New Job

I start working at that other bar tomorrow night! Whoo hooo!

This seriously makes me feel better. Much better.

Now, I don't know how much I will make in tips (only time will tell that) so I really can't project any budgets, but since I have all the August bills covered this will give me a whole month to save every penny I make so I will know how much money I will have in September for the bills.

I do know that I will be making $7.25 an hour, which is the highest hourly wage for a server in this town. So, even if tips are not as much, I am getting paid a bit more. Every bit helps, yes?

I do not have an actual schedule this week. The owner has her schedules set out 2 weeks in advance. Even so, she told me to come in Friday to bartend and next week she will give me my schedule for the following week. So I still have basically another week without pay, but that is ok. I do have the buffer in my account so I should be alright.

While talking to the owner, she told me that her business is a little slow right now (summertime is usually slow for most bars) and that I probably wouldn't make as much as I was making at my last bar. She was trying to be as honest as possible with me, which I appreciate very much. Of course, I have already talked to pretty much all of my regular customers telling them that I am starting at the new place tomorrow night and they have all decided that tomorrow night they are going to the new place to have a "New Job" party for me - in which I get to serve them drinks and they get to give me money. Oh, my regulars make me laugh so much.

They make me laugh and they make my eyes fill with tears of gratitude. I don't expect any of them to leave the old bar to become regulars at a new bar - people are kinda funny about their drinking establishments. But the fact that they have decided to come in on my first night really means a lot to me.

Hopefully, they will like the new place enough to come in every once in a while. (Perferably when I am working) It certainly can not hurt if people come in because I am working there. Besides, more business tends to create more business.

So, it would be safe to say that my spirits are up, even if there are some unknowns. Just knowing that people are there for me has really shown me how fortunate I truly am.


Also, I got a phone call yesterday afternoon from the Housing Division on post. A Soldier wanted to look at my house (it is being listed for rent) and asked if I could meet them there in 30 minutes. Of course I could, and did. The Soldier told me that he really liked the house and the housing manager told the Soldier that she thought my house was "the one" and then they stated that they were going to go to the rental management company listing the house to see about renting it.

The house will be available on the 1st (still have a couple more things to get done in the house) and hopefully it will be rented before then! But at the very least, hearing someone say that they really liked my house and that it was really cute did make me feel pretty good. For whatever reasons, I have a really big emotional tie to that property. It is like an extension of myself so hearing that was like someone complimenting me.

So here says the wonderful boyfriend, "I TOLD YOU EVERYTHING WOULD BE OK!"

Debt Effects...

The last two nights I have basically cried myself to sleep. My dear sweet boyfriend holds me and doesn't say much, because there really isn't much he can say. Of course he has told me that things will be alright; that we will make it through this; that for every door that closes another one opens.



And truthfully, although he is saying all the right things, I really don't even want to hear them.



I want to cry. I want to feel the pain that I am feeling. I want this pain to motivate me even more to get my financial life in order.



But then I want to feel sorry for myself. Or at least be angry. I am not a bad person, I say. I went to work like I was supposed to. I did my job. I finally got a decent budget in order and had a buffer in my checking account and I was paying down my debts! I had finally gotten to a place where I thought things were going to be in some sense of order! I even finally got my GI Bill money deposited into my account and with that and the money that I would have made my last 4 working shifts this month I was going to be able to not only pay my tuition with CASH, but I was actually going to be able to pay OFF Capital One and still have a couple hundred dollars to pay towards the next debt!

My plan has gone to crap!

I wake up in the morning and I have nothing to do. Of course, I have things I can do, but I have nothing that is pressing. Classes are out until the middle of August. The kids are at their fathers until the middle of August. There is only so much laundry a person can do and I can only dust and vaccum so much until there is no point anymore.

We have an eliptical machine (well, it is his) that he has moved into the living room for me so I can catch up on some exercise. More like just trying to give me an outlet of something to do.

I have never felt this way before. It is hard to describe. I have been broke before. I have lived work shift to work shift before. But I always had a job. Since the day I turned 16 I have had a job. This is a very odd feeling for me.

He kisses me on the forehead and tells me, once again, that it is going to be alright. We aren't going to starve. We aren't going to be homeless. Which is true and I am very fortunate for that.

It could be worse. I have to tell myself that it could be worse. But today, in my world, it feels about almost as bad as I can stand it right it.

I think I am going to watch the Pursuit of Happyness. Because that movie just seems to be uplifting and I think I need that right now.

Job Interview

I have a job interview tomorrow night at another bar in town. It is a decent place, although the customer traffic is no where near what my previous bar has. The upside is that the hourly wage is a lot more than what I received at the last bar, so it may work itself out.

There is another place in town that has pretty decent buisness until about the end of November (they have a huge patio) but after that it kinda dies out because it is just too cold to hang out outside. But, if it doesn't work out at this first place, I will go talk to the other place.

I hope it all works out. I really do need income.

Worse than I thought....

About a year and a half ago, the police came into the bar undercover with an underage person with them. I ended up getting a ticket for serving a minor. Which really sucked, because one, I don't normally serve underage kids; two, I practically ALWAYS check ID's (they caught me on one of the few times I didn't check); and three - I didn't even drink until I was 21 so everyone else should have to wait too!

So, I went to court and I paid my $360 fine and thought that was the end of it.

This past May, I renewed my liquor liscense, and since there was no issue in doing that, I really thought the ticket was behind me.

Well, here I go on Friday, walking into work. My boss wants to talk to me. Seems the Alcohol commission in my state is trying to shut her bar down because the bar has gotten 4 tickets in 2 years. (One of those tickets was not for underage drinking but for some other reason). I am the only person still working there that has received a ticket. My boss's lawyer thinks it will be easier for him to fight the suit if I don't work at the bar anymore.

END RESULT: I NO LONGER HAVE A JOB. FOR SOMETHING THAT HAPPENED A YEAR AND A HALF AGO. FOR SOMETHING I ALREADY PAID A FINE FOR.

I am more than distraught right now. I really have no idea what I am going to do. This totally stinks. After close to two and half years working for this place, this is what happens. Great.

Stagnant

I feel like things have just gone stagnant.

I am still waiting on my GI Bill money from the VA. Urgh.

I did manage to get the Cheerleading uniforms paid (everything except the warm-ups which we don't need until October) and the remaining of my dental work got split into two different appointments, so I am able to stall having to pay the full amount right now (only having to pay for one of the procedures instead of both yesterday) and the procedure I had done yesterday actually ended up costing less than originally thought, which does help with the money.

But without this GI Bill money, I am really just hanging on by a thread.

I have to average $150 a night for the rest of the shifts I work to cover all the bills in August if I don't get the GI Bill in time. So no extra debt payments projected at the current moment.

Plus, I still have to pay tuition for this summer, and without the GI Bill being deposited, I don't know how I am going to pay that. (I am still waiting for the rest of May and full June payments)

Hopefully the GI Bill money will be deposited soon!

Still waiting...

I am still waiting for my GI Bill payments. My paperwork is showing being processed. Oh, I really can't wait to get the payment, though! Luckily, I had enough enough money to pay all the bills this month and I still have close to $800 in my checking account buffer, but I would feel much better having the rest of my money! Mainly because I do still need to pay $900 towards tuition and I have to go back to the dentist later in this month and I need that money in order to do those things!

In other financial news, I got a letter from HSBC today saying that they have lowered my credit limit from $2,000 to $300. I already paid off that debt, so the amount they have for me doesn't really matter. What does matter is that this will impact my credit score which can potential impact the interest rates my other debts will charge me! I guess when you pay your bills on time every month, you are the one that gets screwed. I mean, I know I owe quite a bit of money, but I am paying it back and I have never missed a payment. I am a bit perturbed about this. Chase lowered my credit limit by close to $800 last month, so it looks like this could be a domino effect. I really just hope the Providian/WaMu/now Chase card doesn't lower the limit since I am so close to the limit as it is. I may really have to look into putting the smaller cards on hold while I concentrate on the largest balance just so I don't get the limit lowered and owe more than the limit and then get stuck with all the fees and the inability to ever get out of that mess.

I will be so happy when I am out of credit card debt. I have no desire to ever use a credit card again after all of this mess. Just goes to show, everything you need to learn you did learn in Kindergarten - "The good suffer for the bad". I may not have been pristine, but I have always made my payments on time, have always paid my mortgage, car loans, utilities - everything - on time. It really stinks that after getting bailed out by the taxpayer, these companies are screwing the very people who bailed them out. Perhaps we should have just let them fail.