Shopaholic Syndrome

I've given up shopping, except for necessities. I need to in order to remain focused on paying my bills. Having said that, I enjoyed Confessions of a Shopaholic and the three out of four sequels I have so far read; most of which were purchased at my local thrift store. I still haven't found a copy of Shopaholic and Baby, though expect that to be available soon. The movie is just coming out. While I'm not opposed to movies, I tend not to see the movie if I've read the book.

I still buy things, but no longer go to the mall as a form of entertainment; which isn't necessarily good as I understand that shopping malls too are having trouble in these times. In some ways, it's their own fault for having multiplied so much; during my childhood there were different department stores downtown, but initially only about four major malls in the area, supplemented by some smaller malls. Then more malls were built, culminating in The Mall of America. That itself may be recession-proof as it's a hot spot for foreign tourists. The Chinese and Saudi's haven't yet run out of money. Maybe that's next week.

Credit cards are still dangerous for me and for anyone; I pay attention so I won't become like a friend who just realized she has a $4,000 balance on her card and doesn't exactly know how she achieved it. That's the scary part. None of it was due to emergency or necessity. I don't know her budget, how much of a concern it is to her or how long it'll take to pay off. What I do know is that's why I'm paying close attention to my spending and planning ahead.

Lately, I've been thinking about each unnecessary expenditure (defined as those not including regularly scheduled bills, medical expenses, food and gas) before spending money. I went out for lunch one day last week, to a restaurant with a little gift shop. They have a lot of cute stuff, but none of it is necessary, so I looked at it and have a few things in mind for future possibilities but didn't buy anything. The purchases I have made have been a result of a more thoughtful process but haven't added up to that much. I have made a few frivolous expenditures but still have enough money to pay off a small bill. It's only a couple hundred dollars but it's one less bill to pay. I achieved it in part by waiting to buy contact lenses; I have some of the trial ones left and haven't been wearing them every day. It won't kill me to wait.

My mantra is "each month I reduce my total debt." The more progress I can make on that, the happier I will be. Once I eliminate the remaining nagging little bills, I'll be able to achieve my goals more quickly. I'm still torn about which loan to target, the one with the lower rate of interest or one of the set that's tied together at a slightly higher rate.

There's Always Someone in a Worse Situation...

The poor gold-digger girlfriends. I feel so bad for them; bankers with crazy incomes stressed out and no longer having crazy incomes. The gravy train has stopped. No more unlimited credit cards; no more attention from Mr. Moneybags.

Umm, here's a thought, they could get jobs of their own. Maybe that would be a bad idea in this economy. I mean, a girl can't be expected to support herself, can she? Then again, what do you put on your resume? Look beautiful, shop fabulously?

I truly do believe this is a worse situation because it seems like glorified prostitution. The men are supporting these women financially, but based on the info in the story, it seems there's no emotion involved, at least on the part of the distant men. The relationships seem superficial at best and now that the men are in a financial crisis, have different expectations than were out there to begin with.

Technology

While I'm not the first one on the block to acquire new technology, I'm well aware that people trade up for something new in seemingly ridiculously short amounts of time. One of my friends is always getting a new something; she has a good job, can afford to buy new toys and has plenty of people to whom to hand things down.

That was the trend for everyone for the last several years. Now it seems that people are waiting or buying fewer new items. Credit isn't readily available, nor are jobs, so people are being more conservative in spending, at least partly out of necessity.

Despite my colleague, whose husband gets a new cellphone all the time, the cellphone industry's numbers are going down right now. I know a few people who don't have a cellphone, but not too many anymore. There must be more people like me out there; my phone is three years old and I keep talking myself out of getting a new one. It's great to have something new, but I see no reason to take action when my current phone is good. My backup phone is also just fine.

Since cellphone manufacturers send their wares worldwide, it only makes sense that a worldwide downturn in the economy would have an affect on their sales. Existing markets are saturated with people who are off the consumer bandwagon for one reason or another; emerging markets aren't emergingi as quickly as it seemed either. As for me, I just don't want to incur one more bit of recurring debt.

Cutting Back

I didn't do so well on cutting back for Christmas as I ended up donating to charities. I took ornaments from my church's giving tree, so bought presents for a few strangers and aren't there laws about Barbie requiring a change of clothes? In addition, I bought things for the Salvation Army adopt-a-family, and went a bit overboard.

The family we were assigned is a single mom with two teenagers. We looked at their list and everyone had different ideas about the most important thing to have at that age; because programs for the needy have other focuses, we knew we had to buy bedding. If there is any available, it won't be new. We ended up buying everything on the list, and making an effort to find things that teenage boys would like.

I wasn't raised in a wealthy family, but we always had what we needed. I can't imagine not having decent bedding. I now have new flannel sheets for the rest of the winter, courtesy of Kohl's after Christmas sale.

Gift Cards

Gift cards are the non-gift this year. I don't like to give them because it isn't a personal gift. This year, with all the bankruptcies and lessons learned from previous years bankruptcies, along with value-reducing fees that diminished the value thereof, gift cards don't seem to be the way to go.

One thing I've noticed is that grocery stores and convenience stores now sell gift cards for other stores, which adds to the convenience; for those who shop late or early, you have a 24-hour option available. Thrift stores are now also in on the act and sell gift cards for their stores.

I would expect a spike in sales of gift cards for grocery stores and gas stations. People seem to be more focused on the basics, at least for right now.

Good Idea?

Lately I've been reading about kids who are philanthropic, donating money received from Bar Mitzvah or asking for toys to donate rather than toys for themselves for their birthdays. Now this.

While it seems like a good idea to make a donation rather than to give gifts, it would be difficult to retrain people. My mom currently regrets not having children for whom to buy gifts; this desire can be easily satisfied by donating to Toys for Tots or the giving tree at church. This Sunday I plan to pick up a few paper ornaments and provide a gift for a stranger.

Most of my shopping has been done; I only have a few people to buy gifts for and am a year-round shopper, so no problem.

I didn't go Black Friday shopping at all this year. Nice to sleep in.

Shopping Meltdown

Even Target, my hometown discounter, has succumbed to the retail doldrums. It's entirely my fault; they used to get a large portion of my income, especially when they were owned by the former Daytons Department Stores. Daytons is no longer, and Target, well, Target is no longer the store of my childhood but instead has been redesigned as SuperTarget.

For anyone with a long-term view of the TwinCities area, SuperTarget is nothing but Holiday Village, without the massive sporting goods section. Holiday Village was a discount store with groceries and massive sporting goods (gone now, even from Wikipedia). The sporting goods portion is now Gander Mountain and the Holiday Gas Stations are the only entity remaining with the Holiday name.

Daytons and Target taught me to love using credit. I miss Daytons from an emotional standpoint, especially at this time of year. We used to go downtown the day after Thanksgiving and the day after Christmas, to shop the sales. Now? No.

Financial Miscalculations

While I calculated in the cost of most of life when I determined how much money I could devote to my targeted loan, I neglected to include the cost of gifts. In August I had a birthday and bridal shower to take care of, which is fine, I've been really good about spending and only drive if I must; however, September and October will take a bit more thoughtfulness as I don't know how long I'll be working. I went to Target with my mom and sister to choose shower gifts. Then we went to the Dollar Store for cards and paper; my gift is placemats that are shiny and a bit glitzy, so I opted to roll them up and tie them with ribbon from the wedding section of the dollar store.

I have three birthdays and a wedding to deal with in the next two months; birthdays aren't so bad as I have most of the gifts. Wedding gift will be purchased whenever my mom, sister and I can coordinate our schedules; we go as a group and discuss pros and cons, along with wondering about some of the items chosen. We bought wedding paper though I'm sure my mom has some in her big, giant stash of wrapping paper that we're trying to deplete.

All-in-all, I'm not doing too bad with reining in my spending; I did feel like I had gone on a shopping binge but that was because of a couple of gifts, clearance linen capris and getting cash back at the store rather than making the trek to an ATM for which I don't have to pay a fee. I used to have to go to a couple of places I never went, like K-Mart or one of the local billiards halls in order to use an ATM without a fee; now I can go to Target or a drug store, but really, why bother making a separate trip if I can take care of it during a transaction?

Disaster Plans

While I'm marginally aware of the potential for disaster, it seems I'm far less concerned than are others. I live in an area in which I don't think that terrorists will attack, the opinion of Jesse Ventura notwithstanding. In addition to having believed that he, himself, was a terrorist target, he believe that the Mall of America was also a target, yet chose to provide terrorists with a possible two-for-one deal by broadcasting his weekly radio show...from the MOA.

I don't worry so much about the weather either, but have started to notice that there's a lot more awareness of disaster preparedness lately. In some ways that makes sense, due to the apparent increase in disasters; I don't know if it's truly an increase or merely an increase of our awareness, given the transition over the last century of countries such as Bhutan that were isolated from the rest of the world due to distance and lack of modern infrastructure having become bastions of the electronic age.