I started working to built up my emergency fund in about 2014, knowing I'd soon be losing my job as editor of a newspaper. I wasn't making very much money, but I salted away as much as I could. Sure enough, there was a big round of newsroom layoffs in 2015. I've done everything possible to keep some of that emergency money untouched because shit can always get worse. Like, even when we had to blow up our tires every few days, we didn't buy new tires until a new source of money came in. We spent money on house payments and upkeep, groceries, unavoidable medical/dental, keeping our old cars running and gassed and paying our utilities. This year we resumed the occasional casual restaurant meal with friends in order to have a bit of social life. Purchases outside these categories were very few and far between. I am in the process of purchasing curtains to cover the bare windows of the chilly room I work in. I've put this purchase off since I bought this house in 2008. It's time now, because I can do it without dipping into the sacred Shit Happens fund.