this wasn't in the plan |but life is still pretty good

On Wednesday, I just happened to open up Quicken to check on things. And I'm so glad I did. I knew that our student loan payment was due that day and saw that checking account at our local bank was about $6 short. Oops. I had no cash to put into the account, but thought that perhaps The Tall One did, so I called him at work to see if he could run to the bank to deposit some. He had already taken lunch, so it was all on me. I could pull some cash from our ING checking account via an ATM and then deposit that into our checking account at the local bank. Easy, right?

I headed to the bank and used their drive-up ATM to withdraw money from the ING account. I planned to deposit it into the other checking account right at the ATM (so I didn't have to take the kid inside) but my ATM/debit card for my local bank had long expired, so inside we go. I deposit the cash and also request a new debit card.

Everything worked out fine in the end, but of course I learned a few lessons:

• Keep an eye on things, especially automatic transactions. Check you accounts and bills due frequently.
• Keep some cash on hand. I could have saved myself a $2 ATM transaction fee if I would have already had some cash.
• Don't let your cards expire without getting a replacement. This wasn't the first time I wished I had had a current card.

These were concepts I already knew, but apparently I need a little reminder every now and then!