by Hope
Stir crazy, yes. Emotionally drained, yes. Itching for something unknown, yes. And missing my kids, yes. Needing a break from the pressure, yes.
All those and more are the reasons for this road trip.
The Weekend with Princess
Princess and I will be meeting up to attend a weekend Christian women’s conference. We planned this last fall. I was going to go whether she went or not. The cost was just over $500 for the conference and hotel for two of us. This has already been paid ($300 was covered by my Christmas/birthday money.)
Princess paid for her own flight to and from. And I’m driving up. It’s a 10 hour drive for me, and I anticipate that will end up costing right at $70 in gas. I am going to take 3 days to drive up exploring some parks and trails along the way.
Our breakfasts are included with our hotel, and I imagine we will eat out at some point both Friday and Saturday.
Budgeted Money for the Weekend: $140
One more thing I forgot, Addie (my dog) is joining me on this trip. She will be boarded while we are at this conference. I used Rover (<-This is a referral link, if you use it, you will get $20 off your first booking.) to book her sitter. That cost was $113 and has also been pre-paid.
The Trip to Vegas
The trip to Vegas was added when History Buff moved up his timeline to relocate to Texas. Must I go, no. Does he need my help, no. Might this be my only trip to the West Coast and is it fulfilling a bucket list item, yes.
The timeline worked out. The break was needed. And my siblings who will cover my parents care while I take a much needed break fully support it.
I will drop Princess at the airport in OK after leaving the conference and head to Vegas. 20 hours of drive time. I will take my time. It’s 20 hours of drive time and approximately 1,500 miles.
I will drive 3-4 hours per day, work, and sight see along the way, and car camp along the way. I’m packing my food from home – tuna packets, beef jerky, protein bars, cheese sticks, Celsius, and, gallons of water. But will need to purchase fresh, refrigerated food at least once along the way.
Budget for this leg of the journey:
Gas: $200 (anticipate the need for 5 tanks of gas)
Food: $25 (cottage cheese, blueberries, hard boiled eggs, and ice along the way)
Showers: $60 (just in case I need to use truck stop showers every few days)
Misc: $65 – coffee shop stops to charge electronics, souvenirs, etc.
I have Sunday PM – Friday to make this drive, so leaving some time to sight see and explore parks and trails.
Budgeted $350 for the trip from MO -> Vegas. Time = 1 week
Hope is a resourceful and solutions-driven business manager who has spent nearly two decades helping clients streamline their operations and grow their businesses through project management, digital marketing, and tech expertise. Recently transitioning from her role as a single mom of five foster/adoptive children to an empty nester, Hope is navigating the emotional and practical challenges of redefining her life while maintaining her determination to regain financial control and eliminate debt.
Living in a cozy small town in northeast Georgia with her three dogs, Hope cherishes the serenity of the mountains over the bustle of the beach. Though her kids are now finding their footing in the world—pursuing education, careers, and independence—she remains deeply committed to supporting them in this next chapter, even as she faces the bittersweet tug of letting go.
Since joining the Blogging Away Debt community in 2015, Hope has candidly shared her journey of financial ups and downs. Now, with a renewed focus and a clear path ahead, she’s ready to tackle her finances with the same passion and perseverance that she’s brought to her life and career. Through her writing, she continues to inspire others to confront their own financial challenges and strive for a brighter future.
Truly terrible decision making. The only reason you aren’t living on the streets right now is you are staying with family and now you are blowing money left and right on things that are NOT needs. How do you expect to ever retire? Or handle a real emergency like a medical event? Why is health insurance too expensive but only life-avoiding vacation after another isn’t? Being an adult isn’t always fun…but neither is living like a child and the resulting stress that comes from that.
Las Vegas is not the west coast. Driving from San Diego up to the Olympic Peninsula is the west coast and it’s stunningly beautiful. It is about twenty thousand billion times better than going to Vegas, which is fun to experience once but is a tourist trap.
I am not religious, but I would imagine you would want to see the natural beauty of the world that God created, not a bunch of casinos in the desert.
it doesn’t mean you have to go to the real west coast on this trip or that you shouldn’t go to Vegas. But it makes me really sad to think that you would consider this your one and only “west coast” experience.
Ha! I guess I should have prefaced that this was part 1 of the trip. We (History Buff and I took a 5 day whirlwind trip through California from his apartment in Vegas.) It was AWESOME!
I had no desire at all to see any of Vegas itself. But that is where he lived…so it was leg 1 or 2 of the journey to get to the West Coast. And you are right, our country is truly inspiring!
Wow, I want to get gas where you’re filling up. Ten hours of driving for $70 is absolutely wild with today’s prices.
It seems like an optimistic budget, I hope it works but I wouldn’t be relying on Hope, if I were in your shoes.
I wanted to recommend a podcast for your many hours in the car, it’s called Money For Couples with Ramit Sethi. You don’t need to be in a couple to gain insight, so don’t let that turn you off! Couples are interviewed about their financial lives, and it’s a bit more like a therapy session than Dave Ramsey. I think you’d enjoy it and learn some things also.
Hope would not like Ramit. From what I’ve read here, he is far too progressive for her liking (he discusses the positives of progressive taxation and is incredibly anti-MAGA) and explicitly criticizes people who leave their finances up to hope and prayer. But I think everyone could benefit from imagining what their “rich life” looks like, and to spend on what they love and mercilessly cut back on what they don’t. He asks people to really get into their feelings about money, which is awesome.
I agree that he’s very different than Hope politically and…well in basically every other way, but I think she SHOULD listen to his podcast, she could get a lot out of it!
Curious why Anti-Trump needed to be mentioned?
Agreed. Ideological attacks just, in her mind, give her freedom to ignore the factual numbers and questions asked.
Then again, she ignores anything factual anyway and continually shows the priorities of a teenager at best.
I was taking care of parents and random babies as a teen. I wasn’t running off on a silly vacation while not paying for my responsibilities. Andfrom what I can tell, she has fewer responsibilities at 50 than most teens.
I don’t think Hope has a problem with spending money on the things she loves. It’s the everyday general boring stuff she does not wish to fund. I do think there is a possibility Hope will be relying on hope and prayer in her retirement years. It did not escape my notice there was no discussion of her student loan (that she has had for well over a decade on this site) in her March update and that her last update stated she would be focusing on the minimums……again.
The last post hinted she might be reconsidering her health care choice. I hope she does. She already is suggesting she is burnt out. People struggling with their mental health ( and yes burnout is a mental health issue)do not always make great financial choices. I still think she could benefit from a therapist to act as a sounding board when it comes to navigating healthy boundaries and finance. She needs balance. I have to wonder if this budget will be a lot like the forecasts we have seen over the years, overly optimistic, and really not a reflection of what will occur. In her post she mentions her itch for the unknown. I almost wonder if she sabotages herself financially to provide her brain the benefits of that particular itch while ignoring the chaos it has caused in her life. You should not crave the unknown all the time.
Personally I have even mentioned over the years that there is nothing wrong with using money on personal priorities. Fund a trip. Eat out. However, budget for it. Oh and your budget should not be spend $1000 on a trip instead of health care. It should be fund the basics and then save for the trip. The problem for Hope was and is funding those basics. She’ll rationalize going on a trip and then lament that she has nothing for the basics or that all of sudden she has a larger expense as result of not planning for those basics.
I’m sure in real life she is a lovely person. On this blog though she does not read as someone serious about blogging away debt.
You always give great thoughtful advice and grace whenever you can! I have seen another blogger stop blogging after someone commented about her debt and the fact she was going on vacation. She ended up back in debt because she was always helping others out, and I can only hope she makes it out of debt.
Thank you for the recommendation.
Your commitment to spoiling the kids would be admirable if your own financials were solid. I would not want my mom spending money on me that she did not have. You don’t have health insurance and you are embarking on a road trip/cross country trip. You’re running away from things, not figuring out solutions. You are taking a Dave Ramsey course, what does it advise about this?
While this appears to be a very cheap trip with a lot of costs that could be paid out of your regular budget. It still is a little concerning taking this on when your major income source has been lost. You broke it up into silly segments and ignored things that were “prepaid” just to make the cost seem artificially low, whether that is to convince us or yourself that it is a worthwhile trip, it doesn’t matter. But if you add everything together it’s over $1500. 500+113+140+350*2. Add in an oil change and tire rotation for another $80. I also assume you will be buying things, food, or otherwise spending money while helping History Buff. Planning to go to any national parks? Add another $80. Your first attempt at a budget was good, but I think you need to be honest about a more holistic number for everything.
Have you been able to make much progress on your savings?
I like the looking into a holistic number for the budget.
It’s even more than that. The $350 to Vegas is from Missouri. On her way back, she’ll be returning to Texas, ?Austin area. Even with that budget, that’s more than 2 months of health insurance.
Add in the numerous small overages that add up, even a few meals here and there, definite overages on gas cost, and maybe a hotel or two for bad weather, bad sleep, bad back, and it’s 2.5-3 months of health insurance. Including for Gymnast. The kid.
But health insurance is boring. And not having it has worked out in the past, so why not now too? If you get a big bill, just don’t pay. A three week vacation is exciting. Much better choice. /sarcasm.
The part of all of this that just seems so disingenuous to me is 3 or 4 posts ago you were blogging about ways to spend time with your adult children without spending any money. All the while, you had already paid $500 for a Christian’s Women’s Retreat (they certainly do know how to prey on those in need, don’t they?). And then decide you must go to Vegas to help a child move, who you admitted does not need the help. You do not want advice on ways to spend time with your kids without spending money. Don’t waste our time pretending with a blog post about it.
This budget seems FAR too low. $200 for 5 tanks of gas? Not right now. $25 for fresh food? Where will you park your car to sleep? Walmarts? Any other pet expenses? What about the return trip?
The over 2k that will be spent on this trip could easily pay for at least a few months of health insirance. Where are you priorities?!
I can understand why Hope, and anyone with low income and low savings, doesn’t see enough incentive to be paying 8k/year for health insurance just for the off chance that it could save them 5-20k in bills. Health insurance, which will still have a deductible if used. Not sure if this is a choice I would make personally, but I can certainly understand why people do. Many states don’t allow medical bills to affect your credit, emergency rooms must treat you, and payment plans are available if you’re good with paying $100/month per bill for the rest of your life. So maybe comparing it vacation spend to 2 months of health insurance isn’t the best to get the point across.
That being said, money saved from health insurance should be set aside and saved if that is the choice you are making. Not spent willy nilly for road trips. At least that way, if she doesn’t have medical bills, that 8k saved in premiums will be available for emergencies and/or future health expenses. Kind of self-insurance in a way.
yeah, I think people would not be so hard on her if she just ever had a “plan B” or stuck to it. That whole insurance conversation reads like a really immature kid. “ok, health insurance expensive! Ok, nothing will happen and I’m going to go on a dull exciting road trip!”
She just doesn’t want to ever look at very predictable situations and prepare for them. And with today’s prices? My brother is in the south and five days of food poisoning was around 30 grand in the hospital.
I mean, really, even rich people can’t afford to risk it.
I don’t fully disagree, but Hope doesn’t have an average self-insured’s risk proposition. Usually someone who would self insure for health is betting on minimal need to access care, at least in the short term. Hope has already taken that bet in the past and gotten burned.
She appears now to be on the path toward diabetes complications. You can read between the lines of certain posts over the last year or so, when she wants to highlight things being challenging, that she has issues with her feet and legs (wedding), issues with energy, obviously the hearing, many things that are caused by or augmented by diabetes issues. She only months ago said she had a period of struggle to control her diabetes, luckily while she had insurance and providers to use.
Hope also tends more likely to see therapists and mental health providers when she has insurance benefits to cover some visits.
Hope needs the broader access to health care insurance provides. She’s a person who can actually use insurance and get value from it. Without care, she is at elevated risk of becoming disabled in the next 5 years or so. Depending on the full truth of her health, it might even make sense to consider starting the disability path now since it takes so long to get benefits in place. Remember, she’s still 14 years from receiving Medicare.
That’s a good point. Since she has never saved for retirement, she needs to start applying because short of her parents continuing to cover her living expenses, disability may need to take over at some point before she gets to 65.
It generally takes three years to get an approval.
Angie, your response touches on several facets that are at the core behavioral finance when it comes to who’s who ‘successful’ at managing their money responsibly and those who are less so. Long va short term thinking. Instant gratification vs delayed. ‘Boring’ responsibility vs exciting fun. Broad, holistic view va narrow, compartmentalized foci Reasons, rationalizations, excuses for not-great choices that sacrifice tomorrow’s success for today’s benefit. Responsibile vs irresponsible.
And I understand why someone would feel that why: why plan for ‘later’ when later is so far away when I can have XYZ and enjoy today. I understand that.
But for health insurance specifically, the potential cost is much higher that what you’ve listed and could affect gymnast as well, Hope is in the age range and has chronic conditions such that she can reasonable expect larger and more expensive care.
For tough adults like Gymnast , accidents are one of the most common causes of medical bills.
If a major event happens fo either of them the costs could easily exceed the premiums, not even including the ‘hidden’ costs of late fees, higher interest rates, inability to get a home or car loan, lower retirement and savings balances because dollars had to go toward interest instead of yourself, etc that unpaid debt and bad credit bring. The total cost of debt that is high relative to available resources and income is greater and more nuanced than ‘health insurance vs road trip’
I’m wondering if she has paid and is paying enough into Social Security to get the benefit and possibly get Social Security disability. It would be a disaster if not. Not too late to start though.
IMO almost certainly. The bar for a qualifying quarter towards SSDI is pretty low, and Hope has been working. Certainly any year she had ACA insurance or received other benefits connected to federal tax filing (adoption credit, child credit etc) logically means income was reported to SSA.
Yes, I’ve always paid into social security.
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