OK, so one thing I spend a lot on is books.

When I feel guilty about spending too much on other things, I’ll cheer myself up by buying an intellectual book or an autobiography of some important person to inspire me to work hard. OK, and chic lits as well.

I know the “spend because you feel guilty about spending” logic doesn’t really make sense! But books don’t cost that much, so sometimes you don’t realise until the end of the month when love letters from Mastercard come.

I need to control my spending on books because I buy books as if I’m trying to set up a library for the public.

So, I came up with a solution.

MPH has conveniently set up its online store and it stocks all the books they have, pictures and descriptions of each one. They also have categories like New Releases, Best Sellers and all that so you’re always updated on the good books. Best of all, they have promotions and discounts that are exclusively for online purchases only.

So, I thought it would be better that I get a bulk of books delivered to me, rather than me having to hurt my back trying to carry the plastic bags home.

I will allocate a portion of my salary to books each month, since I know I can’t live without new books to read. So I will purchase a few books online and that is it. I can’t step into a bookstore for that whole month. I can’t buy any more books for the month.

I didn’t know how much to allocate, so I decided to surf the MPH online site first to test the waters.

Big mistake.

I got super excited looking at new books that I just kept on adding to cart. The final amount came to RM 700+.

How on earth….? What kind of budget is this?!!

Sighing at my typicalness, I spent so long debating with myself which books to eliminate. Brain and Heart were at it again.

Brain: Do you really need “The Flirt”?

Heart: I want.

Brain: I thought you wanted more educational books and less chic lits?

Heart: I want.

Brain: But you have read many chic lits and they’re all the same!

Heart: I want.

It was a very frustrating debate, as you can imagine.

So in the end, we came to a compromise and I removed half of the books, with lots of sighs.

I ordered during the weekend and it arrived today, therefore allow 3 days for processing and shipping.

The last one is categorised under “highly educational” on my list.

So I’m done with books for this month. But the month is ending. I’m so smart….