Today's Google doodle is a virtual Alexander Calder mobile you can spin. [link]

I never understood how a mobile was such high art. It's pretty and all, but it's a mobile. Then again, my appreciation of most modern art is lacking.

Megan,

Not using credit cards is a very effective budgeting tool.

I have been using credit cards my entire adult life and I have found it to be a really important budgeting tool. Years ago, I would pay everything by credit cards if I could because I had a reward card that gave me realy good cash back. I need that $50 every other month (or whatever) and in the rare instance I had disputes with vendors, my credit card company would have my back.

I now pay all but one of my utility bills via credit card.

I used to put a line in my checking account register for every credit card charge I had so I could pay my credit card off every month. I had budget categories and I would watch my credit card and cash expenditures to keep things in categories.

xkcd: [link] I feel catered to.

I think using credit cards like a debit card can be fine, if you have good impulse control. I could easily do that, myself - I have that kind of spreadsheet mind. But for most people, they don't have that degree of impulse control, or even just plain forget they are on a budget, or can't remember mentally how much they have left to spend in a category and overspend, so carrying only the cash you have to spend can be really helpful. My husband is very much this way.

mr.flea will be unemployed in 4 weeks, so we need to re-do our budget and enforce it hard core. The hardest thing for me I think is going to be stuff for the kids. We have savings for the purpose - this is a planned layoff - but we don't know how soon he'll get a job and we can;t run through all of our savings because it's very likely we'll need to move when he does get a job. I don't think we'll be able to do dance class for Casper; it's $60 a month, plus she'd need new shoes and stuff. We don't actually have a whole lot of discretionary spending to cut, unfortunately. The bulk of our expenses are fixed.

I was freaking out about money because I thought this week wasn't payday, but it is! Phew. And I'm going to get some freelance money shortly, and there's more where that came from, so now I can relax again. But maybe I will still do my own nails today, which was my plan when I thought I was broke for a week....

I was going to say I was happy to no longer be so restrictive about my budget, and then I realized that I made vegetable broth today to use up my veggies before vacation and am eating the strained veggies for dinner, because, hey, why order food when you don't have to?

Dude, you're living the dream! Cheap habits when you don't need them lead to more money for fun things you want!

Noah would be jealous if he could conceptualize having a job and working on a LucasFilm thing.

Hee, Noah! And Yay for megan's job. So cool.

Hey, can anyone recommend an easy randomizer?

My website launch giveaway [link] ends tonight, and I gotta pick the winner.

Going to the Ozarks this weekend, and planning on sipping icy margaritas while all the kiddos play in the river or lake (if the river's too low).

This'll be the first weekend "out" that I've had to do some work stuff while I'm on mini-vaca, and it's kind of weird. Just a the contest winner announcement and emails, but still.

And in news of fiscal profligacy, I've left the a/c in my bedroom on low, and it is helping the living room, I'm pretty sure, even with the window open (the especially profligate part).

We occasionally do the A/c in one room for another. We also hung curtains on tension rods. One curtain separates the bedrooms and bathroom from the living room and another the separates the kitchen from the den. It shocks me how much a difference it makes in terms of keeping the heat out of the living room to use the curtains!

Erin, try random.org. I use it in class when kids present.

I keep my whole house bearable with two window units upstairs! And lots of strategic fans.

Today is going to be bad, weatherwise. It was already severely gross at 5:30. I'm just going to pretend it isn't as much as I can.