Just put a batch of Bobby to bed and it's only 10am. Granted I only got such an early start because I was up at 6am with my back aching. I've been really bad about my Physio exercises, so it shouldn't be a surprise when my back hurts me. I'm going to try to get back into the routine of doing them right after dinner tonight. I've definitely seen improvement in my pain levels and functionality over the past eight months I've been going to Physio.

So I heard back from the lovely Melanie yesterday. She had been trying to get us a better rate on the car loan than the 7.5% we have from the bank up to $20000. Of course here is where we pay for our previous bad credit decisions come back to bite us. It's still a gain, we didn't think we'd even get the credit card this application much less a pre-approval on a car loan. We're just going to pay through the nose for it.

We finally sat down with solid numbers last night and crunched them. This car is going to cost us about $600/month to have and use even at our limited planned km. To manage that we're going to lose most of our allowances, any savings we had been making, and I'm going to have to start pinching pennies. I personally think we had a nice comfy, lush lifestyle before. We could afford to do most things, we grocery shopped based on desire not frugality, we both got a fair chunk of cash to spend without justifications needed and there was room to play if we needed to.

Mike says that's a "normal" lifestyle. I don't think so, but I also know I'm coming from a fairly poor background. According to my "normal" we lived and live in the lap of luxury. The idea of being able to afford clothes when needed and getting my teeth taken care of outside of emergency situations is unbelievable to me if I actually stop to think about it. I've spent most of my life surviving with a rock of a stomach from the stress of figuring out where I'm going to find enough.

But that history and experience means that I can work with almost anything for a budget. So taking a $600 hit on our monthly income is more than doable especially when it gives me mobility. Part of the expense of our life right now is because I can't comparision shop. I can't get our canned goods at Food Basics for 20 cents less. I can't go to the market on Saturday Morning and buy the meat and produce for the coming week. I'm tied into the nearby Zehrs for everything.

I think we need to get this car. The smart move would be to wait another 6 months, or even better another year and then buy. In that amount of time we could improve our R rating through the credit card enough to qualify for the various financing incentives. That would be smart. But what happened was we realized that we could make a car happen. We started thinking about it. We started wanting it. We were never happy without a car, but there was no other option. Now it's an option. Not a wise one. Not a frugal one, but it's an option.

And with that I can't say no. Rather, I refuse to say no. I refuse to go back to "making it work" at the expense of my self-esteem, my time and my back. I've had enough and just knowing that there's a way out makes me desperate for it. I'm so glad that we decided on the car we want before I got to this point. Until we sat down and said, "ok, we want to buy it. This is what we want." in Rheal's office it was still an option. After that it's a decision.

Mike agrees with me about all this. We crunched numbers and cursed and swore until we found a number we could live with. We can live with this. We just have to change nearly everything we do, everything we prioritize; basically the way we live our lives. Enh.

And that's 30 minutes.