Budgeting in the Real World

I've spent the better part of this month working and reworking my basic plan for the year (and yes, I know this will need to be tweaked on a month to month basis, but I wanted a good workable basic plan).
After visting bankrate.com, I realized that in order to get my remaining credit card debt paid off by August (when the Princess goes off to school), I needed to put roughly $950 per month towards the credit card. That would be over 1/3 of my monthly take-home pay. I was determined that I COULD do this.

Wisely, however, I shared my plan with a friend who pointed out that while my goal was understandable, in reality it just wasn't feasible. I only had so many places where I could further cut spending without sitting in the dark every night. Of course I tend to be stubborn and INSISTED I could do it, I just had to get more creative.

I crunched numbers. And re-crunched them. And banged my head against the wall. And finally, I had to admit that my friend was right. There just weren't enough places I could cut further in order to make that goal I had set in my mind -- this is the real world and I guess I have to live in it. (I really hate being wrong).

For now, I'll be putting $500/month to the credit card which should have it paid off by May 2013. Not nearly as early as I'd like. However, I'm going make a vow to be much more consistent about "snowflaking" any extra money towards that balance. At the end of each month, whatever I'm under budget will go straight to that credit card debt. With any luck, I'll be able to knock a few months off of that debt free deadline. Wish me luck!