rainbowtatt

Tomorrow marks the beginning of #febusave, ANZ’s campaign to help chicks be better savers and be more confident with the moola.

And I have to confess, when I heard about it all from Leigh, I felt like that the whole campaign was being put on especially to help ME out.

It’s true!

While I am SO. MUCH. BETTER. with money now than I was ten years ago, I’m still pretty shithouse.

In my first proper job after finishing school (as in, the one where I couldn’t wear jeans to the office), I was getting paid monthly and ended up opening a second transaction account to separate my pay into two halves. That’s how bad I was. And that’s when I was living at home and would scab money from the mothership.

So it goes without saying that I’ve joined the #febusave movement and proudly hung up the little button over there on my side bar. Being a “blog ambassador” sounds so official, I might get it on a business card.

Here’s some official tidbits provided by ANZ and their Women & Money Confidence Report; I can relate to each and every dot point, some from my past, some from RIGHT NOW ZOMG I HAVE NO MONEY SKILLZ:

• 52% of women claimed they know they should have a financial plan or budget in place but keep putting it off.
• Less than one third of women surveyed said they were very confident about managing everyday finances.
• Only one in ten women are very confident in managing their investments, financial planning and superannuation.
• 45% said they had saved less than they planned to over the previous 12 months.
• 2.76 million women (41%) are saving no regular amount monthly
• Top reasons were too many bills, not disciplined to follow a budget, too busy, so put it off
• More than half (58%) of adult women in Australia have less than $5,000 in savings with 33% having less than a $1,000
• 1 in 3 women believe they wouldn’t last longer than a month if they lost their job tomorrow
• 1 in 4 women are not at all confident about their future financial security, claiming they live pay to pay with little savings

Scary shite, huh? o.O

One of the kick-starts to #febusave was to pledge to give up driving to work/buying treats/buying coffee and well, I’m not exactly willing to give up my car/coke/v for an entire month. Reduction I could do, but going cold turkey? Nuh-uh.

BUT! For the last 4 months or so I’ve fallen right off my budget wagon, with no regular saving or anything like that.

So I’ve re-jigged my colour-coded budget spreadsheet in GoogleDocs for 2010 and re-started auto-transfers of funds to my various debts and savings accounts.

Let’s see where Feburary and #febusave takes us, shall we?

It’s rather exciting to get through these weekly milestones, but the end-of-month ones will look more impressive, no?

22/365: friday night laziness 23/365: morning hair and fresh apple juice 24/365: me + cupcake 25/365: unimaginative pic, sorry 26/365: end of aus day 27/365: mmm, lamington 28/365: what coke reduction?

If you get to this here blog in the traditional way (i.e. not with Google Reader), you would have noticed a popup protest about the Australian Government’s planned censorship of our internet:

The idea that MY internet connection could be filtered by “my” Government is nothing short of ridiculous.

Yes, there are horrible things on the internet. But “my” Government has no right to tell me what I can have access to.

A beautiful friend of mine has been battling Crohn’s disease for as long as I can remember. She finds it difficult to deal with the reality of her disease—the hospitalisation, the treatments (she’s even had chemo to try to cure this). She’s fighting to have a healthy life, something that I take for granted. She seeks solace in online Crohn’s support forums—places where she can connect with other Crohn’s sufferers; where they share their journeys and give each other strength.

Under a 2009 trial of the internet filter with certain Australian ISPs, this Crohn’s support forum was blocked. I can’t tell you how heartbreaking it was to hear that something so important to MY friend was going to be denied to her by “my” Government’s internet filter.

Tell me, how is a web site like this a risk to children? Children can get Crohn’s too, you know.

The filter won’t stop cyber-bullying. It won’t stop all child pornography. The list of banned sites will not be publicly available or open to review.

All throughout this post, I’ve referred to the current Australian Government as “my” Government.

Why?

Because:

• Regardless of the fact that I am a moderate leftie
• Regardless of the fact that I danced like a crazy lady when Howard was voted out
• Regardless of the fact that I had big hopes for K-Rudd during his election campaign, when I voted for him and when he won
• Regardless of the fact that my grandfather was Assistant General Secretary of the New South Wales Labor Party and DLP Senator for NSW (and I’m proud of my Pop’s political history, rest his soul)
• If the internet filter becomes one of K-Rudd’s next election promises, you can be sure as shit that I’ll be voting the other way

The filter is just plain wrong.

If you want to find out more, visit The Great Australian Internet Blackout. Their ability to articulate the point of being anti-censorship is far more eloquent than I could ever be.

A bit late with week 3 of 2010, but c’mon, I went back to work and haven’t exactly been coping too well:

15/365: sooky la la | 16/365: me + Saturday night porn | 17/365: Pls don’t make me go back to work tomorrow :(  | 18/365: don’t go back to work mama | 19/365: menial desk tasks are sending me cuckoo | 20/365: happy reunion with Suzie the Singer | 21/365: being patriotic

My favourite?

Safety demonstration: you’re doing it right!

Friday night lazy post brought to you by YouTube!

I love some of the random phrases that come up on Captcha occasionally. I got this one just now when I was leaving a comment over at No Fact Zone:

There’s no real message in this popping up when the words are randomly generated, but it’s funny to imagine a programmer hunched over her/his computer choosing these two words to go together.

Because this all started because I wanted to leave a comment on my favourite Stephen Colbert fansite, so here’s some Colbert porn:

Don’t forget that ABC2 (bless their little cotton socks) now shows the Colbert Report (mere hours after it airs in the ‘states) at 7.30pm Tuesday to Friday.

This is Suzie:

Suzie is a Singer Stylist Zig Zag 457, a model from 1968. She’s 11 years younger than Buela, the other sewing machine in my life at the moment.

I’ve been feeling a bit guilty since I picked up Suzie last night; like I’m cheating on Buela, who’s packed away in the corner of my bedroom.

Buela is a beautiful girl and runs like a charm, but she’s only got two speeds: full throttle and full stop. I don’t have the required 1337 sewing skillz to keep up with her; my stitches were WAY off if I tried to do anything too creative (like follow a pattern).

Suzie runs just as beautifully as Buela, and lets me drive in first gear, meaning I was able to sew nice curves and such. Suzie had me in a very good mood when I went to bed last night.

But then this morning I got up and planned to practice a bit more on Suzie before trying something closer to a Proper Sewing Project. And suddenly the feed dog stopped working. After much Googling I was feeling brave enough to undertake some investigative surgery on Suzie.

And then, I found the source of the problem (excuse the blurry panicked photo):

SHIT. Part of one of the gears (plastic ones!) that operate the feed dog has melted. While part of me is chuffed that I successfully diagnosed the issue ALL BY MYSELF (and Google) another part of me is feeling so so SO guilty.

I’ve probably caused the gear to melt. It’s not even MY sewing machine. I don’t deserve a sewing machine!

I’ve called a couple of places and spoke native Sewing Machine fluently enough for them to understand what I needed and how much it would cost to replace the gear. Just waiting for Suzie’s native owner to give the okay for me to go and take care of it.

This sucks :( I try to do the right thing and borrow other people’s property instead of buying something (cheapish) myself. I play the patient game, borrow two machines and now I’ve gone and broken one.

And so the waiting game continues…

… in the 365 sense anyway!

8/365: FAIL | 9/365: me + Nephew Noah at Australian Jamboree Visitors’ Day | 10/365: wearing my threadless dooce tee | 11/365: bitchin’ stitchin’ reading | 12/365: back on the (elliptical) wagon | 13/365: me + bear’s bum | 14/365: by the glow of the widescreen monitor

Last year whenever I skipped a day, I just cheated and took 2 pics the following day, but stuffit, I’m gonna confess my sins this year ;)

It’s a bit weird seeing my face all over teh interwebs.

It’s different if *I* put it there for the 365 project or as a profile pic on Twitter or Plurk or Flickr or Tumblr or Posterous or the gazillion other services I have an account with.

But it’s especially weird cause my face is showing up on two different blogs this week.

Specifically, on Scarlet Words as part of Elizabeth’s Smiley Sunday and on Blog Chicks as Leigh’s Featured Blogger.

Yes, it’s weird, but – don’t tell anyone else I said this – it’s really cool. I feel like I’m a real blogger now and have received the magical powers that make me funny, well-written, articulate and intelligent.

Can’t have everything though, huh? ;)

Yesterday I went down to Cataract Scout Park in Appin for the Scouts Australian Jamboree 2010. My nephew got to go with his troop so I got to go along to Visitors’ Day with my sister and brother-in-law.

It was predicted to get to about 36 down there, so I was prepared with a frozen water bottle and extra water bottles (that leaked all over the car, but that’s another story). I have to say that Scouts know their game – they had buses taking us poor visitors to whoop whoop and back, chilled water taps around the park itself, NRMA roadside assistance on deck, a temporary police station during the entire Jamboree (10+ days) as well as a makeshift medical centre with doctors and nurses.

Needless to say, I enjoyed seeing so many policemen getting about on bikes and golf carts ;)

If I was a kid, I’d love Jamboree.There’s so much to do, and the kids are treated with respect and likewise with the adults. My nephew is having an absolute ball (he’s already lost his voice after the first week) and if I had a kid, I’d be sending them along to Scouts so they can go to Jamboree.

But I’m not a kid. I’m 31-and-a-half. It was hot and humid. And I had to drink water. A lot of water.

I don’t like water.

But I made it back to my beloved, air conditioned car and looked like a watermelon.

Literally:

(That’s not sunburn!)

I had a 2hr nap when I got home, which I think was borderline heat exhaustion/stroke/whatever. I’m still not 100%, and it’s been a full day since I escaped the heat.

But I really did love seeing Noah and all his little Scout buddies and all the fun they’re getting up to. Just next time, turn down the heat pls!