About Me

Hey there. I’m universally unknown across social media as MsChrysilla.

I listen to Assemblage 23, The Cruxshadows, Ashbury Heights, Strvngers, and a number of other dark dancey bands on a daily basis. I sew my own clothing, largely in black + dark jewel-tones, and now I have a habit of making shirt dresses in kitschy Halloween themed quilting cotton. I hate wearing 18 tons of foundation, and so do my pores, so I don’t.

I don’t work in finance, banking, publishing, or (obviously) web design. Instead, I’ve been a librarian for 22 years, and as such have applied my ridiculous research and knowledge-absorption powers to improving my personal finances. And so I became the Budget Bat I am today.

At the beginning, I was extremely lucky and privileged to have some generational wealth to fall back on. It looks like that’s over now, but I still got a head start. This led to me having virtually no student loans, and gave me the ability to buy a tiny studio co-op in the most unfashionable neighborhood in Queens some years ago. Several friends said I was ridiculous for doing that second part, but now they can’t afford to rent in NYC anymore, and this does not feel like a “win” to me.

And yah, the personal finance blogosphere’s got problems.

So I had the sudden inspiration to start building *waves hand* all this nonsense. Originally it was submitted to a Goth convention as a panel proposal, but was rejected so I guess they didn’t think it was sexy enough. Or maybe they want their attendees to go into ridunkulous credit card debt for their event every year?

I just hope it helps someone a bit more, and a bit faster, than I was able to find help at the beginning. Also, I hope that this will one day change from “About Me” to “About Us” as I find other weirdo contributors.