Slow and Steady: $9,527.33

And down she goes again. I got my New York State tax refund today and was pleasantly surprised. After taking over two months for it to be processed, the amount I received was $50 more than I had anticipated! They must have gone over my return and fixed it for me. Wasn't that nice of them? This money means that I can comfortably pay all of my bills this month and have enough money to breathe with. If I'm really good I might carry a couple hundred extra bucks into next month. Now, I will admit that I didn't send all of my tax refund to my credit cards, which I had intended to do back when I charged this pretty new computer I'm typing this entry on. I probably could have done that and perhaps survived, but that would leave virtually no room for incidentals that may come up throughout the month.

My main strategy is to simply pay off as much as I can without having to charge anything, or pay off any amount I had charged plus a bit more. What I have found is that this will be a better long-term strategy to getting the debt paid down. Yes, it feels good to make a big, honkin' payment to a credit card, but if you end up having to turn around and charge other things as a result then there is no point to that one moment of satisfaction. Not to mention that I started this blog less than a month ago and I've paid off about $235. I will pick up the pace and send a little more next month because I won't have car insurance to pay until July, but all in good time.