Well, only ten more days to go in this month’s discretionary budget cycle, and I’m well on target, for the first time in months. Now that I’m finally getting paid, now I’m staying on budget! Every single month this summer I’ve gone over budget, with too little money coming in to cover base expenses even if I could have made budget. One little calamity after another racked up one big bill after another.
It looks like I’m going to be paid about $545/pay period, about $83 a month more than I expected. If I transfer $249 a month from the summer stipend (prorated over 16 weeks), then I’ll end up with about $185 a month more than needed to cover basic expenses.
As the weather cools, the amount of play will be more than that, since the air-conditioning and water bills drop steeply during the winter months.
That, btw, is without a drawdown from the 403(b). I cut the drawdown to a dollar a month by way of preserving capital. The state requires retirees to take something out, to remain eligible for the payout for unused retirement pay, which, thanks to our leaders’ infinite wisdom, is irrationally paid out over three years. I rolled most of the money in that account over to my big IRA, where it could be invested more intelligently, but had to leave enough to cover this year, 2011, and the first two months of 2012. The last RASL payment is due in February 2012; the instant that hits my checking account, whatever remains in the 403(b) goes straight to the IRA.
I’d left enough to cover a $500/month drawdown, since no one at GDU, the State of Arizona, or Fidelity seemed to know what was the minimum drawdown one could take and still qualify as “retired” for RASL purposes. Late last spring, some guy at Fidelity finally revealed that you could take out as little as a dollar a month. Not having enough to live on over the summer, I kept the $500 ($383 net) coming through the summer but arranged for it to drop to a net 77 cents a month starting this month.
The stock market has been so volatile—and the fact that we’re in an economic depression so obvious—that I wanted to avoid pulling out money from investments whose value probably is near their nadir. This strategy will keep $6,000/year in that account, instead of having it come to me to be frittered away on living expenses.
Nevertheless… I’m thinking that next summer I’ll draw a chunk out of that fund to make life a little less precarious.
If I do get a summer course—or if I can find some other job—then I’ll take out enough to net about $2,000. That would allow me to run the air-conditioning enough to keep the house tolerably comfortable. I am tired, tired, tired of breaking a sweat by working my fingers on a computer keyboard! It might even provide enough, combined with whatever I’ve managed to economize over the nine-month academic year, for me to take a little vacation someplace cooler. If I don’t get a course, then I’ll need net $3225 to cover my living expenses from the end of May to mid-September: that’s a $3,970 drawdown. In that case, I won’t be living comfortably or taking any trips, but at least I’ll be able to get by.
At any rate, in theory I should be able to do OK without having to take much out of savings, as long as I’m teaching. I can improve on that theory significantly if, come next May when I reach so-called “full” retirement age (don’t you love it? at 65 you can be “fully” unemployed and unemployable, but you can’t be “fully” retired!), if next May I take my entire emergency fund and pay back the amount of SS the feds have doled out so far. This would jack up my Social Security payout to the amount it would have been had I managed to hang onto my job to age 66, a better pittance than the one I’m getting now. The amount would the more than the 4 percent drawdown one can supposedly take from investments, and so I think this would be a smart move.
It leaves nothing to buy a new car, however. The Dog Chariot won’t run forever, and so I’ll have to figure out a way to afford a replacement set of wheels sometime in the near future. Oh well…later. I’ll think about that later.
For the nonce, I’m in a daze—another 4:00 a.m. wake-up call, lhudly sing goddamn. Along about 6:00, stumbled into the kitchen to fix breakfast for me and the hound and was jolted awake by a sharp chomp on a toe: more Ondts! I think they’re coming in under the back door this time, but am not sure because I can’t find them outside. They may be entering through the woodwork. Sprayed the little gals with some more home-made window cleaner, mopped the floor, and am now waiting for the tile to dry so the dog and I can get some food.
One reader asked what’s in the window cleaner. I no longer measure, but just toss the stuff together by eyeball. It’s about half a spray bottle of rubbing alcohol, to which is added about 1/8 to 1/4 cup ammonia and a like amount of vinegar. Fill to the top with tap water, and voilà! A very fine grease-cutter, glass-cleaner, and ant-killer.
Sooo much work to do today…must get moving.
Oh, I am crossing my fingers for a vacation for you.
On the employment front: does your school have a course in “Creative Nonfiction”? This is a popular new offering–with your magazine and blogging work, you are already an expert. (Or–could you propose such a course?)
@ frugalscholar: Yes, I’ve taught creative nonfiction in the past, and in fact it’s one of my specialties. Unfortunately, at the community colleges here the interesting courses are reserved for full-time faculty. The department has someone hired to teach creative writing, and she’s staked that course out for herself.
Unless I can find sections in other colleges, such as the ones at Estrella Mountain that I had to turn down because of the SS earnings limitation, I’m going to be pretty much stuck with freshman comp.
There are only two other schools within reasonable driving distance: Phoenix College, which is about the same distance from my house as Paradise Valley, and Glendale, which is over on the westside. Estrella Mountain would be a monster drive, as would all the schools in the far North and the far East Valley. Truth to tell, I’d rather teach composition than drive from pillar to post.
ondt invasions are so annoying. We live in an older pier & beam wood house & usually have annual onslaughts. I made a huge effort last year against the magically reappearing ant trails & immediately fought off the first few that showed up this year, & so far we haven’t been carried off. I use boric acid powder but am willing to use bug spray as a back up. Plus this spring we finally made progress on some of the outdoor ant hills, which I think were the source. We’ve been making more of an effort to keep even the least drip of water or morsel of food (including cat food) cleaned up, so there isn’t a lot to attract them, though I know it doesn’t take much.
I’ve found that when I come into the kitchen in the morning to find insects in the sink (small roaches or daddy-long-legs), a small bit of dish detergent knocks them right out – I use the kind that has a little bit of bleach in it, which I think is the trick.