October Expenses

The last few days have been pretty sweet. Star Trek DS9 on Saturday followed by NFL football on Sunday. Monday was Columbus Day so I played hookie from the bank job, went to the gym with a former co-worker, and then had some delicious Thin N Crispy pizza at Pizza Hut. It has been nice indeed.

Carver called me this morning to say that he got pulled over for speeding a couple of weeks ago, going 50 in a 30 mph zone. He wasn’t drinking or anything but, because of his previous DWIs, he had to hire a lawyer so that his license wouldn’t get suspended. Great. He’s hoping the lawyer will have the charges dropped but he’ll let me know Friday morning. So it looks like Carver’s gonna be on another payment agreement. I allow tenants to go on one payment plan a year, with a $25 payment initiation fee. The last time he needed one was well over a year ago when his longtime girlfriend Linda was dying of cancer. I don’t really see this as a big deal since he makes a lot of money and he only pays $525 for rent. It’s just a hassle doing these damned payment agreements. Oh well, at least I’ll be getting an extra $25 from this situation.

Besides Carver’s issue, everything is going good but I have to get some things done this week. I have to fill out my pension form that I received a while ago. I don’t know why it took me so long but I have to send it in now. I want to be able to go property hunting and not have to wait for the money before I can put an offer down. I have to get my heater guy Gonzalez to come and inspect both furnaces of Alpha and Chi before winter starts. I already hear some struggling in the furnace of property Alpha and I want to get it fixed before his winter rates begin. I also have to get new tires. I’ve already conceded to the fact that I will most likely not reach my quota of 17k this month. At best I should get about $16,500, but a little bit above 16k seems more likely. With the quota out of reach, I can focus on buying what I need like tires. If I can get them new that would be great, but seeing that I’ll only have my GMC Jimmy for a couple more years, I think some high quality used tires would be acceptable. I’m hoping to spend under $300.

Along with the tires I have to get plane tickets for Thanksgiving. The plan is for my old college buddy Nino will pick me up at the airport and we’ll hang out from Tuesday night til Wednesday morning. Then he drops me off at Brooklyn Mike’s house and we hang out until Wednesday night. Then I take a cab to my dad’s place, followed by a cab to my mom’s place, and finally a cab to the airport where I should make it back to Smalltown before Thursday ends. I can’t wait to get that whole family trip over with, but it will be nice to see Nino and Brooklyn Mike again. I haven’t seen them in years. I was thinking Sha’s wife Sonya would be able to get me a deal since she works at JetBlue, but she hasn’t said anything and I only ask once. The ticket will be around $150 and cab expenses should be around $40. An expense of $200 for the trip to Brooklyn is acceptable.

While on the subject of Sha and Sonya, I also have to get a new PO Box. They’ve ruined it with their junk mail and BS so I need to start over with another one. This time, however, I may just get a mailbox from the UPS Store. It costs almost exactly the same and it gives you a real address number instead of a PO Box number. I want to get this as soon as possible so that I can get my current tenants used to the new address by the time I get new tenants with my eventual property Charlie. I may have to get a bigger box, as I should have almost 20 units by the time I retire. I don’t want to continue changing to larger sizes just to save $40 a year, so I might as well get the larger size now.

So that’s a PO Box, tires, airline tickets, and furnace maintenance. It’s all annoying October expenses that I have to pay in order to prepare for November’s glorious 5 paycheck month. It’s better to get them over with now, screw the quota. Get it over with and pay it now so I don’t pay for it later. It’s a variation of the lesson I learned last month, and I won’t forget it.