The £40 Student Challenge - Week Two

Wow, week 2 is over and disaster has struck! There has been a mis-calculation! The sub total reads for the week £49.89, thus indicating that I’m some sort of extravagant bastard! I thought I was heading for just under the £45 mark.

However it doesn’t feel like I’ve been that extravagant. I’ve been restraining myself as far as possible.

Analysing the Brown Book it seems that there were a few anomalies to my prudent spending this week that have led to my downfall.

Boots Lunch Deals = £5.98

Beer = £13.25

Contribution to Birthday Boy’s dirty pint = £1

The last is a bit of a giveaway to where I have come unstuck. This week I have attended two birthday celebrations. At both I have drank the minimum 2 pints needed on a night out to make it anything like worthwhile. I even went in one bar and didn’t buy a drink so not to go over the budget. It was depressing.

To give myself some credit, when you look at this picture taken earlier today you can see the clear signs of budgeting...

1) My Sunday dinner consisted of mashed potato and a whole can of beans. Buying a primary (meat) product today would have put meat meals towards the end of the month in jeopardy.

2) How do you think I am looking? – Slightly gaunt? OK, well maybe that is an overstatement, but I have cut out all snacks and treats, and actually think I am losing weight! Today I saw buy one get one free on chocolate fingers and would have usually taken full advantage. But today I walked on past muttering to myself ‘needless cost, needless cost Andrew’

3) See the tea cup on the table – I’m on 4 cups a day to fend off my snacking urges at the moment. I plan to come down on my tea consumption in the next 2 weeks. But still, it shows my intent.

4) As you can see I am surrounded by newspapers. Although this might seem like a needless expense, newspapers have been my key source of entertainment this weekend, with the cross words being the highlight.

So at the half way point I am £8.46 over budget, desperate for a night out and going cold turkey on chocolate, cakes and biscuits. Still my resolve is high as I march in to next week full of confidence I can do it in £35.