Receipt roulette

Asked Alex to help me figure out where my money actually goes each month. Seemed like a reasonable request until I pulled out my ‘filing system’ - a shoebox stuffed with three months worth of crumpled receipts, grocery lists, and what I’m pretty sure is a napkin from that taco truck.

Receipt roulette

Alex opened his laptop with this confident energy, ready to build me a beautiful spreadsheet. Then I started pulling out receipts. Coffee shop receipt stuck to a gas station receipt stuck to something that might have once been a receipt but now looks like abstract art. His expression slowly shifted from ‘helpful friend’ to ‘what have I gotten myself into.’

‘Elena,’ he said, holding up a receipt that was literally just the number 4.67 written in blue pen on a piece of paper towel, ‘this isn’t how money works.’ But then we found the receipt for that expensive face cream I bought in February and forgot about, and suddenly my mysterious budget gap made perfect sense.

Found the receipt that breaks everything

Turns out my biggest budget problem isn’t overspending - it’s having absolutely no idea what I’m spending money on. Alex is making me a proper tracking system. I’m making him coffee. Fair trade.