Kristabella: Full of Snark Since 1977

Posted By Kristabella on July 27, 2011

Disclaimer: This post is not judging anyone, nor anyone’s situation, nor what anyone said. This is simply MY story. The dialogue on Twitter today made me think about my situation and my situation alone. Everyone has their own story. I just wanted to share mine. The end. Now everyone hug!

There was a discussion on Twitter today about how the average amount of credit card debt per person in America is $14,000. And there was a bit of shock over that because, yeah, it’s a lot of money. And the discussion then started about how people abuse credit and that there was sadly probably a lot of mink coats, yachts and big TVs to show for it.

Now, I am sure that is the case with a lot of the people. There are many, many people who abuse and do not understand credit. Look at all those people who bought houses they couldn’t afford and did interest-only loans. Credit is not FREE MONEY! But a lot of people don’t actually GET that.

I chimed in because that number makes me feel better. I will admit, I’m above the average when it comes to credit card debt. It is not something I’m proud of. And I will admit that there have probably been times when I wasn’t smart about it. I’m not embarrassed. It is my situation and I own it.

But for all that debt? I don’t have anything to show for it.

Well, that’s not true – I am alive because I was able to buy groceries. I still have a job because I was able to put gas in my car and get to and from work. I have a place to live because sometimes those utilities went on the credit card because the mortgage/rent couldn’t.

It’s not something I’m proud to admit. It also isn’t something new to me.

Back in college, my dad started drinking again. This led to him losing his business and going back on his promise to pay for my college education. THANKFULLY, I had a really awesome job, that I busted my ass in, that paid my tuition. But when loans weren’t enough to cover everything else, anything and everything went on the credit card. On the high-interest credit cards they give to us college students. Because we don’t know better.

(His drinking also led to him hanging up on me every time I called for money, which led to me decide to never talk to him again for the rest of his life, but that’s a whoooole different story for a whole different day.)

I got that all paid off in 2006. Ten years later. And that was through doing one of those debt management programs. Which absolutely killed my credit. It took me years after it was paid off, but I have finally built my credit score back up, enough to buy a condo. But I still have debt to deal with. My debt-to-income ratio is not favorable. Because since then, I’ve lost my job a few times and was forced to take lower paying jobs to pay the rent/mortgage. And when my checking account balance is negative, I avoid overdraft fees by putting living expenses on my credit card.

Smart? No. Responsible? Not really. Necessary? Hell yeah.

I’ve recently decided to become proactive and take my financial health seriously. I’m tired of paying minimum payments and not seeing my balance go down. Just last week, I decided to apply for a consolidation loan to help with my credit cards. I am hoping to get enough to pay it all down, but even if I can take a huge chunk of it away and replace it with a loan with a much more reasonable interest rate, I will be on my way. On my way to getting out of debt.

Yay for being an adult! It’s about damn time. I mean, really, I’m going to be 34 in less than 2 months.

*Sung to the tune of “When You’re A Jet” from West Side Story.

Category: A Day in the Life of Me, Age is Just a Number, Deep Thoughts | 19 Comments »
Tags:

Posted By Kristabella on July 26, 2011

Apparently years of reading Jonna’s posts have made me start to make song titles my blog post titles.

(And now as I write this, I’ll be singing this song. “ooh, wah, ooh…let me whisper in your ear…ooh, wah, ooh”)

(I think Twitter has made me lose my ability to write one post about a single topic, without wanting to interject other thoughts in 140 characters or less.)

(I mean, I haven’t even gotten to the point of this post and we’re four paragraphs deep.)

(I blame the heat. Because yesterday, as I stood on the platform waiting for my train, talking on the phone with my brother, I was dripping sweat from my elbow crease. My elbow was sweating! DRIPPING.)

(MY ELBOW!)

Ahem.

Speaking of the heat, I have a secret to share with you. This heat, and the sweatiness and all that it entails, has given me an embarrassing affliction (besides elbow, boob and ass sweat) – it has given me stinky feet and stinky shoes!

I know! GROSS!

I’ve never really had this problem before. And in the past, I guess it wasn’t a problem because I was awful sedentary. I got up to go to the bathroom and that was about it. Also, it was always, always cold in there and I had my space heater on, even in the middle of July. So any kind of perspiration was non-existent.

Now it’s different. I work for a large company. I have to get up and walk to the bathroom, to talk to co-workers and my boss, have to go upstairs to discuss things with other departments. That, plus sometimes I leave work to go grab lunch. All this activity and movement makes a girl perspire. Which apparently means my feet sweat and then I wear the same few pairs of shoes and they start to get smelly.

I went out to the store to buy some Odor Eaters foot powder. I thought this would be a good solution. Except, I don’t wear the shoes that need the powder until I get to work. So if I put powder in them, and then throw them in my bag, I get to work with foot powder covering everything, including my lunch.

So I need suggestions, people! I’m afraid no one will talk to me at work because of my foot odor problem!

Category: A Dash of the Crazy, Assvice, Halp, Spinsterville Here I Come, Weather dot com | 14 Comments »
Tags:

Posted By Kristabella on July 25, 2011

I am tired. I actually made sure to go to bed early Sunday night, knowing that I had spent a majority of the two previous days in the sun, swimming. But then even after 8 hours of sleep, I couldn’t stay awake on the train this morning and ended up passing out with my book open and sleeping almost the whole ride.

Sleeping on the train is weird. Usually I don’t fall asleep, I just doze. Or rest my eyes, as my dad used to say.

Me: Daaaaaad! WAKE UP!

Dad: I’m not sleeping.

Me: Yes you are! Your eyes are closed!

Dad: I’m just resting my eyes.

(Another of his favorites was, when we would ask “Are we there yet?” and he’d say “just a couple more hours.” That could mean anywhere from 30 minutes to six hours.)

Anyway, on the train, it’s hard to sleep. I mean, there are a lot of people and announcements and doors opening and closing. Plus the whole I-don’t-want-my-bag-stolen thing. It doesn’t really lead to restful sleep. But today, I really fell asleep. So much so that when I woke up, I was shocked that the train was packed and the annoying gum chomper was nowhere around.

And of course, then I was even more tired.

It wasn’t as if I did much this weekend. On Friday night, my mom and I went to dinner at Rick Bayless’ restaurant Frontera Grill. And it was AMAZING! The drinks and food were so worth it. After dinner we went to see West Side Story. It is my all-time favorite musical! I know all the words to the songs and I just love everything about it! I was SO EXCITED I finally got to see a live stage performance of it and it did not disappoint!

And then after an insane amount of rain overnight (close to 7 inches!) and convincing myself that I was going to get fired at work (I didn’t. I’m fine. I just overreacted, shocking I know), I drove up for a pool party at my brother’s house. Because it was hot and they have a pool. And I hadn’t seen them in awhile and Skyler was asking when Auntie was coming for a visit.

It was a lovely weekend of lounging around and playing games. And eating and drinking and watching TV. It was just what the doctor ordered. Although, to be honest, it is how I spend most of my weekends, but this time there was wine and people besides my cats to talk to.

At one point, I said to my brother “Pools aren’t any fun without a swim-up bar.” And then my SIL, who I thought was at the grocery store, came outside with a fruity rum drink. Now that is my kind of party!

I even played Life with Skyler, even though I really don’t like that game because it’s so long and SURPRISE! My life is no better as a board game! I think I lived in a mobile home and owed the bank more money than I had! SAME AS REAL LIFE! Well, minus the mobile home.

Yet Skyler was a lawyer, lived in a mansion and won American Idol AND So You Think You Can Dance. To the tune of $200k!

Skyler also has a new kitty (in real life, not on the game of Life). Her name is Princess Mimi and she’s so little! And it made me want another cat. Until I remembered that I’m a man deterrent enough with two cats. One more would definitely make me a crazy cat lady.

And now I’m going to go back to bed. Because I’m still tired and need to rest up so I can read on the train in the morning and not fall asleep.

Category: A Day in the Life of Me, All in the Family | 2 Comments »
Tags:

Posted By Kristabella on July 19, 2011

It is hot here in the Windy City. We are under some sort of heat bubble, or so the weather people are saying. It’s led to temps in the 90s and then high humidity levels on top of that, which leads to heat indexes of 100-110. It’s hot times in the city! Literally.

This morning on Twitter, Dunkin Donuts asked whether we would prefer, at that moment, the current weather or something along the lines of the blizzard we had in February. At that moment, as I was sweating profusely on an air conditioned bus, sharing sweat with my neighbor, since we were jammed in like sardines, I am not sure which is worse.

I love summer and warm weather and flip flops and beer gardens and patio dining. But when it is like it is currently? It’s no worse than a snow storm because you can’t do much outside. You just take less showers. I really need it to just be like 80-85 and sunny every day. With no humidity. That would be nice.

The heat makes me tired too. I get home, like on nights like tonight, after being jammed in a stuffy train for an hour, and I’m ready for bed. In fact, as I type this, it isn’t even 9 PM and I’ve already brushed my teeth and taken out my contacts. Sleep is not too far behind.

It also makes me do stupid things. Like drink too many vodka drinks and act like a fool in front of people. (Although, let’s be honest, that happens no matter the weather.)

It also makes me forgetful. Seeing as I noticed this evening, oh at about 8 PM, that my flat iron was left on in the bathroom ALL DAY.

(The heat also dehydrates me which is why I was home for two hours and didn’t have to go pee once.)

I am always so good about checking to make sure it is off. I mean, we’ve all see the Friends episode, yes? Where Phoebe’s place gets burned down by a straightner? (“My hair is straight. Straight, straight, straight.”) I KNOW the dangers of those heating devices. Which was why I spent MORE on one that I THOUGHT had an auto-shut-off! Because I’m forgetful and lazy and sometimes stupid! I like to buck the system off the bat and ASSUME I’m going to be stupid and prepare for it!

(DID I MENTION IT WAS ON THE COUNTER RIGHT NEXT TO THE SHOWER CURTAIN???!?!??)

Turns out, spending $80 on a flat iron doesn’t guarantee that it has auto-shut off. I cannot thank whomever enough for making sure there was a house to come home to tonight. I am so, so, so, so thankful. And LUCKY. And I will be even more vigilant about making sure I turn it off every morning. This will not happen again.

Trust me.

Hopefully this should also remind me to shave OFF! my leg hair.

Category: A Dash of the Crazy, A Day in the Life of Me, Weather dot com | 7 Comments »
Tags:

Posted By Kristabella on July 18, 2011

I made it to the dentist. The verdict was not good, as I suspected it would be. Since there is like no tooth above my gum line, underneath the crown, there isn’t much we can do. She temporarily cemented it back on, but since it’s not really cemented to much, we’re going to have to pull it.

That and then do an implant. A process that will take 6-18 months and cost me thousands of dollars. So, that’s fun, huh?

My temporary solution is to do nothing and just stare at the oral surgeon referral that is sitting on my desk at work and pretend I don’t see it. Because extra money is something I do not have. Especially thousands of extra monies.

My thinking is I’ll call the oral surgeon next month. We’ll do a consult and then he’ll pull the tooth. And then I’ll fall off the face of the Earth until 2012 when I can put away thousands of monies in my Flexible Spending account to help offset the out-of-pocket costs. And it’s the dentist, if it isn’t a cleaning, there are ALWAYS out-of-pocket costs, even with insurance.

I trust my dentist and she doesn’t recommend things that are cosmetic. And I saw the remnants of my “tooth” and know it’s not much and starting to decay and it’s just better to get the thing pulled.

::::::::::::::

I finished Mad Men this weekend. I watched 7 episodes on Sunday. That and laundry was about all I did. Which was fine, seeing as I was a little hungover from the enormous amounts of vodka I sucked down on Saturday. Dear self, just because it seems to have no liquor in it and it is hot out and you’re thirsty doesn’t mean you need to drink it like it is water. You may up puking on the floor in the corner of the bar later in the night. I said MIGHT.

::::::::::::::

I ended up buying these Nike flip flops and they are amazeballs. They are so cushy and so comfy and it feels like you’re walking on pillows. They are exactly what I need for commuting in this swamp we call Chicago in July.

::::::::::::::

I was on a boat Friday night at the Chicago Yacht Club. It was my first time at a Yacht Club. I got really excited to get my “I’m On A Boat” badge on foursquare, but it turns out, the Chicago Yacht Club isn’t marked as a boating venue. Therefore, no badge for me.

But I did learn a fun game you can play called Yachter or Notta Yachter. It was very entertaining.

I would like to also point out that I had a beer on a yacht on Friday night and that boat ended up winning the 103rd Race to Mackinac Island. Coincidence? I think not.

This will be my pick-up line the next time I end up at a Yacht Club. Something along the lines of “I’m lucky, do you wanna get lucky?”

HEY-OH!

::::::::::::::

I think I have finally caught up on my sleep. The weekend before this last one, I was out by my sister’s to help her take care of my niece Maddie since my sister had just had back surgery. And Maddie decided this would be a perfect time to get her one-year molars and NOT SLEEP. And since I’m not really used to any noise while sleeping, besides the fan, the AC or the cats being stupid, hearing a baby fuss (I was sleeping in her room with her), kind of scared the beejeesus out of me. So much so, I leaped out of bed every time she made a peep. And then took me a little longer to fall back asleep. Just in time for her to fuss again.

Needless to say, I didn’t get much rest that weekend. I don’t know how you parental people do it.

Thankfully she’s cute. So I’ll forgive her.

Category: A Day in the Life of Me, All in the Family, All Things Blogging, Dental DAMN, Land of Random, Spinsterville Here I Come | 9 Comments »
Tags: