What would you do with $400?

For 1 ½ years now, I’ve been moonlighting on weekends at my community’s cab company where I typically pull morning shifts as a phone operator – setting up cabs for my community’s church-goers, the people who found themselves in strange situations after bar time, travelers who come to my town to access the Mayo Clinic and my home’s wide variety of humanity that range from elderly and sweet, young and impatient, some folks who don’t speak much English – some who speak too much and the people who are sometimes drunk.

For the past month or so, I’ve been pulling some extra shifts. We’ve been shorthanded for various reasons and I’ve also come to realize in the year and a half I’ve worked at the Company – when they offer you extra hours, take them. My diligence has paid off and the paycheck I opened on Thursday night was a stunning $400. (OK – $403.20 to be exact.)

Yes, in the grand scheme of things and when you compare these earnings to what I pull down at my full time job, $400 isn’t the biggest chunk of change one can earn. But man – that extra amount of money – wow … It’s only $200 more dollars than I usually make but when you’re staring down a $725 bill for a root canal (down from its original $1000), that $400 is going to make some significant headway into paying that bad boy off and resuming my quest to pay off my credit card debt, which is still standing at $5,500.

Whereas my hard work is paying dividends, the new year has me ignoring every resolution I think I’ve ever hatched. I haven’t made it to the gym (EXCUSES: Illness! Working Tuesdays and Thursdays at the cab company!) and I haven’t even TRIED to lose that 10-15 pounds to fit into my wedding dress. Being greener? Where are my reusable bags? The only thing I’m doing “right” is transferring money into my ING account – which stands at a whopping $60. And … I must confess my fiscal sins to you all – I have fallen off of the “No Direct Deposit Advance” wagon and will be crawling back up after this next paycheck. I will spare you the details of my new Jimmy Johns addiction (although I will say that the Vito sandwich is just sooooo gooood.)

The funny part of my story is that my brother and I have been corresponding back and forth via Facebook recently (oh technology – you can bring just about anyone together). Regular readers know that bro and I love each other, it’s just that both of us would rather wrangle snakes than hug each other. (The last time we hugged was 10 years ago – I know this because my father made us hug before I left for Europe … in case one of us died or something.) My bro and I have inherited the “bad with money” gene and I found myself poised to give him some sisterly advice this morning (or I was going to send him Dave Ramsey’s book). But as the day has gone on and I’ve realized how preachy I’d come off and how hypocritical I’d seem, I’ve taken my buddy Raul’s advice and I’m just going to tell him that I love him and that if he needs an ear, I’m here for him.

So what does this have to do with anything? Next week I’m starting the Sonoma Diet. $300 of my cab money is going toward the root canal (which will bring my grand total to $424 … I just need to work a couple more extra shifts and that will be PAID), the rest of the money goes towards groceries and gas. I’m going to feed $20 to the ING if possible. I’m not going to Direct Deposit Advance anymore.

And I’m going to write my brother back. I have no high hopes of a Brady Bunch existence, but it’s very cool to talk to him.