I spent most of the day today talking to people over Skype and Facetime; I ended up with almost eight hours’ worth of talking! The only other thing I did was wrap up my ledgers for 2021, sup up the budget for 2022, and start my new financial excel file.

I am pretty happy with how my 2022 budget looks. I would never think it could be cheaper to live in the city than in the suburbs, but numbers do not lie. Of course, a big saving is living without a car – I never thought it was such a significant part of my budget. Also, mom’s place here is cheaper than in Palatine, and also – my house refinancing. Even with the current inflation, I have a cushion, so I hope that I will be able to repay my mortgage ahead of schedule and be done with it by the time I retire.

On a related topic: I always had higher energy bills in December, but I was never sure which portion of the electric bill was due to all the Christmas lights and which – to extra baking. Now that I have a gas stove, I know the answer: the electric bill barely changed, while the gas bill is three times higher than in November. So it all goes to the cookies!