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Archive for the ‘About Me’ Category

I’m here today to talk about a solemn topic that has  ruined millions of people’s lives, but that doesn’t mean we’er not gere to have fun! And so our great journey into my debt history we go.

My debt free years

The stage is new york city, the boy is 17 years old and the year is 2004..or something. At this point i’, 100% debt free Oh yeah baby! I had my first job and was getting paid under the table for about two years in cash money! So what I was only getting seven dollars an hour, It was income. (plus if we do the math the take home check would be around the same amount as a check to a person making 10 bucks an hour) The economy was good! I got to SAVE…..a whopping ten thousand dollars! 10K isn’t chump change for anybody I know. ……I bet you’re asking yourself why I’m rubbing this in your face and wishing you has that green paper at your finger tips right now…..

Well, I wish I has that cash now too! remember this was before the credit cards got me.

I Took a year off from school before I went to college ( *ahem* student loans coming up *ahem*) and during that year I blew about $3,000 on a trip to a European music festival and had a great time in Copenhagen Denmark.

Now with 7 thousand left I go to college….there are NO jobs in the tiny little town for the people who LIVE there…..so you could imagine what the prospects were for the college freshmen. Needless to say there was a leak in my wallet for snacks and food and beer and liquor…I got right out of that small place in upstate NY cause I knew that my loans were gonna pile up and I wasn’t going to have any way to fight them

The beginning of my debt nightmare

YAY! I move back to Brooklyn. Just a bit more information on my spending habits at this point in my life. I was very conscious about not building up bad debt at paying off my credit cards every month. “There’s no way I’ll go in to credit card debt like all of these losers.” I thought. I would only spend $3.00 a meal and always walk instead of taking the subway.

But Guess what…It’s really hard to keep a roommate who actually pays their half of the rent. So there goes half of the rest of my 7k of cash! Straight to the land lords. It’s amazing how fast cash can turn into financial obligations. Keeping your income and expenses all balanced is hard! Its no wonder the banks want to know your income. It was a good thing that I had that extra money.

The debt is growing…help me!

I saw that this was a big problem an I took it upon my self to make more money any way I could. Jobs are hoard to get so I started buying electronics for whole sale prices and selling them to my co workers for a profit and also selling stuff on e-bay. Sounds good right? Wrong. I was buying way too many crappy electronics that nobody wanted or that didn’t work. *sad face* On top of that people wanted to pay me in installments…what could I do keep all the crappy stuff myself? well just so you know my customers would stop paying 2 or 3 quarters of the way through….%#$#%. Oh and I bough this stuff on credit cards thinking that I would recoup the costs within my 30 day billing period.

Any-who this is a debt blog not a venting place for my failed business ideas (although not all of my Ideas were failures). any there wasn’t much that could stop what happened next.

Marriage= debt?

I met the most wonderful girl in the would and we got married! Good for us…but not good for our wallet. we were young ok and we wanted to have a nice wedding even though we were getting married at city hall. Oh and a honey moon too! So now we’re in $5,000 credit card debt

marriage is good….tax breaks 2 incomes…a great person to live with. But nobody said anything about DOUBLE THE EXPENSES. food, clothing, travel. debt. That’s when the jobs disappeared, credit card rates stated being raised, and we couldn’t afford payments. I cashed a bunch of bonds to pay off our debt that had grown to over ten thousand! Imagine that going from 10,000 bucks in your hands to negative 10,000 all in the matter of 4 years!

Write off debt

well we ended up getting some of our debt slashed and written off and I managed to get my own business of the ground but we still have around 5k debt and 2 months of rent to pay.

No end in sight….

Leave your horror stories too! yay!

This debt blog is here to help me and you at the same time!

I’ve said it before, I ride public transit. Sure it’s not my favorite way to get around, but it saves me serious cash so I put up with the inconvenience.

If there is one thing you learn – and learn fast – about riding public transit, it’s how to identify the ‘creepers’. I know in 5 seconds flat who will give me grief.

This morning, I noticed a ‘Grade A Creeper’. ‘Grade A Creepers’ are the people you are willing to step back off the bus or train to avoid. He looked disoriented, disheveled, and up to no good. I nearly stepped back out, but I was in a rush to get to work and decided to take my chances.

Bad idea.

As soon as we started moving, he stood to face us. There were four of us on board… all young women. A disgusting smile spread across his face as he slowly started walking toward us. He was, well, I’m not sure how to put this. He was, ‘pitching a tent’ in his pants.

He walked up to two of the women, blocked them in, and started groaning and moaning at them. His ‘tent’ only grew.

In a panic, I hurriedly dialed the emergency number for the train (I keep them on speed dial). Just so you know, in emergency situations, I am not the best person to help.

‘What direction are you headed?’

‘Northeasterly? Oh wait. No, Southwest?’

‘What is the man wearing?’

‘Purple? No. Green. Wait. Blue.’

Despite my poor directions, I apparently gave enough information for them to identify the guy and force him off the train to an awaiting group of officers. Maybe it was because he was the only guy on the train. Whatever.

I went up to the women, made sure they were OK, and gave them the security number in case they should ever need it.

That was it.

I didn’t singlehandedly wrestle him to the floor and punch him. I didn’t shout at him. In fact, I really think I could have done more. I was simply too terrified.

Well…

Turns out, one of those folks onboard sent an e-mail to a clerk in HR and titled it ‘EMPLOYEE DESERVES TO BE COMMENDED’ (my company ID badge was pinned at my waist). The person identified what I was wearing, what I did, and what I said. It was an incredibly kind e-mail. The HR clerk identified me and forwarded the e-mail to the head of HR. The head of HR forwarded the e-mail to me, the CEO, the CFO, the head of legal counsel, and to my direct boss.

The CEO, who I’ve spoken with once in my whole career, personally came down to thank me for helping others. My boss and the head of HR also came to congratulate me.

I was stunned. I kept trying to say, ‘I didn’t DO anything!’ but they didn’t seem to listen.

So, I can keep fighting, keep saying how much I didn’t do, OR, I can smile, say thank you, hope they remember this when promotions are announced, and get back to work.

I choose option B.

What a weird, weird, weird day.