Half-Priced Frappuccinos Anyone?

Has anyone else noticed that Starbucks has been giving away a lot of half priced drinks lately?

Anyway, they're at it again. From May 6-15 Starbucks is offering 1/2 price Frappuccinos between 3pm-5pm.

I need to find a job soon, because there is a coconut blended creme out there with my name on it...

Waiting...

I expected unemployment to hit me much harder than it actually has. That's not to say I'm comfortable, I'm not at ease with the situation at all. If my recent posts are any indication, it's on my mind 24/7. It's been the first thing on my mind every morning I've woken up since then. The whole prospect of being unemployed makes me all creepy crawly. *itch itch* To quote a text from my best friend yesterday:

"Rawr. Get a job. Youre happier when you work."

Yes sir.

All things considered though I've been having a surprisingly decent time since I lost my job. I'm going to chalk that up to the fact that I've been getting enough sleep and spending lots of time with The Boy.

Eh, maybe I'll just chalk it all up to spending time with The Boy ;)

My financial frittering has come to an absolute standstill. I'm not in class anymore, so I don't have the temptation of the University coffee shoppes. If my stomach gets growly at 3pm, I go to the kitchen and make something to eat. Heck, even the Starbucks I had on Thursday was free because the girl at the till felt that the other barista was being snarly and therefore I needed a free drink (score!)

Oh yeah, little heads up from the barista, Starbucks is coming out with coconut syrup this summer. I need a job, because I'm going to be ALL over that sucker. Possibly vanilla bean frappuccinos with hits of coconut. Mmmmm.....

It'll be like a vacation in a cup.

I could go for some vacation in a cup.

What would the drink version of Om Nom Nom be?

Urp Slurp Slurp?

Yeah, I'm waiting for that.

Anyway, I'm off to get a massage before my benefits run out. Have a good day everyone :)

I'm Dreaming

Because the last couple days have been a little stressful, I really wanted to do something light and fluffy. Something fun and semi-useless. I say semi-useless instead of useless, because this exercise can give you real insight into where your priorities actually lie. Sometimes that's just as useful as money. So, inspired by Money Rabbit's What I Would Do With $100,000, and Krystal at Give Me Back My Five Bucks' What I Would Do If I Won $1,000,000: 4 Years Later, here is what I would do if I had $100,000:
Credit Card - $4,300 ($95,700 left)

So long sucker. Like a bad ex-boyfriend, I won't miss you when you're gone.

LOC - $11,000 ($84,700 left)

This is like the annoying kid brother to the aforementioned bad ex-boyfriend. Less directly spiteful, but I'll be happy to not have to deal with it again either.

Car - $9000 ($75,700 left)

I still plan to sell my silvery little lemon, but in the mean time I'd rather not have the monthly payments or inflated insurance on it either. Hello extra $450 a month...

Mortgage - $48,000 ($27,700 left)

My mortgage, while it is fixed, has multiple pre-payment options including one allowing me to put up to 20% of the total mortgage down on the balance every year. That chunk right there takes my mortgage out of the oh please don't let the rates get too high category into the *breathe* category. Ah the things you learn when you're young and dumb.

New Homebuyer's Repayment - $15,000 ($12,700 left)

Because when I put money into RRSPs, I want my tax money back dammit.

Emergency Fund - $5,300 ($7,400 left)

I'd plunk the money for my goal of $4000 in there, along with a little extra just for good measure. That puts my combined cash savings and investments between $9,000 and $10,000. I'd feel pretty good about that for the time being, as that gives me several months living expenses should I need it. Or a new furnace in January. You never know.

Renovations - $5,000 ($2,400 left)

I need to finish the flooring on my staircase, and the tile in the kitchen. After that, I should have enough money left to put up the other half of the fence in my back yard.

Pantry Restock - $400 ($2,000 left)

Assorted dried/canned odds and ends, as well as 1/2 a lamb from a farming friend of mine up north. Some containers to hold dried goods in an orderly fashion would be nice too.

Grandfather's Birthday Present - $250 ($1,750 left)

Because he deserves it. I don't know yet what the exact gift would be, but I can assure you it likely includes a large Tim Horton's gift card.

Grandmother's Birthday - $750 ($1,000 left)

It's my grandmother's 80th birthday this year, and the family is all getting together in BC to celebrate. That means flights and accommodation, along with a gift for my grandmother.

Wardrobe Restock - $995 ($5)

Right now the thing I'm most in need of are a pair of gum boots (rain boots, wellies, whatever you call them). The snow is melting around my place, and the water on the sidewalks gets quite deep in some places. Other than that, some good quality work clothes to kick a couple items off my list would be great.

Starbucks Chai Latte - $5 (I'm Out!)

Because, you know, I want one.

;)


*Missed a couple several others - Oops*
Paying Myself
Finance Say What
Debt Free Kid
Fabulously Frugirl
Little Miss Money Bags
Figuring Money Out
Hi That's My Bike

Tracking Coinage

Okay, a little legend for the calendars below:

Green = No Spend Day

Yellow = Spend Day

Red = Used Credit Card

Here's how it went for the month of February:

February - All Spending
Sunday	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday
		$75.00	$1.25	$0.00	$1.25	$24.00
$0.00	$2.09	$0.00	$2.85	$3.16	$117.15	$13.13
$0.00	$27.37	$199.59	$2.85	$15.24	$1.60	$0.00
$0.00	$3.57	$4.20	$0.00	$1.60	$31.66	$1.25
$0.00	$1.25

*fritter fritter*

*fritter*

*fritter fritter fritter*

You hear that? That's the sound of me frittering away money on a near daily basis buying tea and breakfast items at the university. It occurred to me about half way through the month that I was doing this, so I decided to see what my spending would look like if I took the morning treats out of there. This was the result:

February - Spending, Without Morning Snacks
Sunday	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday
		$75.00	$0.00	$0.00	$0.00	$24.00
$0.00	$0.00	$0.00	$0.00	$0.00	$115.00	$13.13
$0.00	$25.27	$195.39	$0.00	$12.90	$0.00	$0.00
$0.00	$3.57	$0.00	$0.00	$0.00	$31.66	$1.25
$0.00	$0.00

Considerably more no spend days!

However, when I totalled it up, my morning breakfasts out added up to about $30.79 over the course of the month. That's just over a dollar a day. I expected it to be much higher than that once I realized how often I was doing it.

Now I'm trying to decide whether this is something I want to stem for the sake of saving a little extra money, or just let slide for the sake of sanity? I know that the *right* answer is to bring my tea and scones from home and put the savings towards my emergency fund; but right now I am feeling a bit of frugal fatigue.

It sucks. Hard.

The savings grace of having this habit at the university is where I can go to get my snack attack breakfast fix. If I was getting a venti chai latte and scone at Starbucks, it would set me back about $8. Grabbing an extra large chai tea and scone at Cram Dunk? Closer to $2.50, $2 if they have day old baking. The tea itself is $1.25.

I have a month and a half until class is done. To be completely honest, I'm probably going to let myself fritter on this in the morning.

Frugal? No.

Sane? Yes.

I'm already crazy enough as it is, I don't need money driving me further down the rabbit hole.

The Cost of a Guilty Pleasure

I know that taking a bath uses more water than taking a shower. I know this for a fact. Put the plug in while you're having a shower and note the water level when you're done, almost guaranteed the tub isn't even half full. From a green standpoint it's abhorrent that I prefer baths to showers, I know. However when I come inside after walking home from the bus stop in -35, a 5 minute lukewarm shower just doesn't get rid of the chill. It really doesn't. Enter long hot bath. I've been wondering for a little while what my baths are costing me though, seeing as during the middle of winter they happen much more frequently.

Excuse me while I geek out for a bit, I've been wanting to do this calculation for a while.

If you're looking for an easy metric unit reference sheet, I'd recommend using this: http://xkcd.com/526/ Geeky, somewhat tongue in cheek, and not necessarily 100% accurate. Perfect.

The temperature of cold tap water here is close to 10 degrees celsius. I wouldn't be surprised if it's colder than that right now, but I'm going to use this as my starting point. I like my baths somewhere around 43 degrees to start, which means the water has to be heated 33 degrees.

My tub, very crudely measured to bath water level, is approximately 40cm x 60cm x 135cm. I'm not going to take my body volume out of there, we'll just assume that I'm going to warm up the water at some point. This gives us a volume of approximately 0.32m3.

It takes 4.184 Joules of energy to warm up 1 gram of water by 1 degree celsius. 1 gram of water is approximately 1cm3. So, in order to warm up my bath water, I'm going to require: 

(0.32m3) x (1,000,000cm3/1m3) x (33C) x (4.184J) = 44,183,040J or 44.18 MJ

So now I know how much energy this is going to take. Kinda. This is assuming everything goes absolutely perfectly, and that every last bit of energy is converted into heat and goes directly into the water. As nice as that would be, it doesn't happen this way. My hot water tank is heated by natural gas, which isn't overly efficient. Lets assume my tank is 65% efficient.

44MJ / 0.65 = 67.69MJ

That's probably a little closer to what is actually being used to heat the water. My gas bill charges by the Gigajoule of energy. Not that they know the exact amount of energy I'm getting, they've just applied an average conversion factor to the volume of gas provided. Anyway, from my last set of utility bills:

$3.97/GJ for the gas itself
$0.53/GJ for the gas delivery
$0.23/GJ for the GST on the gas
$4.73/GJ for heat

$1.59/m3 for the water itself
$1.18/m3 to drain the water
$2.77/m3 for water

Apparently GST is charged on gas and electricity, but not water? Oh well. I'm only taking the variable charges on this, because I have to pay the fixed charges regardless of whether or not I take a bath. I'm also not taking the electricity for the bathroom fan into account, because I don't really feel like looking for the motor rating. That would mean actually finding the label! lol.

So my guilty pleasure is currently costing me:

(0.06769GJ x $4.73/GJ) + (0.32m3 x $2.77/m3) = $1.21

That's better than I was expecting. Cheaper than Starbucks, that's for sure. However, I can see how this would add up over time. Having a hot bath every day of the month rather than a quick shower? That's almost $40!

It's enough to make me think "I'll just have a shower tonight". Tomorrow, maybe not so much ;)

Going A Little Far Don't You Think?

Don't get me wrong, I love my Starbucks, but don't you think you're going a little too far?

http://www.everydaymoney.ca/2011/01/starbucks-adds-whopping-drink-size.html

A 31 fluid ounces of sweetened beverage? 3 ounces shy of 1 liter? Is this really necessary? No, it's not. It's enabling gluttony. Why not just make the people walk out the door with 2 grandes or 4 shorts? They're the same thing!

I've always been a bit miffed by the fact that Starbucks doesn't list it's short beverage prices on the menu. I was right ticked off when I heard they were planning to take the talls off the menu as well. Marketers know full well that people order what they can see, do most people even know that they have a short option?

The problem here is twofold. Larger sizes come at larger prices. Only show people the larger sizes, and more often than not that's what they'll buy. Waistlines get larger and wallets get smaller.

I like the small coffee shop concept of Starbucks. Yes, the charm has taken a considerable hit during it's global hyper-expansion, but it's still there. Competing with McDonalds and 7-11? Come on Starbucks, I'm disappointed in you.

Technology Hates Me

There comes a point where sometimes you realize you're being too cheap. Either that time is now, or technology in general has decided it hates me and is now ganging up on me.

I had the internet set up at home, then I had a roommate who had paid for his internet up front at his old place move in. Since I was paying month to month and he still had several months left on his account which he had already paid for, we switched the internet over to his. When he moved out, I decided I could get by without the internet at home, seeing as I could check my e-mail on my phone, and I could look at things online during my lunch hour at work. It worked reasonably well; the only time I ran into issues is when I wanted to put pictures in my blog posts, and those pictures were sitting on my computer at home. A little pre-planning and a USB key could probably fix that, but instead I contented myself with not using pictures.

My phone started having problems :(

So, I took it into the Apple store to get it fixed. They gave me directions on how to fix the issue, and I went on my merry little way. I had every intention of posting today, so I grabbed my laptop and headed over to the Starbucks near my house. Free WiFi and 1/2 price chai? Sign me up! I paid for the chai and settled in for a little blogging when a login screen popped up. Wtf? I asked the barista about it, and apparently their WiFi was down. If I had known that I would have stayed home rather than paying for a drink. *grumble*

But, seeing as I had a drink beside me and a comfy place to set up my computer, I figured I'd fix my phone. I connected my phone to iTunes, synced it, pressed the sequence of buttons as I had been told to do earlier. The phone shuts down, does everything it's supposed to do... then can't find iTunes. Huh? Check the connections, everything looks fine, then the phone crashes. Crap.

All I wanted to do was write a blog post!

So now I'm sitting in the Apple store again, using their free WiFi, while my phone is being restored to its factory settings. Apparently iTunes had to be connected to the internet in order to fix the problem? Nobody told me. It's been several hours since this started, I'm hoping I didn't lost too much.

Did I mention this could have been avoided if I had just set up the internet at home? For about $30 a month? Yeah, time to stop being cheap. I'll call them tomorrow.

Mmmmm Chai...

This morning's bus ride was filled with sweet visions of Chai Latte as I read the post over at Fabulously Broke about Starbucks' 1/2 price Tea Latte promotion. *drool* It most certainly helped with the fact that I had to wait 15 minutes for a bus in -25 weather. Thanks FB!


This right here ladies and gentlemen is Chai Porn. Mmmm...

 Unfortunately I can't make it to a Starbucks today between 2-5pm, and frankly in this weather I really don't want to go outside any more often than absolutely necessary. So, I used up the last of a gift card and bought one after class. The spot has been hit, I am now happy(er). When I was working in a camp job, away from civilization for 3 weeks at a time, I would pack boxes of concentrate in my luggage to mix with milk and ice in my water bottle. Needless to say, I was the recipient of more than one jealous stare (and yet no one else just brought the concentrate with them...)

I could wax poetic for a while, but I think that's enough for now. Anyone who loves them as much as I do, and I know there are a lot of you, knows that the cost of them adds up over time. You can get Tazo Chai concentrate in Starbucks and at the grocery store, but you'll probably notice it isn't quite as strong. According to my barista former roommate, the concentrate they use is MUCH stronger. Even after adding water it's still stronger than the store stuff. It works nicely in a pinch though when you have a ridiculous craving, and it's a fair bit cheaper too. The cost of 2 grande chai lattes is approximately the cost of 1 carton of concentrate. Following package directions you'll get 4 lattes out of it.

However, last winter my mom got me a milk frother for Christmas. I have a little too much fun with that thing... I got into making Starbucks style drinks at home for a while. I was making a pretty awesome Cinnamon Dolce Latte that was similar to the one you get in Starbucks. Very similar actually. I've tried making my own copycat Chai Lattes at home as well, though I've never tried to copy the Starbucks one. I think it's time I do try to though. *evil grin* There looks to be some interesting looking recipes here as well. If I come up with a good taste-a-like, I'll post it.

Sometimes it seems like a bit of a shock looking at the sugar contents in these recipes, mostly because we don't know what goes into our drinks when we buy them. According to Starbucks their grande Chai Tea Latte has 42 grams of sugar. This is approximately 10 teaspoons, or little under a 1/4 cup. Suddenly I don't feel so bad for using the occasional teaspoon in my tea at home! lol. That right there is why it's a treat, not a daily indulgence. It's also why a lot of people lose weight when they start cutting out the extra drinks. Oh well, what's the point in living if you can't occasionally enjoy it? I certainly do, and I'm now staring longingly at my empty travel mug. Soon my friend, soon.

A Couple Quick Hacks

Look around any personal finance site, and you will eventually find an article or blog post about frugal hacks. Basically, tricks to can do easily to save yourself money, or get more for your money. There are thousands of them. Here’s a couple of hacks that I use frequently:

At Home:

Out of body scrub and your feet resemble a reptile? Mix granulated sugar, salt, or rice into a squirt of your usual body wash. It works really well in a pinch (and is WAY cheaper than the sugar/salt scrubs you can buy. I’m looking at YOU Fresh Brown Sugar Polish). I wouldn’t suggest using it on your face though. Maybe it’s just me, but I found this to be way too harsh on my skin, and I broke out worse after trying it. It worked really well on my legs through.

While Travelling:

Do you feel like your intelligence is being insulted when you go through airport security and the price of bottled water jumps another $3? I know I do. That’s why I started carrying an empty water bottle though security. On the other side I go to Starbucks and ask the barista to fill it for me. I’ve never had a problem with this. One thing to consider, make sure the water in the country you’re in is safe to drink. I drank tap water in Prague once and was quite sick as a result. In Canada and the US however, it’s perfectly safe to drink. If you go to a fast food joint and they try to tell you their tap water isn’t safe to drink, remind them that the same tap water is being used to make their fountain drinks. TIP: Take the bottle out of your carry on and put it in the tray before putting it through the scanner, otherwise security will rip your bag apart looking for fluids. Or try one of those new collapsible bottles that are popping up everywhere.

At Starbucks

Most Starbucks hacks have to do with coffee, but this one is for the tea drinkers out there. When you order your tea, order the Venti (not a huge price difference from the Grande). The Venti price includes 2 tea bags rather than the standard 1 bag. Ask the barista to leave one of the tea bags out on the side when she’s making your tea. For the extra 20 cents or so you paid for the size upgrade, you now have a second cup of tea. I stash the extra bags in my desk at work. And seriously, use those bags more than once. There is a ton of tea in them, you can easily make 2 or 3 cups. Do that with both bags and you have 4-6 cups of tea for the price of 1.

What are some of your favourite hacks?

Payday

I love the feeling of money in my account. It's right up there with paying down my beast of a debt that I've accumulated. Today I got both :) Shortly after checking to see that my paycheck had been deposited, I put almost $500 onto my debts, and $250 towards my upcoming utility bills. I never pay my utility bills when they come in, they're always paid in advance. By the time I get the actual bill, it almost always says they owe me money. I don't mind that. It means that if I have a legitimate emergency I can forego paying my bills for a month and nobody gets pissed at me for it.

I am being a little bad however... I'm drinking Starbucks as I write this. Or, as my dad calls it: Fivebucks. He's not far off, my Grande Chai latte set me back almost $4.50. At least today they gave me a survey slip. That means the next one is on them :D I love that.