The Situation

     The last time I blogged here I was jobless. I was dependent on my $7,300 tax return to hold me over until I found employment. I bought an $1800 piece of junk car and paid my mom her $1000 back. I was dependent on my mother to pay my cell phone bill and my car insurance, and those two items were paid by her for a very long time, even before I had started blogging. That summer I got a little paper route, and made about $100 every week, until I wrecked my car into something unknown in the middle of the night. I could no longer do the route and had just spent $1000 trying to fix all the problems I was having from the car.
     What saved me though was the fact that I had enrolled in school right after I started blogging. I signed up for all the student loans I could get (Bad Mistake!). Right around the time I had that wreck my financial aid check came and I bought a nice mini-van for $3400. The car would never start again after I wrecked it, and it sat outside my apartment for a year. I sold it for $150 and had it crushed.
     I was in school a little over a year before I got bored, and irritated. It got to where I was arriving to school an hour early and still was late to class because I couldn't find a parking spot.  Plus, I had broken my foot and it was not fun going to class during the winter with ice on the ground. I could never get approved for a temporary parking pass so I could park closer while I was on crutches.  I ended up dropping all the classes that semester.
     I took summer classes in 2010, and passed those, but didn't feel challenged, or I was just lazy. I wanted to work. I applied for a state corrections job in Oct. 2010, a field I have experience in. I got that job, with a raise to start because of my previous experience. Thing is, my state is THE lowest paid state compared to all the surrounding states, and I rake in a whopping $24k a year.  Bright side is, it is $24k I didn't have.
     As of today I'm still at this job, and due for a 5-10% raise Nov. 1st. Not much, but I'm not complaining.  During my college time my wife was able to get her Nurse Aide license and is now working in a nursing home.  We have moved into a house we rent, and it's right in the middle distance wise to our jobs. Hers is 30 minutes one way, mine is 30 minutes the other way. Needless to say, our gasoline bill is through the roof. I sold off the mini-van in Feb 2011, and bought 2 cars for us.
     For the first time since I was 19, roughly 8 years ago, I'm completely independent and pay all my own bills.  That is sad to say, no one should be my age and still depending on their parents. I don't feel very good about that, but that stage in life is gone. Me and her both are enrolling back in school next year, without student loans, and going to further ourselves in the careers we have chosen. I'm always on the lookout for better paying state jobs, but I'm not being very active in the search as I'm satisfied in my current position.
     This is a quick run-down of what has went on the past couple years. It's not a thorough description, but you get the point I hope. I want my next few posts to cover my financial situation, and what you, as the reader, can expect to see content wise on this blog. I'm still working on giving the site a new look and updating lots of information, so please be patient and subscribe, comment, and all that good stuff!!

Finances Update

I figured that I would start off the month right by listing my finances, that way you guys can follow along. I am going to be keeping this info updated as much as possible to the right of the blog on the homepage. A nice quick glance at how I'm doing so far.

The IRS has given me a refund date of March 10th. I am ready for this to come. I need to buy a car badly. My kids need things as well. I've done spoken to the boss(my wife) about how we need to buy extras of the things we absolutely are going to need for the next few months and put back some emergency cash before she tries to go wild and spend it all(she's the spender in the family).

I received my final paycheck from my job today, all of 178 dollars. I should be getting a refund on a water deposit I made with the house we just moved from, so I'm expecting over $50.00 there.

I have no job prospects yet. So we will be stretching our refund for as long as we have to. I have been looking on the internet as well for work, something I can do from home. I've been doing a little pay-per-click sites, but at .005 per click, I can see I am getting nowhere fast. Anyone have any leads on online work that's more promising?