Holy Hail, Old Style Accounting
My drive home last night was one of the least fun in recent memory. As I headed east I drove into a wall of pitch black clouds. As I continued I entered into solid sheets of rain, close lightning strikes everywhere and even some hail that made a distinct sound as it impacted the glass roof of the Tesla. Since the Tesla is an electric vehicle with a massive battery that runs along the entire bottom of the car I do my best to make sure to be cautious about the instant lakes that can pop up on roadways with poor drainage. Despite whatever water precautions Tesla engineers put into the battery pack I just don’t feel comfortable submerging it in any situation.
When I arrived home the property was soaked although our raised areas are still holding up well. The chicken run was totally flooded. I plan to buy another 500 pounds of sand after work to again attempt to raise the ground level in there although past attempts to do the same always seem fruitless. I did take a couple cinder blocks and a tire and put them in the run temporarily so the hens had something else to stand on besides mucky sand.
I had a rocky relationship with my ex-ex-mother-in-law (first marriage) She was always trying to inject herself into situations that I had with my first wife, offering opinions and commentary that was not solicited or welcomed. However when we had issues regarding money and spending she suggested a system that she used which I actually latched onto and still practice today, a budget book.
The system is decidedly low tech for someone like me who typically surrounds himself with as much technology as possible but it has worked for me for going on three decades. If you know me, you know I generally stick with what works. I typically have one bill paying session per week. During that session I pull out my budget book which is simply a binder with dividers for my different budget categories, which there are 8 or 9 of. I have ledger sheets that I print to hold the entries. When I get paid I have set amounts from my check that go into each category. Typically I will allocate slightly more to each budget item than needed so I slowly accumulate an excess.
I go into my credit union web site and record any transaction that hit my account for the week into my check book and the budget book. Any bills that get paid via bill pay also get recorded both in the check book and budget book. After all transactions are written into the check book and budget book I add up all the categories in the budget book to make sure they add up to what I show in the check book, my rough form of auditing. It normally matches the first time but once in awhile I need to go back in to find some error I made along the way.
Once those two numbers match the budget book gets closed up and all of the entries are then also added into Quicken 2011 where I also record all credit card transactions. Quicken is great for giving me a quick way to research past transactions as well as get snapshots of my current financial situation. It may seem odd to most people that I record each transaction in a minimum of three different locations but it has been a system that keeps me in tune with what my financial thermometer is reading at all times. I don’t have a ton of things to thank my ex mother-in-law for but this is definitely one of them.