I let my BJs membership lapse this past fall because it's hard to justify paying the $60 membership as a single person. Then I got something from them in the mail offering me an annual membership for $25, which is what I paid the last 2 years. So I went for it. Just a day or two later, I got a postcard from them offering an even sweeter deal: a $20 membership and $20 back after spendng $60.

It was too late for the better deal, but I decided to nicely ask them if they would still honor it. She gave me the $5 back for the difference in the membership cost but said she couldn't (easily) arrange it so I could get the $20 back after spending $60, but I was stil happy to get something. It never hurts to ask! Note to self: Hold out a bit longer next year before accepting the first discounted membership deal!

I bit the bullet and spent $375 on a second backup key for my Toyota and it is now safely stored with my important documents. Knowing my proclivity for misplacing stuff, the odds of me getting through the next 10 years without losing my one and only key are not good! I have, however, decided to go back to an old habit I had been happy to do without: carrying a purse around with me. It's less likely I'll leave something somewhere, like cell phone, keys or Toyota key (which is kept separate in a Farriday pouch), if I can just throw everything in my purse.

My first car payment will be early February, and that's when I plan to "turbocharge" the car loan repayments with a single additional $5,000 payment in 2025 and then continue paying about $400 a month for the year. So next month will be yet another very tight month, money-wise.  The 2nd $5,000 payment will be made early in 2026, and by doing this, I'll have the car paid off in 2 years, not 5, saving myself a lot of interest.

I very much enjoy driving the car. I like the Sirius XM alot, but don't want to pay $10 a month for it. I am getting used to dealing with blind spots with my side mirrors, though truth be told I haven't driven much on the highway where this would be most important.  But what I'm saying is that I don't think it'll be necessary that I spend $1,000 on the after-market blind spot assist installation.

I plan to at least start my taxes tomorrow. I do them myself. I am still missing tax forms from 2 entities, but I'll see if I can work up the point where I need those numbers. And I should get them any day now.

I did also recently renew my McAfee computer virus protection. If I had been lazy and just clicked on the renew button that kept popping up on my computer, I would have paid $70 for a year's coverage for my computer and smart phone. But by opening a new window and going to the McAfee site, I paid just $42 for it. I hate when companies penalize existing cutomers.

I treated myself (rarely do this) to a yummy sandwich at the general store today coming home from running an errand. I remember one thing I always told myself I would do "when I retired" was buy myself a fresh bouquet of flowers whenever I was at Trader Joe's. I haven't done that yet, partly because when I was there last week it was below freezing and I was afraid that could prematurely zap any flowers I bought in the walk from store to car. As soon as temps rise, though, I will be buying myself flowers!

Recently, my 10-year-old Canon laser jet printer finally stopped working, and I had to buy a new printer.  I paid more upfront for a laser printer, hoping to do better in the long run than spending increasingly ridiculous amounts of money (like $35) on those little ink cartridges.

I decided to just get a b/w printer. I don't use it often but do require it from time to time, for things like my upcoming tax return, which I do myself and so need to print out all the forms.

I got a Brother model that came highly recommended by a few review sites.

But oh, brother, what a hassle it was to connect it with my desktop computer. I had to call my Internet company (Frontier), and since I couldn't remember my rarely used PW for my WiFi, the rep said I'd have to change the password. That's really what started all my problems, because then my 3 Rokus no longer worked. It took a good part of yesterday afternoon to get this all sorted out. They decided to ship me a (free) Eero for the fiber, but even though we had finally fixed the problem on the phone, she said just keep it in case I have problems again.

I was hoping to cool it on the spending spectrum after the car purchase, but alas, my 10-year-old printer is kind of kaput. I guess it was a good run. The rollers were just not feeding the paper in anymore, and after doing some research, there is a cheap little spring in there that often is the culprit and can't be replaced.

Since I wanted to print out my bank statement and then balance my checkbook, and tax season is right around the corner, I didn't want to delay too long, so after investigating whether I could insert a sponge, believe it or not, like one story I read, I just decided to spring (no pun intended) for a new one.

I rarely have need of color these days so I decided to go for a more economical black and white laser printer. Economical not in terms of upfront cost, which was about $200, but in terms of how many pages one toner cartridge wil print compared to an inkjet printer.

Although I hate Best Buy (horrendous customer service), Staples did not have the model in stock and I wanted it today, so that's where I went. I have not got it up and running yet and I absolutely hate having to do that sort of thing, but hopefully tonight.

I have many things I'd like to get done today but I know I won't get to most of them. Work out at the gym. Make lentil soup. Make date brownies. Hang the 2nd bird feeder. Winter pruning and invasive work in the yard since it's mild-ish today.

And now I'm feeling incredibly sleepy. Having green chai now.

I noticed the other day while driving that when I did a quasi-rapid acceleration, the chapstick thing I'd put in the little shelf in front of the stick shift flew out of there; I didn't really see where it went, but when I went to look for it, it was nowhere to be found. Could it be that the missing 2nd remote key to the car flew out of that little storage area in a similar fashion?

Again, for probably the 7th time I searched the floor of the car, front and back, and in between the seats in the center. I FOUND the chapstick but NOT the remote key. Dealer said it would cost $350 to replace and I'm still waiting to hear back what it would cost to install blind spot assist.

2024 was the first year I tracked where I spent my grocery/food dollars. I generally try to minimize shopping at the more expensive stores like Stop & Shop, Big Y and Caraluzzi's, but these, unfortunately, are the closest to me. I like to stop at Whole Foods, Aldi's and Trader Joe's, but these stores are a good 15 or 20 minutes away.

I spent $4,717 on food in 2024.

Of that, I spent $1,200 at BJs. I let my membership drop this past fall. It takes so much time to shop there, and with the exception of the 3 or 4 lb bags of frozen berries, there's nothing I can't get somewhere else.

I spent $939 at Stop & Shop, which is like spending top dollar. I have to work on that, but it's convenient.

I spent $847 at Whole Foods, where I focus mostly on the 365 store brand, which is price-competitive.

Next, I spent $328 at Big Y, a regional supermarket that is priced about the same as Stop & Shop. Just a mile away.

Sadly, I only spent $292 at Trader Joe's, partly because shopping there is an absolute zoo with parking and other shoppers. It's a small store, always packed.

I spent $267 at Aldi's. We all know they have great prices, so I'd like to shop there more, but the challenge is they don't have a  lot of what I need/like. I tend to shop only the fresh produce section and frozen vegetables there. That's it. Everything else is processed. While their parking lot is not quite as crazy as Trader Joe's, the traffic getting there is bad.

I also started shopping, to a lesser extent, at Target ($256), as they have a better price on soy milk, which I drink daily; it's on my way home from other places, too. I also shopped at Vitacost ($178) for a certain bread and cereal I like, at a local but expensive organic market which I think I will visit less often in 2025. I only spent $60 the whole year at Shop Rite(!) That's because they don't have great organic fresh produce, plus it's in a neighboring town (where my father lives) and it's just not somewhere I go regularly. This, too, should change.

Beyond that, I spent very small amounts under $100 at QVC, Amazon, Caraluzzi's, a local bakery, an Amish bake shop when visiting Dido, Harney & Sons, and even a local craft fair.

Conclusions: So I can perhaps whittle my overall grocery bill down a bit in 2025 (it's my #2 biggest expense) if I focus on these things, but if I end up spending more in gas to get there, it will defeat the purpose, so I will need to more carefully build in visits when I'm in the area.

I tend to make multiple trips to supermarkets each week. Why? Well, becus if I travel 20 minutes to Whole Foods or elsewhere and purchase frozen or refrigerated food items (especially in summer), then I know I won't want to stop in at other supermarkets for other items I want on the way home, leaving perishable groceries in the car. This happens often.

I wrapped up my 2024 income and expenses a little late this year. I always glean little insights by doing this analysis after tracking my numers all year long.

1st Tier Expenses ($912-$7,194)

Let's look at what I call my 1st tier expenses. These are my 10 biggest expenses ranging from $912-$7,194.

Looking at the pie chart I created, I can quickly see that property taxes make up the lion's share, at $7,194; that's a nearly 4% increase from last year.

Next up is Food. I spent $4,717, a level that may have finally plateaued after years of steady increases.

My #3 largest expense is the catch-all category I call Household. It's where I put expenses that don't belong anywhere else. I spent $2,246 in this category, which generally includes things I buy for the house that aren't home improvements, like the $200 office chair.

My #4 biggest expense was Health Insurance ($2,231), which remained very low while I was still on Affordable Careh Act insurance, but once I got on Medicare mid-year, it did increase substantially.

My remaining top 10 expenses included my cat, out-of-pocket medical and dental, electricity, lawn & garden, entertainment and heating oil.

So there were small 2-3% increases in some of these Top 10 expenses with the big jump in healthcare expenses, while electric costs and food stayed the same as last year. Surprisingly, my heating oil costs fell by 38%. I was expecting it to be higher since I'm spending a lot more time at home now that I'm retired, but I guess I'll chalk the drop up to market fluctuations.

2nd Tier Expenses ($511-$857)

In my 2nd tier expenses, I saw my homeowners insurance ($850) rise by 27.6%, a reflection of what's going on all over the country; my car insurance ($810) rose by 20%. No claims on either, ever.  It's so important to shop regularly, if not every year, for both these insurances.

3rd Tier Expenses ($100-$500)

In my 3rd tier expenses (the smaller stuff representing 1.2% or less of my total budget), I saw my Internet cost rise by 19% due to a price hike which I fought unsuccessfully.  My car repair expenses with my old Honda fell by 63% compared to the year before. (Side note: I'm glad I sold the car when I did. While it was running great and had nothing wrong with it, I think it would be due pretty soon for both new tires and a new battery.)

2025 Projections

For 2025, I expect to see my car insurance and car tax especially rise with the purchase of my new Toyota this month. (Side note: Surprisingly, I only had to pay $200 more to apply the same insurance coverage I had on my 11-year-old Honda to my 2024 Toyota. So that will see me through August, when a new, unknown premium will be due.) Health insurance and out-of-pocket medical expenses will also increase in 2025 as my first full year of being on Medicare.

I would LIKE to see my monthly electric costs drop as they had done for a while following the purchase of my heat pump water heater one year ago, but the utility company also raised its rates.

2024 seemed like a brutal year for rising prices everywhere, so it was nice to see a few categories where mine fell, not necessarily for the right reasons: A 12% drop in cat-related costs since he passed during 2024. A 62% drop in lawn & garden costs, simply because I didn't need to have any tree work done, so most of this expense was for lawn mowings. The aforementioned 38% drop in heating oil costs was nice to see, as was the 67% drop in maintenance costs (a random thing), the 32% drop in clothing purchases, the 26% drop in dining out and the 63% drop in car upkeep. There were a few other drops in other categories, but they are inconsequential.

My total expenses for the year were $41,645. That's $1206 less than last year, but I'm trying to get away from focusing on this since I am moving this year from the "save" mentality to the "spend and enjoy it" mentality.

Yesterday I bought a new car.

I like it a lot. It's a 2024 Toyota Corolla Cross hybrid SUV. I almost didn't buy it because I was dealing with a salesperson who in my opinion was not a very good salesperson. I had started reaching out to several dealers via email on Saturday, just to get the ball rolling and to see what the prices were like.  Two of the dealers just tried to get me to come to the dealership, which is what I was hoping to avoid, wasting time on multiple trips to showrooms. But the one most local to me was willing to negotiate price via email and we actually came to agree on a price that at least acording to Kellys Blue Book was a very good price, though when they say that, it doesn't include taxes, dealer fees or the price they give you on your trade-in.

Initially I wanted the 2025 model with SE (upgraded) trim, but they didn't have one of those on the lot, so if I really wanted it, I could buy from the factory but then I'd lose out on the dealer discount, which was about $1200. So when they told me they had a 2024 S model on the lot, which is the base model, I decided to go for that since I'd save some money buying a 2024 vs 2025, even though there were some add-ons to the car that I liked anyway.

So after agreeing on price, I did go in to the dealer to show them my car and get their offer on it as a trade-in. They gave me a very low price for it, which I anticipated, but he wasn't open to negotiation, so I walked out. I went home and did some quick searches for comparable models at other dealers and started talking to other dealers, but I concluded that the price was still cheaper at the first dealer, even with the lowball trade-in offer. So I called the salesman back later and told him I could come down $500 on the trade-in;  so at that point we were just $500 apart. Then we agreed to meet in the middle and split the remaining difference.

I met with a separate person to go over the financing. I could have paid cash for it, as I've done before, but I don't want to artifically inflate my annual income that much, so would rather spread it out a bit over 2 years only. I got a 5 year loan but will begin prepayments immediately and plan to pay the whole thing off in 2 years. So instead of paying a little over $3,000 in interest alone, I will pay about $1,000 in interest.

I don't like the rate...6.98%... I was expecting something better with my "Exceptional" credit score, but those Toyotas sell themselves.  I also decided to go with the "Bumper to Bumper" 10-year coverage plan where virtually anything that goes wrong with the car is covered except for maintenance things like oil changes and tire rotations (which are free for the 1st 3 years). Without the 10-year Bumper to Bumper coverage, you'd still get 3 years of free Bumper to Bumper coverage. But to get the full 10 years, it's $25/mth, which seems reasonable.

What I DIDN'T like is that they roll the cost of this coverage into what you're financing for the car. I'd much prefer to pay for it separately so I'm not paying interest on it, but that didn't seem to be an option.  Just one more reason to pay it off quickly.

I am still learning all the electronics of the car. It's been 11 years since I bought a new car, so a lot has changed. I'm loving it so far.

The one fly in the ointment: I have already lost/misplaced the 2nd remote fob he gave me right before I left and was standing outside with him by the car. I've turned my place and the car upside down looking for it and am beside myself becus I know they are very expensive to replace should I lose the one that I have.

I have also asked the salesperson to find out for me how much it would cost to get the blind spot assist retroactively installed. (It would have been on the SE trim had I gone for that.) Becus going from a 4 door sedan to an SUV you lose a LOT of visiblity and it feels like all I can see through the rear window is what's directly behind me. I will have to use the side mirrors more, but still.  I did also order some of those little mirrors to put on top of your side view mirrors that extends your blind spot range of view, but they are so small I'm not sure how useful they will be.

In other news, I went to pick up my father today for physical therapy, knowing he would be excited to ride in the new car since it will be much easier for him to get in and out of since it sits higher than my Civic sedan. 

I had called him earlier this week to remind him that it's very cold outside and he will need to wear a proper winter coat. He agreed on the phone.  At nearly 92, dad does not drive anymore, and of his 4 kids, he relies on me the most to take him out and do things, and I know he looks forward to getting out of his small apartment.

I went to pick him up this morning and he came walking down the stairs to meet me wearing a flannel shirt. I told him he needed to wear a real winter coat (he has a beautiful one my cousin bought him a few years ago which he has never worn). He said he wasn't cold. The wind was whipping the sides of the flannel shirt since he also never buttons his shirts or even zips the lightweight nylon jacket he likes to wear. He said he had trouble putting it on, which I think was an excuse since he knows I will help him put on his coat, as I always do.

Anyway, dad is the most stubborn person I know. Guess I inherited that trait.  I left without taking him to PT, which I really felt bad about, but when it comes to his health and well-being, I put my foot down. (The only reason he got his covid shots was becaus he knew I wouldn't want to take him out without it.)

I think he just doesn't like being told what to do. 

Knowing my father, who has zero negotiation/compromise/flexibility skills, this standoff could last til more temperate weather in spring. I'm not sure I can last that long because I don't like doing things that distress my father.