Fiscal Fast Wednesday Report (1-11-12)

Last week we announced our plans to have a fiscal fast day throughout the year where we do not spend any money. We chose Wednesdays because we thought it would be the best day due to lack of holidays, etc., but there are little things that keep popping up already that make us wish we would have chosen another day of the week. In addition, we have already seen the effects in our day-to-day lives.

There has been a lot of skepticism about shifting the spending to other days before and after the fiscal day. Our financial adviser even wanted me to go as far as finding statistics on whether “fasting” caused binging the same way with a diet. Below is a list of things we have noticed from our experiment.

1) During our fiscal fasts, whether they be the Wednesdays of each week throughout the year, or during the entire week long fast, one thing I have noted is that I need to be diligent about not shopping online and reading to many of the forums that I do on a normal day. This can be a big problem for me because I love reading through forums like FatWallet, MilePoint, or FlyerTalk, which means during fiscal days/weeks, I need to refrain from such activities.

The problem is that while most of the deals I just simply glance right over from lack of interest, occasionally there is a great offer that gets my blood boiling. I get that deer in the headlights look and start reading, researching, and then possibly buying something I might not have needed prior. So the point is to get rid of the temptation.

This drives my wife’s anxiety nuts when I call her out-of-the-blue at work and tell her we can go to Istanbul over spring break for $2 airfares. I am always ready to say lets go, until she starts to unravel my plan with what about the dogs, what about the boys, or if we go to Istanbul, I am going to get that new dress.

This does not mean I can not necessarily peruse through other relevant forums, blogs, and whatever other sites I may research. I just need to be diligent about not waiving that new _____ in front of my wallet.

2) My wife and I decided that if we make a mistake during the fiscal day/week, we are then forced to make the day up the subsequent day. It requires being honest with your spouse and ourselves. This is meant to be an actual mistake too. We can not buy something with the purpose of extending the fiscal fast.

3) Planning some great home cooked meals. We typically cook most of our dinners at home, but we also eat out maybe once or twice per week for dinner, and about the same for lunches. What we did not remember was our favorite restaurant (Deagan’s Gastro Pub) features an AMAZING vegetarian/vegan menu on Wednesdays. Sucks! We are not vegetarian or vegan, but just blocked ourselves from enjoying the most amazing meals in the area. That is except for people that have already promised to pay for us on Wednesdays since those are the rules of this experiment.

4) The library sounds like an excellent trip to do on Wednesdays. The problem becomes when in the first week of the year my wife failed to notice that the video she rented was due within a couple days, and now she owes several late fees. Besides the embarrassment she feels, going to the library now on a Wednesday would trigger having the pay the fines. Plan foiled.

Well that is about it. Short and sweet. Even though I consider myself very aware when spending money, and needs and wants, I have found an even greater awareness by acknowledging that I can not even buy a $0.35 can of soda from the machine at work. Therefore, I bring something from home to drink in the afternoon when I get my daily urge. Fiscal Wednesdays also means I need to come home on lunch to eat, or bring something along with me.

I also have been thinking of kinda reversing the whole fiscal fast idea already in the second week of the exercise. Again the goal is to be more aware of spending habits and not spending any excess money during our fasts. But I am now thinking that in addition to not spending money, we should set a goal of trying to also make some extra money during our fast.

So for example, we have some returns still from Christmas items, and I am thinking about scheduling taking them back to the store on our fiscal day/week to actually “make” money instead of spending. This exercise is in addition to our daily jobs and paychecks. When I explained this new rule to my wife, she instantly asked if that meant she had to go to all the vending machines looking for loose change. I laughed so hard I figured that would be a good ending point to this weeks analysis.