A useful way to look at money
Let me tell you a story that started at 4.25am on Wednesday, when a taxi arrived at my flat in South London.
I was heading to Stansted airport for a flight to Italy - a press trip to the city of Lucca and surrounding Tuscan countryside.
I was quite pleased with myself because, despite being mega busy with work in the proceeding days, I’d been organised with my packing: writing lists, using packing cubes, choosing clothes that actually went together and getting all my liquids prepared in a clear zip-up toiletry bag to ensure the security check would be quick. At 4.20am, I quickly whipped this last item out of the suitcase to brush my teeth. I then walked into another room to grab a charger, saw the WhatsApp message saying my taxi had arrived and left the flat. It was only when I got to the airport at 5.40am that I realised I’d left my toiletry bag - complete with all skincare, sun cream, makeup, asthma inhaler and contact lenses - in the bathroom at home.
Altogether now: fuuuuuuuuck.
What followed was, in one word, expensive. I spent £120 dashing round a packed airport replacing my basic toiletries and make up (turns out Boots is A LOT more expensive when there are no 3 for 2s and they hike all the prices). At least I could actually replace these things - the contact lenses and inhaler were trickier, but after some frantic googling I discovered you could send a next day FedEx parcel from London to Italy. By 6.30am, I had already phoned my long suffering husband to hyperventilate down the line and ask him to dispatch the package for me. Yes, it was at least another 50 quid in the bin, but I reasoned that was justifiable in order to be able to see and breathe.
For the next 24 hours I refreshed the online tracking page with baited breath as the parcel made it’s way to Italy (hooray!) and then - booo - got “delayed” in Bologna. Next thing I know, Italian customs phoned my hotel and said they would need to do a “sanitation procedure” on the parcel which would cost 50 Euros and take four to five working days, by which time I would be back in the UK. Turns out my clever plan was not so clever (although I mainly blame stupid flipping Brexit and Italian customs, which I can only assume is run by the mafia).
I almost burst into hormonal tears when the receptionist explained this predicament, so she offered to phone round some local opticians and see if any of them had my insane +6 prescription lenses in stock, which seemed highly unlikely. I could hardly believe it when she called my room and said she’d found a local optician with “one packet left in your prescription”, and I followed her advice to “get there quickly”, dashing through the streets to blow another 30 euros on the lenses. Victory!
The next morning, I put one of the contacts in and thought “hmm, this is weird”. The weird thing being that I couldn’t actually see. I looked at the box and discovered that I’d been sold -6 rather than +6 contacts, and at which point I got very close to having a full Bridesmaids wedding shower-style meltdown involving screaming and smashing things up for a few minutes (I know it’s only contacts but…FFS).
The reason I’m repeating this very long-winded story is because I’m sure you can relate to that frustrated feeling I had - the one where you’ve made some idiotic mistake which has ended up costing you loads of unnecessary time and money, and you’re just so cross with yourself. At this point was well over £200 down with very little to show for it, all as a result of one careless mistake.
It’s times like these where I like to think about the “idiot tax”, a very useful philosophy for life. I first heard comedian Josh Widdicombe talk about this tax on the Parenting Hell podcast and have passed it on to many grateful friends since. The basic concept is that you must accept that you will spend around £1,000 a year on costs that are mainly down to your own idiotic mistakes. For example, the idiot tax may include fines for driving the wrong way around Cardiff (check), failing to select the correct parcel measurements when sending Vinted items with Evri (check) and of course, leaving your contact lenses in the UK when you head to Tuscany (sigh…).
In all these examples, your own silliness is propounded by maddening systems like customs control and Cardiff’s very confusing road signage, and it can feel like the world is trying to swindle you out of cash, which quite frankly none of us can afford right now. But instead, the best thing you can do for your sanity is shrug it off. Next time you are having one of these moments, please remember, we all do it. Everyone makes ridiculous mistakes which result in wasting our money, time and sanity; it’s just part of being a human. Write it off as the idiot tax (a very universal form of taxation) and move on, just like I - a fellow moron - have also done.