Even after depositing my new and improved post-raise paycheck today, I still had to choose which bills will be paid a little late. And I also had to rewrite my grocery list. That’s not an altogether bad thing, because the items I eliminated had to be things I could do without. Who needs soda, when I have water delivered to my door?

It seems a few extra pennies an hour don’t make much of a difference, even when a whole week’s worth of pennies are collected at the same time. That’s not my problem this week, though. This week my problem is the calendar. I always have problems toward the end of the month, and for some reason in September, the end has come way too close to the middle.

Thirty days hath September, right? And the check I just got included the fifteenth, which was just last Thursday. That’s the midway point, but there’s only one more paycheck this month! The rent I pay on my little cabin here requires almost two full paychecks, and since I started the month in a big hole, that means there’s very little left over to trickle down to things like groceries and credit card bills.

But hey. October will have five paydays in it, and there’s every chance I’ll get caught up without having to sell my car (or, almost as bad, borrow more on my credit card). I work too hard to be this strapped all the time. (Just ask me, and I’ll tell you.) It’s been more than a month since I felt solvent, and coming home from the store today with a light load (and a light wallet) didn’t seem fair. The end is in sight, if I don’t blow it. I think I’ve learned not to do that.