Ways and Means: 2022 Recap

The year started in Mexico, and was mostly sedentary, aside from a weekend in Joshua Tree in March. Full time travel was not on the table yet, but there was a glorious three weekish stint spent in Mexico, which included a weekend there for a wedding and then two weeks in Mexico City….. And wait I’m totally wrong here. [Again, this is being written in Feb 2024.]

I forgot about a week in New York for LOL Worlds! I hadn’t been to New York in so long and this was a short but sweet trip. Actually I also totally forgot about two weeks in Michigan, a weekend in Las Vegas, and two weeks in LA basically. And 2022 actually started with me getting COVID, likely caught in Mexico and then me carrying it across the border to transfer it onto someone else! So yeah, sorry. This would explain why January was oh so quiet. Anyway, here we go with the 2022 expenses recap, andale andale!

• Jan: $3,250
• Feb: $3,250
• Mar: $3,250
• Apr: $3,050
• May: $2,500
• Jun: $4,250
• Jul: $2,750
• Aug: $2,750
• Sep: $2,750
• Oct: $4,500
• Nov: $3,000
• Dec: $3,500

I averaged $3,250 variable expenses a month, which was a very steady first four months at pretty much exactly that number. June was a tad bit higher, likely due to a weekend trip to Las Vegas that I now forgot about. July through September were all remarkably the same as well, which speaks well for I guess the summer months? Once October came around, it was New York followed by Mexico, and that took variable back up of course—although not by much, especially in Mexico City.

• 🥐 Food: $16,500
• 🏏 Shopping: $10,500
• 🪂 Play: $6,750
• ✈️ Transportation: $3,250

In a surprise, food dropped down almost four thousand dollars from the previous year, while the other three major categories stayed about the same. Why the savings on food? I don’t know! Actually, getting back to around $15,000 is more in line with previous years, so 2021 must have been an aberration.

For 2022’s total, it was $37k in variable expenses, $36k in fixed, and $10k in annual. That’s $83,000 for the year, with post-tax adjustment up to $108k. That’s lower than 2021, but higher than in 2020 or 2019. In fact, it’s my second-highest year ever. Since I’ve been keeping track of this Ways and Means, we’ve seen a steady increase of expenses as I’ve moved from my mid-thirties to my mid-forties. I’m gonna compile the annual pre-tax expenditures in the chart below.

• 2022: $83k (58)
• 2021: $92k (67)
• 2020: $80.5k (55.5)
• 2019: $73.5k (48.5)
• 2018: $70k (45)
• 2017: $42k
• 2016: $42.5k
• 2015: $37.5k
• 2014: $39k

As you’ll see, there’s a huge jump from 2017 to 2018, but that is all owing to having a house, which increased fixed expenses by $24k a year—which is rent/mortgage—and having a house presumably means more fixed expenses aka bills. If I take out say, -$25k per year post-2017 to account for the house stuff, the annual increases aren’t quite as high. In fact, it’s only thirteen thousand dollars more from 2022 to 2018. Hurray! Right? Well I dunno. Perhaps for the next few years I should separate out rent since I technically am not actually paying it.

Moving right along to big ticket items. Somehow I watched Wicked ($350) again? Or maybe these were gift tickets, I can’t recall. There were some other viewing events actually, so I’ll just list them. The Harry Potter Musical ($300), a Yuja Wang concert ($250) at Walt Disney Hall, Kristina Wong’s Sweatshop Overlord ($150) at La Jolla Playhouse, Pageant of the Masters ($150) in Newport Beach, and then KPOP musical ($100). And of course two days for LOL Worlds tickets ($250), which was a wild time.

That’s a lot more things I’ve seen in 2022 than the previous years combined right? Pandemic is over! The only other big ticket items were a trip to Universal Studios ($200), a few surfboards ($500), at least one wetsuit ($200), and these pants which I’ve never worn, not even two years later, and cost a hefty $250. They are great pants, but so expensive I have been using these sixty dollar Uniqlo ones that are almost as good but clearly not as stylish. One day I’ll wear them, I promise. I can’t even recall what they look like exactly but I got them at the Tortoise General Store in LA, and they are sort of like this. Oh I can’t overlook the $200 I bet on the Celtics to win the finals. You can figure out if that money was well spent or not.

The annual car issue, this time for a mere $700, and then the house stuff, which was pretty small aka the heating unit had issues ($250) and the dishwasher broke around March, and as it turned out, there’s a dishwasher shortage in America so we had to look further afield for both a good one and one that was sized small enough to fit my slightly askew dishwasher opening. The new Asko dishwasher cost $1,250 but it has been a dream. Honestly, a few weeks without a dishwasher was not fun. Suburban privilege, I know… Two medical check-ups, one annual and one follow up for something I also don’t recall, totaling $750, and then $300 on dental work. (Wait till we get to 2023 to hear about my teeth adventures!)

Total amount used on flights was $1,400, which was actually just airport taxis—I count those as “flight” in my tags because they are travel related—plus bag fees and change fees. (Airport taxis was a whopping $550, while luggage was $450.) Note that none of these “flights” expenses was on any actual flights. I’ve been using my credit card points for actual flights since a few years ago as I had a huge amount stored up. Heck, this year I even bought a ticket ($130) to just go into LAX to hang out before my friend’s flight took off.

And onto accommodations. There was a Magic Castle trip that included staying next door at the Magic Castle Hotel ($200), and then a week or so in New York at a pricey but necessary Airbnb in LES ($2,500), three nights in Vegas ($800), and then a few days in Sayulita ($600).

And in an extreme shock to those who have followed this blog over the years, I apparently didn’t tabulate how much I spent on trips this year. Not the two weeks spent in Mexico to start 2022, nor the New York trip, and even not an expenses recap for Mexico City near the end of the year. Without exact numbers how can I move on with my life?! My best guesstimate for the Mexico trip in January was $1,000, but most of my actual expenses were paid by my girlfriend’s family for that trip. [Thank you so much!!!] The November Mexico trip was Nov 19 through Dec 8, at the cost of $1,400 but that doesn’t account for flights, accommodations, or the all-in hotel that we were at for our friend’s wedding.

Oh actually now that I’m looking at some numbers, there was one glorious three day sprint we had in Los Angeles in February, exploring and jamming everything in. Los Angeles is not usually a trip worth documenting out as an expense, but since it had been a long time since we’d both visited—basically since pre-pandemic—the days was noteworthy and packed. They included lots of fun and food and cost about $1,000 give or take—minus Magic Castle stuff and a hotel in Burbank I believe. There was actually another Los Angeles trip in October, this time for a week, and that cost about a thousand dollars a well. However I can’t recall what we were doing up there… And then to wrap up trips, there was three nights in Vegas at $1,100—again minus accommodations—and New York  was roughly $3,000 for eleven days.

To start, I deleted “donations” and “tattoos” from tags while adding/separating out “gifts” between “family” and “relationship” gifting. Looks like we added “event” as a tag too. And “travel” was deleted in lieu of having it separated out to “luggage” I believe. It’s important to update your tags every year, don’t forget! Use a tag for whatever you want to track the end of the year, and as life changes, so will your tags.

As for this year, overall dining out went down, from almost $14k last year to only $10k this year. My suspicion is that the extra four thousand was due to just having a household of two versus a few more. Or maybe we just ate less! As for other things, most other tags were roughly the same, or lower.

It’s just a fact of life now, that LOL costs $4k a year, and I bought many a skin and funded some esports teams for our org. It’s a pricey hobby but it’s definitely my number one hobby these days. And since karaoke has gone from thirty dollars in 2021 to zero in 2022, it’s probably safe to eliminate that as a tag.

I got one more Ways and Means to do so we’ll leave it here. See you in 2023!