2016 goals: Friends

After numerous toss and turn Sunday night (hence the expensive mistake on Monday), I briefly thought of some 2016 goals while still in consciousness.

I met a friend on Sunday, it has been 6 months since we saw each other. After catching up over a meal, we parted ways and she texted me "it felt really good to meet you. I enjoyed your sharing" with a smiley. Knowing her, I know she meant real. I had the same feeling too - it felt good to catch up and see her, particularly I was able to share what I know in the industry/hobbies that she's interested in (as a second career). I think I support whatever decision she is ultimately going to make (or not make).

And I admire her for her courage to find out what she likes, how she's going to endeavor to make something happen. I had those moments before (briefly), but have not gone around to the stage of trying it out. The look of wistfulness, the thought of other possibilities lying ahead, etc, all these seem to disappear the more I grow. Feelings that were once a part of your "daydreaming" now became 'unfamiliar', feelings that I would associate with a prerogative being young and carefree - have become wishful thinking.

There was something we had in common: we've both been "shielding" ourselves away from socializing/seeing anyone because of the fatigue we experienced in our day jobs. We both admitted that the Sunday night catch up was a pleasant surprise, and we had plans to meet again sometime soon (in a 3-6 months time frame). This gave me a pat on my back, in the sense "Yay! I'm still capable of making a good conversation", "Yay there's people who don't find  me boring". I'm learning to become a good listener, patiently wait for people to finish, and slow to make assumptions. (Did I say I'm type A?)

Most people tend to think others' jobs are better than theirs - certainly my job in their case, which is why I prefer not to talk about too much what I do, because it will sound bragging, or simply ungrateful. As in: "hey why are you whining when you are paid more than I was?". 

However with this friend on Sunday night, she totally understood. We both shared the same view: while we are paid reasonably (not a lot though), the stress level and the salary does correlate.  Even if the remuneration is good, it doesn't take away from the fact that a salary is supposedly not a 'shut-thou-up' money, we work hard to earn it, it's not like we sit and do nothing each day!

There is an ex-colleague who thinks: want to talk about working extra hours? Let's see who wins (longest hours). And I will say, sorry (not sorry!), but that's just WRONG. Extra hours is extra hours, it doesn't matter whether it's 30 mins or 3 hours. It certainly doesn't give him the right to dismiss the extra hours (that I worked) is not considered "extra" by any means (compared with his hours), and I'm not even interested in being the person who wins in having the longest hours. Sorry not in PJ's world :-)

Have you ever thought about one's friends change over with time? Once I heard someone said your friends/circle change every 7 years. I still haven't decided if it's an accurate description! But it makes you wonder once in a while...

Sometimes it's simple things like that makes you grateful in finding people who get what you mean. Without thinking in another way, might I add.

With that catch up being successful, I briefly had an idea of who I'll be meeting in 2016, and I'll be making a list. Will be taking the first step to initiate. Quantity is never the focus here, the goal is to make each meetup meaningful, by being "there" as a good listener.

(I am late this year in drawing up goals for 2016 - there might be separate posts to come, please bear with me - it's one of those things that you will 'get to you' when it does!)

December = Excess = Sick

Disclaimer: I went a little crazy during November and December and just did a huge shop yesterday - it's making me guilty, regret now due to the excess. 

I should know it's coming. Right? Right??? 

The end of the year is always the worst - different sales going on, birthday discounts, etc. Excess makes me feel sick. And I am sick of the stuff piling in my room, sick of the wrong decisions I made, sick of repeating the same route again as the years before.

Definitely some goals are in the making with regards to that, the difficult part is "how to". While it's probably easy for some people who "just don't", it's going to be a bit tricky for moi. In the past I found that too much time on my hands = more mindless purchases, fully busy = less time to shop. However just look at the past two months will tell you otherwise. Busy = stress shop. 

I start to think that clarity is the key, when my mind is clear and focused on goals, and that means really focused and determined without distractions, I generally do better. The environmental factors of course play a part, I do better on days without any credit cards around aka (limited) cash only. I also do better when I have time to connect with frugal bloggers and posts...which comes to the conclusion that while I don't really have spare time as in my previous position, and it's not a thing I have control over. I definitely can do something on my part by leaving the cards at home, go limited-cash-only on days that are planned to be no-spend. Some unsubscribing actions must be done to get rid of the distractions.  

Lastly, how do I maintain the clarity and focus? How can one make frugality on auto-pilot without the need to even think?

Slow Sunday

On this slow weekend, I opted to stay in and hence 2 NSDs.

A few things that were forgotten in the last post, I made a decision to quit one of my side-hustle. Although it doesn't earn much, it does take up a bit of time and more often than expected, I found myself dreaded at the thought of working on it. To put it simply, I told the supervisor that I will have an impending change on my workplace, and that will take time to settle in; secondly but more importantly, I want to free some time to pursue my projects (e.g. de-cluttering, spending time with loved ones and family, exercise, catching up with blogs, or just plain idle...). But to keep things open, I did not exclude the possibility of picking it up in the future - if my work situation allows (but I doubt). Anyways, I felt free.

Starting from April, every month went not frugally, and I intend to change that. I found that jotting down tiny frugal things every few days / per week helps a great deal in keeping me on the frugal / resourceful course instead of looking anywhere to spend. I am also considering keeping a small, palm-sized note pad (and a pen obviously) in my bag whenever I go, so when I think of something, usually a to-do item, or a vague idea like meditation, some project that needs further consideration, I will write it down. Why not use a phone as a notepad? I have done that and the list ended up with many other miscellaneous items, and I cannot cross them out after completion of certain tasks (erase is the only option), I prefer something that allows me to check, check, tick and done.

The idea of keeping a physical to-do list is beneficial in a way I did not expect: when near to tears with boredom this weekend, I looked through the list (now still shreds of papers stapled together instead of a notepad), and realized I could use the time to complete some of the stuff that I've been dragging on: finish reading Mrs Moneypenny's book, draft a letter to the building management office, a wardrobe purge (see? this thing crept up every 6 months. Bastard.), clean my room floor, to rotate shoes (#firstworldproblem), exercise (as far as I'm concerned, with the heat and rainy weather, this will remain as scribbles on the paper instead of an item...sad). 

So the easiest was of course to finish the book where I left off months ago, and I couldn't find it anywhere! Wardrobe purge: not really feel like it now. Mop the floor? The flat below me is blasting their air-con so my floor is trickled with cold water droplets because of the temperature difference (I offed the air-con when I wake up)! It would be futile for me to wipe the floor clean when such situation is anticipated to last until summer finishes.

I turned to rummage through the cupboards and then found some noodles that were close to expiry dates, had one for lunch. Rummaging through the other cupboards I picked out some tubes and jars that are unopened and won't be used, off they go to my friends then. The travel book I borrowed from a friend - it's no longer sitting on my desk but off to the bag it goes - I'll return it when I see him for a dinner or something after work. A few reading materials on the side-hustle that I was working for? The recycle bin! 

I also reserved a book on de-cluttering (the mind and the home) with a click, didn't know it was that easy! Now I just have to wait patiently since there are others who are also waiting for the book. Think this deserves a frugal point!

For the rest of today, I'm catching up with some blog reading and will be charting my frugal course for August. 

I may or may not have mentioned in the last post, that some of the items in the wardrobe are looking a bit washed out and tatty (e.g. black turned dark grey with white cast on top, colors that no longer look like when they're new thanks to the mixed color wash and transfer of dye/colors during wash, things that no longer look good because I've grown fat in the belly - YIKES especially on the last one). I found that shabby looking clothes really dampen my spirits and outlook, I'd feel shabby the whole day and felt compared to, even when my bag is new. After some analyzing that most items in my current wardrobe had lasted 1-3 years, some of them are just outdated, gone tatty, and some of them just don't look good anymore. With this in mind, I have a clothes shopping trip planned next next week, I'd be uber careful and cautious when I consider bringing a new item in, however. This is due to concerns with space, ease of washing with other items (color transfer), style in question (compatibility with my activities and other items), and material. I deliberately pushed this shopping trip later and later, frankly I just want to faint when looking at the current wardrobe, I'm not sure if I have the guts to bring anything new in before cleaning something out, this is something I dreaded on and on. Secondly, some bargains might be at their best when we're stepping into the next season. 

Also on the same note, I really need a change on my hair, it no longer looks crisp nor fresh, instead it looks out of place, still thinking on how to proceed with this one. I may change haircut twice per year to three times per year in order to feel my best. Hope this doesn't come across as vanity, but how I look really affects how I feel (low confidence, insecurity, shy away from this or that). I could no longer deny it when looking at the mirror, and this has become more frequent than before.

As July is drawing to a close, the monthly wrap-up will be up in the coming few days. I'd have a weekend getaway next week so I hope everyone has had a great month!

What are your plans in August?

Monthly Wrap-Up: April 2015

With plenty of blog post reading to catch up ahead, I'll first do a wrap-up of April. I felt like a naughty child who failed to do what I ought to do!

I'll start with something good that has happened this month:

- borrowed some books and finished one

- we bought a travel guidebook using a voucher and ended up paying only a few dollars for it

- bleach wiped my room once, washed curtains, hung them up, changed new bed sheets

- upgraded my credit card and makes earning points faster

- opened up an investment account, which I've dreaded, and still dreaded

- decluttered magazines, found lost photos

The not-so-good of April:

- overspent my budget

- earned very little in side-hustle front

- exercised zero times

- felt the urge to spend / shop, see yesterday's post

- terribly behind on blogs and completely fallen off the frugality bandwagon

- treated a lot of important persons for dinners, my food budget exploded
- NSDs had shrunk in number since I spent a few days away and of course, paid for food and travel day by day

April had seen me throwing my money (and caution) in the wind, since I was stressed out. I don't know about other people, but going on a trip stresses me out a lot, A LOT. There was the familiarizing with guidebooks, lots of decision making, coordinating, researching. All of these happened while I'm still working daytime, there were many times I wanted to say "I can't handle this". This feeling remained after I returned from the trip, as I am already planning another trip, and catching up with lots of things at the same time, opening a bank account, frequent trips to the bank, post office, here and there during lunch, when I'm supposed to wind down. I hope this doesn't sound like bragging (because I'm not), and whoever was the psychologist or something that says going on holidays give people stress can't say it any truer. Holidays isn't all about rainbows, and it gives you headaches not (just) because of money.

April's figures: overspent $3,366, savings rate saw a huge dip to 29.6% only *yikes*

What's in store in May?

- haircut. It's reached so long and thick that I sweated out from it more often than I thought: summer is here

- wardrobe switch. Can you believe it's the 2nd time I do this - meaning that we stepped into winter, and are stepping out of it now!

- more research for the trip, packing

- family gathering for Mother's Day (dinner)

- (another) granny's birthday dinner

- ideally I'd like to step up on the side-hustle earnings but it's out of my control, plus time is not really enough lately

Have a great weekend everyone!

Monthly Wrap-Up: Feb 2015

February just went by in a blur. Have you noticed the lack of weekly goals post? Well, I got detracted once falling off the bandwagon of posting it weekly. Need to do better in this so the next 10 months won't go by without anything done. However as I've noted in the previous post, a few personal crises had crept up on my plate, and I found myself having poor sleep, cannot eat / no mood to eat, and generally feel immobilized due to weakness. There were times I would just sit and cry. My focus in March is on my relationship and family first. Nothing. else. comes. first. Period.

On travel-related matters, I've just realized the miles I've accumulated so far, is enough to redeem a round-trip ticket to Japan. This excludes the oil & fuel surcharge, various tax and airport taxes that I have to pay should I go, which can be often be ridiculous when they add up to about half the price of the ticket if I'd normally buy on its own! Nevertheless, free is free, as I have no plans to use the miles at the moment, I'll just let them sit for a while. Although some of it will expire in mid 2016. My original target might sound ambitious - but I was aiming for a 3x amount of miles before I redeem it - enough for a trip to Netherlands or Germany or something. But the credit card which I use to earn miles is basically earning peanuts when it comes to miles. I used to earn quite a bit of extra miles when I do my shopping via this card with a tracking website, but since I've cut the amount of shopping lately, a little bit of hacking (possibly switching to a higher tier of the card membership, dining at certain places to earn optimum miles), needs to be figured out. 

I've bought a plane ticket for April's trip and just got the hotel sorted out. It was a pain to select where to stay every time, it really is. I'm a no-fuss person and can happily sleep anywhere except on the street, but not everyone is, and I truly understand that. Crossing my fingers that the eating and getting around will be cheaper at the destination, no shopping will be involved. Even the tickets and hotel has been booked, I"m not sure if we're still going on this trip as I said, the personal crisis is major this time. 

On the extra income side, I achieved my monthly goal, am grateful for that. Also worth punching myself noting is, I need to get the blog sale up soon, the clutter is sitting around for too long. This, should be high on my list once the crises has been resolved.

Diet / healthy eating goal:

My diet has been a havoc in February, unstable schedules (both me and my mom) which means that while meal times are stable, the food I had was sometimes junk, sometimes home-cooked, sometimes eating out. This should raise grave concerns for my belly which seems to be getting more obvious. 

DB and I bought a cheese fondue pack to eat in the other night and it was a complete fail - the pack being too salty for my taste, and too alcoholic for his taste. Added to the pack we had processed food (smoked salmon and parma ham) which were way too salty for my taste. (I don't like parma ham to begin with, please don't hate me!) So the dinner was like salt on salt on salt. That's what I hate about buying processed food because I can't control what goes in there. DB suggested we DIY the cheese fondue sauce next time - we'll surely get around to do that as he loves his cheese! This will depend on whether the crisis will be resolved.

Exercise goal - absolutely zero. Again, this will be high on the list once the crises resolved.

Savings rate - dipped from 45% last month to 36% in February. This has to do with the travel expenses I made. Possibly something else, not in the mood to go through the tiny bits now as I'm near a major breakdown.

In other news, the doctor I pay regular visit to, has risen the fees. This is crap news and I hope I'll be getting better and visit the doctor less often, but for the near future I still need to pay regular visits to there. No way of getting around with it since I am sticking to this doc for now.

Hope March will be a better month!

Saying NO to temptations

OK, I've never thought these to be the first pictures to appear on my blog posts but here you go...aren't they pretty?

THAT china ware in the bottom pic...priceless. Well, no, they come with a price tag. What are you doing in a Starb**ks when you are not actually a coffee drinker or a snacker? You may ask. The reason I was there was because of these - I hunted them down for my friends, but the mugs were so adorable...I found them hard to forget. But I'm trying to resist; I have too many cups / mug, I might break them since I'm careless, my home is running out of space, etc The debate is still raging hard this morning when I helped my friends to purchase them (which they'll reimburse me later), and by the way, these are "limited editions" exclusive to this corner of the earth (of course that darn word again!) and sold like hot cakes every year around this time when they are released (some of them the same, some are new designs). The whole city was scouring over these, and I just didn't buy them (yet). I don't think I will, even though I very much want to!

Now I invite you to join me to savor these pretties in a digital form...cross our arms in front of our chest and say no. No, it's not easy, but it has to be done, if we are to stay on course with frugality.

Over to you, how do you resist temptations? How do you convince yourself to say NO?

*Full collection photos HERE. Do not click if you are feeling weak. You've been warned.

Crunching the numbers

So here we are...16th of February!

A quick trip to the budget number reveals that I've spent 78.5% (!!!) of the monthly budget. The remaining days in the month will see me teetering over the edge, and I'll be clutching my wallet very, very tight. There will be a trip to the health practitioner tomorrow and it'll send me right over the budget. 

Previously I made it clear that there won't be any stockpiling purchases this month, but I've made a few slips here and there. I caught the oat biscuits (cheap and tasty) back on shelves again and got two boxes without thought. (Hey they last until December...) With the coming week is major Public Holidays (PH) I should have no problem with 3 NSDs in a row. Next week there will be a banquet (saved for), and an official lunch treat (shared with peers, also saved for) so those won't hurt my monthly budget numbers. But there's another trip to the doc next week, but we shall see.

I'm going to spill the beans about an awesome deal we had on V Day, since me and DB don't want to succumb to paying triple or double prices for poor quality set dinner and such. In the past we've deployed our twisted logic, had our mouths fed in a fast food chain and we can't be happier! Here's why:

(1) no crowds next to us

(2) no need advance booking via phone, no head-wringing moment of "OMG where should we eat at?"

(3) we never like "V Day set menu" prescribed by the restaurant and have the same food as everyone else *BORING*

(4) not dining in a restaurant means we won't be extorted $ (mind you the quality usually goes downhill on fully booked occasions like this, and Xmas)

(5) no pressure to "do what everyone else does", aka a bouquet of flowers and all that sh**

So, what did we have? *cues drumroll*

Our dinner for that night (1 big pizza + 1 baked rice) only costs HK$108, for 2! We could have gone to a fast food chain cheaper than HK$54 per person, sure. But HK$108 for 2 is a major win considering that it's not a fast food chain quality food! (Pizzas do not belong to fast food "menu" where I live.) I had a coupon for a big pizza at $69 versus the usual $149, and since we're *kind of* big eaters, we added a baked rice, it was $45 but the cashier told me the set (same size) is $39 and comes with soup/soda, that's even better! The only downside was that I had to go to the place to order (the place is far away from everywhere else) and self-deliver it home by transit instead of the motorman buzzing it to our doorstep. Sure it took quite a bit of walk and strong arm muscles but hey it's a win-win for everyone! We got our fab deal pizza dinner and can't be happier.

I also booked tickets for DB and I for a short trip somewhere in Easter - it wasn't the prime time for fab travel deals but this period is easiest to allow taking day-offs to make it into a trip. So I guess that'll have to do. Location-wise, it's not where I felt 100% attracted to go but DB really wants to go there so no problems with that. Any travel related costs shall not come under the monthly budget and shall be taken out of another pocket - which I hope will be adequate to fund it...

Everyday frugality

Happy new year everyone! 

The first week of the year was a rather eventful week, so far I've done the following on my to-do list:

- Read 50 pages of the said book read 30

- Jog 2x walked 1x, jogged 1x (but my calf starts to hurt after i'm done with 1.25 miles...had to switch to walking)

- See whether DB needs help with his house move I spent much of Saturday helping him and his mom to pack and move...

- Hand tiny gifts to DB's mom handed her some, still some more

- Pick up free ticket from cinema  done

- Track refunds x 2 done

- Make outfit plan on Sunday shamefully not yet...

- Ship 2 parcels to friends abroad not yet

- Make a list of items for blog sale not yet...but needs to be done soon

- Continue the glasses search looked at a few places, found nothing, the search continues

New year calls for a new way of doing things :-) I'm noting down the frugal things I did each day this week, whether they are on purpose or not! I doubt if I can come up with a frugal thing to do on a daily basis (dig hard and deep enough?), but so far so good. As long as frugality is practiced everyday, I'm contented.

1st Jan: Went for a walk at the park, healthy and free. What's better than the feeling of getting a head start on first day of the year (health goals)?

2nd Jan: Took home from work some leftover cakes and pastries. Dad was kind of excited about one of the pastries being his favourite. The pastries are individually wrapped so they can sit for a while, yum!

3rd Jan: Took my complimentary ticket from the cinema, picked up some beauty samples. Free of course! I re-gifted a purse to DB's mom, it was new but not my taste, she happily took it, win-win!

4th Jan: Can't really think of anything - except that all my spending were on food today.

5th Jan: I could have asked a colleague to share with me the Starbucks BOGOF offer which expires tomorrow, instead I made hot cocoa using what I have. Frankly speaking I just need a hot sweet beverage as I was feeling a bit nauseous whole day. Also I also picked up some free samples on the way home from a chain store, nothing beats beauty on the cheap (free)! Will be cooking up some instant noodles tonight for dinner (1 person serving) using what food we have. Oh and I received birthday money from my distant family, this will be counted as part of the extra income made this month. [Edit: I bought some butter shortbread, mincemeat tarts, and Hershey's nuggets on clearance! The chocolates would be gifted, the shortbread would be an indulgent treat. Talk about a frugal slip! Today is not a No Spend Day hence, but tomorrow will be!]

So far so good : ) I hope everyone's got a gentle but good start of the year.

2014 in review

I struggled whether this post should be written or not, but then I decided what's the point of a blog if I can't be honest with myself and be accountable?

A few things came into mind when summarizing 2014 financially. "Haven't tried hard enough", and in similar vein - "gave in too easily", frailty. 

I began tracking my expenses during latter half of 2014, while the balance sheet is still far from being financially healthy, it allowed me to have a clearer picture of what areas are my weaknesses, what my priorities are, and where shall I head to, financially-speaking. 

But I did take the very first step into putting money for conservative type investment, this practice shall continue when I learn more about investment. No I'm ready to dump my hard-earned cash in one go into the market, I'm going to stick with the least risky side of things. It's that I believe getting it started should allow me to catch up with peers of the same age / situation. I'm not that positive about getting "ahead" of most others, but in the likely event I'm getting a raise next year, that shall leave me with more wiggle room and accelerate the savings rate, and hopefully figure out how to get ahead. 

The hardest part is how to get started, of course. But this is no excuse to sit and do nothing.

My keywords for 2015: Stay focused. Try harder. Don't succumb to the "wants" easily. I would try very very hard to stick to my budget in January, if I succeed in doing so even for a mere 1 month, I'd be ecstatic. 

(Random thought: maybe I should change the profile picture to Scrooge McDuck...)

In 2015, I will repeat this thought daily.

A chillaxing day

I know I shouldn't be complaining about having holidays, but I stayed home pretty much 3 out of 4 days and was kind of bored. Which got me thinking since when holidays must be related to shopping / going out / traveling? What's wrong with staying home?

I dragged myself to do a few things yesterday while at home: read quite a bit of the book I put on and off for a while; went for a jog (3 miles); trimmed my nails; cleaned some shoes; helped out mom with her groceries; washed some towels... 

The only thing I dreaded on was stitching my coat buttons! I had bad experience with stitching back buttons and they kept falling off not once, but twice afterwards (they were nowhere to be found of course...) and it felt like I wasted my time to do something which doesn't last. I told mom about this and said I'd rather go to the tailor's and have them stitched properly (maybe I wasn't doing it right) so that will save my time, and I don't have to worry about losing buttons everywhere! Deep down I know this kind of money shouldn't be spent (make do and mend with your own hands), but a part of me said it's just a couple dollars and it can save me time and effort from bobbling down my head with the stitching and buttons! Plus it may last longer if I take it to the tailor's and have them done properly...

Either way I'm going to ask her to show me how (she mends some simple stuff for me at times), or I'll have it done professionally. In the past I have made a mistake which took up a lot of my time and didn't yield good results! The coat can't wait any longer as the buttons are falling off...that happens with cheap coats that I bought. UGH.

Oh, and yesterday was a no-spend day as well ;-) gotta love it.

2015 Personal development goals

Echoing a bit of health goals HERE and the library card post HERE, the personal development goals below also have something related to books and reading. I've put aside books, classes and learning for ages but I really enjoyed my undergraduate life. Too bad we all have to work to make a living.

Personal development:

1. Finish the magazine backlog
2. Read 3-5 books during the year, non-fiction and health books mostly
3. Make to-do lists every week, month and year to keep on track and do better planning mentally, financially and physically
4. Be surrounded by people who "do good"
5. Empower self

Goal (1): there are about 6 issues at hand. If you're interested, the magazine starts with an "M" and has about 150+ pages each...I love the quality of writing there and the variety of topics (travel! society! geopolitics!) but found that my reading rate was far lagging behind that I cannot catch up with the past issues, plus the subscription fee was too high (although quality matches with the price I'd say), this year I didn't renew the subscription and I have no plans to do that in near future. There's another quarterly mag (here if you're interested) that I'd like to subscribe but I didn't, owing to space (storage) issues and being the slow reader that PJ is (know thyself lol). It costs much cheaper and the quality of writing is still there, and its content is what I'd appreciate: getting connected with life, objects around you and nature, people, etc. It explores a different theme in each issue: on aging, hosting dinners, travel, farming, food.

Goal (2): I know the target 3-5 books is rather pathetic in numbers, but I"m aiming to start small here. I know very well what would happen if I target 10 books or 12 books a year, the reality is I wouldn't be able to accomplish that I(unless all are fiction books) and it'll make me feel bad. In high school I was told by my English literature teacher that I read too much fiction books (she guessed it by my writing style, lol) and she wanted me to spice things up a little by changing the genre I read. Non-fiction was hard and I didn't like it at first, but a year later I began to understand why she recommended that and I thanked her in my heart when I'm rushing for deadlines in my Uni essays.

Goal (3): Risking to sound I'm too micro-managing in every aspect, it's just to make things easier. I have drawn up a list of yearly events: Mid-autumn dinners, red packets for Chinese New Year, dental checkups and washes, insurance renewal, i.e. things that require tremendous effort like bleaching and wiping, or events that incur expenditures. Having this list at hand would help me have a better idea of the monthly budget, how much free time that month I would be, and how much breathing room I'd have (financially and time). Another good things about the list is, it basically works year after year with some minor tweaking.

Goal (4): Let's just say I'm surrounded by negativity and ungratefulness / asinine people particularly at work on a daily basis, 2015 I want to be surrounded by people who 'do good' and make good things happen to others.

Goal (5): It felt as if I've been in the backseat watching my life for so long (years), in 2015 I'd like to take the steering wheel again, metaphorically speaking. I wanted to pick up that 'can do, will do' vibe and that can be done if I can draw up weekly or monthly goals and taking baby steps to empower the self again and tell myself it's possible if I put my mind to it. Goal (5) is closely related to goal (3).

Family/Friends goals and career goals up next!

Christmas came (a wee bit) early!

I had parcels coming from Singapore and Sweden yesterday and on Friday, they were of course, from my dear friends! *claps and does happy dance*

They would always send beauty supplies to me, and particularly in December for my birthday. We would send stuff to each other a handful of times during the year, sometimes they come to visit me  in HK as well. Their kindness and generosity is way beyond anyone I know from daily life. The people I know/see/meet/work with day to day is none of the above, but the best people I know are not the ones I see day to day, isn't that ironic? It's one of my personal development goals (to be posted shortly) is to be surrounded by people who "do good", aka kind and helpful to others.

Back to the parcels, they sent me body lotion, cosmetics (lips and eyes stuff, tons of it), a hair mist, and a few items that I had on my secret wishlist, in fact I almost ordered them months ago but didn't. Here it is on my desk! I wonder how would they know?!

Anyways, it's always nice to have friends remembering you, I love putting stuffs together in a parcel send some RAOK (random act of kindness) back, it's fun! And, I thank god for these friends that I have.

Lucky Draw and (more) frugal entertainment

Christmas celebration went about at the office and we had a lucky draw every year. This year I got a box of chocolates. And I took some leftover whole fruit home :-) those will be eaten tomorrow. 

It was a nice day, although I would really want to win that electric kettle / cordless travel kettle (or any sort of kitchen appliance) / cash vouchers they had there! It'll be much more practical and healthy than having confectionery. 

The Nespresso Dolce Gusto coffee maker isn't my cup of tea though, because I don't particularly like coffee (drink only a handful of times a year), and because you have to keep buying those coffee capsules to feed into the machine (and they aren't cheap)! Now that's not anywhere near frugal to me :-)

To be honest each of us paid something for the celebration, but it's nice to be able to take something home and not just the food we had at the celebration.

A colleague handed me 2 free movie tickets, which would be frugal entertainment for the weekend! I checked the screening and unfortunately only tomorrow and Sunday morning showtimes are available (then it's off-screen for good), so I won't be making use of them :-( am looking forward to re-gifting it to someone else now. Very often when he gives out the ticket the showtimes and locations are already limited to a few. Since I'm not a retired person yet, it's hard to make use of these frugal fun things!

Frugal entertainment: Where's my library card?

Thinking about the trips next year, I dropped by the library during lunch the other day just to see what sort of travel books they have (and how new or dated). Holy molly, while not all are the latest editions, they do have quite a nice selection of travel guides there!

What remains uncertain is the travel dates and location, this depends on my parents mostly. We won't know until next year's spring.

I haven't been to the public library (or Uni library) for years, and I think I might be missing something, something frugal, something fun, something satisfying to the mind and soul :-) It's time to renew my library card and get borrow some books to read. I still have some books I bought long ago (and those that kept sitting on the shelves) with pages un-turned. 

There's this one book I kept reading the first 20 pages and left it aside, when I picked up I re-read the 20 pages and then stopped, this has repeated several times. (And I'm still on page 20 if you want to know)

Over to you, do you stay on course with one book until you finish it? Or read a few books at the same time? And what do you read mostly?

Doing the right thing

I changed my mind (sort of ate my words) - I declined the wedding banquet invitation. To be honest, my initial reply to her was I"d get back to her whether I can make it or not - so my answer now is a NO, and I told her I'm sorry I can't make it on such short notice.

Come to think of it, it's not just about the money. It's about sincerity. The colleague who was getting married invited me a few days ago, and her wedding is in early January. I mean hello, you don't decide to get married in a 5-star hotel suddenly, right? IF I"m one of the "valued" people in her life ,I"m saying IF, which I'm not, neither was she in my life (brutally honest I know), wouldn't it make sense to notify people months in advance? Not weeks. It's barely 3 weeks until her wedding here. Which makes you hard NOT to wonder whether she didn't have enough guests, but she booked a large venue and paid a large deposit, so she scrambled everyone to attend to glean money out from the guests who were not invited in the first round, but only much later, aka last week.

I know some people who handled this tactfully by asking first, then handing the invitation (if the reply was a yes). She didn't. I don't have obligation to "make up for" her lost guests who were unable to attend. In short, I felt a bit cheated. If she doesn't think of me as a valued guest (to ask me to save the date way before), why should I value her invitation and attend? I've done a few favors for her (unrelated to work / wedding), and this is how she treat me? Like an ATM of last resort or some kind?

Oh and by the way, I know *some* colleagues are going, but some are not. My supervisor was definitely not. Either way, I made a counter offer for her to make up for the absence, but she hasn't replied.

And I slept well at night.

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Another good news is, I found myself less and less attracted to the thought of shopping now. Except I bought a comb /hair brush yesterday. I never had a comb / hair brush, or have ever bought one, because I felt I don't need one. Until lately my hair seems to be falling off more than before, I"m hoping this would help. It costed HK$150 and I would be able to use it everyday. This purchase would be practical and well-considered. I'm starting to like this way of considering a potential purchase, thinking about it back and forth, doing research, choosing the most suitable one, starting with the simple one! I've been going through my head that every purchase should be done the way this is :-)

Hope everyone's having a good weekend!

It's not how much you earn, but how little you need

I was inspired by a local TV documentary (HERE if it works for you) which told a story of two men who had given up their jobs and live in nature. They are both uni-grads, who could earn from their profession and yet choose to retreat to a life of peace, non-materialism, happiness and simplicity. And before you ask, no, I don't intend to live in a homestead or retire right now, I won't eat what others have left at their fast food plastic trays (not even for the sake of wastefulness), I can't DIY nor make a fire out of the bush etc, but I appreciate a simple and happy life. Whether you aspire to live a life like theirs or not, there are certainly lessons for everyone in the logic/wisdom/principles behind.

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Here are a few memorable quotes:

"Why make ourselves busy? The goal of living a life is to be happy, peaceful and healthy"

"Aligning with nature / Getting close with nature means meeting your own needs and NOT harming the natural environment"

"City dwellers have lots of resources but are lacking in consciousness, thinking if they have the money they can throw away things at their disposal. Being rich has nothing to do with wastefulness"

"I eat leftover food from others not because I"m poor but because I want to reduce the burden to our Earth"

"It only gets more ironic when the stuff/junk I pick up from others' unwanted trash is getting newer and newer. Why do we dump things that are so new? I haven't bought any new clothes for 10 years, but I could find brand new clothes from others' trash (still in bags/tags)"

"Wearing clothes is not about satisfying others' sight / eye pleasure"

"Happiness coming from consumerism or shopping is a pleasure that puts the earth's resources on expense"

"I never ask how much I earn per month, but ask instead how little I spend"

"The less you own, the more freedom you have because you don't have to worry. I don't ask everyone to do the same but I challenge myself how little I can live on.

"I consider myself rich since I have the right and freedom to choose the way of life I want"

"Simplicity means not to let MONEY have control over TIME, nor control over what we DO"

"I do DIY home-perfecting projects and am not bounded by time. I wait for the materials to come, sometimes it means waiting to find it in the trash or waiting for people to give them to me, I see it as a training for Patience"

"City dwellers tend to think that money solves everything, hence they make themselves busy because of Money. I don't busy myself for Money, I use my brain to solve problems (life), hence I'm not bounded by money nor am I a slave for money"

"A life of simplicity is an attitude, it does not a definitive standard. You don't have to live on an island. It doesn't mean you have to burn the wood logs to get fire to cook, you just reflect on your life (how far you've come) and take the opposite direction"

"Living in nature doesn't mean not spending a dime on anything, it's about avoiding unnecessary consumption, purchasing it in the greenest manner (bringing our own containers when buying food). We don't refute civilization, we're just don't want to create wastefulness (plastic grocery bags and packaging)"

"I don't think my way of life is 'bitter', in fact it is the city dwellers' way of life being 'overly sweet' (saturated with materialism and its abundance)"

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Please allow me to say that I haven't been touched or felt moved by a documentary for a very long time. The last time was probably about polar bears losing their homes in the arctic, starving and died because they are forced to move somewhere they're not familiar with. 

"How do I want my life to be?" is a fundamental question for me, unfortunately it's not an easy one to answer either. Too many people have lived their lives in a breeze and chase after things that they don't intend to, at the end they might not get anything they want from it - because most of the times they haven't even looked and asked themselves what do they want from it? Sure, life gives everyone their share of sh*t now and then. ..Anyhow this is a reminder of why I need to live my life with a clear purpose (aka consciousness above everything I do). I hope my life would be more than just working and spending money on various things in life "mindlessly", and those things might mean nothing to me at the end!