A slight frost in hell?

I took New Year's Day off. What's more, I didn't go to the store to get the month end -- and therefore, the Year's End -- readings.

It's not Hell Freezing Over, but it's a start.

Christmas is great, but the goals are so high that it's a bit nerve-wracking. January is usually my worst month, and my daily sales goal is much more achievable. You'd think the stress would come from the months you don't have high sales, not the months you have high sales.

But it's all a game of expectations, and how much you spend. It's all factored in -- you expect that make the little extra in July and August and December, to help pay the bills. A 10% drop in the busy months is much more significant than a 10% drop in the slow months.

I know already, just because I paid all the bills and credit cards on the 31st of December and how much I had left in my balances -- that I more or less broke even for the year. Zero bills or debts owed, and just enough money left in my accounts to pay the estimated taxes.

Which leaves out the IRA contribution. I probably could've got halfway there, too. But around October, I changed strategy to a "working profit"; that is, keeping the store up, and making just enough money to pay my monthly expenses and taxes.

I'll be doing a full accounting of the month in a day or two, and then a full accounting of the year. I probably didn't make a technical profit as high as 2008, but I wasn't trying for that. Much of the 'profits' in 2008 and 2007 were going into paying off credit cards and such. This year, I didn't have to worry about that.

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The only New Year's Resolution I have is to read at least one book a week. I've been hovering around 38 books a year, over the last few years. That isn't enough. I give myself a little goose every few years, to get reading! Which seems to work.

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I've still blogged every day for over 3 years -- silly, but it's a point of pride. But I'm going to allow myself the occasional, "Hi. How you doing? Me, too!" type entry.

I've been mulling it over quite a bit; I don't think I can even try to take the place of Bend Bubble 2, though I'm willing to let the comments go crazy. Maybe I'll put up a heading once a week; Go Crazy. What do you think of this?

I find myself with blogs I want to write, blogs I would have written three years ago before I was aware of any impact, that I hold off publishing. Not because I'm afraid of everyone getting mad at me -- too late for that, in some cases -- but because I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings, or act like a know it all.

But I'm contemplating publishing some of those, a bit more often, and taking the chance.

Early on, I kept repeating, "Hey, this is my opinion. Of course! What do I know? I could be wrong! I don't have all the inside information, but this is how it looks to me...."

But that didn't seem to absolve me of all responsibility, I guess.

Still, maybe I can start every more controversial entry with exactly that statement above. I don't know, yet.