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33F and overcast with strong gusts and SNOW, this morning!
I threw a jacket over my fleece flannel before heading out with Yvette, because it seemed a bit chilly, but then when we sat down in back, the wind really kicked up and I was thinking... Wow!.. it's pretty cold!
And as the wind died down, the air was suddenly filled with flakes of snow!
Yvette just sat there taking it all in with almost a grin like, finally!
My hands were freezing, but I didn't want to admit that I wasn't prepared for the weather today, so I sat a while longer, as the flurry continued.
Snoop was with us, complaining to me, that we needed to go back inside.
I need new gloves!
And I've got to get the gas heater working back here, because it's cold enough I had to leave the space heater running last night... and I don't like that.
But those things cost money, and I won't know what the budget is for November until I pay those bills!
But today is also Halloween, and garbage day, so I have those things to take care of before work as well.
Okay!.. I printed up the trick or treat sign for the front door, instructing kids to take a handful (because when it's this cold, we're only gonna get five total).
Then I started getting garbage from around the house into the bins.
I took a load of dry laundry from last week upstairs when I got that garbage, and then put what was in the dryer into the empty basket... so that I could put what was in the washer from last night into the dryer.
Then I took the bins to the curb... and back inside, I put new trash bags into all the cans.
Then I started a second pot of coffee in the kitchen.
Whew!
Okay, I Zelled money to BMO for the mortgage autopay... made my car payment... and then paid what credit cards had balances.
AmEx was zeroed, so the utilities are up to date.
DiscoverIT, and CreditOne had small balances, paid to zero.
And now Wells Fargo and PenFed are both down to $100.00 each!
I'll have to double check everything tonight after work... but I should be good to go for November.
Meanwhile, my FICO, according to Experian, is up to 765!
That's higher than it's been all year!
The peak was back in June, when it briefly hit 760!
So NOW IS THE MOMENT TO STRIKE!
I've still got the offer from Discover for a HELOC from last summer, so I'll move on that tonight after work.
Gotta pull this off because there is now only $1000.00 left in savings from that $34,000.00 PNC loan I got in April.
Where did $33,000.00 go, in seven months?
Well, nearly ten thousand of it went to pay back the loan itself, at $780.00 per month, and also the main mortgage, at $630.00 per month!
The other twenty thousand got sucked up by all the big projects... mulberry trees, landscaping, a dumpster, a dump truck, a wood chipper, the fire pit, the hatch door & storm, I can't even remember right now!..
Oh, well there was the studio, and being part time for the summer... and funeral & reunion expenses...
It's just been a very big, very expensive year!
The above is from 5PM, when trick or treating started.
This is from 6:40PM... completely empty.
So I'd call this a success!
For some reason the camera, which goes off every time a car passes, did not register any of the candy being taken except for near the very end when it was almost empty, and three older kids without costumes took the last of it.
So I have no idea how many kids came to the door, but based on past experience, and given the weather, it was probably around 10 or 12.
BUT... if I'd been home and handed out three or four treats to each one, I'd have had some left over.
This way was more efficient!
All the kids got more candy, and none went to waste.
Hard to believe October is over!
This month has been on my radar since Dad died in January!
Everything's been about preparing for it.
And everything went amazingly well!
But tomorrow begins the next mission... to consolidate the old mortgage debt, and the PNC loan from April into a new loan with a manageable payment.
I wrote a lot about how that PNC loan was to buy me time, before and after I secured it. And I knew it was only ever gonna get me to the end of this year.
Now I'm here.
But the house is finally in my name alone.
I've been with GeoStaff over a year, and secured a raise.
And I've gotten my FICO score back up to 765.
Now I just have to pray that Discover is still willing to give me that HELOC they offered last summer.
They should be!..
When they sent that offer, my FICO score was 750.
And since then, they approved me for a second Discover card.
But this needs to happen in November!
Come December... without debt consolidation... it's going to be impossible to pay both the legacy mortgage, and the PNC loan without holding balances on my credit cards... which will drive down my FICO score.
Worse, I could quickly get into a situation where the cards slowly get maxed out.
So... I have one month!
But if things go my way [knocks wood] then I'll be buying myself some REAL time to increase the income.
Not just one year, but ten!
Once I've secured a HELOC, the monthly house payment will be a lot lower than the $1410.00 per month I've been doing this year.
I'm hoping to cut it in half and wind up with something like $705.00 per month[knocks wood again].
And after that, I'm free to start holding balances on my cards, which means I won't have to pay off the AmEx, which absorbs all the utilities and other random bills, to zero every month.
It's got a $16K limit, so as long as I pay whatever I can every month... it could take several years to max out!
But the lights, gas, water, phone, internet, etc, will always stay on!
Meanwhile, I just found out late last week that my union has NOT yet renegotiated the contract.
I thought that happened this year, but it'll be 2024. And a woman who is covering days, now that Jeremy's gone, said most of us want to argue for higher wages because of all the chaos lately with everybody quitting.
So there's a ray of hope that my income might go up by itself in 2024!
Okay!.. that's my Tuesday... and my October.
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