Money efficient

One of my once close friend's birthday is this weekend, so a few weeks ago I saw her online and asked her what she was doing and what she wanted for her birthday the reply was nothing and not sure respectively. I told her to give me an idea of what she wanted(I knew it should be entertaining) and of course the next day she sent me her wish list lol.

1. a camera
2. a new cell phone
3. shoes
4. a nice hand bag
5. DVDs
6. 2GB jump drive
7. a book (she said if I got the book I needed to supplement it with something else.. like item 5)

I was expecting the outcome to be funny but she out did herself, the list went to 10 but I had to cut it off there.. she even started pasted links such as what type of phone I should get. I had to point out to her that phone wouldn't even work with her current mobile provider which just goes to show her desiderative greed. I was initially going to get her a gift certificate for a day at a spa but her wish list has changed my mind and shes probably just going to get a card.

I'm not downgrading her gift cause I'm cheap money efficient, there is good logic and a background story to this chick. She lived in the lap of luxury when she was going to school spending her mother's money getting everything her little heart desired(also bankrupting her mother in the process). She finished university and got a job that didn't pay too well and her mother pulled out the teat from her mouth and life gave her one big slap out of the lap of luxury back to reality.

She couldn't go to the hair dresser every week, shop for clothes or whatever girls buy, etc.., she was broke as a joke. Being the prudential financial advisor I like to imagine myself to be I guided her throughout her hardships helping her manage her income/expenses/credit card debt and it was all good, her books were balanced and not in the negative. She eventually got a good job last year and claimed to be managing fine now that she had extra money, I stopped paying attention to her finances as she seemed to be getting by on her own with the better pay.

That was 1 year ago, she is now jobless as her 1 year contract ended Friday gone. My basic calculations of her take home salary tells me that she should have paid off her school fee(she was pursuing her MBA in finance.. the irony) and be in good financial standings over the last year, this is not the case though. Last month she called me asking for assistance in getting her DSL back up as it was disabled due to her outstanding bills. She asked me to log on to her bank account and pay the bills then contact the ISP to get the service reactivated, I obliged. Her bank's dashboard showed me a very empty savings account and two maxed out credit cards both of which had late payment fines with growing interest on the outstanding balances... wtf. I ignored and payed her bill and got the internet service reactivated and spared her the lecture on being responsible.

How is it possible that the girl dig herself into such a hole in such a short period of time? I washed my hands of her after her long distance BF came to visit her for three months and she refuses to see my points on how unhealthy there relationship is for her. She claimed she tried to break up with him 3 times in January after I spoke to her about it but he didn't accept it. He is now back in that other country probably with the other girl he lives with(just for sex and to assist him in getting citizenship according to him) over there and now she is here by herself engaged to get married to him next year... I kept my comments to myself.

In the weeks after looking at her bank accounts she called and I learned that not only did she have credit card debt but she also took out a loan and still have tuition outstanding. Not to point any fingers here but it is my assumption that her dilemma is also assisted by her bum of a fiance who is full of crackpot schemes. I am not being mean, I have never met the man, I am just repeating how I've heard her refer to him previously.

EDIT---
It seems I went off into a rant there for a bit.. all of the above was written on Friday, it's now Sunday and her birthday has passed lets just wrap up this post. I had to write about this because most of her list violated my gift giving policy for girls which clearly states not to buy something for a girl she can't afford herself, hence she got a birthday Hallmark card. Of course there are subclauses that allows for exceptions in cases where the girl is responsible but life deals them a bad hand and hence can get a nice expensive gift but this is not the case for my friend.