A post in which things start to even out

It was cold this morning.  That was bad in that it was uncomfortable in the house, but good in that it really shut up that little voice that was whispering you're doing just fine with the space heaters, maybe you don't have to spend this money after all...

Yeah, I can't be living that way. 

I got the call from Bobby around 1pm that he was at the heater place.  It turned out I didn't have to meet him there, I could just give him the number and they would run the card.  That was good, because that meant the heater went on the card as a purchase, not as a cash advance, which is charged at a much higher interest rate.  He also ran it at the place he needed to buy the duct-work.  He called me about 4pm to tell me that it was installed and running.  I should come home to a warm house - thank God. 

So I had been thinking about how to pay for all of this.  So the heater and duct-work went on the card at about $2500.  I cleaned out my savings account to pay the guy $600 tomorrow.  Then I called the Evil Empire and struck a deal with the credit card people to have the rest of the money moved to my account.  Unfortunately, Bobby's business is too small for him to be able to run a card, so that part did have to go on the credit card as a cash advance. Sigh.  I saved a little bit of money by having them transfer the money, rather than writing a Visa check on the account (I don't know either), so that was a small mercy.  The problem was that they couldn't do so immediately.  But it should be there in 4-6 days.  So I called Bobby and left a message to explain all that.  He called me back later, and was very nice about it.

I went down to HR to talk to them about making some adjustments to my 401k contributions.   I had thought about getting a loan on my 401k, but then thought if I just (temporarily) decreased my contributions, I should be able to pay off the heater reasonably quickly, if I throw in my profit sharing from this year and my income tax return next year.  Of course there go vacations, etc.  But you gotta do what you gotta do, right?  I'm too old and spoiled to go back to living on beans and cabbage and never going out. 

I called Jason on the way home and talked to him a little, just because he had called and it would make me feel better.  It did.  I'm excited about seeing him tomorrow, although I am less excited about taking him to meet Dad and Eve.  I know they'll be on their best behavior, I'm just stressed about it. 

I stopped by the grocery store, where I was sorely tempted to get some Palmetto Pimento Cheese (Rhonda had heard that it was really good, although I haven't tried it), but I knew that if I got it I wouldn't eat the left-overs that I needed to eat in the fridge.  So I was strong.  I was so glad to have this heat thing (close to) over that I seriously considered going out for Korean food with the boys tonight, but in the end I just felt too poor.  I feel more poor than I actually am, but I didn't need to spend the money.  Plus I'll be eating out with Jason and stuff this weekend, and there is still the jeans-waist-to-pain ratio to consider. 

When I got home, the house was a living temperature, which was nice.  It didn't feel warm really because I don't keep the thermostat set that high.  I thought man, I just paid a lot of money to get back to the status quo...

It was a quiet evening.  There were plenty of things I needed to do, but I just plain didn't feel like doing them.  I cleaned some winter squash I had baked, but hadn't gotten around to seeding and stuff.  I'm going to make winter squash pancakes for Jason this weekend - they are surprisingly delicious.  I virtuously ate left-overs and cheese toast while watching Cupcake Wars, then went to bed with a new Sweet Genius, and a very happy Crooner who was tickled that the heat was back on.