Only Five Days?

I finally got around to reconciling my monthly expenses list for July.  (Have I told you guys about reconciling my monthly expense list?  When I first got my Franklin Quest day planner it had a month-end half-sheet where you could break down expenses by date and category.  I decided to do so every month to keep track of how much I'm spending and what I'm spending on.  Big caveat/loophole: It's only for expenses where I pay in cash -- no credit card.  So no, it may not be the most accurate representation of my spending habits.  And it has still not done what I originally wanted this monthly check-up to do, which is to make me reflect and ultimately curb my spending.)

When I sit down and do this chore, especially when I get around to it later than earlier in the month, it feels like I'm rolling a boulder up a hill.  That's probably why I often procrastinate doing it.  But it has to be done, and I finally got around to doing it for last month.  So, I get out my receipts (I most always get them), I put them in order (although I had already done so some time ago), and then I write down all the totals for expenses I paid cash money for.  But a funny thing happened: For nearly all of the receipts, I saw "credit card."  I had a huge pile of receipts, but I was whipping through them because I charged whatever I spent.  After I got done, I looked through my Franklin Quest and saw that I had written down expenses for only five days.  In other words, if I am correct, I took out my wallet and used money to buy things on only five days.

I consider that remarkable, even moreso because we're monthslong into the pandemic.  With the onset of the coronavirus spreading throughout the country, not only did I not go anywhere and thus not spending money, whenever I did spend money I was more apt to whip out my credit card than cash.  I got very concerned over catching the virus through the exchange of legal tender, specifically the bills and coins I would get back in change.  I now understand that picking up coronavirus through "fomites" (objects or materials which are like to carry infection -- thanks, Oxford Languages via Google!) is now regarded as a minor way to get the virus.  Still, my reluctance to use straight cash money has persisted and, apparently, still persists now.  Besides, it's fast.  The cashier and I have one fewer thing to exchange (although I usually always ask for a receipt), and once I stick that card in and take that card out, I'm out.  Consequently, a shorter stay means I'm not lingering around an indoor space where I could pick up COVID-19 breath from someone standing close to me.

I've been astonished and, actually, quite pleased at the number of dates I have spent cash money on since the virus hit.  Usually there are 20-5 days I have to list down a page, and that gets along and imprints the thought that doing this is a pain in the ass.  But that hasn't been the case in the past five months.  The pandemic and ensuing lockdown, if you will remember, began in March; I was tossing bills and coins around like nobody's business in the first half of that month, but I virtually shut down once I and the country realized this was a big fucking deal.  In the end, I used cash on ten days in March.  I remember being just frightened of everything all through April, so it basically was work-Target-home all month, and so I spent cash on only two dates.  I used tender on five days in May, which is probably a reflection of the caution fatigue that set in.  That's further confirmed by the ten dates in June when I used currency -- maybe as normal as things get for me during The New Normal.

So how come I went back down to five for July?  Don't know.  Maybe it finally sunk in that things are so much easier/convenient/better if I just used my credit card for everything.  Or, like I said, I could be wrong and I overlooked a pile of receipts that showed I tossed money around all of July.  But I wanted to note my shortened monthly expense list(s) here.

One other thing.  There is a national coin shortage.  How in the hell could that be?  People may not be spending money nowadays, but I'm sure some people at least are using dollars and cents when they do spend money.  Eh, but what do I know. ...