Tuesday, April 23, 2019

Hard to recall March

Being a father of 3 has a lot of perks. One of them is being constantly busy if I don't want to regret being born.
I have a second shift gig, so I don't see my family much during the week since they are mostly gone when I am up or asleep when I come home.
The oldest get home before I leave, but he leaves for school before I get up. My middle one gets up just before I do, but I'm usually still waking up when she leaves for school. The youngest gets up early days she should sleep in but tries to sleep in on days I have to drag her to places for swim lessons or speech therapy.
She's been in afternoon preschool for 2+ years. I've taken her to speech therapy a long time. Probably close to 200 sessions.
Swimming lessons started back in October. Probably 40+ sessions.
It's hard for me to run errands since I have my morning allotted during the start of the week and I am tired by the end of the week to feel like starting errands until I have no time to do them.
Inefficient use of time makes for an angry wife who is tired and annoyed the house isn't perfect upon coming home from a first shift job.
I don't eat with my family, but I wash their dishes.
I tend to the bills, and daydream about a debt-free future and eventual retirement.
I am forty. A long ways from retirement given I work for someone else for a living. A lot of planning seems to be needed to will oneself into being debt-free. After a decade of simply shifting the deep hole of debt around, I can see the light. I mostly have my mother to thank. I can work longer hours with her to watch my youngest, while she also gives freely towards her grandkids' betterment and such.
Aside from credit cards, we have student loans, a car loan, and a mortgage. Student loans and car payments will probably be done in 2020, but there's probably going to be another car on the horizon... there's always another car, right? Mortgage originally was for 30 years, then after a re-fi 20 years, thus paid off by 2031. Could be paid off sooner, but my oldest will be in college in a few years, followed by the other 2 eventually.
We'll probably switch banking institutions. Might come out ahead like when I switched insurance last year and saved a ton on home and auto until the kids start to drive, at least. We're dropping Netflix after they announced their rate hike.
We shop primarily at Aldi and Sam's Club for food with Target and Meijer rounding them out for non-meat matters.
We can drop YMCA membership, but I'm sure a cellphone will be added to the plan to offset the savings.