Seattle Simplicity broke down and went to the retail therapists at Tiffany’s.

In response, I posted a website with lab diamonds which my friends showed me the other night. (The website requires Flash.) These are conflict-free diamonds which is why my ethically high and mighty friends were looking at them. But check out the prices! They are saving up for a ring set that’s less than $2000.00 for a 1.5ct solitaire that’s D color and VVS1 rated. Not too shabby. How’s that for a good deal on an engagement ring.

As I mention this to my lovely co-worker, she tells me that Tyra Banks is the Queen of Cheap. Apparently the supermodel loves a good deal so much that she wears fake jewelry all the time. I haven’t seen the video yet, but you gotta love that she thinks it’s just fine to wear fakes.

It doesn’t need to be *real*. It just has to *look* real.

And for what it’s worth, lab diamonds are the real thing. They just didn’t come out of the ground or have any moral taint. Instead they probably are made from chemicals that pollute the environment instead of the horrible strip mining/mountain leveling that takes place with diamond mining. But I guess you have to pick your evil.

From what I’ve read, the lab diamond process is similar to that of making semiconductors, which drive all of our computers, so I actually have no moral problem with the environmental pollution being a computer geek by trade. (I am joking about that. My business is a horribly polluting business.) Diamond transistors may be in our future, and excuse me while I unleash my inner-geek here, but how hot will that be? Pretty effing hot actually since diamonds, by their essence were produced under high heat conditions. But think of how fast these transistors can go! Oh my. Ok I’ll stop now. Such talk will make me breathe hot and heavy. Throw me a copy of Electronic News and EETimes and I’m in 7th Heaven.

Last night I updated the Save-O-Meter by 4%. I am very close to my goal. Under $700.00 more to go.

I came to a decision about all my wailing and complaining. I was mainly inspired by Single Ma’s priority to save money over paying down debt. I really feel as though I will sleep better if there is some cash around instead of liquidating the Emergency Basket. My wedding expenses, my dental bills are all bills I have to live with. I got myself into this mess and I will get myself out, even if it costs me some interest to do it.

I even cooked my own dinner last night to remind myself that I am *STILL NOT* doing enough to live frugally. I constantly dine out. I really want to buy a new OPI nail polish because the one I have is very pale pink and I would like something in a darker pink because that seems to be in style now. And I asked myself today why would I want to spend $6 dollars on another nail polish when I can’t go to Seattle in September?

I really despise eating ramen every day for dinner, but I renew myself to cooking more often at home and dining more frugally since that is where I spend the most money right now.

I’m going to Puerto Rico next weekend for a very expensive wedding. I should have declined, but I’m the maid of honor and the only attendant. I would be declining on my friend confiding to me that I’m her closest emotional intimate in town. How do you say no to that? I was supposed to room with a friend, but she forgot to change her RSVP on the wedding website and the bride and I thought she was still going.

Well, apparently she’s not. So I am stuck paying about $150+/night for three nights at a posh resort. Yes, I resent the bride mildly for certain decisions she’s made in regards to selecting a destination wedding. While she did give me the opportunity to pass on it because of the expense, I said yes only because I thought the other friend was going to help me share expenses. And the bride is also stuck holding the bag for a guest who did not change her reply before the headcount was taken. Now I know that an RSVP is not a firm commitment to anyone of anything. Lesson learned. When will my naivete rub off? Why do I take people at face value and expect them to behave with integrity?

Now that the other girl isn’t going to go, if I can’t find another wedding guest to share a room and split the bill, I will have to forgo two other weddings in September to get my teeth fixed, which I probably should have done anyway. This is after one of the September grooms asked me this morning to write a letter for INS about how he met the bride through me. I am crushed.

Yeah, don’t even talk to me about the vacation time I’m giving up to fly the horrible skies with airlines that lose my luggage.

This fiscal challenge is going to be a tight squeeze on me for the rest of 2006. I’ll be paying for all this stuff with credit cards till Christmas at least.

Unlike Jane Dough, I don’t have a five-year plan. I think in the last two months, I’ve gotten all willy-nilly about my finances. Granted, I’ve had quite a few distracting, enormous life events happen to me during this time. I feel like I’ve turned into an ostrich with my head in the sand. At one point, I had to call my insurance company to make a payment by telephone at the last minute because I had forgotten to mail the payment. Life’s definitely kept me spinning around in a whirl of busyness. Last night was the first time I went grocery shopping in about two months and cooked myself a very frugal dinner. (And wouldn’t you know it, I left my lunch at home this morning.)

Right now, I have a lot of short term expenses that are killing me. Four weddings requiring out of state travel and a massive health expense, for which I am underinsured and underfunded. I actually think I can do it all without stumbling too much, but any hopes I had of maintaining the Emergency Basket of Cash has flown out the window.

I’ve always known that I had to go and get some dental work done. It’s been lurking in the back of my mind. I was already saving $3K in a flexible spending account to get this work done in 2006. I’ve spent about $1K of the FSA on some other medical expenses (glasses, co-pays, prescriptions, etc.), and dental insurance will only end up covering about $1.5K. Out of an expected $10K in expenditures, about $3.5K I will be able to finance immediately. I will need to find another $6.5K.

I will be liquidating the short term savings portion of the basket when work is done in July and then again when one of my CDs expires in September. I will be reserving about 40% my since those are locked up in CDs. Unexpected health expenses are what the EBoC is for, right? That will leave me with $4K to finance.

I could pay myself first very aggressively and start saving 10% of my monthly pay, a la Single Ma style, but that would mean short shrift on paying down my credit card debts which are only racking up because of these weddings.

I just don’t know what to do. Should I start paying the minimums on my credit cards and saving more cash? Should I put it all on credit cards and start shoving money to the lenders? Should I liquidate all of my cash reserves?

I shouldn’t have ignored my health for this long and yes, I’m paying a hefty price. So an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Dental floss is cheap and even if you don’t have dental insurance, try to get your teeth cleaned anyway. Trust me. You’d rather put $300 a credit card now for a cleaning, rather than pay $3000K later for an extraction and dental appliance.

I’m still running around like a chicken with my head cut off. But here’s a post for you to read this morning if you haven’t read them all last week.

For my MD peeps an update on the BGE rate hike.

Gatorade Price Map from Madame X.

Tricia points us to an inspiring website. I really liked this site and will probably blogroll it soon, when I get around to about 50 other admin tasks.

All Things Financial has a post about money, spouses and secrets. I am highlighting it not so much for the article as the great comment by Him. I’m dying laughing.

Sepaking of which, Make Love Not Debt has a supermarket post that’s very good. I added my 2 cents to it in a comment.

I also ended up not buying dinner last Wednesday. I got a soda and spent only $2 for that. (Jones Diet Black Cherry. Yum!) Turns out my leftover pizza snack+ sized meal was enough. I did wake up pretty hungry on Thursday, but not enough for me to eat breakfast. I think I’m at the same place today. Hungry, but not enough to breakout the plastic and buy a breakfast. Methinks I’ll have lunch at 11am.

May 27th 2006, James Cornell was riding in the sidecar at the Isle of Man races and sustained multiple injuries in a crash at May Hill. As of June 19th, according to the official race website, James is still in critical condition in a coma. One racer, Jun Maeda, has already passed away from his injuries also sustained in a race-related crash.

Right now James is still on the Isle of Man, receiving care, but his family and friends would like to transport him back to the US. The website with full donation contact information is at James Cornell Fund.org. To sweeten the deal, I will hold a drawing amongst the donors through this website. Just comment here that you’ve made a donation. I will knit a hat and set of mittens for the winner of the drawing. It’ll be plain, wooly stuff, but I will make it out of nice Cascade 220 washable wool.

I’ve never met James, but I feel compelled to put this up since a bunch of my friends know him well and are concerned for his well-being. Stateside transport for a patient that is still in critical care is problematic, but when I read between the lines on things people tell me, I think the medical facility is somehow lacking and that at the very least, moving him to London is probably a good thing.

Having sat bedside with someone in critical care, I’m more than a little freaked out and praying for his eyes to open. The motorcycle and race community has been great, taking the time to visit him and give him stimulus in the hospital, but there is still a lot more money that needs to be raised.

I’m not fond of internet panhandling which is why I won’t do it for myself. But getting overseas medical transport for a critically ill patient is expensive. I firmly believe that the quality of care will improve if he could come home to receive care. American medical facilities really are the best.

And finally, please, no comments about high speed racing, etc. Yes, it’s all dangerous, but that’s what makes it an exhilarating sport. James is pretty lucky to race at all, because frankly I’m not yet brave enough to get a license and a bike.

Please forward this to anyone you know who is a motorcycle or race enthusiast.

Ok. I’m going to go cry a little more now. Thanks.

CNN/Money has an article which instructs you how to calculate your blended mortgage rate.

I found this rather interesting. I got a figure of 6.0% from a mortgage at 5.75% and a HELOC at 7.18%. If I wanted to refinance, I’d probably have a tough time finding a loan for that price without incurring lots of points and closing costs. I think I’ll sit tight and forget about refinancing as I watch interest rates climb higher and higher.

I highly recommend their method though. It punches into a spreadsheet very easily. My numbers are not down to the tiniest penny, but in the rough thousands. I think it’s good know what your balances are roughly so that you can make quick calculations on the fly with a minimum of research.

EDIT: Dammit. Republishing because I don’t know AM from PM apparently.

Ask me about power outages and lost luggage. So far this trip isn’t going so well. I can only hope the airline reimburses me for the extra expenses.

And sadly my Red Devils lost to the Moo Cows of Switzerland. Friday was a sad day indeed.

Money, A Memoir, by Liz Perle.

Imagine moving yourself and your toddler to a foreign country, only to land and be told by your spouse that they want a divorce. You’ve got your passport, your kid’s passport, $3000.00 cash, a 13-hour flight and a sense of despair to bring you back to the States. That’s what happened to Liz Perle when she arrived in Singapore with her 4-year old son.

I really wanted to like this book and there are many good points in it with which I agree. It’s a wake up call for marrieds and divorcees who are living in a upper middle class bubble about their finances. But I’m not married or divorced. I feel very bad for Ms. Perle, but she’s rebounded well with vigor and headstrong determination from her prior circumstances. I applaud her for writing something personal and admitting to her mistakes through the process of divorce and financial enlightenment. She writes for every woman to take responsibility for their finances, single or not. I just didn’t feel that the book spoke to me since it’s full of anecdotes about divorces and divorce advice. If you’re about to get a divorce and you’re worried about your finances, definitely read this book. There are one or two savvy tidbits on divorce strategy in there which might serve a person well, male or female.

The other thing that I enjoyed about the book is the mind-money connection the author makes. My regular readers know that I firmly believe our psychology influences our spending and saving pattterns. Suze Orman discusses this point a lot in her book 9 Steps to Financial Freedom. Ms. Perle is very candid about her adolescent dreams about money and lifestyle. They’re pretty average dreams I think most girls have. Some White Knight is going to marry you and take care of it all. Nothing to worry about. I know I had those kinds of dreams too, but now those dreams disgust me as I see the reality of life and too many broken marriages. A girl has to take care of herself, which is what the author is trying to get across.

This book is exactly what it bills itself as, a memoir. I cannot find fault with that. It’s about Ms. Perle’s experiences and related information to that experience. It just doesn’t resonate with me since I haven’t been through those circumstances. Your mileage may vary.

This is a comment post to something FMF posted today about the cost of weddings.

Out of the four faraway weddings I have to attend this year, only one is a true ‘destination’ wedding in PR. The other three are where the bride and groom happen to live. Those three places are just really far away from me. I’m the maid of honor for the PR wedding so even though the bride said it was ok if I couldn’t afford to go, there was no way I was going to say no. I’m rooming with another friend and recycling a dress for the ceremony to keep things more frugal. The only new thing I will have to buy is some fresh sunscreen and a few tanning booth visits so my office cubicle-fluorescent light-cultivated translucent skin doesn’t burn to a crisp while I’m there. (Of course, I won’t be doing the tanning booths because I have no time to go!)

I think anyone that plans a destination wedding and selfishly expects people to attend is nuts. That seems pretty rude to pitch a fit, Bridezilla-style, and demand that people attend. Frankly, I’m not looking forward to a weekend on the beaches of PR because I really don’t care for lying around on a beach and prematurely aging my skin. I hope to be indoors all day watching World Cup soccer!

I know I’d like to have a destination wedding so that my guest list pares itself down by putting the onus on my guests to choose to attend versus having crazy fights with a mother-in-law about who gets an invite. Self-selection can be good that way. The only other reason for me to have a destination wedding is at a midway point between me and my family living overseas. That way it’s a holiday for everybody.

To put a little perspective on things, my cousin in Korea just got married. There were about 600-700 people at the wedding hall and reception. Whether you like it or not, things will snowball there to the point you can’t stop it. However, it is customary for people to fork over wads of cash as gifts and so the wedding guests usually pay for the whole shindig and any money leftover goes to a house downpayment.

600-700 guests. Can you imagine that?