? Top Ramen noodles and mac & cheese and chips. You know what’s NOT cheap? Fruits and vegetables and nuts and meat/seafood that won’t kill you. I can easily spend over $100 for food that will last me maybe a week. Meaning, I could theoretically spend over $400 on groceries in the next month if I want to stick to non-processed, good-for-my waistline foods. But my unemployment is only $214/week, $856 for the month. Should I really be spending half my money on healthy food when my MINIMUM credit card payments are hovering at $700?? This is when finding a job is a huge priority. I’m stuck choosing between avoiding debt collectors and feeding myself. Oh sure, I could use a credit card to pay for groceries. But that’s how I got into this mess in the first place. Shit, shit, fuck, shit.

Ok, before I start to panic…luckily, my checking account is not at $0 and I have a little bit of money saved for a rainy day. If I’m crunching my numbers correctly (and by crunching, I mean using my calculator, because math hates me), I should be ok to buy “good” groceries for a month. If September rolls around and there are still no job prospects, I may resort to eating beans & tuna, and using my credit cards to pay for everything. I may also have to pretend to be a fresh college grad so Starbucks doesn’t say I’m too overqualified to work an espresso machine. Ok, anxiety attack averted. Or at least, postponed. 

Back to the shopping at hand, and what to buy. I have come to the conclusion that there are TOO MANY DIET PLANS AND ADVICE floating in the universe. In the past week alone, I’ve had friends recommend the Fast Metabolism Diet, Precision Nutrition, Herbalife shakes, a juice cleanse, and something that has to do with cabbage soup. Of course there’s also the big guns of Weight Watchers, Nutrisystem and Jenny Craig with Paleo gurus making a strong play too. And they all say different things from high-protein/low-carb, no carbs at all, carbs when you earn it, eat the same thing for a week, eat different things every two days, count calories, don’t count calories, fish oil is good for you, fish oil will give you cancer, cheese and yogurt is great for you, dairy will kill you dead. What the hell, universe? I just want to know what to buy at the grocery store. And I’d like to come out with a receipt that doesn’t make me think all my food has been dipped in gold.

After reading all that I could and before I chucked my computer out the window in frustration, I’ve decided that the plan that makes the most sense for me is: PRECISION NUTRITION. Well, a modified version anyway. I can’t actually afford any personal coaches, but I can try to apply their diet principles. 1) Eat every 2-4 hours, and every meal/snack should have lean protein and vegetables. 2) Since fat loss is my initial goal, I should only eat “other” carbs when I earn it. So if I want rice or bread, I better get my butt moving. 3) Avoid simple sugars and calorie-rich drinks (e.g. soda, breakfast cereals, ice cream, etc)…Ugh, that one’s going to hurt. 4) Eat healthy fats (e.g. nuts, avocado, animal fats, flaxseed, etc) 5) Try to eat whole foods instead of supplements. What I also like about this plan is that they anticipate you will break the rules 10% of the time. Meaning of 35 meals in a week, you may wind up with 3-4 “imperfect” meals…and that’s ok!! It’s not the end of the world!! I appreciate this flexibility, especially being on such a tight budget. If my roommate brings home something to eat, I like that I can accept a free meal and not freak out over straying from a diet. I also like that it doesn’t feel like a traditional diet. Yes, I have to avoid eating some things. But it’s actually promoting eating, and not cleansing or starving. I’m prone to low-blood sugar levels…and I’m also cranky when I don’t eat. So any meal plans that allow me to not pass out and to also maintain a level of civility to others is A-OK in my book.

The plan, however, does recommend zero-calorie drinks. So I’m fairly sure my coffee with a little bit of non-dairy creamer isn’t entirely compliant. I will try to switch coffee for green tea and see how that goes. But fair warning. If my family starts to disown me (I get even crankier without coffee), I will switch back. So that’s my diet plan. What the hell I’m going to get my lazy ass to do about EXERCISING? Uh…I’ll figure that out tomorrow. One step at a time.

I ended up going to Trader Joe’s and Pavilions. I had some coupons at one, and there are items that are cheaper or unique at the other. Here goes my first real attempt to see if I can survive eating well on a budget. The following should hopefully get me through Saturday. I have tentative plans for dinner out Friday, so this should be approximately 29 meals/snacks….damnit, I really want a chocolate chip cookie. Just gotta keep the image of back boobs in my brain. Must. Resist. Sweets.

ALREADY IN THE FRIDGE

• Eggs (10)
• Stuffed Peppers w/ Turkey & Wild Rice (1 from Trader Joe’s)
• Frozen Turkey Meatloaf Muffins (Trader Joe’s – a in case of emergency and there’s nothing else to eat meal)

GROCERIES = $71.96

• Peanut Butter
• Green Tea
• Unsweetened Vanilla Almond Milk
• Turkey Deli Slices
• Frozen Broccoli (2 bags)
• Bananas (7)
• Cucumber (1)
• Organic Green Grapes
• Spinach (1 bag)
• Organic Mini Carrots (1 bag)
• Homestyle Whole Chicken
• Chia Seeds (let’s see what the fuss is about)
• Frozen Mango Chunks
• Frozen Berry Medley
• 3 Salads (pre-made at Trader Joes)
• Stuffed Peppers w/ Turkey & Wild Rice (It’s really the only way I’ll willingly eat peppers)
• Hummus

With love & food,

-Sleepless in LA