My good fortune

In these particularly tough times, getting a bit of good fortune every now and then can be extremely uplifting. Recently, my wife and I were given such a windfall, and all of a sudden the world was bright and sunny.



The situation was brought about through 3 factors:

A)We filed our first Joint Tax Return and got 3 times what we were expecting back, mainly due to the fact that my wife and I have extremely disproportionate incomes, and that she's still a student.
B) I got an extra paycheck. You know those 2 or 3 times a year when the dates align and you end up with an extra pay period in a month. Well that happened around the same time.
C) My company reversed it's earlier decision about "no profit sharing", and gave us our share.

All this equaled a grand total for us of about 10,000 dollars. You know....I never added it up until now. Wow, you know, that just does not happen everyday. So, what would you do with this money? Here's what we did.

First....THE DEBT

First, a grand to the mother-in-law for random expenses and rent. Second...now those of you who have read my blog for a while have seen that one of my new year's resolutions was to pay off three credit cards in 2009. Well, two are now gone.










PAID!!!!!!!!!!!!!!





Ok, so that was really fun. I really love seeing a $0 balance on these bad boys...now where is that shredder.


*A while later after some maniacal laughter and shrieks of joy*

Ok, I'm back. I feel better now. HAHA! only 2 Credit cards left and then I will be FREE....FREEEEEEE!

*crashes back down to earth*

Oh right, those are the two with the highest balances...right then...back to work, lol.

Anyway, on to happier news. After the great debt reductions of 2009, we looked around to what we really needed around the house. Well, let's see, typical guy response, let's get a bigger TV! *WHACK* I mean 32 inches is fine dear...what do you think we need? After some hemming and hawing, it came to us in our sleep...or rather when we woke up groaning and both our backs killing us! *DING!* We need a new bed!

So thus began the great mattress hunt. Have any of you tried this...I've seen calculus problems with easier solutions. The main factor was durability. I had been through three beds in 9 years. Now I'm a big guy, 6'3" and about 50 lbs overweight. Now, don't judge, I'm working on it *goes to dust off his wii fit*. Anyway, the fact is that I should not be destroying frames and collapsing beds, but I do. Our current bed was rather comfortable until the frame bent, and then the mattress went to shit shortly after. The information on mattress is very hard to come by an impartial source. Plus, then you have to wade your way through all the buzzwords. Then after you've done all the reasearch and gone to the store, the salesman/woman tells you something else is better. So after MUCH diliberation, 7 different mattress considerations, over 2 hours of laying down time, we decided on this:


We went with Latex, because it's feels like innerspring, but is much more supportive, and lasts 4 times as long. Every bit of research I did said that if your a heavy set person, this is the mattress that can take it. They were the best feeling in the store, and after a firmness compromise between my wife and I, we settled on this one. It cost twice as much our previous queen mattress, and hopefully we'll get the 10 years out of it that the warrantee covers.

So after paying down the debt and getting something the house deperately needs, what's left. Oh yeah, HAVE A LITTLE FUN!

This money paid for our recent trip to florida, some car repairs (new tires and 60,000 mile inspections SUCK!), and we're even putting some in the bank.

But not before I feed my little habit:


Magic: The Gathering. Some people smoke pot, others drink the weekends away in bars, some collect rare coins. I play Magic. It's my hobby/obsession depending on the time of year, and how good a mood my wife is in when you ask her about it (jk honey, I love you). Yes, the new Magic the Gathering set (Conflux) was released just this past Monday, and I got to stock up on not just the new Conflux cards, but some old cards that I'll need to complete in the extended format (the older format) for the next few years. For those of you not familiar with the game, it is a really fun experience that has to be played rather then explained. Basically it's like playing an advanced game of chess with specially printed playing cards. If you go to www.magicthegathering.com their is a tutorial that can explain it much better then me. I don't know what it is about these kinds of games, but ever since I got my first Trading Card game starter deck 6 years ago, I've been hooked! Now I've floated from game to game till I came to the grandaddy of them all, the one that started the genre.....Magic. Magic has a really great company behind it, and is the most popular of all the card games out there. It's also the most challenging to play which is good news for me as I love a good challenge. To try and convey my love for this game, I don't watch any sports, but if they broadcast the Magic World Tour (yes there is one), I would watch that. I love it so much, that I actually have a seperate blog about it. It's full of game terminology and stuff, which is why I don't post the reports here.

So thank you for letting me share the great good luck I've had, and I wish you and yours the same.