Kninja Knitter

Some progress is better than none, right? And while I may not make progress toward one of my goals in the short term, that doesn’t automatically equate to a setback. March really had me on the struggle bus a good portion of the time. Work was incredibly demanding for a majority of the month, and my extracurricular activities began to pick up even more. My evening schedule is closing in on pre-pandemic levels, as activities resume.

I’ll do my best to focus on the positives while still holding myself accountable where I didn’t progress as I should have.

Financial: more in than out

I met this goal without too much difficulty, though it still wasn’t as stellar a result as it could have been. But just as I don’t deny myself the occasional indulgence in a sweet treat, I enjoyed entertainment a bit more than usual. Ultimately it was the one budget category where I exceeded my planned expenses. But there were reasons!

Unlike February, I didn’t have any exorbitant outlay this month. But as I mentioned, I went over budget in the Entertainment category. I went to see a couple theatrical productions in town, both starring friends of mine with whom I’ve shared the stage before. It’s vital to support live theater when and where we can since it has a key impact on the cultural life of the city. Arsenic and Old Lace was incredibly funny, and I enjoyed my front-row seat immensely. Bare: A Pop Opera was a moving experience. The mostly-new-to-me musical had some very funny moments but definitely required a tissue or two by the end.

The tickets for those two shows aren’t what put me over budget though. Rather, it was a couple larger expenses related to longer-term entertainment choices. First, I opted to join in on the latest Brandon Sanderson Kickstarter campaign following his announcement that he’d secretly written four novels due to the changes in his schedule resulting from the pandemic. And now I’ve gotten back into serious reading mode for the first time in a long time! And then I attended the reveal party for the 2022-23 Broadway Series season in Columbus. Being a subscriber, it was a pleasure to witness the exciting announcements. Since I’d paid for my current year’s subscription way back in 2020 (the reveal for 2020-21 happened a few days before the world shut down), I haven’t had that expense for some time. I’ll revisit my budget to be sure I account for it, but our program allows subscribers to break down the cost over six months to make it manageable. Plus I have a credit in my account due to a cancelled performance during the current season.

The final result for the month was that I spent $1,078 less than in February, and my net income for the month was $287 in my favor. I know I can do better, I just have to be more conscientious going forward. It’s still good news. And my promotion raise goes into effect in April, so if I continue to curb the spending I can really boost the net income as the year goes on. (+)

Belongings (General Stuff): more out than in

This is the area where I truly fell short. Between a very heavy work schedule that included a lot of work over a couple weekends and my various organizational commitments, I just didn’t have the mental energy to devote to sifting, sorting and pitching for more than a couple hours. Ultimately, I did start to fill a couple of boxes – one with donations and one with items for my son to sort through – but they haven’t made it out the door yet. I’m giving myself some grace here, recognizing that I did a lot of work in the first two months. My schedule should scale back somewhat in April, so I should be able to resume soon!

As for acquisitions in March (non-consumables), I had a couple bigger ticket items to replace old tech. Internet woes prompted me to buy a new cable modem. And I upgraded my cloud drive since my old drives are no longer supported. WD gave me a decent discount for the upgrade, and the newer tech should last for a while. On the Amazon front, I got a new Bluetooth keyboard to replace one that died. (-)

Yarn: more out than in

I managed to complete my March gnome, but that’s all I completed. At least this month I bought no new yarn! March net change: -117 yds, 2022 total: 4,995 yds

Health & Wellness

I managed a couple great successes in March. When I donated blood early in the month, I “scored” a blood pressure reading of 120/76 which is my best reading in I don’t know how long! And, as the OrangeTheory Transformation Challenge came to a close, I had my latest InBody scan done. I lost nearly three pounds overall, but gained 1.5 pounds of muscle – which means I lost over four pounds of fat! My body fat percentage dropped below 40% which has me just thrilled.

I’ll be scheduling my next DEXA scan in a couple months, but I’m already thrilled with my progress. OTF changed their programming effective April 1, and so far I’m really enjoying it. My anniversary as a member is coming up, too. Definitely the best move I’ve made this decade! (+)

In conclusion

I still have plenty of work to do. The weather is warming up in fits and starts, but hopefully it’ll be more consistently comfortable soon. The one behavior that has me scratching my head is the changes in my credit scores. I’m using Credit Karma and Mint to track various things including credit scores. In early March I managed to pay off the balance on my largest credit card, so my charges this month were manageable – I should be done paying interest on the various cards going forward. But now that I’ve dropped my balances across all cards to less than 5% of the available credit, I’m seeing my credit scores drop – this doesn’t make any sense to me! All the resources are saying to get the credit used percentage below ten for the best impact on my score. My installment loans, including my mortgage, have declining balances as well. Would someone please explain this??? Today I checked and TranUnion dropped my score by 17 points!! And the only change to my accounts was that the outstanding balance on my largest credit card was reduced by $85. Cue eyeroll.

Knit on.