Quick update

I haven’t posted in a while because of two reasons: bad spending and SO BUSY.

Last weekend I was in a performance that required Christmas coloured, wintery costumes. It was outdoors. I hardly own any green or red, so I ended up buying a green sweater from the Gap, and a white scarf and toque from H&M. All of which I will wear again, but they were expenditures that I wish I hadn’t needed to make. I wish the group was professional enough to have sponsors to provide our costumes! We got free pizza and hot chocolate, I guess I can’t complain TOO much :) We had a rehearsal on Friday and two shows Saturday, so that took up those days. I went shopping with my Aunt on Sunday (AND BOUGHT NOTHING), and then went to see a dance performance that a friend of mine was in. It was very good :)

And now, I AM SICK AGAIN. Not the flu, thankfully. I had a lingering cough from the flu I had, and then I had sinus headaches on both Monday and Tuesday, so it was not really a surprise to me that my throat flipped out on Tuesday night. I am prone to getting sinus infections that infect my throat if I don’t realise what’s happening and get medication. Just lovely, eh.

So, T booked his medical! £386 :( So I sent him a money order for £143. We’re paying for all this Permanent Resident stuff together, because I think it would be unfair to make him pay for all his costs, and myself only pay for $75 sponsorship application fee. He actually tried to refuse the money order, but I told him I was going to send it anyway and then he’d HAVE to cash it anyway, so he had to just accept it.

There’s also been more stuff happening with the ‘transfer to Boston office’ idea (which is the best plan of action), but we’ll see if it gets any further. So far, it’s honestly been ALL TALK.

We’re going through a bit of a rough time though. He wanted me to visit the UK for Christmas, but I honestly want to spend Christmas Day here with my family. So I thought why not go over on Boxing Day? We’d be together for our anniversary (December 29 :)), and New Year’s! He’s not happy with my decision, and feels like I’ve chosen my family over him. I’m normally the kind of person who goes with the flow and tries to please everyone else before myself (and ironically, T is one of the people who tell me to stop doing that!) So now I’ve told the truth about how I feel about where I wanna be for Christmas, and he’s been miserable about it for two days now.

I love Christmas, it’s my favourite time of the year. I love Christmas the way my family does it – it’s all about family and Christmas Brunch with the whole family, then gifts – I LOVE seeing people happy when they see what I got them! Then Christmas Dinner, then talking to family in PEI on the phone. Everyone’s in a good mood, everyone’s relaxed.. it’s the best day and it makes me happy. T’s family has apparently got the use of a hotel for Christmas (I know, you’re THINKING I’m crazy) that T’s Dad’s wife’s son-in-law works at. It just seems to… un-Christmas to me. They will be the only ones there – no staff or anything. Will there even be a tree? Maybe, but it will be some cheeseball fake one that has no meaning. I spend hours putting as many lights on my parents’ tree as possible, almost making it a fire hazard! We have an angel on top that we’ve had for years, and the ornaments have been collected yearly by my Mom since we were born. I don’t wanna be in some big, empty hotel for Christmas.And I definitely don’t wanna be in a bad mood on Christmas because I’m wishing I was somewhere else.

I really should sleep. My mind is racing though, so it’s a bit difficult.

Recap of October goals, and new November goals!

Well.. let’s see how I did for October!

1. Reduce my debt by clearing credit card debt completely and getting line of credit debt down to below $4000.
   Credit card debt was cleared! :D Unfortunately, I didn’t get the LoC below $4k – it’s currently at $4,224.97
2. Take the dog for a walk every evening that I am not out of the house for dance classes or some other reason (socializing, etc.) I was doing really well at this and for some reason have stopped.
   I didn’t do well at this. Being sick was part of the problem, but not the whole problem. I only took her out 6 times, and they were all before I got sick.
3. Learn to cook my own Chicken Tikka Masala and Pad Thai. God, how I miss Sainsbury’s ready meal CTM :(
   Did neither! The flu killed my appetite for about a week and a half, and I’ve been quite busy.
4. Cook  my yummy vegetable soup, and also bake my ginger cookies that are amazing.
   I made the ginger cookies, but no vegetable soup. I also made Halloween cupcakes for my baby dance class.
5. Sell more stuff on ebay!
   I did sell more stuff, but not as much as I’d like.. I need to get more focused on this. I have too much crap!
6. 15 No Spend days :)
   DONE!
7. Finally make it to that damn Hot Yoga class.
   Not done.. which really sucks. I need to either go to it, or start going to the gym. I just can’t work out at home – I have no motivation. I need to feel competition from others around me, it always made me push harder. The gym was perfect for that!
8. Work my full hours every pay period.
   Yeah, well. We know how well that went!

November goals:

1. Get the LoC below $3000. I should be able to do that no problem. I’m really hopeful that I get it closer to $2500. I’m sure I can if I get my full hours in.
2. Start losing weight – walking the dog, going to yoga, or getting a gym membership – I HAVE to do something.
3. Eating healthier. I’ve had two apple turnovers today, and three Halloween sized bags of Doritos. Food just feels SO GOOD though, I need to find something to replace it :|
4. Do another cleaning/purge of my bedroom, and box up the stuff I don’t need until I move out. I’m feeling overwhelmed by the amount of crap in here.
5. Challenge myself more – do one thing a day that scares you!

Being sick makes me spend I guess!

Well, this has been a baaaaaaad week for No Spend Days, but thankfully, I’m only two short :D So as long as I can stay away from a store tomorrow and Saturday, I will have met my goal!!!

My little brother, who I work with, has lost 50 pounds. He now weighs the same as me, which is very depressing! It’s very motivating because I am 5 inches shorter than him!!!! And boys are supposed to weigh more!! ;D Needless to say, his clothes do not fit anymore. He was a 38 inch waist/large to extra large, and now he is a 34 inch waist/medium to large. He is a typical guy who hates shopping, so he enlisted me in helping him find new pants, and a winter jacket.

We had two shopping excursions. On our first trip, I took him to the Bay where he finally bought new jeans! Levi’s, regularly $70, on sale for $39.99 – so he got two pairs. We found him a Firefly winter jacket at Sportchek as well, for $150. He fit into a medium!! It’s a proper skiing/snowboarding jacket that is really nice, and in a cool pixelated print. Then we went to Arlies, where he bought some nice brown Volcom pants (kinda like Dickies), with navy pinstripes – $70, not too bad. At Arlies I also found mittens THAT ARE BEAVERS – I’m serious. So I had to have them. I can’t stop looking at them, touching them, playing with them, making chomping noises, and making perverted jokes. They were $30.

Since I was at the mall, I just HAD to stop into R.W. & Co. (that was sarcasm!) I was looking for new shirts for T as he has gotten holes in two of his dress shirts, and is now down to 3 dress shirts for work that he will actually wear (he has a few others, but won’t wear them because they’re too dressy looking.) I ended up buying two shirts for him, a black and brown striped one at $58 and a black and blue striped one on sale for $35! Then I also bought myself a dark red and black rose print top at $50.. sigh. It’s gorgeous though. And I need more work-appropriate clothing. It was slightly see through, so it needed a camisole for underneath. They were $22.50 or two for $35, so I bought two. I have four other R.W. & Co. camis, and they’re at least 4 years old and still going strong, so I consider it a sound investment. I got black and red, and they have pretty beaded embellishment at the top.

THEN, I went to La Senza. Excuse me while I hang my head in shame.. I bought two new sets of PJ’s. Okay, they were $19.95 each and I got my 10% prestige discount. They both have the Eiffel Tower on them, which I adore. Even though I had a panic attack while climbing it! But seriously, Eiffel Tower :D

Tonight, we took a trip to another mall an hour away, to find these other pants my brother had wanted from Arlies. He ended up getting two more pairs of Volcom pants, one dark brown with lines of dashes all over in a tan colour, and then also a tan pair. This particular Arlies had a sale on them, so he got $10 off each pair, for a total of $60 each. Then I went into La Senza, SHOOT ME! I ended up buying 5 more pairs of underwear because I found the ones that say “Eiffel in Love” on the butt. Actually, 6 pairs because I had another “Buy 5 undies get 1 free” coupon. So, in total I’ve gotten 12 pairs of underwear from La Senza for $50. Which is awesome, because they’re regularly $7.50, and I won’t buy any other brand because I find their cotton underwear SO SOFT, not to mention they always have cute characters!!! And I really needed new undies, seriously. I meant to buy some in June when I visited Canada, and forgot, and I refused to buy underwear at La Senza in England because it’s not the same! They’re an entirely different company!

I got paid this week and my pay cheque was pretty crap – I’ve updated my sidebars accordingly. Being sick really screwed me over. I only got holiday pay for Thanksgiving, then I took a day off with sickness, and the next day I only worked a portion of my hours. This week hasn’t been that good either – I got into work at NOON today. I really need to get my ass in gear so that I can get this debt paid off. I am not down as far as I estimated I would be by now, and I’m not going to meet my October goal of getting the LoC under $4k. I am close.. but not under. I have four pay cheques from now until Christmas, so I need to max out my hours so that I can put $1k on the LoC every pay cheque, and still have a couple of hundred for expenses. I need to have the LoC paid off by mid-January, because I’m upping my RRSP contributions then, and I need to start saving up my Emergency fund, hopefully max out a TFS, and start saving money for when T and I are eventually, FINALLY living together again.

I’m wondering if I should have asked about a raise this year. Last July (2008) was my last raise. My boss had told me that I would have a performance review and possible (but more likely than not) raise again in July 2009. But it never happened. And I never asked about it, because at the time, it felt like we were always getting emails saying “We may not be able to pay you this week..” So I kinda figured that I should be glad that I had a job, and not bother. If they were worried about not being able to pay us, surely they couldn’t afford to give me a raise. And inflation has actually decreased (deflated?), so according to the Bank of Canada, my cost of living has gone down. I’m not sure if I made the right decision. Sure, I can always ask for twice the raise next July (which is what I ended up getting last July because I hadn’t had a raise for two and a half years!), but it won’t be retroactive, and I won’t have gotten the interest on it.

I’m still trucking along at the ebay thing, although I really don’t want to anymore. A box I sent to someone got bashed up, and they filed a paypal claim against me for the product not being as described, or something like that. They want half the money back, which is depressing because I already took a huge loss in selling it ($180 worth of brand new stuff for $50), and the shipping was more expensive than I quoted them so I actually got less than $50 for it. The actual items I sent aren’t broken, but the boxes they were in are dented. I’m probably going to give in, but it sucks because I will end up with less than ten dollars from the entire transaction now. So, I’m feeling pretty ripped off. I can’t even file a claim with Canada Post (there was insurance on it), because they need to see the packaging before they will take the blame. How am I supposed to do that when the packaging is somewhere in the States?! I feel like there is no protection for the seller on ebay, only for buyers, so I am pretty bummed and don’t want to list anything else.

I’m still coughing a bit, but mostly better. I’m so glad that’s over with, that was a horrible flu!

Stupid flu.

Well, I haven’t blogged in a while, and I’ve certainly had a few No-Spend days.. all thanks to the flu :( I’ve been sick for an entire week now. Last Sunday I did nothing other than sleep and drink fluids. I didn’t go to work on Monday and it was a repeat of Sunday. I worked from home for the rest of the week because I was still dealing with fever/chills up until Thursday, and so much coughing! I can’t stop coughing! I woke up several times last night, mid-coughing fit, and then had to be up at 7:30 for a dance rehearsal. Needless to say, I was like a zombie today. This has certainly been one of the worst cases of the flu I’ve had.

I am planning to go into the office on Monday (especially since it’s payday), so I am hoping I feel a lot better by then. Our office is always freezing – the building management claims that the offices on the south and east always complain it’s too hot, and the rest complain it’s too cold.. so we all just have to deal with it, or something. Our office is on the north west corner of the building – we don’t get sun in the windows till late afternoon (and that won’t be happening much longer, damn winter.) I don’t want to have to sit in a freezing cold office when I’m sick. I refuse to. And, we’re not allowed space heaters because it’s a fire risk.

I’m finding myself really lonely lately, though I suppose it’s compounded by being housebound Sunday to Thursday this week (I snuck out to pick up some Halloween supplies for my dance class of 4-5 year olds on Thursday evening ;)) Although T and I didn’t dress up for the last two Halloweens (they don’t really celebrate it in England..), I find myself a little jealous of the people here I see planning costumes and parties. I’m not doing anything – I am probably going to dress up in some sort of thrown-together costume for my 4-5 year olds’ dance class on Monday.. but that’s it. In fact, I will probably end up being the one who hands out candy here at my parents’.

I’m missing having T around, and having our group of friends in the UK. I severed ties with a lot of friends from high school and elementary, because we’ve grown in different directions. So I don’t really have anyone around here anymore, which can get really boring. I just can’t be friends with people who do drugs, or people who have multiple children with multiple fathers and haven’t had a job in six years. Then there’s the one who cheats on her boyfriend.. ugh.. I just don’t know what to say to her! The one best friend I had who I really cared about, I’ve given up on. I made plans with her twice when I came back to Canada on a visit, and she ditched me both times. She didn’t even have the decency to text me to say she couldn’t come, and it was costly for me to have to call multiple times leaving messages for her asking where she was, from my UK cellphone :( She later told me she was in the hospital really ill both times, which is amusing because I didn’t realise she could update her facebook status from the hospital bed.

I’m getting so frustrated with my current living situation. People keep asking me when T is moving here, and it’s just such a big story of what we’re trying to do that I feel like an idiot trying to explain. There’s a little voice in my head (it’s the same one that tells me my ass is huge in those jeans), that keeps telling me whoever I’m talking to is probably thinking “oh, I doubt he’ll end up moving here.” It’s even moreso difficult to explain because I just feel like the whole situation is not a plan, and more of a jumble of ideas that no one is executing.

I was more positive about everything when I first made the decision to move home, even though I was bawling my eyes out at the time. My visa was up early August, I had to come back to Canada no matter what. If I was applying for a visa to go back to the UK, I had to come back here and apply. But did I want to stay in England? No. Not really. The only reason I had gone back to England in June was because I wanted to be with T. In the few weeks before I left, he started speaking to his work about transferring to their Boston office – an idea that we both liked. They would pay for him to move, he would keep his job stability. We’d be able to see each other (yay, JetBlue flights!) MUCH more often. If he really hated North America, he would just be able to transfer back. He’d be much closer to Toronto (and in the same time zone), to eventually start looking for work there. We were both excited about the prospect of a new city to explore. Multiple higher-ups okayed the idea. It seemed everything was in motion for him to go. His co-workers were telling me that it was definitely going to happen.We visited Boston, we both really enjoyed it. I looked forward to the idea of working from his apartment in Boston for a week, and spending the weekend in Maine.. or something like that!

Fast forward a month, and everything was flipped upside down when one of the higher-ups got fired. A new person, with different ideas took over the role. So, as it is now, there is no plan for him to go to Boston. And every week, I hear another plan of his about how he’s going to convince them they need a certain position in Boston that he can fill. For the first month of this, I always met his ideas with a positive reaction, and would get hopeful. But I’m seemingly less pumped when he tells me nowadays, because it seems like the idea is going NOWHERE. And, he’s seriously put himself out on a limb – emailing multiple people in multiple positions at his office and at the Boston office. He’s SO unbelievably unhappy at the office in England as well, which makes me feel really upset about the whole situation.

So, I took it upon myself to fill out all my sponsorship stuff for the PR card for him, and he’s supposed to be filling out his part of the application. He told me two weeks ago that he’d have it in the mail the next day. I don’t think he did because I haven’t received it and he hasn’t mentioned it. He didn’t even want to apply for it in the first place because he didn’t want to move here without a job, and possibly be jobless for a few months. A co-worker of T’s that he holds in high regard had tried to get a job here and wasn’t able to. He took it upon himself to tell T that the Canadian job market is hard to break in to, and that it would be near impossible for him to get a job here. I don’t know what to say or do to counteract that, because I don’t have experience as an immigrant trying to get work here. But how hard can it be – there are tons of immigrants here! And although we are in a recession, my friends are having no problems getting new jobs in Toronto right now.

Ahh, it’s nice to have a blog to vent to.

It has been a good day!

Two awesome things happened today – I paid off the last of my credit card AND I got my credit report. I am happy to report that all my accounts are R1 or O1 – woo!

I am not sure I am doing so well with my No Spend Days – today I had to buy dinner because I had no time to make it, and yesterday I bought some new undies at La Senza. With their Prestige card, and a ‘one free pair of undies’ coupon, I ended up getting 6 pairs for $25 and change (tax included)! Thankfully, undies are one of the things on my “it’s okay to spend on, because you really need new ones” list. But the tally so far is 6 NSD in 14 days – ugh that’s horrible!

I’ve sold some stuff on ebay, which is awesome. I just wish that doing the listings and giving accurate shipping prices wasn’t such a pain :(

How could I forget?!

I almost forgot to post a picture of the fall jacket I got for my birthday.. :)

Ignore the excessive reuseable bags and Montreal Canadiens towel hanging up in the background – I was too lazy to move them all.

I lusted after this jacket for about four weeks and then when I bought it on my birthday it was on sale (and then I got 25% off  on top of that!) I’m 99.99% in love with it – but the buttons are plastic or resin or something, so I secretly wish I could replace them with buttons like these. The colour is a yummy wine colour (which I’m totally gravitating towards this season), and it’s slightly fuzzy, which is super cozy. I’ve already had to bust it out a few times because of the horrible weather we’re having!

I also got a new purse which I totally forgot about. It’s a rip off of the quilted Chanel style, which I like because I think it looks classy and suitable for work. I removed the scarf, because I just didn’t like it.

Personal goals for October 2009!

It’s time for my October goals :)

1. Reduce my debt by clearing credit card debt completely and getting line of credit debt down to below $4000.
2. Take the dog for a walk every evening that I am not out of the house for dance classes or some other reason (socializing, etc.) I was doing really well at this and for some reason have stopped.
3. Learn to cook my own Chicken Tikka Masala and Pad Thai. God, how I miss Sainsbury’s ready meal CTM :(
4. Cook  my yummy vegetable soup, and also bake my ginger cookies that are amazing.
5. Sell more stuff on ebay!
6. 15 No Spend days :)
7. Finally make it to that damn Hot Yoga class.
8. Work my full hours every pay period.

I never officially made a September goals list, though I did do quite a few things that I had intended to.

1. I filled out and sent T the Permanent Resident application documents. I still have to call Revenue Canada to get my Option C, and get a letter from my employer.. but I don’t think either of those will be a problem. The Option C takes 7-10 days to receive, and is free!
2. I sent two money orders to T to get our joint account paid off (hooray!)
3. I sent away for my free credit report. I haven’t gotten anything back yet.. hopefully soon.
4. I made $52.05 on ebay selling some stuff! AND I have two auctions ending tomorrow. I also made about $5 selling MAC postcards.
5. I did a lot of stuff that I had been putting off, like sewing a button back on my duvet cover, and fixing a broken bracelet.
6. Bought a hard drive and got my pictures backed up! Phew :D

I went to the mall tonight, and ended up buying SHOES. They’re completely different than what I was originally looking for in a shoe to wear to work, but I realised that I need a heel because my dress pants are longish. I really like these and can hopefully sneakily wear thin black socks with them because I HATE NYLONS.

I also went to Le Chateau to take my sweater back. Both pockets were coming off, and the collar was coming off. This isn’t the first time I’ve had quality issues with their clothing, so I sent a scathing email to their head office yesterday, about how I will not shop there anymore, and I will tell everyone I know not to. Well.. they don’t do returns. Seriously, they only do exchanges or store credit. This even further cements why I will never shop there again. We ended up exchanging the sweater, and hopefully this one doesn’t rip. Because if it does.. there will be hell to pay. I do not want a store credit. I told the cashier that $100 is too expensive for an acrylic sweater that’s falling apart. Yes, $100!!! Freaking acrylic! It does not help matters that we went into R.W. & Co. afterwards, and found a yummy soft sweater that’s nicer than this one… for $70 :(

I don’t think I will have a hard time with doing 15 No Spend Days, because I am down to $50 spending money until the 12th, and I haven’t paid my cell phone bill yet. I’m not allowing myself to spend money, except to ship the stuff I’ve sold on ebay.

So finally, here’s my birthday gifts!

I have to say, it all looks much nicer ON than it does hanging on a hanger.. :) That’s the evil sweater.. well.. that’s the new one. Send it some good karma so it doesn’t fall apart! It’s nice.. but it’s acrylic and the stuff on the front is faux leather.. all for $100 :|Totally not worth it, my poor Mom :/ The shirt and pants are from R.W. & Co. You can kinda see in the picture that the pants have the same wine colour running through them.. they’re gorgeous. The top is way less shiny looking in normal lighting – the flash totally threw it off.

I also took a picture of my new frame, filled with a bunch of pictures (10 of the 18 spots are filled), but I feel too weird to post it.. even with the faces blurred.

My weekend should be pretty lackluster – laundry, boxing up my ebay sales, posting new auctions.. and then dance classes on Sunday.

Getting stuff done.

Today has been a day dedicated to getting stuff done. Laundry, cleaning, and vacuuming were all top on the list. Then I started listing stuff on ebay, which is always such a pain. It seems like it was worth it though, because out of the five auctions, three have bids already! So hopefully I can make some extra money to pay off the debt! I also still have more stuff to auction, but I have decided to stop for today, and see how these five go.

I also replaced the plastic in my new picture frame with glass because I accidentally broke the plastic. I was cleaning it, and it cracked.. it was just cheap plastic crap. Replacing it with the glass spurred me to finally go through my pictures from the last three years. I had lost them, and I didn’t have backups, but thankfully I got almost all of them back using a disk recovery program. They’ve been sitting in a directory on my laptop for a few months – I was putting off going through them because I was worried I had lost a lot. I think I lost four pictures out of six gigabytes worth of pictures, so I’m quite happy with that result! I may be able to recover those four pictures from another drive.. *fingers crossed* I found 10 nice pictures of T and I to print out for the frame. There’s room for 18 pictures in it, and I currently have 1 in there.. so it looks kinda sad!

That also spurred me to buy a Western Digital passport drive for backups. I have been meaning to buy one for a long time, and finally I found a good deal online, so I went ahead and got it even though I wasn’t supposed to spend anymore this pay period. Once I get it, I am going to put some time aside to scan in important documents – like my passport – so I have a copy of them if ever needed. I definitely need to start backing up – I bawled my eyes out when I thought I had lost all the pictures. At work, I am constantly stressing to my boss about the importance of backups in case of a server failure, and I don’t even have my own stuff backed up!

I sent off a request for a free credit report today, to Equifax. I sent them a photocopy of my passport, and both the front and back of my driver’s licence. I hope that is good enough for them! I’ve never had any kind of credit report done before, so I’m interested to see what it’s like. I’m mostly doing it to make sure that there is no identity fraud going on. If I am going to eliminate my debt (and get my credit back on track), then I don’t want someone else screwing it up for me :/

I haven’t done pictures of my new clothes yet because I haven’t worn them! I’d rather take the pictures in daylight so that the colours are more true to life. I also have a bunch of emails to send to friends back in England, and for some reason I haven’t felt like it today. It’s almost like my social anxiety comes over into my ability to reply to emails – I’m so worried about saying the wrong thing or sounding like a total dweeb!

I still have a little bit of money left over in my spending budget, because I didn’t end up paying for the movie last night. I remembered that  had quite a lot of Scene points, so I redeemed 1000 for my ticket!  The movie was okay.. but with 20 minutes left to go, the bulb in the projector went out and they couldn’t get it fixed! So they gave everyone in the theatre two free passes! There’s no expiry date on them, so I was cool with that. I might use one to go see This Is It.

Hopefully I won’t have a lot on my October Goals list, since I am trying to get so much of it done this weekend. I have three hours of dance classes tomorrow though, so I won’t be incredibly productive.

What a busy week!

This week has been pretty busy.. and it’s not over yet! So I haven’t managed to take pictures of the things I got for my birthday, but that post will be coming soon (weekend probably.) Tomorrow I’m going to see Fame with some of the girls from the dance studio, so that’s where most of the $20 that’s left in my spending budget will go. Then it will have to be a No Spend weekend!

Today was technically a No Spend day, although I ended up getting some socks that my Mom paid for (because we were shopping at her place of work, where she gets a discount.) I needed new socks because all I had was white athletic socks and those do NOT look good under dress pants! So I got some thinner socks, in a few different colours – nothing crazy though. This is weird for me because I have only worn white socks for the last.. oh.. 15 years?

Now I just need to find work suitable shoes! I dislike pretty much everything I’ve seen :( My office is super casual, so I don’t want to wear heels. And I don’t want ballet flats, because I need shoes I can wear in winter. So I need something that covers the whole foot, with no heel. This is incredibly difficult to find right now, apparently. Hopefully, once winter gets closer, there will be tons to choose from. If not, I may end up with these.

I’m a little bummed because I didn’t work my full hours this pay period. I’m like the only IT professional in the world who gets paid hourly. I’ve been getting into work a little late. It’s no wonder, it’s 1 :30am and I’m still up. I was doing so well when I moved home from England, I kinda stayed on BST (British Summer Time) and was asleep before 10, up at 5 or 6 am. But then, when T was in Boston for work and I visited him, we both got on bad habits.. like staying up till 2 am. It didn’t help that the one night in the hotel, we got woken up by a fire alarm at 2:30 am! Pay day is Monday,  so I will get to see how much less my cheque is because of my laziness. That needs to stop!

T finally got the first package I sent him, which has one of the money orders for £250 in it. I didn’t send it registered because it was too big (it would have cost $50!), so it wasn’t trackable, and I was freaking out about that. The second one I sent registered in a smaller envelope for $15, because along with the second £250 money order, it has all the stuff for his application for permanent residence in it. It has some forms that are already filled out by me, with some of our details on them.. I do not want those getting into the wrong hands. I probably owe another £75ish to our joint account, but I will find that out next month when the bills come through.

I’m really hopeful about the PR application. T is very demotivated at work with a lot of stuff that’s been going on lately, so hopefully when he is finally here and has a job, he will look back and see what a good change it was. My only worry is how long it will take him to get a job. We are hoping to be in or around Toronto, and the IT industry there doesn’t seem to be too bad right now – I have an engineer friend who just got a new job this week. Of course, I’m not sure T wants a job in engineering.. right now he’s in a web team doing programming. He wants to take on more of a project manager role while keeping a technical aspect.. hopefully we can find something that is the perfect fit for him pretty quickly.

I added some stuff to ebay tonight, so hopefully I will make some money off of that. If I don’t make much, at least I’m getting rid of stuff. I sold a MAC postcard for $5, so I have to mail that out. Hopefully it won’t cost more than $5 to ship – I didn’t charge shipping. I was going to just throw them in the recycling, so I’m not worried if I get nothing for them.

A good birthday weekend :D

So I had my birthday on the weekend, and am now officially 29. Eep!

It was enjoyable, and I tried not to do anything I didn’t want to. I am too much of a YES-person (“Yes, I’ll do this for you.. Yes, I’ll go with you to this event.. ” etc. etc.) so I NEEDED a weekend for me. I spent Friday night after work playing video games :D I am loving the game Fable 2 and I have 58 of the 66 achievements :) I also played Zuma, which is so very addicting. Still haven’t beaten the Popo Poyolli temple though.

Saturday I SLEPT IN! Then I went shopping with my Mom at my favourite store (where I can afford the clothes at, that is), R.W. & Co. We sneakily worked the system.. she offered to buy me some new clothes for my birthday, and I had a ‘25% off on your birthday’ coupon which is only supposed to be for items bought by me, for me. So she snuck me her debit card and pin number, and “I paid for my new clothes” ;D but really, Mom paid for them :) I ended up getting a new fall jacket, a wine-coloured dress shirt, and dark grey dress pants that are kinda plaid (but very subtle.. all dark colours.) The 25% ended up being a nice discount, and she also bought a sweater for T for Christmas (and got the 25% discount on it.) She couldn’t stop looking at the sweater and saying how nice it would look on my boyfriend. Ok, whatever Mom :) I think she’s trying to fill the void of being able to buy nice clothes for a man, because my brother wears skate clothes and my Dad is retired so it’s strictly jeans and sweatshirts for him!

We came home and made spaghetti, and I made baked Eggplant Parmigiana. It’s so freaking GOOD. We also had my favourite – Angel Food cake with whipped cream and strawberries :) Then I got more presents – a long cozy dark grey sweater from Le Chateau (amazing, I didn’t know they sold anything but club wear), a big picture frame that I am going to fill with the pictures of T and I from all our holidays we’ve been on, and a cupcake carrier!! AHH :D My brother is buying me a Soap Wall from Lush, but I told him to wait to order it because I have a coupon coming for Lush. I’m trying to get him in the habit of using coupons and spending less!

T sent me flowers, which was really nice :) They’re pink and quite pretty. I’m a bit bummed about not spending my birthday with him, and not spending his upcoming birthday with him. But then again, the last two years I was a bit bummed that I didn’t get to see any family on my birthday. I can’t have it both ways, at least not yet. Speaking of which, I went to Canada Post on Saturday and I sent T paperwork for his PR application. Hopefully we will have it mailed off to Immigration Canada by mid-November. I’ve been reading on some forums that some people applying for the PR as  common law partners (like T and I) got it approved in three months! The website says six, but I think our application is pretty straightforward. There is no reason I can see why they would deny me as a sponsor. That, and we have SO MUCH proof that our relationship is legitimate, and well, we lived together for two years.

Sunday I relaxed, and then had three hours of dance classes. I was up on pointe for the first time in AGES. We only did about 20 minutes of pointe, but my feet were hurting. I think I need to find some toe tape before my feet turn into big gross blisters :/

I will take some pictures of my new clothes tomorrow, tonight I am just too tired. I taught dance class for three hours tonight.. first class is the 4-5 year olds, and I’m super tired just after that one! Then I had a tap class and a jazz class to teach. The jazz class is teenagers who have only been dancing for a few years, so I like to kick their butts with superhard stuff. Which tires me out even more…

I’m down to just over $20 spending money until next Monday, but I think I will be okay. If I end up going to Hot Yoga on Wednesday, I will have to pull $40 from my credit card to pay for it, but I am going to let myself because I really need to start losing weight. Either Friday or Sunday night I am going to see Fame with the rest of the staff from the dance studio, so the $20 will go towards that. So if I do anything else on the weekend, I have to find FREE things to do. This also means I don’t have the money to get Quiznos/Tim Hortons/junk food for the rest of the week. Surprisingly, I am enjoying this ‘trying to stick to a budget’ stuff :)