michaelandbetsey.com

The weather reports had been ambivalent about the likelihood and amount of snow. It was a 40% of 6 inches, then a 20% chance of 2-4 inches. It would start Friday morning, or evening, or wait to Saturday. Maybe it wouldn’t come at all. But by Friday morning it was clear it was coming, and there would be at least 4 inches. By noon on Friday the sky had become an even grey color, the flat slate that we always associate with snow on its way.

Betsey came home from work and we made a last run out for supplies. Betsey has already made sure we were taken care of for food, batteries, blankets, candles, etc., so we went looking for a sled. No dice. We did find new boots for Elliott, thankfully, because he’ll need them. We get home around 3, driving through light flurries. Within an hour, there’s an inch on the ground. Elliott wants to play, and who am I to deny him? So we get bundled up in boots and snow gear, and start to trek to Glen Arden Elementary, about a 1/4 mile away. On the way, the neighbors lend us a sled. By the time we reach the school, we’re in 2.5 inches or so of powder. We spend 15 minutes sledding down the hill before Elliott gets cold and we head back. There’s 4″ by this time. And it keeps coming and coming all night. At 8:30, the power goes out, so we head to bed early.

In the morning, we’re greeted with one of those classic Americana snowfalls. A thick blanket of powder with a crust of ice across the top. Its hard to walk through, and slow going whenever we head outside. At most we can handle 30 or 45 minutes at a go before Elliott loses his energy and needs to come inside. But its wonderful, and joy to see his delight in it. A bit of a meltdown on our first journey out, but our second one is a great time, throwing snow at dad, and sledding down the big hill at Glen Arden:

The new year is always a good time to review what you’re doing and clean up the neglected corners of your life. Its allows us a dividing line, a place where we can say “this is what we’re done before, here’s what we’re going to do now”. This week I’ve been focusing on two things: the strategy for Simatra (which I won’t elaborate on here), and our financial house.

The depressing thing about reviewing our finances (apart from being unable to retire and start my own brewery/bakery/cheese shop) always seems to be that there are very, very few ways for us to increase our savings. In the last year, I’ve been diligent about tagging all our purchases on mint, so I’ve got a good idea about what we spend money on. And the bulk of it is: mortgage, student loans, and child care. Its unrealistic to assume that we’ll drop the mortgage or student loans to rate any lower than they already are, and I though we could drop our expenses on Elliott’s care, we’ve done enough digging to know there’s a strong, high-R relationship between expense and quality, and shortchanging my son is something I can’t do.

But I did find a few forgotten elements of our financial life that could be altered. Forgotten credit card rewards were a big one. But the one that made me happiest was my 10 minute conversation with Charter. We cut the cable out of our home a year ago, for reasons of savings, improving our son’s development, and the fact that everything we want to watch is on DVD or the internet; but we’ve retained Charter for internet service and a land-line phone (I’d be happy to ditch the land line, but our mobile reception at the house is terrible). And I decided that that monthly bill really should be lower. So I called them, informed them that AT&T could provide equivalent service for $20/month less than Charter, and could they top AT&T?

Turns out they could, quite easily. $25/month less than my current bill in fact. So, with a 10 min phone call, we saved $300 for the next year. I feel giddy and proud at that. I hope Clark Howard would be proud. The most difficult part was getting a hold of the actual person to talk to, because the automated system doesn’t present you with the option to talk to a person. I discovered, however, that by routinely repeating “F*** you” to the automated machine, you will quickly get connected to a live human being.

We’re in Atlanta at A’ba and Da’s house.  Elliott is watching Wall-E.