An Expensive Week!

Ok, so awhile back I wrote a post about how it's not thaaaaaat expensive to live, or at least grocery shop, in New Zealand. Some days I feel like the entire universe (of New Zealand anyway) is working against me to disprove my theory that living here can be "affordable". Other days I feel like we're really getting the hang of budgeting our money here, and then something will happen.

Exhibit A: My cute new car.

Looks innocent, doesn't it? Runs great. Is easy-ish on petrol. How much could one little oil change cost? A BILLION DOLLARS roughly, when, oh by the way, rear brake pads must be changed (safety), oil and fuel filters must be changed (efficiency) and some sensors must be repaired (???).

Cost of an "Oil Change": One round trip ticket to Cairns, Australia

Exhibit B: Bringing my husband to the grocery store.

Being all geologist-y

He's cute, right? How much could he possibly eat, right? He eats everything. (He's totally going to protest being in this post, which is totally making me smirk right now...)

So I made the mistake of bringing him to New World, which is the sort of fancy-shmancy grocery store. I appreciated having the company, because grocery shopping is one of the chores I seriously loathe. No idea why- love to cook, love having the things from the grocery store... hate being there. But man, his company comes at a price! "Smoked salmon a little bit on sale!? Lets get two!...... Ooooooh, fancy beers!........ I need a new toothbrush. No, not the $3.99 one........ We need bacon........... Hey, what do you think orange flavored cranberries taste like?........ Life is too short to drink crappy wine." 

Haha, ok that last one was a joint effort, and I'm probably equally partially to blame for our grocery bill, which was well into double digits, or: One night at a 4.5 star resort in Cairns, Australia.

Exhibit C: A stupid foam roller.

I strained my back at Cross Fit doing dead lifts. Yep, I'm that person. Keep your back straight, they said... I know why now. Ow! I'll never do it wrong again. Anyways, remedy? Physiotherapy, deep tissue massage, chiropractics. Ha. Remedy for the non-wealthy? A foam roller. An expensive, blue cylindrical piece of pressed foam. These things are actually miracle workers though, and 3 days later my back is totally dialed in.

Cost: Snorkel and wetsuit rentals for 2 people for one day at the Great Barrier Reef.

Can you tell where we're planning our next vacation?

Bonus Expenditure:

Remember how I decided to reunite with running? Well, I have been using the same shoes for running, the gym, etc. for the last 3 years. Total no-no. I'm just really bad at shucking out triple digets for running shoes. So I decided to go to the local sports shoe spot and get some new shoes.

They did this whole sweet shoe study on me. I ran around their store and ran on a treadmill while they filmed my feet. Some techy foot software they've got diagnoses your running stride, and prescribes the appropriate shoe for you. So I got professionally fitted for the shoes pictured above. I'm not gonna lie, I'm a bit skeptical of the whole thing, mostly because I'm halfway through Born to Run, which all of you should read, which strongly supports barefoot running and rips apart the whole running shoe industry citing them as fraudulent and responsible for 99% of running injuries. (Run on sentence winner!)

Anyways, I bought the shoes. And some running pants, cuz guys... It's cold out there! So Happy Early Birthday to me... One more 4.5 star resort in Carins night later. Ugh.

When I got home I actually had minor buyers' remorse because I did the Internet Comparison. The Internet Comparison is something that no New Zealander, especially expats, should do. Ever. When you do the Internet Comparison, you'll find out that you could have got your Very Expensive NZ$ running shoes for Half As Much US$. This is painful. I actually thought about returning them and buying online. And then Scott told me, with no sugar coating, that I would be "a terrible human being".

A side story: Recently I asked Scott to remove Wilbur, a spider who has been living in the upper corner of our living room for approx. 4 months. We were having our first guests over for dinner and I really didn't feel that Wilbur needed to be a 5th wheel. Scott dutifully got up on the chair to scrape Wilbur, and his elaborate web, down. But then he noticed that Wilbur had really spent a lot of time making this web home. He had fly wings and bug parts carefully dissected and displayed around his web like trophies of his life accomplishments. Scott was so impressed by Wilbur's dedication to his craft, and thankful for the eradication of the flies, that he left the spider and web in the corner. Moral of the story? There's two: a) don't judge me if there's spiders in my house, it's Scott's fault. And b) he's obviously a way better human being than I am, and will judge me forever if I buy shoes off the internet.

Rainbow on a rainy day... nice change from sunrise?

In conclusion, my wallet is thankful that we have two full time jobs. I am thankful to have new brake pads because it's freaking pouring rain out there. And I'm lucky to have a husband who is 10x more morally sound than I am and can keep me in line. We'll just grow old together with no money and lots of spiders in our freezing home with our fancy bacon and rainbows.