Brooke vs. the World

Welcome back! We are building a new site for our “new” trip plan. Keep checking back for more updates!

Brian’s family came in for a weekend to see the sights of New York City. There was a lot to pack in, so we were of course beat by Monday. Friday night started off with a wonderful dinner at their hotel, complete with wine, steak, dessert, and coffee. I love big luxurious meals!

Saturday morning entailed a large breakfast, a train ride to Grand Central, and tour to the top of the Rock! I had never been to the top of the Rockefeller building, and it was quite (windy) fantastic. Around mid-day, Brian’s dad bought us all a pass to the hop on hop off tour buses that ride around town. We had a fantastic time learning about the city’s history. Evening rolled around and we made our way to Broadway for a showing of “Spamalot”. I laughed a lot, I mean, who didn’t. It’s a musical performance of Monty Python and the Holy Grail!

Sunday involved sleeping in a bit and joining in on a Champagne brunch (ooh la la – never had one of those before). We made our way into the city again to hop back on a bus for a bit. The rest of the afternoon was spent in Little Italy and China Town.

It was definitely a lot to take in, I’m sure. And, the one thing I learned is we cannot travel like that on our trip (I knew before, but this was just a reminder). Just writing this now I had trouble remembering what all we did!

There are only 6 glorious months until our trip now!

I turned 24 on May 29th. I don’t think I’ve ever had a birthday outside of Illinois until this one, and even though it was fabulous, it was also definitely costly, and a bit surreal. You must be thinking, “24?! That’s so young!” And yes, it is young, yet I have this overwhelming feeling that I’ve lost something. What happened to all those ages that you look forward to? Driving at 16, voting at 18, drinking at 21… my big years have come and gone and here I sit, a 24 year old woman with nothing left but the chance to rent a van at 25 and social security.

For many years, I have been mistaken for way younger than my actual age. You know, the usual, “Are you even old enough to drive?” when paying for gas at the age of 19, the intense scrutiny of my ID when trying to get into the bars, and my favorite, “What high school do you go to?” Then abruptly something seemed to change. Instead of asking me what high school I went to, they started asking when I was going to get married. Instead of examining my ID with a microscope, they let me slide through the checkout with a case of beer and not a second glance. At what point did I go from looking 16 to 24? All this has really added to the surreal vibe of my latest birthday.

Even so, Brian has done his best to make it a nice one. Honestly, I didn’t care what happened as long as we have cannoli. And that we did! With a trip into the city, a museum, dinner, wine, dessert, trains, and subways, we were well over $100 on this birthday outing. It hurts a bit to think about since $100 was my monthly fun budget back in Normal, but I needed it. I needed the fun, and I definitely needed Brian telling me that 24 might be the best year of my life.

Update: Even with all of our recent splurges in NY, we are well on our way to our 50k goal. We have 35-ish grand between us, and 7 months to go! Now if I could only get a dollar for every time a bum hit on me or I got yelled at out of a car window…

The past week has been non-stop:

–move out of old apartment
–set up at mom’s to work for the week
–family dinners
–a long drive out to New York
–move into new apartment

This might explain why I could barely make it out of bed today. I’m beat! However, it was well worth it. I love road trips!

We left on Friday, the 18th, early. And by early, I mean like 4:30am we were out the door. Our first stop was in Normal, IL to drop off the keys in our old apartment. That took a whole 10 minutes, then it was on for I-80, our favorite interstate. This is where we stayed for the rest of the day, watching the scenery change from state to state, which really isn’t much. Indiana and Ohio basically look like Illinois – boring, but I will give the weather a two-thumbs-up. As you can see here, the sky stretched on and on.

We made few stops along the way, the main one being at Cracker Barrel for some breakfast. Seeing how I used to work there a long time ago, I’ve had a lot of Cracker Barrel, but this one was the best ever. For some reason that smoked sausage was *excellent*, and it basically made my meal. Wow, way to go CBarrel. Just when I think I have you figured out, you go and surprise me once again. Brian had to do the usual and ask for a bottle of syrup that he didn’t need just so that he could pocket it and run! I won’t let Brian buy the real maple syrup at the grocery store since we rarely make breakfast and it is so expensive, so he has to resort to stealing it when he can. Way to keep up with tradition, Brian!

The real scenery began in Pennsylvania with the rolling mountains and lush greenery. The last time we did this drive, we hit Pennsylvania around 3am, and it was foggy (not my fondest memory of NY trip ’04). I’m glad we both got to see it this time in the daylight.

Day 1 ended in Stroussburg, which is on the edge of Pennsylvania and New Jersey, and the home of the cheapest gas we’ve seen the entire trip! (Definitely photo-worthy) We found a cheap hotel to spend the night recuperating for our big move in day that followed.

Day 2 began early. We drove the rest of the way to White Plains, found the apartment, and started the dreaded process of unpacking the jeep. For thinking we didn’t have too much stuff, we sure did make plenty of trips up and down the stairs! I definitely enjoy our apartment when I’m not thinking about how much we’re paying (3 times more than back in Normal for half the space!) But, that’s ok. I’m sure if you give me a few more weeks, I’ll be used to the extravagant prices.

We’ve really only been here 1 1/2 days, but I can already tell that things are a lot different out here.

There are rarely any beater cars driving around. We actually spent the day counting the rare few – 6. Brian definitely feels out of place with his jeep’s replaced panel.

Apparently, it is extremely common for people to bribe their cable person to get free cable – so common that a landlord might condone it. I was upset that we couldn’t get the same stations with our TV antenna as back home, but we still couldn’t do it. I guess we’re just goodbodies!

New Yorkers like to do things up big, even their bagels. I was actually removing cream cheese from my bagel today!

Overall, I’m excited for the change in pace. I love discovering a new place, and I especially love the convenience of the train system. I have a feeling this is going to be a great summer, even if I can’t pick up the Fox station with our bunny ears.

P.S. Anyone want to let me watch the House Season Finale at their place the 29th?

Can you kill your car twice? Well, yes, metaphorically. The first time I killed my car, I had just paid off my loan for it. This time, I’ve simply sold the bugger!

How exciting is that?! I am now officially car-less (and no longer directly contributing to global warming), but don’t you worry, I don’t really need one on a regular basis (lucky me!). I put an ad in the local paper on Tuesday, and by Saturday afternoon, it was gone and out of my life forever!

I didn’t have a very grand car, so I only sold it for $5500. Five thousand will be put directly into a CD for a return fund, while the other $500 will go directly to my trip fund. I love making leaps and bounds in travel funding like that

So, I bet you’re wondering what else has been up with us? Nothing except just working on getting out of here and to NY. Brian is finishing up his busy semester, and I have been packing/cleaning the apartment. On top of that, I have been working a part-time job scoring tests to make some extra money. But, before you get your hopes up, this month is not going to be so hot in the money sector. I have a couple of doctor appointments coming up, one of which was not planned and very necessary, that will drain the funds pretty heavily.

To make up for this little setback in funding, Brian and I have decided to downgrade Western Europe. We’ve been talking about it for some time, but finally made the official statement, “no, we can’t see every country in Europe on this trip.” The main course of our Western Europe stay will be Spain & Italy, with a touch of Greece and a sprinkling of Portugal and Switzerland. Mmm, I can taste Western Europe now.

P.S. – Only 8 months until we leave, 7 1/2 months until I’m done with work, 6 1/2 months until I put my notice in.

P.P.S. (or is it P.S.S.?) – Oh, and we bought our first flight to Guatemala on Dec. 27th! Take-off is confirmed.

I don’t know if I’ve said it yet, but saving for an around the world trip is both exciting and stressful at the same time. When you’re thinking about the possibilities of traveling to certain parts of the world, you know that every last dollar is important. As you can tell, I’ve taken hold of that thought and have been doing as many things possible to pinch those pennies, because let’s be honest, those couple bucks can easily extend a stay from a day to week in some exotic locations.

The exciting part of saving comes with the realization of how much I can achieve in life when I put my mind to something. I have been able to set a goal, a non-traditional goal, construct a plan to achieve that goal, and actually follow that plan through to the end. Even more exciting is the realization of how in control of my future I really am. I’ve always been somewhat of a dreamer stuck in a traditional life pattern: do good in school, then move on to do good in work… just work-work-work while following the standards. When I was in high school, I used to dream about moving to Australia for a year before going to college (what people call a gap year in other parts of the world was unknown to my circle of family/friends). Everyone thought I was nuts and wrote it off as another one of my dreams. “You should just go to college right away.” I hated it. I hated being told I couldn’t do something because they just thought it wasn’t the “correct” path for me to take. I ended up just going to college right away, but my dream remained in the back of my mind, waiting to make a reappearance.

The stressful part of saving, however, is also apparent. I always set my goals high because it makes me work harder, and thus, achieve more than I would otherwise. This high goal has caused me to be a little too obsessive and concerned about money. I now understand the value of a dollar, but with that comes a tragedy every time I have to dish out a little more money than I was expecting. With this in mind, I bring you the story of bad banking.

I used to have a small, online business, and since I’ve started saving for the trip, I haven’t had time to focus on that… so it is closed. I cancelled anything and everything that goes with that, except for my small business checking account with National City. There was literally $3 left in the account and on my list of things to do (to do: cancel bank account), but I just haven’t gotten my silly ass over to the bank to do that. To make matters more interesting, I still had the account address at my mom’s house in East Peoria, so of course all my statements mail there (I think you know where this is going).

Not a big deal. This was not a big deal because everything pertaining to that account besides the account itself had been closed.

Or, so I thought.

I went to visit my mom this weekend, and in the process picked up my stack of mail that has piled up over the weeks since I last visited. I was cleaning and organizing the apartment yesterday (the landlord is showing it on Tuesday to a prospective tenant) and I opened my mail from National City. In it was a lovely little letter that read a little something like this:

“On 03/28/07, there was not enough money in your National City checking account to cover the debit items we received that day.”

My immediate thought was that someone got a hold of my account numbers and went charge happy. I took a closer look:

Debit: $9.99      Action: Paid/Acct Overdrawn      National City Fee: $34.00

It turns out that GoDaddy.com decided to automatically renew an email account I had associated with the business (even thought I *thought* I cancelled that a few weeks ago, but, alas, not 100% sure) for a measly $10, and since I had $3 in my account, it brought me to a grand total of $40.00 in the hole. I was so angry!

I know, I know. Only $40, what’s the worry?!

I look on further and read the fine print. Brace yourself:

“If an account is overdrawn and remains so for more than 4 consecutive business days a $8.00 continuous overdraft fee will be charged each day it is still overdrawn.”

Take a second to think about it. This happened on March 28th. Yesterday was April 15th. I am cheapo Brooke who wouldn’t even spend $30 on a camera charger because it wasn’t deemed necessary.

My hands got a little tingly; my stomach dropped. I reluctantly log into my online account to see that this tiny $10 mistake turned into a whopping $112 burden. Normally, this wouldn’t make me feel so crummy, but I have been working so incredibly hard (2 jobs) to get that $112, and there it flew, out the window. I broke down and started crying with frustration.

Brian helped to alleviate the situation. We went to get some cash to put into my account and cover the expenses, and tomorrow I am definitely going to close out that account. I still can’t believe that daily overdraw fee – no thanks National City. You may offer free small business checking, but charging over $100 for a $7 error hardly seems right. Nay, I say! Nay to National City!!!

And that, my friends, is a lesson in *bad banking.

*bad banking refers to both my lack of upkeep on the account, and national city’s outrageous overdraft charge.

So, you have a great day at work as things are calming down and you’re all caught up. The stress of the last couple of months starts to fade away, and that crick in your neck from constant computer ticket attack mode is slightly less noticeable. You feel great, and you feel even better when you find out that your vacation pay is on the way… oh yes, a week’s pay directly in your pocket.

Elated, flabbergasted, you struggle to find the right words as you realize this will make up for the $500 you’re behind from buying the wonderful camera with which you used to take these hysterical pictures. Finally, back on track!

“Out of my way world!” you say with gusto as you excitedly dial, no wait (you’ve decided to play it cool), as you confidently dial the nearest health department. You explain where you’re going and halfway through the list of countries the doctor interjects, “You’re going to need everything, you.”

“Everything?” you say.

“Everything.”

In a final attempt to make the most of an unexpected turn of tone, and mainly to keep the cool-vibe you’ve had going thus far, you throw caution to the wind. “Sign me up.”
“Ok, that’ll be 20,000 travel shots at $20,000 a piece.”

The blank stare on your face turns to horror as you realize not only are you getting a million jabs, but you are also going to pay a million dollars for them. So much for back on track!

Maybe next time little girl, maybe next time.

Nothing special about this Friday afternoon. Brian and I were out running errands for a bit, but when pulling into our parking lot, we heard a commercial about McDonald’s fish sandwich. There was something about the sound of fried fish that sounded quite tasty – could have been the fact that I had nothing but a piece of peanut butter bread for lunch, or just the delirium of actually getting out of the apartment – I uttered the words I’m not usually known to utter:
“I feel like fish.” 

Brian was floored. Only moments before he was ready to come home, but the thought of getting fish… Well let’s just say we don’t have that very often. (No, I’m not a fish/seafood person if you can’t tell from the story thus far.) We immediately circled around the apartment building and back on the street. Now to find a place. 

Since we are budgeting for the trip, it was a definite “no” on the Red Lobster. Where could we get the most bang for our buck fried fish? Then it hit me. Cracker Barrel, duh! They have a Friday night cod special that comes with 2 sides and biscuits or corn muffins – sure to leave you full. CBarrel it was.

We got there early, not even 5:00pm yet, thinking we could get in and get out. Wrong. The parking lot was packed and there were 2 tour busses in the lot. D’oh. Oh well, we’re getting fish. No harm in a wait, so we waited. It was twenty-five minutes of knick-knack hell, but hey, its ok, we’re getting fish! And FINALLY, get fish we did – ate it until we were full.
The fish dinner came with four pieces of fried cod, French fries, baby carrots, and ooooooh corn muffins and apple butter. I doused on some malt vinegar, dipped in some tartar sauce, and enjoyed one tasty bite after the next. And don’t forget the iced tea. Cracker Barrel wouldn’t be complete without that drink to wash it all down.

It was a good dinner. We chitchatted about our day and tried to unwind in preparation for the weekend. A table next to us pointed towards the window, and naturally, my eyes followed. Snow flurries were coming down in a not-so straight pattern from the wind. It looked worse than it actually was, and as soon as the flurries started, they began to dissipate much like a snow globe right after its shaken. I turn away and notice that trademark peg game on the table, but eh, why even bother picking that up. I solve the damn thing every time. (Yes, I am a genius.) 

When I couldn’t eat another bite, I decided we should leave. I grabbed my coat and smiled to myself. “Brian, this was a great idea. My brain feels smarter already from all this omega-3.” He chuckled and agreed.

Outside, the snow was starting to come down again, but it wasn’t really sticking. Being from Illinois, you kind of learn to just deal with it, especially by March, so we hopped in the jeep and onto I-55. It was probably about 6:00pm now, so there was some Friday evening traffic, but surprisingly there was a heavy patch way ahead and behind us, with the occasional speed-demon zipping by. We basically had this section of the 3 lane interstate to ourselves, which was extremely nice since we were content with our big dinner and taking it slow. It just wasn’t bothering us when people were zipping by, and instead of speeding up, we just kept in the far right lane, enjoying our time on the open road.

The wind was blowing the snow around a bit, but we didn’t think anything of it… nothing until…

“Hey look at that car over on the other side… he’s backwards.” I was pointing across to the shoulder for the lanes going in the opposite direction. We were separated by a small concrete wall and three lanes.

We were going over a long overpass at about 55mph (we could have been going much faster, but was taking it easy because of the snow), and just as I finished pointing at the car on the other side, something clicked that maybe we needed to slow down, only it was too late. Halfway through that thought the car started to spin to the left on the ice that we couldn’t see. We crossed 3 lanes of traffic (luckily there were no cars immediately there) spinning towards my side of the vehicle. There was no time; this was it I thought. I grabbed Brian’s arm and prepared for the worst.

The front right end of the jeep hit the concrete wall and we finished the 180 degree spin by sitting on the shoulder uninjured, but very startled. It took a second to realize what had happened. “I’m OK, are you OK?” we both asked each other. We thought we made it through the scary part, only at that moment we look to the left and see another car doing same thing but hitting the rail on the opposite side. Brian started freaking out saying, “We need to get off this overpass or we’ll get hit!” He was right. He started up the engine, flipped the flashers on, and drove in the opposite direction off the overpass, cars still continuing to speed past us into the icy part.

Insert pictures of jeep. (maybe someday i’ll get around to this)

“SLOW DOWN PEOPLE!” I wanted to yell. Couldn’t they see the condition of our vehicle?… the flashers?… us driving in the opposite direction on the shoulder???

We made it a ways from the accident site and parked, trying to figure out our next step. The traffic was pretty heavy now, so we couldn’t just turn around and go in the proper direction. Finally, a cop stopped (probably just a few minutes later) and we told him the condition of the overpass. He said we should head home as we were drivable, and eventually a patch cleared up where we could turn around going in the proper direction.

We headed back up the overpass. Traffic had slowed down a lot, and we saw why when we passed the spot where we initially hit….

A car hit the wall right next to Brian’s bumper and was flipped over. A semi hit the side rail trapping a car in between. Other cars were smashed on the rail. Cops everywhere, cars flung everywhere. All driving normally not seeing the ice that had just appeared. It was a definite scare and wake-up call for the both of us.

It’s been over a week since the accident, and it still gets us, the thought of what could have been that night. I’m convinced it was from all that omega-3 that Brian was so quick-minded to get off the overpass right away. Otherwise, we probably would have been smashed with the semi and the flipped car. I’m also glad we were in Brian’s jeep instead of my dinky cavalier. We are very lucky.

Brian’s also convinced of one thing. He should have known it was too good to be true when I started off the evening with, “I feel like fish.”

Unfortunately, this post doesn’t really have any straightforward theme/story to tie it all together, so what you see is what you get. This post is purely a look at where we are and where we want to go from here. T-minus 10 months; 42.85 weeks; 300 days ’til take-off.

February money goal:
If you read the last post, you would know that my money goal was the magic number, $11k. However, I only managed to make it to $10,500. Hmm… was I being overly anxious? No, I would have made my goal, but I ended up buying my Canon Digital Rebel XT! It was a long and stressful process, but I managed to find a good deal, only after nearly missing an extreme rip-off on ebay and other outbidding mishaps. I settled for buying used from adorama.com, and so far I am very happy with my decision. The camera body/battery/accessories kit cost me $395, and I then found a Sigma 70-300mm DG lens on E-bay that ended up costing another hundred. So far I’m at $500 (thus why I missed my $11k goal) and I would like one more lens (birthday in May! anyone?), specifically the Sigma 17-70mm DC Macro. I think those two lenses will make a great combo pack for the trip!

Part-time job:
You’ll be happy to know I finally found another part-time job as a test scorer. It only lasts a month, but it pays $12/hour, which is even better topped off by the fact that I will get to work from home! The job starts in April and should bring in at least $700 after taxes. Woot!

Summer/Fall housing:
Brian is going to be working in NY again for the summer, and instead of going through the pain of being separated as we were last summer, I’m going with him (I love having a portable job). Now comes the tricky part – If we renew our current lease (it ends in June) we will:

-have to pay for at least a month of rent past December
-have to pay for two apartments for the entire summer
-have to worry about the stuff we have in the apartment all summer; move stuff out of apartment and move it back in to avoid that worry
-have to find a summer subleasor and worry about our stuff with someone we don’t know; move stuff out of apartment and back in at end of summer to avoid that worry

These ideas were just not cutting it with us, so we’ve come to the conclusion to not renew our current lease, find a furnished 1 bedroom apartment for just the fall semester, and to start storing/selling our possessions before NY. We have been looking and found a furnished 1 bedroom apartment for the fall semester. The rent is cheaper than what we are paying now (we have a 2 bedroom), so we will be saving more money for the trip. The furnished part means we only have to move what we need – computer and clothes – making the whole moving 3 times in one year part less painful. And, we will only have to worry about rent for months we will actually be living there. How nice!

Selling my car:
Since I started saving for the trip, I’ve resented my car. I am dying to get rid of the stupid thing, because, honestly, I hardly ever drive it. I work from home, and really only need it for groceries and if I want to drive to see my parents on the weekend. Other than that, it is a costly beast that taunts me from my office window. I was going to wait until November-ish to sell the damn thing, but am thinking of just bumping that up to May. The car is going to be my come-home fund. I am going to put the money I get from selling it into a CD so it can collect interest while on the road, but hey, if I can start accumulating interest sooner, more power to me, right?

Trip fund:
I keep making test itineraries/budgets so I can get a better idea of the type of money we want to save for the trip. I think what we are both shooting for is $25k each, and that is after all necessary pre-trip costs (medical, vaccines, insurance, first leg of flights, gear) have been dealt with. So, I’m thinking we will need to be able and make $30k in order to meet our $25k goal (this is a broad guestimation, and I like to overshoot). Brian seems to be well on his way – he is kicking my butt in the money sector. But, will I make that goal? Let’s see!

Current progression:
Current money = $10,500
Putting $1500 away normally each month for 10 months = $15,000
Income tax return = $1000
April scoring job = $700
Total = $27,200

Guestimations:

Birthday & Christmas = $1000
Selling belongings = $250 (keeping most things of value; computer/guitar)
Fall part-time job = $2000
Interest = $400
Grand Total = $30,850
Seems to be that if I just keep on keepin’ on I should be golden.

Other items of interest:
The government might be watching us, but guess what! We’re watching you, too!

What do fancy cars, chandeliers, lounge singers, and Kid Rock all have in common? That’s right, The Four Seasons hotel. Brian and I just had the most luxurious (and expensive! Thanks Brian’s family!) weekend away in Chicago savoring succulent lamb and pork tenderloin dinners, partaking in the mini-bar, and enjoying 24/7 service, all the while having that song in my head (you know the one).

We spent two nights in a deluxe room – two nights that would normally get us 2 MONTHS in our apartment – if only we could have been there for 2 months. *sigh* But, there’s a reason I don’t stay in places like that all the time (besides the money). If we had that experience all the time, it wouldn’t be as special as it was this weekend. I was thankful for every piece of the adventure… every taste… every smell.

On that note, let’s start with the tastes of a weekend in Chicago:

Our fabulous dinner Friday night consisted of, for me, steak, mashed potatoes, red wine sauce, swiss chard, a glass of merlot, and crème brulee for dessert. Brian had the lamb, wild mushrooms, swiss chard, mint lamb sauce, a glass of merlot, and assorted sorbet for dessert.
Our breakfast on Saturday consisted of, for me, lemon ricotta pancakes with sour cherries and lemon spread, and a nice cup of coffee. Brian had the Irish oatmeal with brown sugar and green raisins, washed down with some coffee.

Our delicious dinner on Saturday consisted of, for both Brian and I, pork tenderloin, spinach, mashed potatoes, wheat mustard sauce, and chocolate mouse crepes for dessert.
Sunday morning, we had breakfast delivered to the room. We both had the eggs, hashbrowns, applewood smoked bacon, sausage, bread, jam, coffee, and juice.

Need I say more?

The smells:
The complimentary shampoo/soaps they provided were absolutely amazing. Brian and I both thought we smelled awesome, all day, after washing with their products. And, the shampoo made my hair so soft! We had to snag the leftovers to take home with us!

The textures:
Besides the awesome feel of the paper, disposable swim trunks that Brian used one evening, we both really enjoyed the luscious terry cloth robes waiting for us in the bathroom. I honestly spent most of my room time in my robe and slippers. Paradise.

The sights and sounds:
This one is easy. I was blown away by The Blue Man group on Saturday evening. It was an amazing show that definitely tackled these two senses.

Overall, it was a stimulating weekend for all five senses, and one that I probably won’t get to have again for many years to come. The buildings, the lights, the cars… and that song playing my head. Yes, it’s true. I got to ”set up shop at the top of Four Seasons!”

Ok, ok, so it was like 2 floors down from the top, but don’t you dare try and take that away from me.