Budgeting . . . yeah, right

Yesterday I attended a wonderful workshop about couponing (see couponingincriticaltimes.blogspot.com), conducted by someone with whom I had developed an on-line relationship and met up with some of the other women who were on this e-mail group as well. The workshop was very affirming in that I am in the process of polishing most of the tips and techniques she presented as I have had a lot of this information presented to me through the electronic correspondence of the last few months. However, her very first instruction made me squirm: "Budget!"

I don't. My excuses were numerous--being empty-nesters, we tend to be loose on our committing to the evening meal together--we may go out with our own friends or meet up together at a restaurant if the workday ends late. Additionally, one of our greatest pleasures in living downtown is having people call when they are in the neighborhood and drop by, but we never seem to be ready with the drinks and snacks. There's the rush out to the store to buy these items, and rushed shopping tends to be pricey. I saw all these scenarios as budget-breakers.

THIS SPENDING MUST BE MANAGED!! Therefore, I hereby publicly pledge to give food and household items a budget, and that does include eating out. We've all heard that the best first step is to write every expenditure down for a month. I'm gonna for May. Starting in June I'll have a good budget number to shoot at, and hopefully beat!