The plan this weekend was to save money and start living like the starving student I now am. I had an amazing plan, stay in Friday night, bypass the Modest Mouse show in favor of the free Brooklyn Block Party featuring Talib Kweli, then a free "interpretive dance" performance on Sunday and watching the VMAs on Sunday night. ALL FREE SHIT, right? WRONG. Here's how I spent $197.50 in two days.
Saturday-Decided to spend the morning studying at my favorite coffee shop (I just read a review of it that said "every time I come to the Outpost I see someone famous, like M.I.A. , who lives in the neighborhood". Seriously? M.I.A? That rules!) which also meant spending $15 on two iced coffees plus breakfast and lunch (stupid stupid, and never saw anyone famous). Next came $12.50 on cleaning shit for the apartment so my roommate doesn't start to hate me. Next came $5 on a dress that I bought in a panic after being invited to a fancy fashion designer party (yeah, $5, and that's rounding up. I love my neighborhood).
Next stop, block party! Here I was pretty good (hard to spend too much at a free block party) UNTIL we got bored waiting for Talib Kweli. (local acts came first, including the all white reggae band and the woman who kept infusing her songs with public service announcements like 'remember to fill out your w2s!' and 'teach your kids to spell!') so I spent $27 at the bar next to the park. (hey, guys, I'll get this round!)
Next stop, swanky party. Yeah! Also free, right? WRONG! In order to impress the guy who called me Melissa all night the last time I met him, I decided the nice thing to do would be to bring him a $30 bottle of vodka (his birthday after all), which I mostly drank myself because I felt so weirdly out of place at the party (and he still didn't remember my name). Also, did not wear the $5 dress, which may have been a mistake. Also, according to the receipts and a vague memory of eating potato chips on the train, I bought some food after the party ($9).
Sunday-All aboard express train to hangover-ville. Dragged myself out of bed (people are dragged, right? like hanged?) to obligatory hangover brunch ($15) then to hangover movie ($11) and hangover getting-duped-out-of-$7-by-con-artist/fellow-human-in-need/homeless-man. ($7). Then, $20 for new shoes after mine literally fell apart in the west village and I hobbled into the nearest overpriced shoe store and bought the cheapest ones. Then, wine and dessert ($20) to impress my new friend d at her tv watching party. THEN, $20 on a cab home that should have cost $6 because the driver got lost and I was too tired to argue.
Oh yeah, almost forgot the $76 subway pass I bought. Plus a ton of coffee. Which brings us up to the grand total of $197.50
Man, so, the theme is a) I spend money on stupid shit and b) I spend money on stupid stuff trying to impress people. Luckily for you guys, you may be the next person I buy stupid stuff for in order to impress.
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10 comments:
Couple thoughts here.
$7 on a bum, yah, waste of money.
$76 on a subway pass? Legit. Doesn't count. So really, it's a $121.50. Subtract the $20 on shoes and you're down to about $100. And for a weekend, that's only $50 for two days.
That's not bad.
$5 on a slutty dress? That's a gift that'll keep on giving. Now you're under $100. Seems like you were frugal this week.
And yes, 'dragged' is correct. Reference the Beatles, 'Dragged a comb across my head'.
You're in fine shape.
Crystal? That was an awful story. :)
fighting my urge to line edit the beatles.
bergemann, remember that $9 slice of cake? that was to impress YOU and you were like -meh.
with bills, we all hoes, in new area codes...
I heart Crystal. Please write every day.
well if you feel like blowing some more money, cat and i are going to be in dc this weekend. i don't think it's a holiday, but,
The problem isn't that you're spending money, it's that you're keeping track. I spend like that all the time, but I just throw away receipts or put gum into them when I'm lazy. Then you get to have fun stories like, "Remember that time I had 2 cents in my checking account??" and "Remember that time I had negative 141 dollars in my checking account???"
That's my recipe, anyways.
Gosh, now I'm nervous! It appears I've somehow neasrly doubled my readership (from like 4.5 to 8 people) AND a mystery commenter, it's very exciting. N.E.E., did we ever live in an egg together?
Thanks for the nice things. Ems, I DID love the cake, but it was so good and rich I could only eat a few bites! Brett, don't be an asshole. Simon, if you can make it to the east coast by Friday night for the end of Rosh Hashanah, then maybe we'll be able to hang out:)
I have to echo Werd's sentiments on this one. The best thing to do is to not keep track.
For example, I recently assumed that $650 worth of requisition checks that I deposited were safely in my checking account and paid off my credit card. Instead they were lost by the bank and now I have to figure out where that deposit went and how to live on $250 less for the next two weeks.
Wait, that was sort of a bad example for why it's good not to keep track. Uh... I'll keep thinking.
Good post though, Melissa.
Asshole? I was trying to be cute. :(
I actually liked this story. I agree that keeping track of money spent can be dangerous. But not keeping track on money spent can be even more dangerous. I think you chose the better of two evils.
First of all, you will clearly win when it comes to hipster bingo. You live less than two miles away from the epicenter of hipsterdom. The only advantage that we, outside of Brooklyn, have in this contest is that, of the things listed, many of them are only cool for hipsters not in NYC/Illiamsburgh.
That's right - Illamsburgh.
Also, I don't have a camera. Wah wah.
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