It’s time to welcome the new year, so when ASUS reached out about a giveaway, it was a no brainer. What better way to get 2021 off to a flying start with some free and awesome hardware?
Listen closely - to be in with a chance of winning, you can enter one of two ways.

How do I enter?

Got a build specced out for the future? Or even just speculating?
Enter your Proposed Build:
1) Head over to www.pcpartpicker.com and create a build list featuring the following:

• An ASUS AM4 motherboard (X570, B550, or B450 chipsets)
  
• An ASUS graphics card
  
• A CPU, cooler, motherboard, memory, storage, video card, case and power supply.
  

2) Use the Reddit markup function to share your list in the comments directly below.

• Old Reddit
  
• New Reddit
  

3) Include a brief explanation as to why you chose the specific parts
4) Fill out the Google Form
Already built a PC with an ASUS AM4 motherboard and ASUS graphics card?
Enter your Completed Build:
1) Head over to www.pcpartpicker.com and create your exact build including motherboard, CPU, cooler, memory, storage, video card, case, and power supply.
2) Use the Reddit markup function to share your build in the comments directly below.

• Old Reddit
  
• New Reddit
  

3) Upload a picture of your build with your Reddit username in the picture to Imgur and include the link in your submission, along with a brief explanation of why you chose the parts.
4) Fill out the Google Form
That’s it - Remember, you may only enter one of the methods above! Winners will be chosen by ASUS and the /buildapc mods based on the lists you came up with.

Prizes:

[Proposed Builds]
First place : ROG Crosshair VIII Dark Hero + AMD Ryzen 9 5950X Lisa Su Signature CPU
Second place: ROG Strix B550-XE Gaming WIFI
Third place : TUF GAMING B450M-PRO S
[Completed Builds]
First place: TUF-RX6800-016G-GAMING
Second place: ROG STRIX LC 360 RGB
Third place: ROG STRIX LC 240 RGB

Terms and conditions

• Entries close at 11:59pm GMT on January 10th, 2021
  
• Build lists that do not follow entry requirements will not be valid entries.
  
• Only one entry per person, via just one of the entry categories, is allowed.
  
• Entries must have a thread comment and matching Google form entry.
  
• There are no location restrictions, shipping will be from ASUS directly.
  
• Winners will be contacted via Reddit DM. If we receive no response within a week, new winners will be chosen.
  

Be sure to check out Build Your AMD Gaming PC with ASUS! Good luck and happy holidays!

The Tale isn’t long. All the other faff is. Words in the Glossary will be marked with ^*
—-
Me - Contracting Electrcian. Dresses in high visibility long dark blue trousers. High visibility blue and bright yellow, long sleeved work shirt. Company logo left breast pocket. Both of these have the shiny reflective strips. Dark brown work boots with blue PVC glue^* on them, because, glue. Also, I have my hard hat^* clipped to my belt.
I live in a small-ish rural town in Australia. The kind where everyone seems to know everyone. It can take 40mins just to buy milk because of all the “oops-eye-contact” socialising. I’ve been fixing all manner of equipment at this store for a while and get along with mostly everyone. But not Produce-Tzar “Steve”.
—-
It happened again, Tuesday, after work. I got a Pokey.
I was at The Supermarket, looking at jam^*. Holding, and contemplating, a jar of IXL^* Raspberry in my left hand, and an IXL Strawberry in my right, I heard the all too familiar behind me..
Woman - (terse) : ”Where is the sugar.”
Me - (I ignore her. Without an “Excuse me”, she could be talking to anyone. Outwardly I must seem to be daydreaming, but jam is no joke. This is a week-long commitment, and it cannot be rushed. Jam people will understand.) : “...”
I receive a poke to my back, signifying that The Pokey Game has begun, followed by.. Pokey Woman - (terse, and indignant now) : “I saaaid, where is the sugar.”
Me - (still striving for a jam resolution) : “Isle 17, half way down, 3rd shelf.”
Pokey wanders off. All Pokeys, 100%, never thank. Ever.
About 2mins later, while I’m feeling guilty for glancing at the Beerenberg Plum^*, I receive a much firmer poke in the back, followed by..
Pokey - (annoyed, verging on anger, slightly raised voice) : “There IS no isle 17.”
Me - (still looking at jams. The Beerenberg knows I’ve glanced now. It knows it’s a contender.) : “I am sorry madam. I mis-spoke. Isle 7, half way down, 3rd shelf.”
She again wanders off, a little stompy now.
About 5mins later, holding the winner, I’m a little further down the isle looking at the ingredients on a new breakfast cereal. From the end of the isle I hear..
Pokey - (raised voice exclamation. I imagine that ‘The Ride of the Valkyries’^* is playing in her head.) : “THERE HE IS!”
Putting the cereal back and turning, I see Pokey heading toward me, followed by Store Manager “Brad”.
Pokey - (older-than-me lady. Standing. Pointing. Glaring, vengeful eyes.) : “TWICE! He sent me to the WRONG ISLE, TWICE! I want him REPrimanded!”
Brad - (arms crossed, also glaring at me.) : “This is not one of my staff, madam. Is there anything else I can help with?”
After a couple quiet moments, Pokey demands sugar, and Brad escorts her.
I head to Brads office, where a few minutes later..
Brad - (tired and exasperated, like all supermarket store managers ever.) : “Could you at least do this on my day off?”
Me - (matter of fact) : “Mate, you know the deal. I stop when the planogram^* stops changing. That replacement touch-screen for convection oven two should be here tomorrow. I’ll see you then, hey.”
As I’m walking out, I hear Brad say, “Standard chimes for the end of cook this time!”
I’m smiling, because I already know I’m going to set it as the 16bit theme song from ‘The Twilight Zone’ TV show. It’s one of the selections in the installer menu. The other oven already has 16bit ‘The Imperial March’. Because of course it does. (No. Seriously, they do. Brad gets to pick when the planogram stops.)
Thank you for reading.
—-
Glossary
Glue - Glue of any variety has no master and doesn’t obey the natural laws. Beware of glue. PVC glue for electrical conduits will always end up on your boots. Just accept it.
Jam - Typically a fruit conserve. What some less discerning call Jelly. Jelly is made of a Gelatin base, is wobbly, and your Granma will put fruit in it. If it’s a special occasion, you may get Trifle.
Hard Hat - You lift the brim of a hard hat to gaze at the newest idiocy on a job-site. My hard hat has the slickest, sickest stickers.
IXL/Beerenberg - IXL Fruit Conserve is the best jam on the planet. This is my hill. Beerenberg is second. Beerenberg Plum on peanut butter toast is amazing.
The Ride of the Valkyries - That one by Wagner in ‘Apocalypse Now’ when they’re dropping napalm on everything. Good film. Jed Bartlet is in it.
Planogram - Every efficient shoppers nemesis. This is the plan for a store where products are supposed to be put. Stores change this all the time based on how much kick-back a manufacturer gives them for prominent placement of their products. Sometimes they swap WHOLE ISLES around. You go in to get jam one day, and now that isle is health foods. Changing the Planogram was invented by Satan.
The Twilight Zone - Rod Serlings, The Twilight Zone. A black and white TV show from a million years ago. You like X-Files? Stranger Things? Go find and watch the OG of the genre.
—-
The Tale is over. The rest is just my idiocy. Read, or don’t. All good.
The Pokey Game I’ve said this before. High Vis clothing is mercurial. You are both invisible, a personal assistant, and a Corporeal Google. I’ve lost count the number of times I’ve been politely and rudely approached for information and/or assistance. Polite has always gotten all the friendly help I can muster.
Over the years, I used to engage with the Rude. I tried reasoning with the Rude, seeking to understand the why of the Rudeness. I tried giving the Rude the benefit of the doubt. Maybe they’d had a bad day, gotten some bad news. Maybe, maybe, maybe.
I tried remonstrating with the Rude, in an attempt to bring enlightenment and humility. Having done work in Police Stations and Court Houses, I knew that cells had no wifi access, so I stopped getting all up-in-their-grill.
I learned that, sometimes, Rude is just Rude.
So I started playing with the Rude.
—-
Here are The Rules: (For the time being)
1 - All Rude gets ignored. (This is not to bait into escalation. Most times, Rude just goes.. away. Which is fine.) (Actually, I’m not sure if it isn’t with the hope of baiting. So I can play.) (It’s probably baiting, hey.)
2 - All Pokeys must be played with. (Regardless of venue or personal time constraints.) (See below for examples based on venue.)
3 - Must be dressed in High Vis. (Playing the Pokey Game in casual dress is like low-hanging-fruit. Because what if I was dressed similarly to store staff without realising it.) (I started to bring the hard hat to the supermarket because it was happening so much there. I wanted an extra difficulty for more points.) (There is no points system.)
4 - Must be pleasant and polite. (Cells have no wifi.)
5 - Extra Points if a Pokey comes back more than twice (Sent a guy to three different isles once. 3 is the most so far.)
Venues Service/Gas Stations - These are mostly for directions. Mostly by Caravaners. So of course they get the wrong directions. - If asking to borrow tools from my work vehicle, I walk over to the vehicle, and drive off.
Hospital - Non-staff cannot be played with. They may be in need of medical attention, bereaving, worried, etc. That’d just be mean. - Staff get played with. I stand there ignoring them and see just how committed to the poking they are. Twice poked is the most so far. I put them on my list for further attention by other means.
General Pubic Areas - Same as Service/Gas Stations
Supermarkets (The Main venue for games) - “Where is..” gets the treatment in the tale. If they come back for seconds, they’ve had to walk past other people to arrive back at me. They are more than fair game. (Maybe it’s like that joke where the bear says to the hunter, “You don’t come here to hunt, do you.”) - “Get me..” something off a high shelf. Readers 6’ and over will attest - when out in he wild, you are by default, a Common Use Implement. For these Rudes, I keep grabbing the wrong items and try to give it to them. Without speaking.
—-
I still wonder what some people must have gone through in their life, to be at the point where poking others is acceptable. I feel kinda bad for them. Just not bad enough to stop playing.
Oh yeah. IXL Raspberry.

It’s been years since my last totally new build, and wanted to share what I learned about making my new PC into a spectacular neon rainbow over the last month. My kids thought my old computer was "so boring" compared to my sister's so I knew I had to bring my A+ game with a rainbow explosion :)
I’ll start out by saying that figuring all this out has been by far the most confusing and frustrating part of my new build. Every time I thought I understood everything, there was always yet another exception to the rule. So don't feel bad if you feel like this is all super complicated and confusing, because it is! There's a TLDR is at the bottom.
​

The difference between RGB vs ARGB

The first and most crucial piece of information is that there are two types of “RGB” for PCs:

• RGB = 4-pin 12V header = Every LED on the device must be the same color
• ARGB = Addressable RGB = 3-pin 5V header = You can control the color of each individual LED on the device

ARGB (also sometimes known as digital RGB) is far more flexible, can create way cooler effects, and it’s what most modern LED devices use. It's also a newer technology, so a lot of older "How to do RGB" posts/articles just assume you're using the 12V kind. Also you should never plug an ARGB 5V device into a RGB 12V header. Each type of device should be kept to its own type. Some photos comparing ARGB vs RGB headers can be found here.
What makes it very confusing is a lot of product listings and articles (like my post title!) just say "RGB" without specifying which type they're referring to until you dig deeper into the specs.
​

The different ARGB connector types

Adding to this cluster-mess is that most 5V 3-pin ARGB devices use a 4-pin footprint which have one of the pins left off so there's only 3 physical metal pins. But because nothing involving RGB is straightforward, there are also some ARGB devices that use a 3-pin footprint instead (JST-SM 3 pin). This image shows the two different ARGB connector types.
Because of this, some ARGB devices include a cable compatible with both types of ARGB headers. But other ARGB devices only provide one option and you'd need an adapter if it's the wrong type of your setup. This very important detail isn't always listed in the product description either because it’ll just say “3-pin Addressable RGB” without specifying which types of headers are supported, making it extremely frustrating and confusing. In an attempt to keep it clear in this document I’ll use the following abbreviations which I’ve made up just now (if there are better ones, let me know and I'll update):

• 3P3F - 3-pin Addressable RGB header with a 3-pin JST-SM footprint. Sometimes also called a DGV connector (Data, Ground, Voltage).
• 3P4F - 3 pin Addressable RGB header with a 4-pin footprint: 3 physical metal pins as one pin is left off so the signals look like this: (+5, Data, NC, GND) - used by most ARGB devices and motherboards. NC stands for "No Connect" because it's blank.

​
​

How do I control all these lights?

Modern motherboards usually include both 5V ARGB and 12V RGB headers which can be used to control your lights via their respective motherboard utility software (MSI Dragon Center Mystic Light/ASUS Aura Sync/etc). These motherboard headers can be named a variety of things depending on the manufacturer. On my MSI board the 5V ARGB header is called JRAINBOW while the 12V RGB header is called JRGB. You can use both types of headers at the same time as long as you make sure to connect the correct type of (5V ARGB or 12V RGB) devices to their respective headers.
For ARGB, most motherboards (Asus/MSI/ASRock) use the 3P4F header for ARGB, but other motherboards (Gigabyte) use the 3P3F header for ARGB. However based on comments it looks like newer Gigabyte boards have moved to the "standard" 3P4F ARGB header which is good news. So check your mobo manual to confirm what it has. Yes, it’s a confusing mess.
Older motherboards might only have a 12V 4-pin RGB header or even more horrifying, no RGB header at all!!! We’ll cover what to do in that case a bit further down.
Making things even more complicated, some manufacturers created proprietary headers/protocols that plug into their own proprietary light controllers which are then controlled via USB. Corsair is the most famous example of this as their fans/lights will only work with Corsair's proprietary hubs which then talk to your PC via an internal USB header. Though as some comments have pointed out, you can buy adapters to get around this.
Corsair isn't the only one either, other "addressable RGB" manufacturers (NZXT for example) have decided to do their own thing with a proprietary connector and/or protocol that doesn't work well with anything generic, and it's often not obvious that's the case until you buy it and it doesn't work with the other stuff. If you keep to the same ecosystem it'll (usually) "just work" all together, but you'll limit yourself to a specific brand.
If you want LED devices that have more flexibility across brands to mix and match, look for the device product description to say "Compatible with MSI Mystic Light and Asus Aura Sync" which typically means it uses a generic 3P4F ARGB header. But there may be exceptions, so I can't 100% guarantee it'll work with your other devices and this is a huge reason why RGB can be such a headache.
Finally some fans or light strips or cases have no external connections - they can only be controlled by an included remote. The product descriptions sometimes aren't clear when this is the case, so you have to read the specs very carefully and read the reviews. Some devices provide both a remote and ARGB header connection and you hold down a button on the remote to switch between the two options.
​
​

How do RGB fans work?

The fans typically come with two cables connected to them: one for controlling the fan speed (like any other fan) and the other for controlling the LEDs. However some fans have a 3P4F header while other fans have a 3P3F header, and some fans provide both types of connectors. Also remember that double the cables, double the cable management!
There’s also some fan “kits” that come with an ARGB hub that all the fans ARGB cables plug into and then you can control the LEDs with a wired remote. This is more common if you buy a 2, 3, or 4 pack of ARGB fans together as one package. Also some fan kits have the ARGB cables plug into their specific proprietary hub, and then the hub has a single cable that plugs into the standard ARGB header for your motherboard.
​
​

I have 20 ARGB fans for my case and only 1 ARGB header, what do I do?

Most motherboards only come with one or two ARGB headers. You have a few options

1. Use a simple splitter - Straight forward and cheap. You connect it to your motherboard's ARGB header. However whatever colopattern is used on the longest device will be the colopattern used for all the other devices connected to the splitter. So if you set a 12-LED pattern (like a rainbow) with three devices connected to the splitter - a 12 LED strip shows all 12, a 6 LED fan shows the first 6 of the pattern, and a 3 LED fan shows just the first 3 of the pattern. So all devices connected to the splitter will be mirrored. This may or may not matter to you based on how you want to light your system. Also each ARGB device has an amount of max current it could use, so you want to make sure the sum of all those devices hanging off the splitter is less than what your motherboard supports (usually around 3A).
2. Some devices allow you to daisy-chain them together so you only need one motherboard header to connect multiple LED strips/fans (think of how your Christmas lights chain together). You'd have to determine if your particular device can do this as some devices have a connector to support this and some don't. It often has the same limitations as using a splitter with the mirroring. However as a commenter pointed out, that's not always the case depending on the device.
3. Use a hub - Typically an ARGB hub works just like a splitter and is connected to your motherboard's ARGB header, but also includes a connection for power (usually provided by a SATA power connector from your PSU), so you can power more LEDs/devices than a splitter. But it still has the same mirror coloring limitation, which may or may not be important to you. Some fan kits (especially if you buy a 2 or 3 pack) come with a hub included.
4. Use an ARGB controller - The most flexible option because each device you connect to the controller can have unique colors/patterns and won't have to be mirrored. It’s typically controlled via an internal USB header on your motherboard and does not use the ARGB header on the motherboard at all. It also allows you to control the lights without having to use the motherboard software. I went this route and *highly\* recommend it.

Keep in mind that there are also power limitations to consider. Some LED devices have their own SATA power connector to get around this limitation, while others just use the ARGB header 5V power which will then have a limit on how many fans/strips you can daisy chain or split off. That particular limit will be motherboard dependent (usually around 3A but you have to check your mobo manual for your specific board) and also dependent on the power draw of the LED devices. But the end result is that you can’t actually control 20 ARGB devices off a single ARGB header because the LEDs would get way too dim.
​
​

I don’t have a RGB or ARGB header on my motherboard, how can I turn my PC into a rainbow wonderland?

There’s two options:

1. Make sure the LED device you’re interested in comes with its own remote. The drawback for a physical remote is that it might be complicated to get that remote outside your case if it’s a wired remote, so anytime you want to change the colors/patterns you would need to pop open your case. This may or may not be a big deal for you. There are some remote-only LED kits that use a wireless remote though, so you could search for those too.
2. Buy specific hardware to control the LEDs like the Razer Addressable RGB controller I mentioned above which connects to your PC via an internal USB connector that almost all motherboards have.

​

My experiences with different devices:

• Razer Addressable RGB Controller: By far the best purchase I made in my technicolor rainbow journey, this lets you connect 6 different ARGB devices and give them each unique colors/patterns. It works with ARGB devices that use the 3P4F header (3 physical pins in the 4-pin footprint). You use Razer’s Synapse3 software to design the lighting schemes. This software does have a bit of a learning curve, but is quite powerful as you can layer different effects. I’m a huge fan of this controller and since it was only released in Nov 2020 I don’t see it mentioned much yet, but I consider it a must-have for anyone who wants to seriously light up their PC. Especially because it seems to be the only universal controller like this that exists at the moment. You can split/daisy chain on each of the ports too, for a maximum of 80 LEDs per port, or 240 LEDs in total. The fans I bought have 12 LEDs each so there’s quite a lot of headroom for daisy changing. It’s compatible with just about any ARGB device that uses the standard WS2812b LEDs that almost all ARGB devices use. It connects to the internal USB header on your motherboard so it's also compatible with just about every PC. You could also use a standard micro-B USB cable and connect it to an external USB port, so you could use it with desktop 5V ARGB light strips too. It also comes with tape to stick it to your PC or alternatively it has screw holes compatible with SSD mounting in your case (which is what I did). The one odd thing with this is it uses an old-school Molex connector for its power source instead of the “standard” SATA power connector which is a bit annoying to attach another cable to the PSU. There are SATA to Molex power adapters available, but I didn’t try it so perhaps someone wants to be a guinea pig let us know how it goes.

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• G.Skill Neo Z RGB RAM: You control the RAM RGB using the RAM manufacturer’s software running on your PC. The G.Skill software is fairly configurable, I had no issues and I really like these RAM sticks in particular because they diffuse the light really smoothly.

​

• Asus 3080 Video card: You use the video card manufacturer software to control the LEDs on your video card. So DragonCenter for MSI cards, Aura Sync for Asus cards, etc. The Asus 3080 I managed to snag just has a small logo LED so I turned it off because I already had so many LEDs going on in my system.

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• MSI X570 Tomahawk: You control motherboard RGB via the manufacturer's respective motherboard utility software. For MSI specifically their RGB software used to be available as a standalone program called MysticLight, but now their RGB software is only available bundled as part of their DragonCenter software package. For older MSI boards you can still install and use the older standalone version to control the LEDs, but unfortunately newer MSI boards (like mine) you have to use the bundled version. My board has only a few LEDs on the back so I just turned them all off.

​

• Lian Li Strimer Plus Power Cables: I blew $100 on these but they were so worth it! These are extensions so they’ll work with any power supply. The 24-pin Motherboard one comes with a controller, and you plug in both the motherboard and GPU extensions in that controller. You can use the controller as a physical remote, or alternatively you can connect the controller to a 3P4F ARGB header on your motherboard. You long press on the “mode” button to switch between the options.Make sure you get the “Plus” version which is newer and looks much better than the original version. It uses a SATA power connector and can get *super* bright. The normal GPU extension has a 6+2 and 6+2 connection, and there’s now also a new 8+8+8 GPU extension available for the RTX 3080/3090 cards that require it. The GPU extension comes with the option to drive it off a 3P4F ARGB header, so you don’t have to buy the 24-pin extension in order to get the controller if you don’t want to. But I’d highly recommend getting both. These are my favorite RGB devices in my build. Finally, these Strimer Plus light strips have too many LEDs for the Razer ARGB controller, so if you try connecting it to the Razer controller, you’ll get an error and it’ll refuse to recognize it. I have them connected to my motherboard ARGB header directly.

​

• DeepCool Castle EX 240mm AIO: IMHO this is one of the best looking AIOs out there because you can remove the logo entirely or replace it with your own custom one. It includes a connection for both the 3P3F and 3P4F ARGB footprints so that’s a huge bonus too. Default fans were a bit loud though at 100% and replaced them with ARGB ones that are quieter.

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• DeepCool CF120 fans: Nice and cool 12 LED ARGB PWM fans. The stand-alone CF120 come with adapters so it works with both the 3P3F and 3P4F ARGB headers. Sadly the CF140 wasn’t available standalone, so I had to buy a 2-fan kit. The kit includes both a fan controllesplitter and an ARGB hub/splitter. Unfortunately the ARGB hub that came in the kit only includes one ARGB header adapter and I don't’ see anywhere that sells the adapter by itself. So both fans would have to be the same colopattern, unless you buy another CF120 just to get an adapter. Which I did. RGB is a slippery slope!

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• Be Quiet 500DX case: Has the standard 3P4F ARGB connection and hooked it up to the Razer controller and works and looks great. There’s a button on the front to control the LEDs by cycling through the options on each press if you don’t have a ARGB header. You hold down the button for 3 seconds to toggle between using the button or using the ARGB controller to controller the LEDs. Also the front panel strip and the interior top strip are mirrored, so you can’t make them unique colors from each other. It uses a SATA connector for power. Case is great too!

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• Razer BlackWidow Keyboard: Standard RGB mechanical keyboard, RGB is controlled via Razer’s Synapse3. You can do some cool effects triggered by specific keys you specify. It’s really nice to have both this keyboard and my ARGB controller controlled by the same software. The only disappointment is the lighting scheme isn’t saved to the keyboard memory, so if you use Linux or plug it anywhere else, it just defaults to a rainbow color.

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• Phantek Digital Halos: I originally was going to go with these because they allow you to add LEDs to *any* case fan and can be cheaper than buying a ARGB fan if you already have boring non light up fans. So you can light up your Noctua NF-A12x25’s if you wanted and they look really good.

There are 2 different main lines:

• Halos RGB - 12V RGB with 18 LEDs (120mm) or 21 LEDs (140mm)
• Halos Digital - 5V ARGB with 30 LEDs for both sizes. Looks much better than the RGB version.

And then each line has two different versions:

• Normal (non-Lux): Plastic frame, plain cable
• Lux: Aluminum frame, braided cable, and crucially, includes a 3P4F ARGB adapter.

I originally bought these not realizing that the normal non-Lux version only has a connection for a 3P3F header, which is not compatible with my motherboard or the Razer controller. You can buy the adapter separately for $5 a pop, so I bought that, but all 4 adapters were *super* loose on the ARGB header and would fall out of both the Razer controller and motherboard headers. I really wanted to like these, but I had to return them because it just didn’t work well at all. I was also super annoyed I had to buy an adapter and wait a week to ship because Phantek’s product description doesn’t make it clear at all that it’s not compatible with the standard 3P4F ARGB header.
​
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Some last notes:

• Razer’s Synapse3 software theoretically has hooks to also control the RGB RAM and the MSI Mystic Light from inside the Synapse3 studio, but I found it to be very buggy and didn’t work well. Also while my RGB RAM has 8 LEDs, I could only control 4 of them with Synapse3. So that level of integration doesn't seem quite there yet. In the end I had to use 4 different Windows programs to control all the various devices (Synapse3, MSI DragonCenter, GSkill, and Asus Aura for the video card)
• For Linux users (as 99% of RGB software is Windows only) or for people who don't want to use their motherboard's software because they hate it, or for anyone who wants to script their lights, there is an open source project called OpenRGB for controlling select LED devices. But device support is limited and I haven't used it myself so YMMV.
• There’s a subreddit dedicated to custom Razer profiles that you can download and use.
• I did not explore any of the Crucial RGB fans/controllers because they’re so expensive. I believe they use a proprietary connection though. I’m sure someone in the comments can provide more information on that ecosystem. (Edit: And here's some very useful information on that ecosystem)
• Crucial isn't the only one to create their own proprietary ecosystem as some other fan/case/LED strip manufacturers also decided to do something proprietary, and it's often really difficult to figure out what kind of connecter or protocol a particular device uses without having to buy it first and see for yourself. It's by far the most frustrating thing about planning an RGB system. But these closed ecosystems are becoming less common and typically if the LED device you're buying says "Compatible with MSI Mystic Light and Asus Aura Sync" then it uses a generic 3P4F ARGB header.
• RGB=Red, Green, Blue. Each color is made up of 8 bits to give 256 (2^8) possible values for each color, and then all combined give the 256x256x256=16.7 million possible unique colors you see in marketing all the time.
• For anyone looking for the technical details, 12V RGB devices work by dedicating one line for Red, one for Green, and one for Blue and adjusting the voltages to adjust the colors. ARGB is more complex and details can be found here.

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This is everything I wish I’d known when I started this whole process, so hopefully it can help someone else out too. I’ve always thought being a concert lighting engineer would be a fun job and this is the closest I’ll probably ever get. So while RGB isn’t for everyone (and just like Crossfitters and people who don't use Facebook, you don’t have to ask someone if they don't like RGB, they’ll make sure to tell you), I’m extremely happy I went all out on the RGB!
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• PCPartPicker List
• Photos of my build

TLDR: Buy 5V Addressable RGB (ARGB) devices that use the standard 3-pin ARGB header in a 4-pin footprint (3 physical metal pins as one pin is left off) and get a Razer Addressable RGB Controller which connects to your motherboard’s internal USB header. Now you’ve got something that’ll work with almost any PC and almost all standard generic ARGB devices.

Hey all...I've been pretty exhaustively trying all the current streaming services. I know this is a Stadia group but I thought if anyone out there is curious about what the experience is like on other services, perhaps you could benefit from a layman's experience using each service and trying to make it my "main" service. Like I said, I'm a layman, not a professional reviewer, so there's a lot of things I'm still learning, but having tried all three of the major services, here's my thoughts.
Edit: Please bear in mind this is not an exhaustive list, just some thoughts based on a couple of months of on and off testing. I'm certainly not trying to sway or influence anyone's purchasing decisions, just giving some general thoughts that might help when trying to decide which service to look into. I know not everyone can get ahold of / rush out and buy all of the devices I have listed here - I happen to work for a tech company so I have a lot more devices floating around than most other people. Your mileage, of course, may vary!
I know there's also Steam Link, but since that requires you to have a PC capable of playing the game in the house somewhere, I'm not considering that a streaming service.
Testing Devices:

• ChromeCast Ultra (Stadia Only)
• iPad Pro 2020
• Asus G14
• Pixel 2 XL (xCloud only)
• iPhone 12 Pro Max (Stadia only)
• nVidia Shield (GeForce Now only)
• Samsung Galaxy Chromebook (Stadia only)

Amazon Luna

Notable Games: Control, lots of highly rated indie titles (Blasphemous, Bloodstained, Iconoclasts)
To be fair, I only have about 6 hours on Amazon Luna, but they've been pretty excruciating. My wifi averages about 75-90 MBps, and about half of the games I tried suffered from lag and graphical smear, mostly the Ubisoft+ games. The indie games played fabulously well. Luna is probably the service I have the least to say about. It's $6 a month for Luna on it's own, so it's kindof like the "also-ran" effort - it's cheap, but might be the most forgettable of the bunch. The user interface is better than GeForce Now, worse than Stadia, and unlike Stadia it doesn't seem like Luna can be enhanced with browser extensions.
I have Ubisoft+, so I tried to play Immortal: Fenyx Rising on Luna and it was absolutely horrible. Smeared graphics, dropped frames, input lag, the works. It was the only experience across all of the big three services that was literally unplayable. This seemed to be a problem only with the Ubisoft games, however, I have to stress.
Pros

• Netflix-style game selection, with lots of indie titles you don't see many other places. Control is the only standout AAA title, and it looks and plays fantastically. Indie games were great too.
• Integration with Ubisoft+ is seamless and the games just become part of your library.
• Twitch integration is pretty cool - nice to see streamers who are playing the game live when you jump into the game page.
• Runs in the browser but also has dedicated apps - a plus for me.
• Luna is probably the best service for Twitch streamers - it's integrated right into the UI. I don't stream so I wasn't able to test it, but it seems pretty easy.

Cons

• Seems to be in Early Access, so I literally don't know anyone else who has gotten an invite.
• The pro of having niche indie games is offset by the con of not having a wide game selection. Of all the services, seems like Luna has the least, but broadest, selection.
• Seeing an ad for Luna, WHILE PLAYING LUNA, was irrationally annoying. Amazon just can't freaking help themselves I guess.
• I signed up for Luna fully expecting to play all of my games claimed through Prime Gaming...literally none of those games are available.
• If there's a way to find Luna from the main Amazon home page, they've hid it pretty well. I'm sure it's buried in one of their dozens of menus but I could not for the life of me find a quick and easy way to get to Luna from Amazon dotcom.
• This is a very minor point, but Amazon Luna ONLY works on Chrome, while Google Stadia works in either Chrome or Edge Browser (since it's built on Chromium). Probably doesn't make a difference for most people, but to me Edge seems to run better, so I'm docking a point.

GeForce Now

Notable Games: Cyberpunk 2077, Control, Immortals: Fenix Rising, Metro series, Destiny 2 (all paid)
I picked up an nVidia Shield specifically for GeForce now, but my wife and I have ended up using it primarily for Kodi and to watch Netflix more than playing any games on it. I'll just say it straight out - GeForce Now sucks ass. It's a broken, shoddy, inconsistent mess. It's actually WORSE on the Shield than it is on PC, because there are so many times when I needed a keyboard to do anything. I tried playing Immortals: Fenyx Rising on GFN on my Shield which required me to log into Ubisoft+. I'm fine with that, since you only have to do it once...but using the Shield remote that came with my Shield, the on-screen keyboard never popped up, forcing me to track down a second keyboard from in my garage and plug in. After I plugged in the physical keyboard....THEN the onscreen keyboard popped up and just mirrored what I pressed on the physical keyboard. What? Why?
Games are all over the place as well. Witcher 3 was a nightmare - every time you try to play the game, it wants to install the DLC packs onto whatever virtual machine you've been assigned. Then when you can play, it dips so far under 30 fps it's literally better to just play it on a budget PC with Hairworks off.
Plus the Shield ain't cheap - it was like $200 at Best Buy, and didn't include a controller. $100 more gets you a Series S, and $100 LESS gets you a Stadia-enabled Chromecast WITH a solid as hell controller, just for comparison's sake.
Pros

• Raytracing, I guess. Control looks great?
• Links with Steam, GOG, and Epic, so you keep your games if the service goes down at some point in the future. Also technically "cheaper" overall than Stadia cos you can find cheap keys online or Steam sales (which seem to be more frequent than Stadia sales) and still get the game in your GeForce Now.
• GFN seems to have the widest selection of enabled games. Not all that impressive since you have to own the game already, but this does give it somewhat of an advantage.
• Links to Epic library, which is cool. 80% of my games on Epic were not GFN enabled, which is not as cool.

Cons

• Literally the hardest of the big three services to use. Not a "pick up and play" experience. Requires a lot of effort to get working, and even then, inconsistent across platforms.
• Even on nVidias own hardware, it can be tricky to figure out what games actually are on GeForce Now and which aren't and get them running right.
• Some games just don't play well. Witcher 3 is a buggy, low framerate mess...while Control is smooth as butter. No rhyme or reason as to why. I couldn't get Mankind Divided to play full-screen - it always wanted to play in a window.
• Since you're just running a virtual machine, you still have to fiddle with graphical settings. Some games don't look right when first started, and you have to remember to go into the settings and change things to match whatever screen you're on.
• Twice I still had to wait in a queue to play even though I paid for the Founder's subscription. Insanely frustrating.
• One hour limit to gameplay if you don't pay for the Founder's subscription, and you're stuck waiting in a queue. There were times where I was in a queue of over 300, which translated to upwards of 18 minutes one session, waiting to play. I would go as far as to say, if you don't pay for Founder's, don't bother with GFN at all.
• Also, just because I don't have anywhere else to put this, Ubisoft's Cloud Save system is atrocious. This isn't nVidia's fault, I just want to complain about it.

Google Stadia

Notable Games: Cyberpunk 2077 (paid), Hitman: World of Assassination (Pro), Destiny 2 (Pro), Red Dead Redemption II (Paid)
Stadia is easily the best overall, but it still has its cons. I came to Stadia thanks to Cyberpunk 2077 so I have the most hours played on Stadia of the big three services. Stadia on the Chromecast Ultra seems to me to be the hands down best way to play streamed games currently.
Of all the services, Stadia was the one that felt the least like a "me-too" service and more like a dedicated platform. Almost all of the other services felt like a way for corporations to dip their toe in the water and figure out if there's money to be made, while Stadia feels like someone who really grasps and cares about gaming is at the helm.
Pros

• Least barrier to entry. Download Chrome or Edge Browser, grab any bluetooth controller, and you're off the races.
• No subscription required. You can play any game purchased on Stadia without a subscription with no queue system, no picking a virtual machine, no Steam big picture mode...it's just, hit the Play button and go.
• This is a big one for me - seems to have the best "capture" integration. Though, the iOS / Android app could use work (just let me download the image and share it? Why do I need to share a link?) overall, sharing your snaps and vids is pretty easy on Stadia.
• Playing with the Stadia controller on my TV after picking up a Chromecast Ultra felt like magic.
• Similarly, being able to "pick up and play" games like Cyberpunk 2077 on a Chromebook felt similarly magical. The game looked its best, believe it or not, on a Samsung Chromebook that I tested at Best Buy. Random side note but the Google guy at Best Buy was SO EXCITED that I wanted to check out Stadia on a Chromebook. He was over the moon.
• The game selection for Pro does have some interesting titles that I wouldn't have picked up otherwise. But see Con 1 below.

Cons

• The game selection for Stadia Pro is a tad lackluster at the moment. Definitely enough to keep me playing, but there wasn't really a "must have" title that jumped out at me. Bunch of average, quite playable titles
• The game selection for purchases is a little thin as well, seeing as how the service is over a year old at this point. I know it’s on literally every other platform but I would have loved to do a second play through of Control on Stadia, and stuff like Horizon: Zero Dawn, Hades, even some older indie titles like Transistor or Pyre, some of the Lego games...
• UI seems like an complete afterthought, which is a little weird since this is a Google product. This is solved a little bit by extensions like Stadia Enhanced, but that's a third party fix so I'm still listing it as a con. No search? Captures seem deprecated?
• Probably the highest "cost" to play, since you have to buy the games outright, and sales seem few and far between. If Stadia just vanishes at some point (which, let's be fair, Google has a track record of doing with their services) they haven't really outlined what happens to your library.
• No raytracing yet. Not really a con for me personally, but other services offer it.
• This may just be a bug but I'm listing it as a con - a number of times the Stadia homepage just wouldn't load. I was left staring at the Stadia logo wondering what was going on for minutes at a time. I'd have to close out of the browser and restart. Not sure if that's an issue with Chrome, but it seemed to happen on Edge browser as well.
• Stadia-specific versions of games. Now, hear me out - usually this is a PRO not a con, but in Stadia’s case it seems to be a con as making a wholly new build of a game for a specific platform probably just isn’t in the cards for a lot of developers. That could be what’s slowing down a lot of games coming to Stadia - the time and money required to build a new version of the game. Hopefully we see some “Stadia first” games that will convince other developers to jump on board.

Xbox Game Pass / Game Pass Unlimited / Gold / Live / Play Anywhere / xCloud / Whatever it's being called these days

Notable Games: Nier: Automata BAG Edition, Dragon Quest XI S, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Mass Effect Andromeda
Xbox Game Pass gets added to this list on a pure technicality.
So, technically Xbox Game Pass isn't a streaming service, but I include it because on Android, there actually is a "cloud" option for playing your console Game Pass library. The Cloud streaming works surprisingly well, but you're limited to either an Android tablet or phone because it doesn't seem to work properly on Android TV. I've heard you can sideload onto the nVidia Shield, but that was beyond the scope of what I was trying to accomplish with these reviews...I just want something I can pick up and play. So, yeah if you don't mind playing on your phone, Game Pass Cloud is actually probably the best of the bunch in terms of ease of use and game selection. There are so many things I want to play on Game Pass it's actually a little overwhelming. However, I don't want to stare at a 5" screen for hours to do so.
Pros

• Wide game selection with lots of games being added every month (almost every week, seems like)
• Broad game selection - seems to be some standouts from just about every game genre. I know this seems like a repeat of point one, but they're very different things - it's one thing to just throw a ton of games on your service, its another to make sure you're representing every genre out there, which Game Pass seems to do more admirably than any other service.
• Streaming seems to work just fine. I was able to play Dragon Quest: Inquisition on my Android phone with very little issue. Couple of times the connection dropped, but it was no better or worse than Stadia.
• It seems like services are stumbling all over themselves to get included in Game Pass.

Cons

• Again, inconsistent experience. Offerings are different on console than on PC...why is Torchlight III a console exclusive? Why are all the good games pushed to console and cloud, with PC being an afterthought?
• Games seem to come and go randomly - some popular games pop up for a few months and are gone, other seemingly niche titles have been on the service since launch
• Probably the biggest con - no streaming on PC, iOS, or Android TV. Baffling choice. Maybe there's business reasons I'm not aware of, but as a user, it's maddening.
• Minor point, but good lord Microsoft needs to simplify EVERYTHING related to Xbox. No one can figure out what the hell service we have when I try to talk to people about it - there's Game Pass, but there's also Games with Gold, then there's Live, then there's Game Pass Ultimate, but there's also Play Anywhere, which isn't really a service, just some sort of cross-play, And the number of times people thought I have a Series X when I actually have a One X was insanely frustrating as well. I know this doesn't have anything to do with the service, but jeez man why is everything Microsoft does so haphazard?

Whew! I actually had way more to say on this topic than I thought, I guess. I've probably spent more time and energy on this than I should have, but working from home has given me a lot of time on my hands, so hopefully my experiences can help save someone else some time and effort. Would love some counterpoints as well!

If you were not aware, Comcast (which is a de facto monopoly in many parts of the state) instituted new data caps of 1.2 terabytes per month for internet starting Jan 1. Customers will be charged if they go over 1.2TB, but deceptively, these fees are waived until March 2021 (I presume so no one catches the policy change until months into effect). This may seem like a lot of data, but even a small household with HD-4K streaming, video chat like Zoom for school/work, maybe some video gaming (many games have huge downloads), etc will easily put the average household over the cap and cause fees.
Comcast clearly did this to make more money off of us. It's 2021, the internet is not a "luxury" but a completely necessarily utility (try maintaining a job, or hell even finding a job, without the internet). The fact that we are being charged more than our already high rates is absurd. We're already being fucked by the lack of competition in high-speed (don't tell me Verizon or Frontier with their 40mbps max speeds compares to what Comcast/Xfinity and Cablevision/Optimum offer, it's incomparable).
I recommend that you look up your reps and write them IMMEDIATELY to act to ban these data caps. There is no reason the largest entertainment conglomerate company in the country needs to nickel and dime us for more money.
Here is what I wrote my reps, Rick Lopes (Senate) and Manny Sanchez (House):

Hello Senator Lopes, Congratulations on being elected to the Senate, I am happy to say I was one of your voters. I am writing because I am deeply concerned about Comcast’s new data policies, and action is needed by yourself and your colleagues (I’ve also written to Rep. Manny Sanchez as well) to protect consumers. As you are likely aware, Comcast under their Xfinity brand is a de facto monopoly in many parts of the state. If a resident needs high-speed internet there are often no alternative options except slow, dial-up options falsely advertised as “high speed” – I live on Shuttle Meadow Ave for example, and other than Comcast at 100+ mbps, the only option is Frontier at “up to 40 mbps” which would suffer even in my 2-person household. There is frankly an illusion of choice, and anyone wishing to have competent internet for work and school is forced to take the local high-speed provider. Recently, Comcast announced a 1.2 terabyte monthly data cap taking effect Jan 1, 2021 which would charge users for overages. This is DEEPLY alarming for CT residents especially during a pandemic, but will persist beyond COVID-19. Over a terabyte seems like a lot of data, but for a family using video chat, streaming entertainment, and/or video games it is very easily surpassed. The net effect of this policy will be a majority of Connecticut families will be forced to pay even higher rates to Comcast/Xfinity. You need to pass legislation banning such data caps immediately. There is no actual justification for Comcast creating data caps. This is merely a response to “cord-cutting”; with more customers leaving cable in favor of streaming video, Comcast is looking to make internet their profit puppy. The issue, however, is that unlike cable which is primarily for entertainment, the internet in 2021 is an essential utility—try finding a job or staying employed without internet access. Comcast says they need the data cap to promote network infrastructure stability, but Connecticut users already pay far more for internet than those who live in areas with greater ISP competition. Moreover, Comcast is a massively profitable company which just acquired NBC/Universal. It is the largest cable TV and home internet company in the United States. There is absolutely no need to listen to their lobbyists, because they will only continue to act in the company’s best interests rather than those of your constituents like me. I respectfully request that you pass legislation banning such data caps for home internet. Moreover, I would love to see legislation that increases competition in some way. In the UK, for example, legislation was passed to force ISPs to rent out their network infrastructure to competitors—similar to how CT residents can “choose” their energy provider, which rents on Eversource infrastructure. This kind of solution both promotes competition and better prices for consumers, and removes barriers to entry for new businesses (namely setting up an entire network). Moreover, I would love it if we passed a state net neutrality bill. It is clear that the federal FTC has abandoned the best interests of the American people, for example the exiting chairman Ajit Pai is a former Verizon lawyer and has demonstrated his loyalty to them time and again in office. Net neutrality is supported by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and is in the best interests of consumers, to the detriment of service providers who are looking for more ways to make money off of us. I would love to discuss this issue in more depth, and help research other states’ approaches to similar legislation if you need it (I am a law student at UConn).
Regards, [NAME]

Also, I need to rant about why I hate Comcast so much. They are an absolutely horrid company. To name a few:

1. They rebranded as "Xfinity" to create the illusion of being a different entity. Deceptive as hell.
2. They offer insane prices compared to places with greater competition (no duh).
3. They are a massive conglomerate who uses this vertical integration not to reduce costs for consumers, but to drive them up. (You would think based on basic economics that they would use economies of scale to save money, which they do, but they don't pass these savings on).
4. They sell your internet usage data to advertisers and it's a cost of having internet with them.
5. By default they force your router to offer Xfinity wifi hotspots to passers by.
6. Like most monopolies, they offer better rates to new customers than loyal, existing customers.
7. They have repeatedly argued that internet is not a utility and instead argue it's a luxury.

I can pull citations if needed.

Note: I’m not a citizen, but I’ve been living in the US long enough to be considered a resident alien for tax purposes. On my visa, I cannot work any job that’s not directly related to my major in grad school (IT/computer science), but I can invest in the stock market.

Section One: Assets and Debt

Net Worth: from -$13,603.63 (Jan 2020) to $9,605.97 (Jan 2021)
Retirement Balance: $16,000 in my 401(K).
I only started working 2 years ago and my company messed up my registration so they basically didn’t put any money into it my first year there (I found out in horror and they gave me around $1,000 to say sorry…). I contribute 9% and my company matches 3%.
Savings account balance: $2,500
I have $2,500 set aside as my “emergency fund”, and I’m building back my vacation & study abroad budgets after having to tap into them for a move. My job is very stable and I won't be let go any time soon (unless I quit myself) so I’m not setting aside a big emergency fund for now.
Checking account balance: $3,111.01
Investment account: $1,500 in some stocks.
I initially dumped half of my 2019 bonus and some monthly contributions (totaling around $4,000) to this account to test strategies. This was my “study fund” and I didn’t care if I’d lose it all. I grew the account to around $10,000 and withdrew almost everything (that went to all the fees I had to pay to break my lease, my brother’s lease, deposit, moving expenses, and new furniture) and left $1,500 worth of stocks in there right now.
Credit card debt: $2,243.76 on my BestBuy card and PayPal Credit.
I had the money to pay for the items in full but they offered X months interest-free and I wanted to throw money into my debts instead. I always pay off all balances well before the deadline. I also pay all my credit cards in full and have never paid any interest.
Student loan debt: $11,046.09 left on my $20,000 loans at 8% for my BA in Biology and Statistics. Day 1 of arriving in the US, they sat us down, handed each of us a pen, and said hey kids here are the terms of your 8% loans, sign the documents now! I just turned 17, didn't even know I had to pay this money back, and remembered thinking "Is 8% a lot?" That's how clueless I was.
As a non-citizen, I will never have them canceled, so my plan was to tackle this as soon as possible and I started paying more aggressively until they made it 0% interest since Q4 last year.
Car loan: $4,900 left on my $10,000 loan at 8.9%. I didn’t have a long credit history when I bought the car (September 2019) since I only got my first credit card after graduation, so the rate was terrible. I’m planning to pay this all off after my bonus comes in March.

Section Two: Income

Income Progression:
2012 - 2016: I had multiple student on-campus jobs all throughout my undergrad, making from $7.25 to $10/hour. After graduation, I couldn't find any job directly related to my majors within 3 months (I had only been searching for Bio lab work), ran out of money, and had to go back home. Honestly, I didn't want to keep doing science either and was very lost back then.
2017: My first full-time job was being a tutor for a private college prep institution when I went back to my home country to “figure out what I wanted to do with my life.” They paid pretty well for the standards of living there ($1,000/mo). I worked that job while self-studying how to code and data science courses on the side and preparing my grad school applications.
2019: I got a job at my current company a semester before I graduated from my MS in Data Science program. This was my first “big girl job.” I started out at $64,000 and couldn’t work for 2 months due to complications in my visa processes so that ate up all my savings that year. By the end of the year, they bumped my salary up to $76,000 and we also had an annual 3% raise, so in total $78,280 + 5% bonus.
2020: One of my teammates left and one thing led to another, I got a title change from Data Analyst to Data Scientist towards the end of the year. I asked for a raise and they bumped it to $96,000 + 5% bonus.
2021: After our annual 3% raise my salary is now $98,880 (+ at least 5% bonus). I think I’m slightly underpaid, but this job is very low-stress and flexible (especially after we WFH).
Main Job Monthly Take Home: $5,082.58
Taken from my last paychecks (before the annual raise)
Gross salary: $8,000
Tax: $2,081.68
401(k) deduction: $720
Health insurance: $115.74

Section Three: Expenses

Rent & renter’s insurance: $935 for my share for a 2bed/3bath condo. My parents pay a flat $700/mo for my brother’s share. He recently moved here since his school went virtual until at least the end of this semester and our family wanted us to be nearby to take care of each other.
Savings contribution: $900
Investment contribution: $420, but will increase once my car loan is paid off.
Debt payments:

• $1,000 on car loan until paid off.
• $200.13 minimum on student loans for now at 0% interest, will increase to $1,100 when car loan is paid off.
• $300 for Best Buy & PayPal Credit promotional deals

Car insurance: $127.01 ($762.05 paid in full every 6 months)
Car registration: $25 ($300 annual)
Donations: $20 monthly (ASPCA), plus several hundreds throughout the year (last year I donated to BLM orgs and local animal shelters)
Gas: $0. I drive an electric car. Charging probably drives up my electric bill by a bit, but still cheaper than gas. Also, this means no car maintenance at all until my car battery dies, which probably won’t happen in the next 5 years.
Utilities (electric, natural gas): ~$150
Wifi: $40
Cellphone: $10.61 ($108.66 for 6 months and I got a $45 credit from my bank)
Groceries: $500 (for 2 people)
Subscriptions: $20 (HP Ink, shared Netflix account, YNAB, Disney+)
Pet expenses: ~$20 for wet cat food
Personal care/hobby: I collect perfumes. Between makeup, skincare, clothes (which I had planned to stop buying this year) and perfume bottles and samples (the majority of my "personal care" expenses...), I averaged $400/mo last year. Without the makeup, skincare and clothes, I budget $150/mo this year for my fragrance hobby.
Household supplies: $30
Education: $30 (language/technical textbooks, Udemy/Coursera)
Gifts: $30
Credit card fee: $21 ($250 annual)

Section Four: Background

Was there an expectation for you to attend higher education? Did you participate in any form of higher education? If yes, how did you pay for it?
Education is one of the top priorities in our household and this has been instilled in my mind since I was a kid. Perhaps because my grandparents were both professors and my parents both attended grad school, it was expected of us to have at least a bachelor's degree. With that said, my family tried to support our higher education financially as best they could and I'm very thankful for it. During undergrad, I had need-based financial aid and on-campus jobs, and my parents helped with the rest of my tuition. I still had to take (required by the school) a $20,000 loan. My grandmother helped pay for my 2-year master's program.
Growing up, what kind of conversations did you have about money? Did your parent/guardian(s) educate you about finances?
During high school, I had a measly weekly allowance and my dad had me write out all the transactions in a notebook. I thought it was very silly back then but now thinking back, it was probably some good practice. Other than that, they didn't talk about money at all, and I was absolutely clueless and wasn't interested in personal finance until a couple of years ago. I don't remember how but I think I woke up one day and decided to read every book about personal finance I could find and now I do talk with my dad about finances.
What was your first job and why did you get it?
My first job was washing dishes as a student worker! We all had to do it our freshman year before we were allowed to find other jobs. I managed to find 3 other jobs (stage crew, sports event worker, and math tutor) and stayed with all of them for 3 years.
Did you worry about money growing up?
Even though our parents never let on to us about their finances, they made sure that we'd grow up comfortable financially, so I didn't worry because I didn't know anything.
Do you worry about money now?
Yes. As I grew up, I came to learn more about my parents' financial situation and realized that they've sacrificed a lot for us. I had the majority of my college tuition supported by the school, but my brother doesn't, and tuition in the US isn't cheap, especially when you convert it to our local currency. I also never know for how long I can stay in the US and keep making the same kind of money I'm making now so I'm trying my best to pay down the student loans ASAP.
At what age did you become financially responsible for yourself and do you have a financial safety net?
I became fully financially responsible for myself when I started working at my current company. Before that my student worker jobs paid for my personal expenses in college but my parents still chipped in for tuition. I guess my family back home is my safety net but personally, I wouldn't ask them for help even if bad things happen to me in the future.
Do you or have you ever received passive or inherited income? If yes, please explain.
Nope.

Diary

Day 1 (Thursday) - $3.35

• Alexa wakes me up and turns the light on. I change into my work clothes and head downstairs to my “office.” My boss starts our daily standup call, talking about what we did yesterday and what we plan for the day.
• I have my annual review meeting. Everything goes well and my bosses are very pleased with what I’ve done, especially after I transitioned into my new title as a Data Scientist, which honestly brought me more fulfillment in my job as well. We talk about our annual bonus and raise, which I already expected. It’s not a lot of money but hey any money is money and I’m not saying no.
• Some people bought my photocards so I gather all the orders and purchase a shipping label since 1 order is with tracked shipping. (Don’t ask me how this works but I’m a K-pop fan and we collect expensive cardboards. Depending on the popularity of the member of the group, profit margins can go up to 400%.) I head to the post office and drop off all the packages ($3.35)
• I’ve been waiting for the mailman all day and he finally comes! I’ve been working from home for almost a year now and my back pain is starting to kill me so I decided to “invest” in a $400 chair with lumbar and neck support. My cat happily takes the other chair and starts claiming her territory on it.

Day 2 (Friday) - $206.24

• I wake up on cue at Alexa’s daily briefing. Half an hour passes while I ponder on a perfume sample set I saw in someone’s fragrance collection on Reddit.
• I eventually give in and purchase the Zoologist sample set ($120.24). It’s within my budget this month, I’ve been eyeing this one for some time now and I can resell it for 80% value once I’m done testing them, so it’s not a huge loss anyway.
• Late lunch today. I make a quick lunch with sausages and keto toasts and quickly finish it while watching some YouTube videos on personal finance and updates on $GME (no I did not buy any shares).
• When in doubt, throw every leftover food in your fridge in a pan and make fried rice. Side dish is sweet and sour tomato and egg “cloud soup.” Then we have our weekly family video call with my parents back in my home country.
• I go down the YouTube rabbit hole again and buy 2 more perfume sample sets ($86.00). All the purchases today (~50 samples) would probably take me months to try out so I promise myself no more until next quarter as I click the pay button.

Day 3 (Saturday) - $71.27

• I wake up at 8:45 am and laze around for half an hour, scrolling down Twitter and answering my friend’s questions on how to enter the stock market. Today is my cheat day (I have one every 2-3 weeks), so I contemplate if I should order delivery for lunch. I check YNAB and decide that it’s too expensive, so I go downstairs to make myself a hearty breakfast with a latte, half a croissant, grilled chicken breasts, and snack on some shrimp crackers and tangerines.
• I purchase a shipping label ($3.22) and head out to the post office. For some reason I want to smell like a lemon cake today, so I spritz on Xerjoff Lira, put on sunscreen, and head out. This perfume always makes me feel so warm and delicious.
• I spend the whole afternoon catching up with my Chinese and Korean lessons for the week.
• Suddenly craving some instant noodles, so I immediately get up and head to a local Asian grocery store to shop for instant and pho noodles (I’m planning to make pho for Lunar New Year) and some snacks for my brother ($38.71). We drop by a bubble tea shop nearby and get bubble tea and 2 dessert cakes ($19.71). I usually don’t drink sugary drinks, but since it’s my cheat day, I put in an order and pay for the both of us.
• Some more PC orders came in and they’re all with tracked shipping. The post office is closed tomorrow but I’ll just pay now for the shipping labels so that I won’t forget ($9.63).

Day 4 (Sunday) - $0.00

• I literally do nothing today until 4 pm.
• I make dinner, then finish my Chinese lesson and review the flashcards I made yesterday. That’s enough activity for the day.
• One of my friends calls to show me her album haul of the day and I'm tempted, but (fortunately?) there's no kpop store in my city so I make myself forget about buying any more albums.

Day 5 (Monday) - $40.10

• I wake up with a headache, not feeling too well, so I request a day off and message my boss. I can’t go back to sleep, so I just lie there in bed for a couple of hours. I suddenly remember that WandaVision is on air, and there are a couple of movies on there I haven’t watched yet, so I subscribe to Disney+ ($7.52) and start binge-watching.
• We ran out of soft drinks for my brother, so I have to drive to Costco again after lunch ($32.58). I also need to drop off all the orders that came in over the weekend.
• I go to my old apartment for my move-out inspection (I haven't been living there since December but still had to honor the 2-month notice and pay for all the rent). There are a couple of spots that might cost me some deductions in my deposit. Sigh. At least I get to tell them to remove the charges on my lease for February, and they assure me that they will.
• I finish binge-watching some movies on Disney+. I see Colourpop is advertising some Valentine’s Day palettes on my feed. I do not need those, I do not need those, I do not need those. I should’ve just unfollowed makeup brands on social media. Some more late-night scrolling, and then I finally go to sleep.

Day 6 (Tuesday) - $8.02

• I wake up groggily, still feeling a bit sick. We have a late standup today, so I take my time making my coffee and start working, as my cat also settles in on my lap and starts napping. My head is still aching and I'm not sure if it's the cold or just keto flu so I load up on electrolytes, fish oil, and acetaminophen just in case.
• Somebody lowballed me on one of my postings. Ugh I hate it when they do this, but this one is not selling too well, so I meet them halfway. I purchase another shipping label ($3.03).
• Today is our bi-monthly deployment date, which means all the engineers (and anyone who has committed changes in our codebase) meet up and sit around until all the merges are deployed into production. I had some changes last week so I just sit there and do my own work until it's my turn. My boss told me this morning he had some test API from one of our new clients so I go to check out some of the data there. Oh how I love me some messy, messy data that nobody knows what to do with.
• The repair guy who came to fix our washing machine doesn't leave until 5:15 pm so I drop by the post office late, but just in time as they're collecting the mail! Then I drop by a nearby (rather upscale) grocery store as I'm running out of heavy cream, but everything is so expensive. I compare price per oz and pick up the coffee creamer instead ($4.99).
• I heat up the cauliflower rice and leftover curry and eat dinner as I watch Coco (I can't believe I've never actually watched it!) Then I review my Chinese flashcards for a bit, do half an hour of Just Dance until I sweat, play with my cat, and call it a day.

Day 7 (Wednesday) - $3.49

• I stayed up quite late yesterday playing a mobile game and finally wake up after snoozing the alarm for the 84th time. My boss starts our standup at our usual time; there's nothing urgent or pressing today so I just take my time. I take a quick nap in the afternoon and go back to work.
• I use the last drops of avocado oil to fry up some bulgogi for dinner. Need to go back to Costco for more avocado oil tomorrow, I guess.
• After dinner, a friend asks me about perfume samples that she wants to try. I go online to search for them but no dice since they belong to a new collection that only got launched in Europe. I take this time to try out some similar smelling samples in my collection as well.
• I review my Chinese flashcards and do some workbook exercises. After an hour, my brain is fried on Chinese but I don't want to go to bed yet, so I pick up a book on my bookcase that I was reading a while ago (A Random Walk Down Wall Street) and read one more chapter.
• An order came in so I purchase another shipping label ($3.49), update my budgeting app for a bit, and then head to bed.

Summary

​

Category	Amount	Note
Food & Drink	$95.99	Groceries
Fun / Entertainment	$7.52	Disney+ subscription
Home & Health	$0.00
Clothes & Beauty	$206.24	Perfume samples
Other*	$22.72	Shipping labels
Total	$309.75	shipping labels not included

*I don’t count the shipping labels as expenses because they’re already factored into the profits I made from my sales, but I included them anyway because they're still charges on my accounts. Any profit goes back to funding my album purchases so... I guess it's a vicious cycle.
Overall, a pretty normal week for me in terms of food. I don’t eat out often (I allow myself only one meal and one dessert every month) and have used up my 1 dessert allowance this week so I probably won't have any more this month. I might’ve gone overboard with the perfume purchases this week, but tbh perfumes bring me joy. My mood is lifted and I'm transported to old and new places every time I put on a perfume that I enjoy, so for me, it’s worth it. I try to be frugal whenever I can, but I'll never skimp on education and hobbies that make me happy. Writing this week-long diary, I realize I need to get back to working out, though. I'll probably have to stop procrastinating and pull out my RingFit gears still inside the moving boxes. Playing Just Dance also makes me miss dancing so bad as I used to be active in several dance crews since college (but stopped after I started working full time). I'll try to stick to Just Dance for now to get my cardio until Covid is over and I can get back to in-person dance classes.

Hi!
I have internet in the UK from a national ISP on a sh*tty free router. I've always wanted to try and do a setup where I use PiHole and an always-on VPN to completely protect (no ads, no bad sh*t, better securitry) and mask anything (ISP can't see) on my home wifi for any devices... and to do this as much a fun project as anything (e.g. see my question 3 on the dashboard)... I just want to do it for the enjoyment (I am comfortable with setting up the Pi and have used them before) and also because I believe deeply in privacy and that internet ads and modern internet is terrible with too much rubbish loading everywhere in the background. Etc etc. -- no doubt why pihole was invented!
I already have paid-for VPN with a well-known global provider that I use a lot (usually voted a good one, OS, no logs, etc.), and most of of my machines/devices are on it e.g. phone and laptop. Though, they are not 'always on' and sometimes the connection goes down so presumably they 'leak' info somehow in different ways (this is not my area of expertise on how DNS stuff works unfortunately... I have OK linux admin knowledge but know vvvvery little about internet traffic beyond the basics).
But it's hard to find up to date info on the 'best method' to do all this in 2021... I am reading old guides and wondering if recommended specs and recommended setups are still correct when they were written about a few years ago.
My questions, boiled down a bit, are:

1. Is the way to go for doing this still PiHole (setup first?) + PiVPN...? And if I do this then 1a. Can PiVPN be configured in an 'always on' manner that means you will never connect to the internet UNLESS all your traffic is through the VPN? i.e. total protection and no leaks? Also, 1b. Will this work (PiHole and PiVPN) despite my home internet + wifi router being crappy and only letting me do basic LAN settings for DHCP? Or am I gonna need a fancy new router?
2. Is a pi zero with 512 RAM still enough spec to do this in 2021? Or do I need sth more powerful like a Pi 4 etc? I read that PiHole doesn't need much processing power... but I guess I find it hard to believe haha, just because Internet traffic always makes me think mega processing power required! Even if my use is fairly "medium" by modern standards (netflix, youtube, the odd basic game).

Would really appreciate any advice on these issues as I'd love to have a go setting it all up. Oh, one more pt -- money is not a big deals if I need a new router, but naturally I'd like to do all this as cheap as poss for the satisfaction and also because I hate buying new electrical stuff if possible not to (environment blah blah).
Oh, one other question on a more interesting topic:

1. I see there's a cool diagnostics screen thing you can add to PiHole and I'd love to do this (to show off to my friends of corse!)... but... is there anything even cooler for this in terms of visualisations and analysis you can run? It'd be so cool to try and setup some maps ... like IP locations and stuff where you're connecting to... I am suggesting this purely for fun really... I'd just love to have such info in my hallway on the wall to show where all your internet comes from!

​
EDIT: THANK YOU FOR THE AMAZING REPLIES. AM CURRENTLY DIGESTING.

I am 33 years old make $101,975, live in Baltimore, MD and work as a Systems Engineer. My husband is an Electronics Engineer, he earns $94,200 a year. Combined salary - $196,175
Section One: Assets and Debt
Retirement Balance: ~85K combined for me. My employer contributes 10%, I contribute 8%. I also put 50$ in a Roth IRA every paycheck. Husband (P) has ~75K total. His employer ended their 8% contribution thanks to COVID Edit - He just received an email this week that it will be resuming in March, yaaaay! He also contributes $100 a month to an IRA. So ~160K Total.
Equity: We have ~45K in home equity. We bought our house about 4 years ago, and thanks to grants we were able to afford the down payment of the house (we got about $17K in grants)
Savings account balance: We have $40K saved. We are saving up for our next house, so we are trying to build our cash savings.
Checking account balance: I try to keep at least $500 in my account just in case
Credit card debt: None:. I use a CC for most of my purchases but pay off the balance every month. P does the same.
Student loan debt: I graduated with about 33K in student debt. I paid this off somewhat aggressively, then was able to pay off the final lump sum with money I received when my grandmother passed away. P also graduated with around 30K in loans, and paid it off before we were dating.
Section Two: Income
Income Progression: Both my husband and I both only very recently started making as much as we do now. My first salary out of college was 30K as a software tester, and P's salary was $29K. We changed jobs and even moved across the country twice growing our career. When we moved to Baltimore a little over 5 years ago, I was making 49K and P was an hourly employee with no benefits, but earned around 52K a year. I was able to switch from a software tester to a systems engineer a couple of years ago, and that is when my salary began to really increase. I received a 10% raise this year and a promotion, which bumped me over the 100K mark. P's salary increased a bit when he became a full time employee with benefits. His job here in Baltimore was a really challenging transition for him, but he really stepped up and his hard work definitely payed off.
Main Job Monthly Take Home: I get paid biweekly, each paycheck is 2257.20, my monthly is usually 4514,40, except for the two months where I get an extra paycheck. P's monthly take home is 5400. Our combined monthly take home is usually 9,914
Section Three: Expenses
Mortgage: $2240 P pays this.
Daycare: $2200 I pay this!
Donations: Monthly $10 to local NPR. We donate randomly to other organizations throughout the year.
Electric: Usually ~200 in winter, closer to 100 in summer. I pay this.
Wifi/Cable: $120 P pays this.
Cellphone: $128 P Pays this.
Subscriptions Netflix - 12 Hulu - 12 Baltimore Sun - 14 Neighborhood association - 23 (P and I split these)
Pet expenses: We just had to put down one of our cats, who did have considerable expenses at the end of her life, including medication that cost $50 a month, and special medicated food. We still have two cats, but they are all healthy and have no extra expenses for now.
Car insurance: $250
workout classes: I take aerial silks and trapeze, the cost works out to be ~120 a month. It's an expensive hobby but it gives me so much joy.
Section 4: Money Diary
Day 1 - Tuesday
5:30 am - I have a 16 month old (T) who wakes me up at 5:30am. We got a bit of snow on Sunday, and expect his daycare to have a late start today, but T has a runny nose so I have a sneaking suspicion he will be home with us all day today. I give him milk and play with him until it's time to wake up my husband (P). We take turns waking up with T because we both hate mornings.
7 am - P is up, and we give T some sort of food
8:30 am - we agree T cannot go to daycare, so we decide to split the day watching T so we can both work some. I work in the morning, so I bring my laptop downstairs so I can check my email while we get the real breakfast ready. P makes pancakes for himself and T, and he also makes tea for me and coffee for himself. I have a piece of toast with my tea.
9 am - I go upstairs to our spare bedroom which we have converted to be an office thanks to COVID. I try my best to focus on work in the morning. I work on some reports and get some files organized and ready for analysis. At some point in the middle of this I get dressed, wash my face and brush my teeth. Days with T home can get chaotic and my self care often gets dropped.
12:30 pm - P and T ran out and picked up lunch while I was working - we all feast on tacos (T eats an entire chicken taco). $28.14 We normally cook lunch but thanks to the snow and having T home we are mostly out of food.
1 pm - P leaves for work (he cannot do most of his work remotely so he has to go in). T goes down for a nap, and I try to make the house less chaotic, also get a little more work down. T wakes up around 3 and we play for the rest of the afternoon.
5 pm - P is home, we make flatbread pizza with red peppers for T. T has gotten super picky and pizza is one of the few ways he eats any veggies these days, so it's a common offering. P and I have instant ramen for ourselves, with lots of veggies added in from the fridge (we really need groceries).
8 pm - T is asleep, P and I clean up a little, then I video chat some friends of mine for an hour. I remember to order bread, which is delivered on Fridays to the liquor store a couple of blocks from my house. Suddenly it's 10pm and bedtime. $9
Daily Total: 31.14
Day 2 - Wednesday
7:10 am - I am woken up by T running into the bedroom. It was my turn to sleep in a little, never thought how much I would appreciate an after 7am wakeup. P and I discuss T's runny nose. T has no fever or other symptoms, but we play it safe and decide to keep him home one more day. Ugh. T gets as breakfast bar for his first breakfast today.
8:30 am - I make T eggs for 2nd breakfast, get ready for another half day of work (I am working in the morning again).
10 am - I am trying to pay attention to meetings but it is hard. T is clearly fussy and tired of being stuck in the house. He has been cold and miserable when he is brought outside though. Everyone is frustrated and grumpy.
12 pm - I give up on work early, heat up Trader Joe's chicken tikka for lunch. P also heats up a frozen Trader Joe's meal. We heat up some leftover flatbread pizza for T, but he refuses it. He eats yogurt and all of the chicken from my meal. Thanks kid. I start putting together an order from the grocery store (we only do curbside pickup because of COVID). It's going to be a larger order because it's been longer than usual since we have gotten groceries.
5 pm - P gets home with takeout. P gets a veggie burger, I get meatballs, we get spaghetti for T. We offer T some of our meals, he refuses everything except the spaghetti. $47.53
7:45 pm - T is in bed, I log back into work. A coworker send me some documentation to review, I do that and also start going through files and gathering data. While I work P makes pumpkin bread!!
9:15 pm - I log off for the night. I play Just Dance on the switch and dance around alone in my living room for a half hour to get some sort of exercise in.
Daily Total: 47.53
Day 3 - Thursday
6:10 am - Woken up by T. It's after 6 - yay! I watch T closely, we are hoping to take him to daycare today. His runny nose is still around but seems better.
7 am - T gets some of P's pumpkin bread for breakfast. P is up and we decide to take T to daycare today. We run around throwing everting T needs in a bag, de-ice our 2nd car as P has a dentist appointment at 8 and we haven't used that car since the snow storm.
7:45 am- the whole family somehow makes it out the door. T gets very excited to see he is going back to daycare. He was definitely tired of staying home too. I drop off T and and head back home for an actual full day of work
8:15 am - check email from my kitchen while I make tea. P stops back home after the dentist, makes coffee to bring to work and feeds the cats.
11:45 am - I make the last hello fresh meal I have that has been sitting in the back of the fridge getting sad. It's grilling cheese with veggies and couscous. P shows up around 12:15 and we eat together (he eats the other portion). I started getting hello fresh irregularly in November, to help with my sanity thanks to COVID. [Note - P works just a few minutes from our house, so he has been coming home for lunch every day during COVID times]
1 pm - P heads back to work, I go back upstairs to my "office". The rest of my work day is filled with meetings, screensharing covid life, and writing some code.
4:45 pm - I wrap up work and head out to pick up T. His face lights up when he sees me.
5:15 pm - P makes bean and cheese quesadillas for T and himself. I have half of a Trader Joe's frozen beef and broccoli. T gives up on the quesadillas after a few bites, but accepts some applesauce.
7:45 - T is in bed. P runs out to pick up some beer and tonic for me. I prepare a grilled cheese with some pesto and spinach snuck in for T's lunch tomorrow while P is out. $16.53
8 pm - P is back, I make a gin and tonic and hop on a virtual game night with some of my coworkers. P watches hockey and has some beer.
10pm - go upstairs for bed. Brush teeth, wash face, moisturize, bedtime!
Daily Total: 16.53
Day 4 - Friday
7:10 am - Woken up by T who is trying to climb in the bed to wake me up. P takes him down to have breakfast (pumpkin bread and some oatmeal), while I wake up and brush my teeth. I help get T out the door, then I take a much needed long shower. My showers are either 2 minutes or 20 minutes these days, there is no in between.
8:10 am - P asks if I want anything from the bakery by the daycare. I decline, as we need to finish up the bread we have. He gets himself a raspberry danish and a coffee $7.16
8:20 am- P makes me toast and tea as I empty the dishwasher. Then we eat breakfast together and answer our morning work emails. P is out the door by 9 to go into work, I head upstairs.
12:10 pm - P stopped by the grocery to pick up our order $89.30, and also picked up Chipotle for lunch $13.77. He gets a burrito, I get a bowl. We both add queso to our meals for the first time, because fuck it. The queso makes the meal so decadent and I only want to sleep now. After we finish eating we put away the groceries - they were out of a lot of things we requested. Blah. I can't make much of what I was planning to cook, and continue to feel frustrated with COVID.
1 pm - P heads back to work, I go back upstairs despite the meows from my cat who wants me to stay downstairs on the couch. I wish cat. I eat 2 squares of chocolate to get me through the Friday afternoon (yes, I am the person who eats dark chocolate one square at a time. It can take me a month to get through a bar sometimes. I am a monster)
4 pm- I stop working a little early and jump on a zoom call with a couple of friends. We catch up for a little as I start making veggie fritters in hopes to get T to eat any vegetable.
5 pm - P arrives home with T. I offer T the fritters I made and he eats a few bites. I'll take it. I also quickly cook some pasta and steam some broccoli. I mix in some pesto and call that dinner for P and I. P gets T to eat some applesauce as well.
6:15 pm - I go to my aerial silks class. I have been doing aerial since I moved to Baltimore and I love it! Class is an hour long, after it I stop by the liquor store where the bread I ordered earlier in the week is dropped off. I also pick up a bottle of wine while I am there. $16.34
8 pm - I get home and T is asleep. P and I have a couple of drinks (beer for him, wine for me) and we watch RuPaul's Drag Race. We have watched this show for years and had kinda stopped watching it, but picked it back up in the pandemic times and it's exactly the energy we need.
10:30pm - Head up to bed a little later than we should. Lazy face washing and teeth brushing, then sweet sweet bedtime.
Daily Total: 112.80
Day 5 - Saturday
6:45 am - I wake on my own and T is still asleep!!!! I actually get to wake up for a few minutes on my own before I see that T is up. This is the latest he has ever slept and I am overjoyed. I give T milk and we play and look at every book he owns. At 7:45 we wake up P and we both marvel at how well T slept.
8 am - P starts making breakfast for T and himself. I just have toast and tea as usual.
10 am - Another aerial class for me this morning - this time dance trapeze, my favorite! This class is so challenging but I love it. I come home bruised and worn out. It's not ideal for me to take the two classes so close together, but that is just how the schedule worked out. While I am at class, P takes T to the playground to get some energy out.
12 pm - I try to get T to eat more veggie fritters for lunch, but no luck. He "eats" an apple for awhile, and has his trusty yogurt. I honestly don't remember what P and I eat for lunch.
1pm - T naps. P and I chill on the couch and do as little as possible. I order a pair of leggings off of amazon, as I have only worn leggings this winter and it shows. $25.44
3:30 pm - T is up, and we all get dressed to go to the bookstore near our house, which allows you to shop by appointment only - we have one for 4pm. I am just so excited to go somewhere. We browse for a bit and get 3 books for T, P gets a random book, and I randomly buy an expensive but beautiful cookbook - it's all about lunch bowls, and everything in it looks delicious. We spend a lot, but we never go shopping these days and are glad to support a local business. $70.98
5 pm - Dinner time! I heat up some chicken, which T eats most of. I am able to add a few pieces to some instant ramen I made. I also add spinach, green onion, and corn to my ramen. P makes a burrito for himself (P is vegetarian, which is why we eat completely different meals sometimes. He had no interest in any chicken). After dinner we video chat the grandparents, then it's T's bedtime routine.
7:45 pm - T is asleep. I decide it is time for me to make a chocolate torte. I haven't had a true dessert in awhile and I am craving something, and this is what we have the ingredients for. While I am baking, P runs to a grocery near our house. We don't like going inside a grocery these days, but we really need some of the items that were missing in our last pickup. He comes home with way more than what was on our initial list, but we will use everything $71.71 The cake is out the oven, I make a ganache for the first time ever to top the cake and P is in love. He has a much bigger sweet tooth than me, so he is very supportive of my random baking. We end the night eating cake, having some wine, and just chatting and catching up until we head to bed at too late of an hour.
Daily Total: 161.13
Day 6 - Sunday
7 am - Woken up by P & T. I take T and we play downstairs while P gets as little extra rest. It's snowing/raining outside and it just looks awful. Around 8 P comes downstairs and we agree to order breakfast for delivery since no one wants to do breakfast or anything at all in this weather. I ordered homefries and turkey sausage (something other than toast!!) and P gets an egg and cheese sandwich, and also orders pancakes to share with T. We put something on the TV, which we rarely do with T around, but if there was a day to be lazy this is it. Our food comes quickly and we eat it up! $19.51
10 am - we put T in his high chair and let him go wild with paint. This is fav indoor activity for rainy days. Once he is sufficiently messy, P takes T upstairs to wash off, and I pick up downstairs.
12 pm - P makes mac and cheese for T, which he eats up! Both P and I eat some of the boxed mac and cheese, and never get around to eating anymore.
1 pm - T is down for his nap. I play stardew valley on my PS4, while P plays something on his Switch until T is up. We eat some of the chocolate torte.
3:30 pm - It stopped raining and the sun is out! Once T is up, we all get dressed and walk to the park near our house. T finds lots of good sticks and watches lots of good dogs.
5 pm - I make a chicken noodle soup, P makes a flatbread with pesto and red bell peppers. T eats some chicken from my soup and some of the flatbread.
8 pm - T is down, P runs by walgreens to get diaper cream for daycare, since both groceries were out of it. $15.49 We watch another episode of RuPaul and go to bed around 10pm.
Daily Total: $35
Day 7 - Monday
6:15 am - wakeup by T. Play with all the cars until we wake up P at 7. T gets the last piece of pumpkin bread for breakfast.
7:45 am - Drop of T at daycare. Head back home, P makes me tea and makes himself coffee. We both have toast. As usual, we check email and have breakfast together, then he heads into work at 9.
9 am - I start working on some very exciting reports. Yay Monday. Daycare calls and says T hasn't been eating lunch and asks for advice. They commiserate with me on how tricky he is with food and we come up with a few ideas.
12 pm - I heat up some leftover soup for lunch, P comes home and heats up a burrito. We are both busy with work so todays lunch is a quick one and we don't talk much.
1 pm - I am back to work, back to reports.
4:30 pm - I stop working and get some food ready for T. I make some spaghetti and also some bread with peanut butter on it. P arrives home with T, and T runs into the kitchen asking for food. I give him the plate and he throws everything on the ground. I try not to let his eating (or lack thereof) get to me but it's been hard yall. P can tell I am frustrated and takes T upstairs so I can chill out. I say fuck it and heat up this frozen flatbread thing from trader joe's that we have had in the freezer for awhile for P and I. T decides he will eat that. Whatever kid.
8 pm - T is asleep, P runs out and gets a taco for from the place near our house. I had told daycare how T always eats tacos for us when we get them, so we are going to see if he will eat them at daycare. P also gets a taco for himself, since the flatbread wasn't much food. $7.86
9:30 pm - I eat my feelings in chocolate torte. I also decide I need to do something productive to feel better and that we are going to finally order the next size up carseat for T instead of looking online and getting overwhelmed and never buying something. We decide on using the same brand his current carseat is (Britax) and get a midrange model $201.39. This devolves into watching dumb videos on the internet until it's time for bed.
Daily Total: $209.25
Section 5: TOTALS
Total Expenses - $640.15
Food + Drink - $326.85
Home + Health - $15.49
Clothes + Beauty - $25.44
Transport - $0
Other - $272.37
Section 6: REFLECTION
This was honestly a stressful week for me. The snow days hit a bad time with work for P and I, so we spent more on takeout because of that. We also spend more on groceries than normal, but that was because we had spent much less the previous week and were out of many staples. The carseat was as bigger purchase, but I feel like there is always a bigger purchase around the corner these days, which has been making it harder for us to save as much as we would like.