Debt Freedom, Faith and Fatherhood

2009-12-26T14:14:00.000-08:00

Wow!!! We are back up and running at DFF&F. We just recovered our password to begin writing again. Boy so much has happened and we will fill you in over the next few weeks.
Christmas was great. The boys received many toys and I got an Ipod Touch which I may use to post blogs occasionally.
I will write more when I am not so busy at work, but we are very close to doing live news, so I will get back to writing later.

2008-03-01T09:24:00.000-08:00

Wow How Long It Has Been.

I have not submitted a blog in a while. I believe around Memorial Day 2007 was my last entry. I had forgotten my log in information and just came across it today.
Wow! I need to give an update as to what has happened in the last year. Well lets start with we are now over two years without using credit. We have said no to some purchases because we couldn't afford them, and we have saved up to make some other purchases because we felt that they were important.
One of our biggest goals in 2007 was to build a deck around our pool and find some way to pay cash for it. We were able with the Lord's help to do that and we enjoyed that deck all summer long.
A major goal for 2008 was to pay for a vacation to Tennessee in a cabin in Pigeon Forge for the entire family, extended and all. We were able to save up and pay for this vacation, again thanks to our wonderful Lord in heaven, and we will be taking this trip at the end of March.
My wife was diagnosed with thyroid cancer in January of 2008 and was treated for it at the end of February. So as I write this on March 1st, we are three weeks away from our trip to Dollywood and what a blessing it will be to do it all cash free. This is the first out of town vacation in our lives that will not have payments follow us home.
All glory to God in the highest. Through Him all things are possible.
We have really come to enjoy our new found financial freedom tahnks to budgeting and just living on purpose for over two years. It was hard to say no to ourselves at first, but we realized that we are not congress, we have to live on less than we make. The money doesn't belong to us anyway, which makes it easier to give away.

2007-05-29T18:35:00.000-07:00

THE PRICE OF TRAVEL

With the price of gas on the rise, many people are struggling to find ways to pay for the added increase. There are some reports that people are altering their vacation plans because of the elevated prices.
Some of my co-workers are wondering at what price gas will need to rise to before I stop coming to work. This is kind of a ludicrous question because I have to come to work somewhere, and I have a great job, perhaps one of the best jobs in the state.
I got to figuring out how much I spend a year in fuel traveling to work and back. I spend $3000 dollars a year for fuel. Two years ago, this was a panic situation for me, before I began learning to be a better steward of the Lord's money.
The other night, I went to Speedway to gas up, and I got $39 dollars worth of gas. When I put the pump handle back into the pump, one more cent clicked on the meter and it read 39.01. One cent is not that big a deal right. Until you realize that if they do this to 318 people, they get to keep a gallon of gas that was paid for. Lets say they do this to 3,180 people a month, which is only 106 people a day, they get to keep 31.8 gallons of gas while drivers pay for it. 31.8 gallons of gas will fill up my ride twice.
We are not altering our vacation plans this summer, but we have reworked the budget to pay for gas. I hope the gas pains are not too severe for any of you out there.

2007-02-19T18:33:00.000-08:00

GOAL SETTING

One year ago this month I embarked on a life changing mission to get out of debt and to improve the economic health of my family. This took incredible focus and dedication and sacrifice. Sacrifice has been the hardest aspect of this because my habits were so bad. I feel confident that my family and I are headed in the right direction financially. We have a long way to go, but we have made definite improvements.

I am now undertaking a new goal that will coincide with my debt reduction. I am going to lose 40 pounds by Christmas Day. That is a full 44 weeks from today. That means that I have to lose 15 ounces a week. That breaks down to just over 2 ounces a day. The biggest obstacle for me in achieving this goal will be my undeniable, uncontrollable, seemingly insatiable appetite. I love food and always have. As a young boy and young man, I could eat as much as I wanted and have no repercussions of any kind. I have not controlled my appetite as I have aged and it has caught up with me.

I have always been mentally tough and able to achieve just about anything I set out to do. I am the most driven person I know, which intimidates some of the people closest to me. This same quality that some feel makes me tough to be around is the same quality that has helped me reach many goals in my life to this point.

To lose 40 pounds by Christmas Day is going to require some major behavioral adjustment. I am going to succeed at this with lots of prayer and lots of dedication. I just wanted to post this goal because a large part of goal achievement is to write the goal down thereby creating accountability which also lends to achievement.

I will put in weekly updates and keep everyone informed of my weight loss. I will begin to weigh myself every day beginning Tuesday February 20th and this will allow me to keep a daily number in mind and celebrate small victories.

2007-02-10T18:10:00.000-08:00

GENEROSITY

Generosity is a philosophy that I struggled with up until 15 months ago or so. I think that generosity is important. So important in fact that I don't believe one will achieve their goals without being extremely generous. I had set some goals to give of myself this year and I wasn't really sure how I was going to do it. I fell short of my giving goals last year and I want to get better at it in 2007.

I listened to Dave Ramsey interview the secret santa from Kansas City, Mo one day on his radio station and became inspired to give outside my comfort zone and create a new comfort zone for myself. I really got the opportunity to do that today.

I was at my favorite restaurant today and I was standing in line picking up food for some people at work, and I got a real conviction to give to someone in the restaurant. Behind me in line was a young father and his son, and I gave a ten dollar bill to the cashier and told him to let that take care of those two meals.

I felt really strange after doing that. I ran out of the restaurant with my food and got in my car and sped away. What a weird feeling. Later in the evening, I thought, what a good feeling helping someone anonymously is. I am going to try to do this once a month while on baby step 2 of my total money makeover. I think that giving is one of the best ways there is to bless the giver and receiver. What a great feeling I had for the rest of the evening at work. Well that is all for this post. Just thought I would put these feelings into words to better prepare me for baby step 7 which is build wealth and give a bunch of it away.

The proverb says the borrower is slave to the lender, and I am trying to become a generous slave on my way to freedom. Freedom from debt and stress and living paycheck to paycheck. Freedom to give as I want and become a better person.

2007-01-15T16:24:00.000-08:00

ONE YEAR LATER

Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day. This day honors a very important man in American history. Without the hard work of Dr. King, the America we know today would be a lot worse. His nonviolent approach to change is respected and is the way all change should be sought after.

This also marks an important anniversary here at DF&F. It was one year ago today that we last used credit. That's right! One year credit card free. We charged a hotel room in Chicago on MLK day in 2006 and we decided shortly after that to never borrow money again. As tough as that new mindset has been, we have struggled through. We heard many things about how one cannot live without debt and about how it is impossible to live without a budget. We persevered through the year on Dave Ramsey's plan and by tightening the budget. We had a garage sale and a flood and even had a $1200 repair on our van, but we made it through without credit. I pray that 2007 will be even better and we will never need to borrow money again.

We only have the Lord to thank for this. He has provided all of our needs and has taught us why it is important to manage His money better. We are on our way to becoming better stewards and hopefully we will be able give more and save more in the future.

Credit cards reek!!

2007-01-06T17:40:00.000-08:00

CHANGING MY FAMILY TREE

We started my oldest son Mickey on Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace Jr. program for kids to learn how to handle money. Dave says to let kids operate with envelopes from the age of 4 to about 12 depending on how they are wired. Mickey is a bright boy who gets it early, so we started him in the system on his seventh birthday.

The envelopes he operates with are pretty simple. He has a giving enevlope, a saving envelope and a spending envelope. He is saving for a robot that he wants that costs $179. He is very enthusiastic to save for this robot and he will not spend any money on anything but giving. He puts everything else in the save envelope.

I am thinking about a 401Dad to match his savings for this robot. If he shows the character to save prodigiously, we may match him dollar for dollar. This kid is going to achieve great things in life and I am very supportive of him every day.

My younger son is three, but we plan to have him follow in his brothers' envelope toting footsteps. He is a few years from needing to understand this process, but with some experience under our belts, we will do it even better with the second child.

We opened up a mutual fund for them that will hopefully help them in the future either with college or a first home or emergency fund or something big.

2006-12-29T17:36:00.000-08:00

End Of Year Goals

Well as 2006 leaves us and 2007 is in our path, we at DF&F would like to reflect on the last year. We set out to become debt free at the beginning of 2006 with some pretty lofty goals. We wanted to reduce our total bills from 21 to 10 when the year began and we wanted to go the entire year without assuming any new debt.

We just paid bill #13 in full today and only have 8 debts remaining. We have been living on a budget now for four months and getting better at it every month and we are no longer deficit spending every month. This is due to a combination of debt payoff and lifestyle adjustments. We have only the Lord to thank for our good fortune of the past year, and we have faith that we have changed our lifestyles permanently.

We really feel that the Lord will continue to bless us in the future and we will keep praying for his guidance in our lives. After all, we are managing His money for the good of His kingdom. Everything we have belongs to the Lord. Remembering that will go a long way towards helping us make better decisions in the coming year.

We really discovered that the borrower is slave to the lender and we don't want to be enslaved anymore. Happy New Year from all of us at DF&F.

2006-12-23T04:56:00.000-08:00

It has been almost a month since my last post, and that has given plenty of people time to devise plans to separate me from my wallet. I have been using all my energy to stop these people. It has not been easy but I have been somewhat successful. I will elaborate later in the post, but first, let me say that my family and I are right in the middle of our KwanChrismakkahLutherKingday celebration. What we do is celebrate the holidays right through Martin Luther King Day. This is not meant to be irreverent as I feel MLK was the greatest living American ever. OK back to my post.

More car problems with our Pontiac Montana. We have had a rough last month with this vehicle. This time I had to get a tuneup. On that vehicle , the rear sparkplugs are very difficult to get to, which meant that I would be taking it to a shop. I chose a tire shop because they had the best price. It took them three and a half hours, but they had the best price. So the vehicle is tuned up and is still running rough. I anticipate a transmission repair in 2007 sometime and I am saving towards that end.

Later in the week, I received a call from one of the people who gave us an estimate for the deck that we want built around our pool. He wanted to come out and save us some money. I told him that the company we were going with was $550 less than he was and that he was wasting his time if he couldn't beat them. Then he did something really stupid and clueless.
He said "Aren't you financing this purchase?"
I said "no I don't borrow money anymore. What would it matter whether I was financing or not?"
He said "Well you could pay more for it if you make payments over paying in one lump sum."
That is the mentality that got me into my debt crisis and I am changing the way I view everything. But folks like this salesman believe this and so do a lot of American consumers. They ask how much per month rather than how much. This guy was going to charge me $1400 for an $800 deck for the privilege of making payments.

This is why I have vowed to never borrow money again. It is not going to be easy, but it will be worth it when we are debt free.

2006-11-28T16:07:00.000-08:00

THANK GOD FOR THE EMERGENCY FUND!!!

Well our 1999 Pontiac Montana blew a head gasket sometime in early November. We decided to admit that it happened the day before Thanksgiving. We tried everything to fix it but it was the gaskets alright. Both of them. We had to take the car to the dealership. I can't stand most auto repair places, but the dealership is more knowledgeable than Pep Boys or any of your other tire stores that do auto repairs.

Using Dave Ramsey's plan we had a $1000 dollar emergency fund to cover just such an occasion. The problem is that this total emergency cost just over $1300. We scraped together $1197 and that is all we could get because we refuse to charge ever again.

On Monday morning the dealer called and he tried to add a couple of other repairs to the job. This would drive the total bill to over $1300. I informed the manager at the dealership that I only had $1197 and that he should stop repairing once he reaches that dollar amount.

Well he called Tuesday morning with the job completed and I said I would be right down to get the van. When I got there I slowly counted out 11 $100 dollar bills and the remaining $97 and said that was all I had. The bill came to $1196.70 and he had written off the rest. I was praying for three days to have our money be enough, and the Lord provided. God has never blessed anyone with debt.

The mini emergency fund is depleted, and we will spend most of December rebuilding it, but I am thankful for it because it kept us from acquiring more debt. Financial peace is going to be great.

2006-11-17T16:41:00.000-08:00

Our Christmas Spending

My wife and I finished Christmas shopping for our boys in the beginning of November. Doing this has made this Christmas season a lot less stressful on my wife and I. We like to get the Christmas shopping done early every year, but this is the first year that we have been able to do it the right way, without credit.

We are also trying to save $880 for a deck and we are trying to pay off two more debts entirely before the end of the year. We would love to start 2007 with only 7 or 8 total debts instead of the 21 we started 2006 with. This will take some "December Discipline," but I think we can do it.

We are very thankful for the benefit that we have received from learning to live within our means and living on a budget every month. We are getting better at budgeting as every month goes by, and we are hopeful that the discipline learned will help us in years to come as we learn to live debt free for the rest of our lives.

2006-10-31T09:20:00.000-08:00

BOO-RITO

Today is one of the best days of the year for a guy who otherwise could care less about Halloween. Chipotle gives away free burritos if you are dressed like a burrito and go into the store. I want to thank DB for the hat. He was unable to go to Chipotle and loaned me his hat instead. I went behind the counter and took a picture with these two Chip-hotties after which I enjoyed four crispy chicken tacos with rice added for free. Happy Halloween!!!

2006-10-30T16:17:00.000-08:00

SAVING MONEY

Well it has been a couple of weeks since I last posted. I will have a fun Halloween post coming soon, but today I want to talk about saving money. My wife and I have decided to make an $880 purchase in the spring. This is an addition to our swimming pool. We have to have a third of the money before Thanksgiving and the rest when the work is done. We are going to sacrifice and come up with the money in keeping with our goal to never borrow money again.

We are going to need to live like no one else so that later we can live like no one else while we are saving for this purchase. We have learned a lot while coordinating Financial Peace at our church and we believe in the plan and most importantly the proverb THE BORROWER IS SLAVE TO THE LENDER!!!! God had it right when he said that and we are feeling enslaved right now.

If we can save for this purchase, this will be a family milestone for us as we have never saved for a purchase of this size before the purchase. I know we will do it but it will take incredible discipline, and lots of prayer. Living on less than we make will be the most important lesson learned by our family in 2006.

2006-10-16T19:13:00.000-07:00

AVOIDING DEBT

With the Christmas season approaching rapidly (it will be here before you know it) I feel compelled to write about avoiding debt. We just hit 270 days without using a credit card of any kind. We are beginning to feel confident that we can live without them. Luckily, we have not had a large visit from Murphy yet to deplete our emergency fund, which we haven't touched since August 28th. These are major milestones for our family. I have been in debt since I was 19 years old and I want to be debt free by age 40 and never have debt again. Our marriage has consisted of over ten debt filled years and I am sick of it (the debt, not the marriage.)

I am going to set some debt freedom goals and I will post those goals here, if for nothing more than accountability or inspiration to whoever may read this blog. Ordinary people can become debt free with some focused intensity.

This Christmas is shaping up to be the first Christmas of our married life where our debt will not increase as a result of gift overbuying. We are really doing a good job exercising discipline with our kids and our friends kids. Everybody just has too much stuff. I am really starting to feel weird
which is good because normal in America is broke and in debt. Weird is debt free with financial peace.

If we can make it through the Christmas season with no additional debt and pay cash for every gift, we will be ahead of the game for the first time in a decade.

Our 2007 financial goals are:

Pay off an additional $16,000 in debt during the year. (We are at $15,000 + year to date right now.)
Save an additional $2,500 towards emergency fund. (Right now it is $1,000.)
Take a vacation in the summer that we can afford and pay cash for it.

Using Dave Ramsey's philosophy, our family has seen a $17,500 turnaround in our financial situation (Savings + Debt Payoff combined) in 2006 and we hope to continue the discipline into 2007. We are living like no one else so that later we can live like no one else.

Here's hoping your Christmas season is a credit card free one and that Financial Peace is right around the corner, as we feel it is for us.

2006-09-27T07:08:00.000-07:00

Max got his first haircut today. The before picture is below while the after picture is to the right. He was very good during the process, and as you can see by the before picture, we had let things get out of hand. I am glad we were able to get it under control. Now he can get a job to help us beat some of this debt.

2006-09-20T12:42:00.000-07:00

Halloween Blows!!

I can't stand Halloween. I don't like the holiday at all because:

I don't like to purchase a costume for kids that they will only wear once and not remember three weeks later
I don't like the idea of begging for candy
Why not beg for candy all year long instead of October

I want to create a holiday where we can beg for meat. You go to someones door and you say "Trick or Meat" and you get a hamburger or a piece of steak or something. I realize this is frought with perversion at the chance of seeing someones actual "meat"(euphemism for penis). But you must take the good with the bad. You will get a lot of meat and look at very few penises and you won't remember either three weeks later.

If you insist on going trick or treating, dress as this guy:

2006-09-20T12:32:00.000-07:00

Rubber Band Ball Update!!!

Here are the latest pictures of the rubber band ball. It has gotten out of control. Mr Incredible is no match for the ball. More pics to come.

2006-09-17T17:37:00.000-07:00

Guinness World Record attempt here at F and M!!!

We are attempting to break the record for a rubber band ball. The record is 3,120 pounds. It was either that or have my wife break the record for longest beard for a woman. She declined that so we will try the two ton rubber band ball. Sounds impossible huh, well lets wait and see. Here are two pictures of our progress so far. The first picture is where we are currently. The second picture is the bouncy ball we started with.

2006-09-06T09:37:00.000-07:00

Opened A New Credit Card Today!!!

A few weeks ago before school started, my wife and I had saved up $100 in a clothing envelope for back to school clothes for my kids. I had my lovely wife check to see which of the kids needed what and she said Max, my youngest was fine, but Mickey would need some clothes. So we set out to buy school clothes. We got everything we needed and then ran out of money, but that is how this is supposed to work. Two weeks later, my wife "discovered" that Max would need some clothes, but of course, no money in the clothing fund.
We have also been saving for tires in a tire fund, and I pulled some money from that fund to pay for clothes for Max. Off we went to the consignment store to look for clothing. My wife found a deal at Sears for some incredible deals. We got two outfits for twenty one dollars and 30 cents. We got to the register and the woman told us that we could get $15 dollars off our purchase if we opened a Sears card today. I signed up for it and had a balance of $6.30 and paid that immediately at the counter. The card will come and we will close the account and cut it up.
I can't believe I found a positive use for a credit card. I wouldn't have tried this had I not become disciplined to never use credit again, but it felt great to get two outfits for $6.30. Credit cards reek.

2006-09-04T19:25:00.000-07:00

There have been complaints because I haven't put a picture of myself on the blog as of yet. Here it is. I'm the one in the middle with the cheap rug.

2006-08-29T12:45:00.000-07:00

Today was Mickey's first day of first grade. This was his first experience going to school all day. He did a fantastic job and we celebrated with dinner out at the establishment of his choice.

2006-08-22T16:03:00.000-07:00

This is a result of our most recent camping trip. We went camping in Pennsylvania and saw a litter of black labs and ended up with this one. I was the one who said I would never get a dog but here he is. His name is Scrappy and he's a pretty good dog but he whines a lot at night. Hopefully that is very shortlived. The black labs have a very good reputation for behavior so I am confident that he will be a good addition to the family. Here are the two kids as well.

2006-08-16T16:12:00.000-07:00

ACT YOUR WAGE!!

This entry deals with learning to discipline yourself to make wise purchases that you can afford. One of the toughest things for me when I was charging like a crazy man was my inability to tell my wife and children "no" when they wanted something. The phrase "I can't afford it" was not a regular part of my vocabulary. Well I have come a long way towards learning how to act my wage. I don't make purchases I can't afford anymore. I really put thought into making purchases and I try to make do with what I have.

I recently just got the "I need an IPOD" bug. You know the feeling that you get when you feel like you must have an item. Well I found an old mp3 player that I had purchased four years ago and I sat down for an hour and figured out how to load it again and voila no IPOD needed. Now I am listening to Dave Ramsey on podcast every day on the way to work.

The lesson I learned is that if you will make do with what you already have, you will never miss what you don't have. As Dave says, if you will live like no one else, later you can live like no one else.

2006-08-04T17:49:00.000-07:00

My Wife's Furry Light Brown Carpet

Dave Ramsey always talks about never paying retail and always buying only big, big bargains. My wife and I thought we would put that to the test last week when purchasing a carpet remnant for the basement. After reading Dave's chapter on negotiationing the best price. I felt armed and ready to do a win-win negotiation with the folks at the carpet store.

We went to the carpet store with a certain dollar figure in mind to pay for the remnant and I planned to "flash the cash" as Dave says and get the best deal possible.
As we happened upon the style and color we wanted, I began to think about the retail price and how much below that price I thought the store may be willing to go. I made my offer with a fist full of $20s and it was accepted!! I couldn't believe it!!

My first try was successful. I can't wait to try and purchase everything this way. I tend to get carried away with something when I like to do it. I go at it full bore. My father always had a saying "Go at it all ass or no ass at all, not half assed." I will surely go at my purchases all ass now and try to negotiate everything. My next attempt at this will be for a Futon for the basement. I am going to try to get that thing at a discount. I can't wait to save the money for my tires and negotiate a better deal on those too. One day, an automobile with $100 bills on the car hood counted out very slowly and methodically for effect. Man that sounds fun.

By the way, day 197 without charging and no desire to charge. My wife is even saying things like "Let's start a furniture envelope and an envelope for a deck around the pool." Man is that exciting. Debt freedom is going to be fantastic.

2006-07-26T19:21:00.000-07:00

MONOPOLY

The famous family game is going plastic. Monopoly Money Traded for Debit Cards
A new version of the famous board game will swap paper money for an electronic banking system. Is it blasphemy?

Board game giant Hasbro is giving one of their most popular games, Monopoly, a distinctly modern makeover by swapping out its trademark multi-colored paper money for debit cards. The new electronic banking version of the game (pictured here), which is as-yet only slated for release in the U.K., features plastic Visa cards that are swiped through a device to keep track of a player's funds. "The new electronic Monopoly reflects the changing nature of society and the advancement of technology," spokesman Chris Weatherhead told Sky News. We can't help but wonder what's next. Will the Monopoly Man's dandyish attire be swapped out for designer threads, or for a millionaire in a double-breasted suit with a horrible comb-over?

This is outrageous!! The kids of today are going to be taught that it is okay to put things on plastic. You spend 12 to 18% more when you buy with plastic. My family will stick to the old fashioned version.

2006-07-17T19:19:00.000-07:00

Getting Out Of Debt

Well today July 17th is day 180 without using a credit card. I hope to never use one again, as you know from reading previous posts. Six months is somewhat of a milestone for us because we were in the habit of charging everything, so such a radical behavioral change has been fantastic.

We had 21 total debts on January 1st, 2006 and by using the debt snowball plan that Dave Ramsey talks about, we have paid off 12 bills in full and over $10,000 in debt so far. We are finally getting the hang of the budget and living by spending only cash.

Perhaps equally as important, we have managed to double the baby emergency fund of $1000 that Dave tells us to get. We will be dipping into that to get our basement back in shape after some recent flooding, but that is something that we would have charged on credit cards just one year ago.

We have also been able to increase our giving at church and that is a very important part of this process. We are not yet at ten percent, but we will be one day, and hopefully more than that.

I have actually had people start referring to me as weird for not using credit or debit cards, and I like that I am weird, because as Dave says, broke is normal why be normal. I also have some inspiration to pull from. I work with a couple of folks that are debt free and they have become role models so to speak in my journey. I consider it very important for people who are looking to become debt free to tell everyone they can so they can find some inspiration to help them along the way.

I will be debt free one day and I will stay debt free with a six month emergency fund in cash to fall back on should anything happen. I hope everyone in debt reads this and understands what debt is doing to us as a country and individuals everyday. It is ruining us.

2006-07-14T19:36:00.000-07:00

A DEBT FREE LIFE

A life free of debt is what I dream of.
A savings account larger than three months expenses.
Purchases made every day with cash.
Don't use borrowed money for anything.
Giving until folks problems are solved.
Able to do whatever I want regardless of what it costs.
Retire with dignity.
Join Financial Peace University at a church near you. Your life will become all of these things if you want it to.....In the house of the wise are stores of choice food and oil, but a foolish man devours all he has. -Proverbs 21:20

2006-07-08T17:05:00.000-07:00

The Buck Stops Here

Thursday I got a chance to accomplish something that I had never even attempted before. I changed the brakes and rotors on my 1999 Pontiac Montana. I am sick of making mechanics wealthy by paying them to do things that I can do myself with a little extra effort and some reading. I taught myself to change my own oil two years ago for a savings of $480 over that span of time. I can change the oil for about $11 per vehicle, and I love doing it.

I had certain family members worried about my ability to do this. They were probably reminiscing to my days as a Toys R Us employee when I would build bikes and have a couple of handfuls of "extra parts" to give the customer when I was done assembling their bikes. This resulted in my "promotion" to truck unloader and I was told to take the laissez faire approach to bike assembling. All of that aside, I was able to finish the brakes once my new friend DW showed up with a breaker bar. DW is a mechanic at the local Buick dealership in town and he does not mess around. Once he showed up, we were done in 45 minutes.

I am going to learn how to do most of the repairs on both of my vehicles so I can save money. Net savings on the brake and rotor job: $70.

2006-07-05T19:25:00.000-07:00

DEBT LOVERS BEWARE

I had a conversation recently with someone who mentioned a love of credit cards because of all the "rewards." Make no mistake about my feelings on this subject. ALL DEBT IS BAD!!! These companies are in the business of making money. I want no one to use a credit card ever again. My goal is to see America debt free by 2050 so we can begin to fund the end times. When Jesus Christ comes back and asks us to cash out, I would like to be able to do it without a negative balance.

There is a reason why God mentions money over 2000 times in the Bible. That is 4 times as often as He mentions anything else. He knew we were going to struggle with money for our entire existence. The borrower is slave to the lender. I want to be debt free so that I can serve Christ and help spread His good works and so I can live more comfortably and worry free for the rest of my life.

Remember, all we have is His. We are stewards of his money. Shouldn't the question be: How much of the Lord's money are we going to keep?

2006-07-04T05:07:00.000-07:00

Keeping His Balance

Well, my son Mickey was finally able to do it. After trying all last summer and this spring, he was finally able to learn to ride his bike without training wheels yesterday. We went out at about 9:45 am and by 10:30, he was riding 20 yards at a time without having the need for me to hold on to his bike. I had even called one of his friends from kindergarten who does ride to come and provide some inspiration, but by the time his friend showed up, he was already doing it by himself.

Learning to ride the bike is one of those milestone events that every child must go through. For the child, it means they are becoming a little more independent. For the parent, it means I'm yet a little closer to losing my little boy. With each day that passes, he is getting older and more independent. Here are some pictures of his first solo ride.

2006-06-18T04:27:00.000-07:00

Garage Sale Day Two

Never in my wildest dreams did I think that so many people would want so much of our crap. We had a great day again today. The neighborhood has really benefitted from the transfer of our stuff to their houses, but more importantly, we have benefitted from separating the neighbors from their cash. I have to bring a few things back inside the house today, and I will get to donate a few things to Browning Ferris Industries, so I consider the sale a success.

The christmas stuff was a dud. I couldn't get anyone to think about Christmas in June. Perhaps my son standing around with wet swimming trunks on and a towel around his shoulder had something to do with it.
He didn't have a problem thinking about Christmas. As a a matter of fact, we talked about it at his tee ball game. My standard response is always "lets get through the summer and then we can start thinking about Christmas."

If you are ever totally mad about being in debt or if you just want to make your 1100 sq. ft. seem a little bigger, have a garage sale. You will get rid of a surprising amount of things and make a little cash as well. But stay out of debt and use the cash to buy what you want. I would like to see all of America debt free by 2050.

2006-06-17T04:01:00.000-07:00

My Vacation

I have been on vacation from work for a week now. I have done more work on my vacation than I ever do at my real job. We have culminated my vacation with a get out of debt garage sale.

Lowe's department store and purveyor of household goods is to get the first $153.89 of our profits from selling our crap to others. I will then be done with Lowe's credit card forever. I don't dislike the folks at Lowe's, but I will deal with them on a cash only basis from now on.

We made $253 our first day and day two is this morning right after I am done typing this note. Today's theme is Christmas in July as relatives have brought over some 25 or 30 year old Christmas decorations to be sold. I will dress as Santa (oops typo on that becomes Satan,) and sit out among the merchandise as the ninety degree heat begins to warp my already twisted brain.

But thats ok because we will pay off Lowe's monday morning and profit from the rest. We take our finances month to month and will have to do so for a while longer until we get some elbow room in our monthly budget. 150 days without using a credit card and I think we have formed some new habits. I would still like to tighten up more though. Do we really need toilet paper? The pilgrims just used leaves. One day I would like to use dollars. Bills, not three quarters, two dimes and a nickel. Happy Father's Day

2006-06-07T19:13:00.000-07:00

The Child Prodigy

My son Mickey is six years old and is very astute for his age. He has an understanding of the household finances, the grocery list and what can be purchased at which stores, and a grasp on how much money it takes to buy various big ticket items such as electric trains and Power Rangers playsets.

That said, he asked me to teach him how to play chess about six months ago. It was rough getting him to remember which piece could move in which direction for the first couple of months. It was fun to play against him and spank him while talking smack. I got to try new strategies and ways of getting him to lose his queen early in the game and then I could move in for the kill.

He started to read chess strategy on the internet ( I forgot to mention that he taught himself to read at the age of 3) and play practice games and he got progressively better as the days went by. He started to get tougher and tougher to beat and I would find my smack talking would decrease dramatically.

Recently though, he stepped it up a notch and reached down deep to find something and he is now beating me half of the times that we play. This kid is going to be a very special boy one day, I believe world changing special when he grows up. I will be able to look back proudly on instances like this and smile.

2006-05-21T16:28:00.000-07:00

FAMILY GUY

Tonight is the season finale of the Family Guy on Fox. This is the greatest show on TV. The best part of watching tonight's show is that I get paid to watch it because I am at work. This show is relatively crass and irreverent, but I appreciate it for what it is, an escape from reality.

For those of you who have never seen it, I will describe it and some of the main characters in the show. First of all, it is animated, so it is totally fictional. It was created by Seth MacFarlane, who does a large amount of the voices. He was scheduled to be on one of the planes that hit the World Trade Center, but he was hung over and missed the flight, so the story goes.

The show is based on a family in Quahog, R.I. named the Griffins. Peter is the father, he has a wife named Lois (who is pretty hot for a cartoon woman) and three kids named Chris, Meg and Stewie. Stewie is a baby with an English accent and a great vocabulary. The Griffins have a dog named Brian and he talks and drinks and smokes too.

The show creators do a great job of personifying Brian and making the viewers forget that he is a dog. He went to Los Angeles on one episode to become a director of porn movies. On another episode, he tried to enroll at an Ivy League college and get his degree.

Every once in a while, the show will have him do something that normal dogs do like drag his ass on a carpet, or he will be unable to stand in the back of a van. The genius of this show is great.

Well the season finale is about to start and I don't want to miss it, so until next time, enjoy Family Guy.

2006-05-03T16:22:00.000-07:00

The Suckitude of Debt!!!

I am going to be debt free within 12-18 months and I am determined to do this. I have cancelled my Home Depot credit card effective December 30th 2005 and put it in a Debt Management Program because I charged everything on it, including a seven dollar toilet seat a year or so ago. I was out of control with charging things, and I just got sick of it.

An example of Home Depot's greed. I received a preapproved credit card offer from them today. You know, one of those offers that we all receive from credit card companies saying we can use their money instead of ours. I can barely pay back the $1600 or so I charged over a nine year span and these bastards are ready to give me more money.

Home Depot is not alone in their greed. I receive three to six offers a week from credit card companies, and this is after I blew a 618 credit score because of being so deep in debt. These companies are trying to capitalize on the fact that I have stuff-itis and I am not going to let them capitalize on that. I am going to be debt free one day soon and then I will pay cash only for all purchases. So bring it on credit card companies, but my goal is to put you folks out of business, at least at my house.

107 days since using credit cards and going for permanently. Next milestone 180 days.

2006-05-03T08:03:00.000-07:00

Opening Day of Teeball Season

This weekend was the lidlifter of my son Mickey's fifteen game teeball season. The day started off with a parade through the streets of Howland by all the teams in the league. The kids got to throw candy to onlookers as they marched along the mile and a half parade route. All the athletes were in full league regalia and seemed ready to start the season.

Of course, the league is for five and six year olds, so the games are rather unpredictable. Well, I should say the kids behavior during the games is unpredictable. Most of the assistant coaches time is spent handling beverage requests for the players and making sure that no one takes a ball "off the grill or dome" during the two inning conquest.
This league is instructional which means no outs are recorded and no runs count. The kids hit the ball and run station to station until eleven have batted, and the twelfth gets to clear the bases with his or her hit.
My son appears to be having fun and always wants to go to every game, which is a good sign. Later, he may sour on baseball if he gets a bad coach or has a bad experience. I hope not.

Little league blew ass for me. My coach had a heart attack one game and even accused me of not having enough talent to haul in a can of corn at the age of ten. He told one of the kids at a practice that on the night of his conception, his father would have been better off to masturbate rather than conclude the act of coitus with his wife. This coach eventually died of a heart attack in his forties, and I am still a baseball fan, so no harm done to me. I hope my sons just get to enjoy sports growing up without having to worry about any of that kind of stuff.

And then let them grow up and find a job that is even easier and less work than mine so that they can live a better life than me.

2006-04-26T12:51:00.000-07:00

Best Indians Logo ever!!!

2006-04-22T05:00:00.000-07:00

The Difference Between Two Boys

The other day my two year old called me Chris. Many times he heard my wife call me by my first name and he decided the time was right to give it a whirl. This is my second child, so I didn't let it bother me like I might have were it my older son.

Of course, my older son never called me by my first name. As a matter of fact, my older son never did anything even remotely mischevious. He lulled my wife and I into a feeling of expertise, like we had mastered parenting and could do no wrong. So we decided to have a second child.

Then we discovered the difference between two boys. My younger son, Max, is a lot like I was as a child. He is daring and ballsy and fears very little. He reminds me of the days when I was a child and I would refer to my mother as "your old lady" to my father, or when I dared young Mike Coe to pet a 200 pound saint bernard, and then watched in delight as the dog threw him around the yard like a rag doll for fifteen minutes.

I have a feeling that I will be at school quite a bit with Max as he grows older explaining the difference between him and his older brother to teacher after teacher. I'm ok with that as long as he turns out as spectacular as I did. There is only one thing I secretly hope he does. I secretly hope that he bareass farts on his brothers face as I did to my older sister. I still think that is one of my greatest accomplishments as a child and I will be proud of that for many years.
Insane!!!

2006-04-20T04:46:00.000-07:00

WHAT IS WITH THE INDIANS!!!!

How could a team score 15 runs one night and then give up 18 the next? I don't expect the pitching to be as good as last year, that was a miracle, but they still are supposed to contend for the division title this year. Westbrook has been solid ever since the outing in 2004 when he threw seven perfect innings of relief.

I hope these guys can become more consistent and go on a long winning streak. Go tribe!!!

2006-04-18T19:11:00.000-07:00

Mickey's Baseball Schedule

My son Mickey had his teeball schedule released today. He is a member of the Detroit Tiger baseball club. His schedule follows:

April 29 1:45pm
May 1 6:00pm
May 6 10:00am
May 8 6:00pm
May 13 10:00am
May 20 11:45am
June 5 6:00pm
June 7 5:30pm
June 10 11:45am
June 15 7:00pm
June 16 7:00pm
June 17 1:30pm
June 24 1:30pm
June 29 7:00pm
June 30 5:30pm

All times are Eastern and games will be played at Mines Field in Howland.

2006-04-16T18:28:00.000-07:00

EASTER SUNDAY

Easter Sunday. The celebration of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Churches full of "holiday christians," those folks who are only seen on all the major holidays. It was nice to see our church so well attended today. I would like to see that kind of devotion year round.

My son announced yesterday that if he could correctly guess where his Easter basket would be hidden, I had to give him $50. Needless to say, he still only has $9.30 in his piggy bank.

Getting together with family is one of the best things about the holidays. I enjoy eating a meal and sitting down with family members to socialize. Then I leave for work and they have fun for the rest of the evening.

I realize during my hour drive to work that I work too much and miss too much fun with my kids. I have to work to pay down my debt (reference my earlier blog on finances.) One of these days I hope to be debt free so I can work wherever I want and spend some more time with my family. My job is so boring I can't find enough to read or write, and I have mastered every Gameboy game I have. Well time to do one hour of work and go home.

2006-03-31T15:52:00.000-08:00

2006-03-31T12:42:00.000-08:00

Olive Garden

Had lunch at Olive Garden today. All the soup and salad and breadsticks one can eat for $5.95. I set my goal at a buck a bowl which meant I had to eat six bowls. Well I fell short but I still gave it to the man in a couple of different ways. First I went to Giant Eagle and bought a gift card for Olive Garden, which saves me money on gasoline. Then i went to Olive Garden and my wife and I ate soup for seventy five cents a bowl. What a fantastic lunch. The gift card has enough left on it to do this again and I love the soup I tried. It was some sort of potato with vegetables and it is my new favorite. When I remember what it was called, I will post it here.

2006-03-21T19:37:00.000-08:00

Contentment

What a magnificent word contentment is. More importantly, what a magnificent feeling contentment is. Contentment is different for every man,
woman, and child on the face of the earth. My six year old son has an idea of contentment that involves me being off work for extended periods of time and him putting 3 episodes of Power Rangers a day into our DVR. My two year old son is content watching Elmo and writing the letter W on his Magna Doodle.

My idea of contentment is to just be happy with what the Lord has provided to me. This is sometimes a hard concept to grasp because it requires a realization that I have been blessed. I was disappointed a couple of weeks ago because I couldn't afford the eight pound box of cheesesticks at Sam's Club and I began to feel sorry for myself and my idea to buy everything with cash only. I arrived home from the store and as I was loading my second refrigerator with food, I came to the realization that mozzerella sticks or no, I was truly blessed.

A fine line exists between contentment and settling. To find out the difference will make me very successful in all that I do.

2006-03-11T19:03:00.000-08:00

Happy Birthday Max!!

2006-03-11T18:53:00.000-08:00

Birthday parties

Today was the 2nd birthday party for my son Max. We started out the day by getting his two year old pictures taken and he behaved phenonemenally. He took twelve poses and was in and out of JcPenney(free plug) in twenty five minutes.

Birthdays for the kids are always a great time. They remind me of how quickly time is flying by, but they are also a reminder of how lucky we are as families blessed with children. The entire family gets together and eats and socializes (which is my favorite part of the day) and then the child opens gifts and receives more things that we can't find a space for in our 1100 sq. ft. home.

Birthdays are a big deal at our house and I usually take a three day weekend around the kids' birthdays. I usually do something really special with the birthday boy the night before the party so that it is his special day. My children are really treated well by their grandparents and even my older son received three gifts today even though it wasn't his birthday. The next child birthday party will be in December, so I have some time to recover and plan that one, although I am already receiving advice on what type of party to have, so I will be ready for whatever comes.

2006-03-09T09:00:00.000-08:00

Spring Training

The best time of year for a baseball fan. This launches eight months of nightly guaranteed entertainment. Baseball is always there for you. Turn on your radio from early April until October and you will hear a game almost every night.
At this time of year I make my annual predictions as to what will transpire over the next eight months, so here goes.

The Indians will win 85-90 games and win the Central Division
The White Sox will be in it till the end but injuries will deplete their roster
The Indians will lose Aaron Boone to an injury the first week of the season and it will end his season, thrusting Andy Marte into a starting role with the Tribe

Now for the team leaders:

Homers Travis Hafner 44
RBI Hafner 125
Average Peralta .330
Wins Cliff Lee 22
ERA Sabathia 3.57

Here's hoping that the team clicks on all cylinders to make 2006 a playoff year.

2006-03-09T08:43:00.000-08:00

My Family

2006-03-08T19:13:00.000-08:00

I am currently working on a program to get out of debt. I had my "I've had it moment" in early January 2006 when I realized that I was out of control debt wise. We had a family funeral in Chicago and had to charge the entire trip and I decided that I was done using other peoples money to pay my expenses. We have cut up all credit cards and closed all accounts and at this posting we have gone 51 days without using credit.

We decided to start living on a strict budget and start paying cash for everything. We are living out of envelopes and giving every dollar a particular assignment for the month. Every dollar has a name and we are strict about sticking to it. This takes some forethought and some planning, but if I spend 160 hours a month working, I can certainly spend one hour a month telling my money how to behave. Living on a budget has been very worthwhile.

The most important step to a successful budget is to learn the concept of satisfaction. If you can be satisfied with what you have and can get, then you will be able to make this work. The plan we are using was thought of by Dave Ramsey. He is a radio host who has been broke and is now wealthy and helping others get there too. His plan utilizes seven steps he calls "baby steps." They are as follows:

Save $1000 dollars as a mini emergency fund
Pay down debts in order of lowest balance to highest balance
Establish an actual emergency fund of 3 to 6 months expenses
Invest 15% of all household income into Roth IRAs and pre tax retirement funds
College funding for children
Pay off house early
Build wealth and give!!

Before starting the baby steps it is very important to get on a monthly budget. Without a budget, you will likely keep utilizing the same bad habits that got you into debt in the first place. It is also very important to stop using credit cards and to stop borrowing money. You can build expenses into your budget that will prevent things from being emergencies that aren't really emergencies, like our aforementioned funeral in Chicago.

The most important step in the baby steps is the $1000 emergency fund. Having this fund will stop you from having to use credit for when real emergencies arrive. Determining what a real emergency is will be difficult at first, but should get easier as you go.

The inspiration to do this comes from thousands of other Americans who have done this very thing. They have chosen to stop using other peoples money and live on less than they make. I tell anyone who will listen what I am doing because I think verbalizing it lends to accountability which is very important when trying to radically change habits which are in some cases three decades ingrained. I also hope for prayers by telling people because ultimately your path will be cleared by the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Dave Ramsey's famous quote is "Live like no noone else so that later you can live like no one else." This is a great sentence to carry around in your wallet or to memorize and remind yourself that only through discipline will change occur. If you keep doing the same things you have been doing you will keep getting the same results. I chose to change my habits and change the course of my family's financial future. I hope to be the last of the Moriarty's that has to struggle financially through debt.

2006-03-08T16:12:00.000-08:00

Watching Seinfeld at work is one of my favorite things to do. I work at a television station, therefore I am paid to frequently watch tv. Of course, we in the business refer to it as monitoring the off air signal for quality control purposes. When I was a child, my parents would get me away from the television by telling me that no one ever made money watching television all day. So I am watching Seinfeld and getting paid to do it.

Work to me is just a portion of your day that takes you from that which really matters, which is your family. Sure it's a great way to make money to pay the bills and get the things we want or need, but if not for bills and wants or needs, I could occupy my time with other worthwhile ventures. Don't get me wrong, I am a very lucky man. I have a wife who I absolutely adore and two great kids and we want for very little, except for more of my time.

That said, it is great to have a job that I love and that really comes easy to me. I have known since I was 8 years old that I would be working in the media. I had a little Nylint live production truck that I would set up in front of the television set and "televise" Monday Night Football. Of course, after the first quarter was over, the miniature plastic crew was responsible for supervising themselves because I had to go to bed. On nights when I was unable to "con"vince my father to let me stay up until 9:45, I would go to bed to the smooth voice of Herb Score and Paul Olden as they relayed the events of the latest Cleveland Indians game to me through a small transistor radio. I knew then that somehow I would be involved in the media.

I listened to a lot of baseball between 1978 and 1993 and subsequently graduated from college and acquired an internship at a local tv station in a small market. It was then that I fell in love with the business. I knew that I wanted to work in telivision for the rest of my life. I have heard it said that if you find a job you love, you will never work a day in your life. That has been true for me to this point, and that lessens the disappointment of being away from my family for eight hours everyday. I thank the good Lord everyday for that blessing

My First Blog Experience

2006-03-08T12:33:00.000-08:00

Well this is my first experience writing a blog, and they should get better as I go along blogging. I am going to try to get the people to understand the world as I see it and maybe give some folks a better outlook on their situation. More blogs to follow but I was just summoned to start a Chipotle run. I will explain the intricacies of this later, but suffice to say it is the most important part of the day. I am in charge of feeding the four people at my house as well as the twenty people I work with nightly. That means I run to Chipotle and pick up burritos for everybody once in a while.

As I mentioned, I am a cog in a four member family engine. I have a lovely wife Michelle and two boys, Mickey who is 6 and Max who is 2. These boys are entirely different from one another, which only surprises me as everyone I mention this to replies "Well of course." I am very into being a Dad in a society where a lot of men are not into being fathers. Fatherhood is not a chore for me but a blessing and I embrace it happily and joyfully. I think that the most important gift one can give a child is their time. Be there when they need you and stay away when they don't. My father grasped this concept exceptionally well as he was raising me and I hope to keep the trend going with my two boys.

For me, that means bringing them up in a Christ centered environment. It is here where I think a foundation for good behavior, good discipline and good habits are born.