On.......being broke and loving it

I'm dead broke this month. Bank manager saw it fit to halve my overdraft limit from 2000 to 1000. This was done with such subterfuge that by the time I realised it was too late and my salary had already gone in for the month, effectively wiping of 1k from my available account balance.

You see, I live beneath the line of positive equity, my brother calls it the land of the red. In fact I have not seen any black figures in a while and I have become strangely accustomed to this. I tell a lie, there was that one time my balance bopped it's head above sea level. I think that was in May 2004 when my account had been credited in error. Before I could even breathe the rarefied air of positive equity, my head was slapped back down to the murky depths of overdraft by the brusque hand of the bank manager. Bastard.

This month I have had to re-adjust my budget and prioritise the things I can and cannot afford:

This month I will be able to buy butter but no bread to eat it it with;
This month I'll take a girl on ONE date but there will be no money to treat her with

There will be money for soap but no toilet roll to clean my yansh with;
There wil be money for internet but not broadband and, thus, I will suffer a 56k bandwidth

Bele go shrink, pocket go tight;
I go try find money settle gas, settle phone, settle light

Visa, MasterCard and Amex will all smile with glee
as they assault me with an average APR of 18.3


I have decided that despite this enforced period of cheddar scarcity, the bank manager is actually doing me a favour. He has monitored the trend of my account over the past few years and come to the conclusion that I could do with a bit of a leg up. Think about it, this time next month, I will actually be back in the land of the black. I will be free from the shackles of the gbese that had become an all too familiar bedfellow.

I have also come to find that there is a certain paradise to be found in poverty. It strips you of the artifice in your life and you focus on the fundamentals. For example I have been recently ogling the Nikon D80; a 10 Megapixel behemoth of a digital camera and would probably have closed eye and bought it this month. What is wrong with my current 7.2MP camera I ask you? Nothing. What tangible difference will there be in the quality of pictures that I will take with the two cameras? Well, apart from the higher resolution, faster image processing and superior night acuity - not that much.

Thankfully, because of my brokage, I will not only save my money but can also reapportion the three hours I had earmarked to devour the camera's 87 page manual. I can instead use this time to go for a walk and become one with nature. I am surrounded by woodland and on this walk I would reflect on many things; the unique flying patterns of geese, the peculiar courtship calls of the chaffinch and the various sexual techniques employed by a porcupine when mating [1]

Add to this the number of hours I will save not calling people because of a lack of phone credit and by the end of the month, I could be well on my way to an advanced level of inner tranquility and even achieve nirvana. I could even change my name to Zen which be like totally cool dude.

Yes, I am truly finding a certain bliss in this brokage of mine. Capitalism can wait and so can I; the Nikon D80 goes on sale next month. :-)

[1] Porcupines have soft underbellies and some of the males suffer a spike to the heart when they attempt to climb the female from behind. Tragic but at least the rodents die happy!