One of my long term goals is to be able to live off of no more than 60% of my income. Since I'm the sole breadwinner, I don't make a lot of $$, and I have a nice chunk of debt, it's a little challenging.

Currently, my debt expenses should run me about 45% of my take home income. One of these debts is a loan from the Guild and since it isn't due for about a year, so my total out of pocket debt is about 30%. My current living expenses are about 69%.

My short term goal is to eliminate enough of my current debt so when the Guild comes looking for their money, I won't go over the 30% debt load. This will make it far easier to pay off the debt and ideally, convert that 30% to savings.

I don't really want to have to work at the Souk to accomplish this: the time to payoff ratio is pretty low right now. But I'm going to need to stick very close to my budget to achieve my plans.

By my calculations, I should be able to put away for the following:

1. $500 emergency fund,
2 Freedom accounts:
a. car maintenance/service
b. Christmas
c. family trip (my mom lives far away).
d clothes (mainly shoes and a coat)

There's only a narrow margin for clothes (I'm loving the thrift store) and really no space for a few householdy things that I'd like to buy.

So what I've done is make another line item in the budget called Objects of desire. which will be bought with extra $$ I earn at the Souk. Because they're not necessary, but just desired, it's ok if it takes a bit of time to raise the $$.

This is what I'm saving for this month (calculated by hours mucking stalls):

1. Helmet & protective gear = 5 hours
2. Table = 36 hours

I like this plan because it places the entire operating budget on my day job, which is really more appropriate than having to depend on 2 jobs to get the bills paid.

I just need to be really careful and not waste money.