“Money is better than poverty, if only for financial reasons.”
― Woody Allen, Without Feathers

After allowing ourselves to indulge last week, we put ourselves back on more typical austerity. Knowing I’m going to publish a full list of accountability each Saturday this month is an excellent tool to keep me frugal, even if it’s a lot more intimidating than I initially thought it would be to do (perhaps naively). Judgement and scrutiny, self inflicted or otherwise, is not fun to volunteer for. But still, expenses will happen. I knew I had a big yearly cost coming this week and so, anything not spent on groceries was basically restricted. It’s worth noting that my biggest drop of money was an automated payment that required precisely zero effort from me but still accounted for 60% of my spending, hence my query yesterday.

Sunday
We made “brunch” at home, did some meal prep and a ton of chores to get set up for the week, and exercised. I also spent some time on writing projects, and exchanging emails with friends. I’m doing the Yoga Revolution program from Yoga With Adriene this month for my flexibility (and to tick off a goal!) which is free and available on YouTube. But it was time for the annual renewal payment of my professional site, which is an automated payment…so, without so much as lifting a finger…
Annual site renewal/hosting/domain fees: 75.00.

Monday
I headed into the city to work even though a Tube strike promised to make the commute a mess (previous strikes have resulted in me spending up to four hours a day on foot getting to and from a workspace) so I got up, packed a lunch, and got some mileage on my FitBit. It was a longer day that usual, but far from fatal. Unfortunately I’d snapped a cheap hair clip I use daily and so had to stop into Boots to replace it: 1.50

Tuesday
Ditto most of the above, minus any strike headaches and the need to replace things. Thank goodness. A no spend day.

Wednesday
No spend day again! I worked from home on a bunch of pitches in preparation for…

Thursday
I worked from a good friend’s office all day until meeting up with another friend and member of an editorial team for a magazine to pitch some collaboration ideas and content. It’s a great opportunity, so fingers crossed! We could only meet up in the evening and so had food together and split the bill.
Dinner meeting: 25.00 (paid in cash)

Friday
A couple of meetings today that required getting up and about the city but all my food prep was ready to cope, snacks included. I also landed a new gig with a great day rate, hurrah! Heading home and into the weekend I had to pick up a few things and, after reviewing our cupboards and budget, Jeff and I decided we could afford some pizza.
Groceries 10.oo
Takeaway dinner: 15.00

Saturday
We decided to make it a home day with chores, and so delayed renewing our travel cards and doing a full food shop until tomorrow, aka next week’s budget. Sneaky, but that’s three no spend days this week to counteract some freelance costs.

Total: 126.50