Threads, Glasgow and Back In Black

Now that we've both been paid, Dee and I went shopping in Glasgow this weekend. It was meant to be a big splurge, and we earmarked £100 each to spend, mostly on clothes and shoes. My wardrobe, for example, is pretty "backpacker" at the moment, with a bunch of short-sleeved shirts and sensibly warm jumpers, one pair of jeans and one pair of corduroy pants, all colour-matched a fetching (and grime-disguising) brown.

So my plans were to get a bunch of hip new threads, to ready myself for the coming months and the monthly charity "casual days" at work. On top of that, I thought I'd get another shirt and tie combination for work. I think Dee's plans were similar, although she's had to get a few things for work already. Women have it both better and worse in corporate attire I think - more freedom in their choices of what to wear, but more freedom means more choice, and more choice means more sophistication is necessary. Me, I've got the good pinstripe suit I brought from home and a plain grey one from the local op-shop. Sorted.

Anyway, long story short (too late!) we walked around for hours and ended up with very little. I got two jumpers, Dee got a £5 t-shirt. Tried on a lot however, so that's something.

This morning we've gone through our budget, and thanks to on-call money for both of us, an extra couple of weeks on Dee's first pay cheque and a profit-sharing scheme from my work we will be able to completely pay off our Australian debt this month! Brilliant to be out of the shadow of that looming responsibility, and to be able to close the account off completely. Better yet, next month we should (if frugal) be able to pay off both of our British credit cards, clearing the score-card completely and setting us up fresh and new - just in time to save some dosh for a 2-week rail trip around Europe in July/August with Dee's brother Chris.

It's quite exciting to think that we can do that - get a cheap rail-pass, book some backpackers and travel from Scotland to England, to France, Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy and home again. It's also the whole reason we're here, so actually doing something about it is a very refreshing feeling.

Well, best get to work. Cleaning up the house in preparation for the coming week!