Don't Let the Monkeys Enforce Murphy's Law

Never, I repeat, never say out loud...What else can go wrong? I don't know if it is fate that likes to play tricks on us or just plain old Murphy's Law, but it seems like if one thing seems to be going good, then something else is going to come along and throw a monkey in my wrench...or is that a wrench in my monkey?

First things first...I started this blog with all good intentions to let everyone know what I'm doing to make money online. Well, it seems that as fast as I can make it, one more thing in life requires money.

It all started when I decided to pay off some debt. I did get one credit card paid off, but unfortunately, Christmas rolled around and I used it for a little Black Friday shopping. The plan is to pay the balance each month, or at least half. Anyway, I thought to myself, man, this debt payoff is moving pretty smooth and based on my scientific calculations...er, actually Dan's Super Snowball Calculator, I should have all my credit cards and personal loans paid off in only 9 months. Well, I did not take into consideration those little WTM's (Wrench Toting Monkeys) that seem to pop up out of no where.

Just to give you an idea, these are my latest little WTM's:

Brake job and 2 tires (to replace the badly worn, daily self-flattening rear tires) $200.00
Daily laundry drop off service for the past 2 weeks (I think my washing machine slung a rod!) $200

• NSF charges for not paying attention to my newly started checkbook register $175

Still searching for happiness...priceless.
I will go back to the drawing board tonight, make a stronger commitment with that checkbook register, and scientifically recalculate that snowball plan and get back on track.

ClearCheckbook.com

I've come to realize that I spend half of my time making money and the other half spending it, and the whole time wondering "where did my money go." So I thought I would sit down and try to figure out my finances and see where the money is disappearing to...but wait, I don't even keep a checkbook register much less maintain a budget.

I have always played roulette when it came to my bank account assuming as long as I logged in and checked my balance, I would be fine. Well, I'm here to tell you that you don't win at that game very long relying on luck. So after 10 years of daily checking online just to find out my balance, I've decided to start being responsible for my finances. I'm not one to keep up with an actual checkbook (I hate physically writing anything) and if I can't do it online, then I usually don't do it at all. So I went straight to Google and searched for an online checkbook register. The title for their first listing, ClearCheckbook.com caught my attention...Totally Free Online. Hey, "Free" and "Online", what more could I ask for. I looked around for about one whole minute, created an account, imported my statement from the bank and...voila! I had an actual checkbook register in less than five minutes.

After I got everything up and running, I started checking out their features. My favorites are the Google widget and the AIMbot. You can put a widget on your iGoogle page that gives you an overview of your account as well as quick links to your ClearCheckbook.com account. The AIMbot is awesome. You can send an IM requesting your balance and even add transactions straight from AIM. You can also send the same requests by sending the AIMbot a text from your cellphone. How cool is that?

The creator of ClearCheckbook.com, Brandon O'Brien, developed the program primarily for his own personal use, but decided to share it with the online community. The idea behind making ClearCheckbook.com available was to give high school students and young adults an easier way to track their spending at the same time teaching them basic checkbook fundamentals. This is exactly the type of program I was looking for...easy, free & online.

If you're looking for an alternative to a paper checkbook register, you should give ClearCheckbook.com a try and guess what, no advertisements to clutter your checkbook register. If you like the program and it works for you, please consider giving a donation. He maintains the program at no charge to you and he doesn't run advertisements anywhere on the site.