A Chronicle of my Changing Times.

Resourse Management Redeux

So a bit has changed since my last post on this.  When last you left me I was fretting about my financial state of affairs.  To understand this, you have to know I've had other friends decide to go into Peace Corps with more of a cushion then I have.  I hear tale of people with thousands of dollars saved up who get to travel and have their stuff together for when they return to the states.  So, whilst I'm willing to accept the life of poverty that lies in front of me - I'm more than a bit concerned regarding what comes aftereven there I must realize that the graduate school life is one of even greater abject poverty.  So this PC transition is actually good for me.

What's changed since I posted last is that my parents have made me an offer which I can hardly refuse.  Instead of my selling my Jetta to Carmax, they offered to buy it from me for the payoff amount.  They would then use it for the 27 months I'm gone and return it to me when I return for gradutate school.  The drawback to this was that I wouldn't even have the proceeds from the sale to fall back on to pay off these last minute bills.  No, instead I have to tap into my 401k to raise that cash.

Now, given I spent the last 5 years of my life working with 401k's and their distributions, I'm well aware of the ramifications of my actions.  But given my circumstances of being in the Peace  Corps and making next to nothing, this was the most opportune time to take some money if I ever had to.  And there are one or two other reasons why this is a good move for me, which I won't bore you with here.

Sufice to say, I'm now going to be able to pay off my debt, keep my car and still have some retirement saved.  It's all about money management and being comfortable with your decisions, which I am.  Not the way I would have liked to plan it, but it works.  Even when I had unexpected bills pop up.

This afternoon whilst beginning to pack I looked over my electrical needs and the coverters I had bought.  Honestly thinking about it I decided that two of my appliances would be better served if I got regular plugs for eastern Europe for them rather then the usual converters.  So I called up Dell (for my laptop) and Apple (for the wonderful iPod) and got the real plug adapters - which weren't cheap, mind you.  It ran me about $130 to get both.  But there's a difference between being a tourist and living in a place.  A tourist jerry-rigs things to make them work.  Someone who lives there does things the proper way.  Which is why I spent the extra dough.

Later today (it's 3am now) will be my final American church service for a while and then a family dinner with the usual suspects.  It'll be a day free from packing or cleaning.  I look to enjoy it.

Oh, and one last thing.  Using Ziplock bags to vaccum pack one's clothes doesn't work as well as one might suspect.  Is all I'm saying.  it works, just not as well.

Posted by: mjmarble at April 17, 2005 00:48 | link | comments

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