A re-posting because some of my readers couldn't open the original posting with IE-6.
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Originally written two years ago, but still very much relevant today.
Monday, December 31, 2007
Saturday, December 29, 2007
Molding the Savvy Shopper at Any Age
In response to the Dollar Stretcher article "Molding the Young Savvy Shopper."
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It’s come to my attention in many subtle ways that a good portion of our population isn’t prepared, or even knows how to get prepared, for a coming economic downturn. The unprepared range in age from pre-teen to a spouse of many years, and encompass both genders.
It doesn’t take a sudden job loss to throw someone off kilter—it could be a death, an out-of-control credit card debt, a bad mortgage deal, or someone who was raised in a household where nobody cooked from scratch, and nobody had reason to think twice about it.
No matter what the age or gender, people shouldn’t be caught unaware of how to defend themselves from inflation, loss of income, or the death of the usual home keeper. Know the basics:
• Learn to say and accept the word NO.
• Know how to use coupons, in-store sales, and rebates to their maximum advantage.
• Know how to read shelf labels and discern the unit price as compared to the shelf price.
• How to keep or reference a price book—what it means, and how to add to it or modify it.
• Know how to read a cookbook and follow written instructions.
• Know your own limits as to taste, food allergies, food restrictions due to health issues, room in the fridge and cupboards, and budget.
• Learn how to read and comprehend a nutrition label—this is one terrific key to choosing foods with actual nutrition versus foods loaded with empty calories.
• Learn how to become deaf to ads, marketing, and other money cons in print, in person, and on the TV. This also goes for trends and fads.
• Scrutinize everything for fine print before buying anything—there’s always a catch, and you want to be informed. If you don’t understand it, don’t buy it.
• Reduce, reuse, recycle, scavenge, and swap—use imagination instead of money.
This is why it’s so very important to teach every member of the household the fine art of frugal living—they may be living without the resident black belt frugalite at any given moment. This could cause a whole myriad of suffering on many levels beyond the expected grief and sadness—it could lead to worsening of health issues requiring special diets, or even someone having to resort to public assistance (or worse) due to needless spending. We want our loved ones to be able to carry on without us, so we must make sure they can before something happens to us.
There are still generations of people entirely dependent on public assistance because they were never taught how to correctly manage their budget and expenses, and frankly, there’s little hope of ever reaching these people to turn things around—“the system” is all they know, and it will be disappearing one day soon.
If you or a loved one find yourselves inadequately prepared to handle the tasks necessary for frugal living, ask yourself this question: “What would (insert resident frugalite here) do?”, only ask it NOW why he/she is still alive, mobile, and able to teach you. People easily become rendered mute or paralyzed from accidents or strokes, so don't wait any longer to learn and educate your friends and loved ones--it may be the one enduring thing you leave behind in this world.
Part of the reason why I write this: a few years ago, my mother-in-law died of ovarian cancer, leaving behind an overly-dependent husband (he was capable of everything, but relied heavily on Mom). As a result, he died seven months later from lack of money- and food-knowledge. He never asked about how to care for himself when she was still alive, and she never bothered to teach him, even though she knew she was dying. Unfortunately, I was stuck on the East Coast due to navy obligations, and couldn’t move out with him. He was unwilling to move here, so he remained alone until his death by microwaveable Jimmy Dean breakfast sandwiches, in spite of my daily e-mailed attempts to instruct him otherwise.
It shouldn’t take a death to wake someone up to the fact that they’re helpless outside of work, and it shouldn’t take a job loss or crushing debt to realize the same thing.
People can learn this skill NOW—at any age, any income level, and for any reason. While still at home, or still married to a longtime spouse/home keeper, or still working, please make every effort to teach, learn, and practice frugality in all its forms and levels—it may be the very thing to save your life (quite literally).
Make frugality a priority in you and in people you choose to surround yourself with. The #1 reason that people go into debt is to keep up with the Joneses, and what they don’t know is that Jones is broke too! If you already know and practice the frugal basics, the Joneses make wonderful teaching opportunities. Don’t be shy—pass it on once you’ve mastered it.
There are other skills besides the ones I mentioned above, but I leave those for you and your tutor. We’re never too old to learn new tricks, and the particular trick of frugality has been around a few centuries. We Americans first saw it in the Victorian era, and continue to see it every day in the Amish—they’re masters of it.
The coming downturn may end up being severe enough to reverse our current achievements in technology and engineering; we may be forced to downsize a lot of things, but mostly expectations. The best you can do is downsize and rethink things for yourself at a personal and household level so as to avoid becoming part of a larger-scale crisis. The word commonly used for this is “conserve.” I’m not sure simple conservation is going to be enough, so learn about and be prepared to take more drastic measures (again, see the Amish for examples). Learn frugality until you reach black belt status, because you will need it to survive largely unscathed (think Dust Bowl and Great Depression here).
Even if things don’t take a turn for the worst, frugality will make you a very wealthy person in strategy and knowledge, if not in money.
______________________________________________________
It’s come to my attention in many subtle ways that a good portion of our population isn’t prepared, or even knows how to get prepared, for a coming economic downturn. The unprepared range in age from pre-teen to a spouse of many years, and encompass both genders.
It doesn’t take a sudden job loss to throw someone off kilter—it could be a death, an out-of-control credit card debt, a bad mortgage deal, or someone who was raised in a household where nobody cooked from scratch, and nobody had reason to think twice about it.
No matter what the age or gender, people shouldn’t be caught unaware of how to defend themselves from inflation, loss of income, or the death of the usual home keeper. Know the basics:
• Learn to say and accept the word NO.
• Know how to use coupons, in-store sales, and rebates to their maximum advantage.
• Know how to read shelf labels and discern the unit price as compared to the shelf price.
• How to keep or reference a price book—what it means, and how to add to it or modify it.
• Know how to read a cookbook and follow written instructions.
• Know your own limits as to taste, food allergies, food restrictions due to health issues, room in the fridge and cupboards, and budget.
• Learn how to read and comprehend a nutrition label—this is one terrific key to choosing foods with actual nutrition versus foods loaded with empty calories.
• Learn how to become deaf to ads, marketing, and other money cons in print, in person, and on the TV. This also goes for trends and fads.
• Scrutinize everything for fine print before buying anything—there’s always a catch, and you want to be informed. If you don’t understand it, don’t buy it.
• Reduce, reuse, recycle, scavenge, and swap—use imagination instead of money.
This is why it’s so very important to teach every member of the household the fine art of frugal living—they may be living without the resident black belt frugalite at any given moment. This could cause a whole myriad of suffering on many levels beyond the expected grief and sadness—it could lead to worsening of health issues requiring special diets, or even someone having to resort to public assistance (or worse) due to needless spending. We want our loved ones to be able to carry on without us, so we must make sure they can before something happens to us.
There are still generations of people entirely dependent on public assistance because they were never taught how to correctly manage their budget and expenses, and frankly, there’s little hope of ever reaching these people to turn things around—“the system” is all they know, and it will be disappearing one day soon.
If you or a loved one find yourselves inadequately prepared to handle the tasks necessary for frugal living, ask yourself this question: “What would (insert resident frugalite here) do?”, only ask it NOW why he/she is still alive, mobile, and able to teach you. People easily become rendered mute or paralyzed from accidents or strokes, so don't wait any longer to learn and educate your friends and loved ones--it may be the one enduring thing you leave behind in this world.
Part of the reason why I write this: a few years ago, my mother-in-law died of ovarian cancer, leaving behind an overly-dependent husband (he was capable of everything, but relied heavily on Mom). As a result, he died seven months later from lack of money- and food-knowledge. He never asked about how to care for himself when she was still alive, and she never bothered to teach him, even though she knew she was dying. Unfortunately, I was stuck on the East Coast due to navy obligations, and couldn’t move out with him. He was unwilling to move here, so he remained alone until his death by microwaveable Jimmy Dean breakfast sandwiches, in spite of my daily e-mailed attempts to instruct him otherwise.
It shouldn’t take a death to wake someone up to the fact that they’re helpless outside of work, and it shouldn’t take a job loss or crushing debt to realize the same thing.
People can learn this skill NOW—at any age, any income level, and for any reason. While still at home, or still married to a longtime spouse/home keeper, or still working, please make every effort to teach, learn, and practice frugality in all its forms and levels—it may be the very thing to save your life (quite literally).
Make frugality a priority in you and in people you choose to surround yourself with. The #1 reason that people go into debt is to keep up with the Joneses, and what they don’t know is that Jones is broke too! If you already know and practice the frugal basics, the Joneses make wonderful teaching opportunities. Don’t be shy—pass it on once you’ve mastered it.
There are other skills besides the ones I mentioned above, but I leave those for you and your tutor. We’re never too old to learn new tricks, and the particular trick of frugality has been around a few centuries. We Americans first saw it in the Victorian era, and continue to see it every day in the Amish—they’re masters of it.
The coming downturn may end up being severe enough to reverse our current achievements in technology and engineering; we may be forced to downsize a lot of things, but mostly expectations. The best you can do is downsize and rethink things for yourself at a personal and household level so as to avoid becoming part of a larger-scale crisis. The word commonly used for this is “conserve.” I’m not sure simple conservation is going to be enough, so learn about and be prepared to take more drastic measures (again, see the Amish for examples). Learn frugality until you reach black belt status, because you will need it to survive largely unscathed (think Dust Bowl and Great Depression here).
Even if things don’t take a turn for the worst, frugality will make you a very wealthy person in strategy and knowledge, if not in money.
Thursday, December 27, 2007
Post-Holiday Commentary—Comparing 2005/2006 to 2007
2005/2006: As you all know, I’m Atheist, so I sat on the sidelines and watched the annual spectacle unfold around me. Unfold it did, and in big, new ways.
If Jesus is the reason for the season as many say, then how on earth did a baby shower get so out-of-control? Frankincense and myrrh would have never made it this year—not even as stocking stuffers!
The lunacy involving the trees and household decorations came awhile back with the entrance of Martha Stewart. From there, it went high-tech and Hollywood: outdoor lights covering every single square inch of property, in varying colors set to the beat of loud music; front lawns covered in holiday-colored props ranging from Santa and his sleigh to full-blown mockups of Santa’s workshop, complete with elves, toys, and other assorted characters; Santa portrayed as Elvis, the Grinch, a Hell’s Angel biker, an Oscar celebrity, and a robot; and gifts ranging from the simple plastic gift card all the way to cars, diamonds, fur, and plasma screen TVs that can’t fit through the front door!
2007: Not so much lunacy for trees and household décor (probably because of the writer’s strike), but the outside still got set to music via a computer software program, and one man even has his own Santa radio station that allowed you to hear his display music on your car radio. This year, there weren’t so many of these spectacles to observe—it seemed more older folks with smaller households were largely responsible for the music-timed extravaganzas, and not many younger families were involved this time. Instead of plasma TVs, the electronic must-have this year was the Nintendo Wii—it’s nice to see that even our electronic wants are finally getting smaller, with the popularity of navigation systems, all-in-one phones, and digital cameras.
2005/2006: It seems the shopping craziness this year has been detoured toward the decorating craziness, with neighbor outdoing neighbor, and whole blocks competing for attention—some even charging admission to see their displays. There was a mock-up of Hollywood and Oscar night, a mock-up of the North Pole, a mock-up of the Las Vegas strip, and a mock-up of the Trump Towers—all with Santa in the shot somewhere.
Has anyone stopped and though about the monumental amounts of energy wasted on such frivolousness, and for what? As time-consuming as it all was to build and put up, it all has to come right back down, and be stored somewhere…and then comes that dreaded electric bill.
2007: I guess the party went elsewhere—people this year tend to be more conscious of the energy bill, the energy waste, and the decadence. Some people did have the forethought to use LED lights and solar-and-battery-powered displays, but this will probably be a dying trend altogether. The ostentation, the overall cost, plus the maintenance will be too much for many of us. I’m sure the weather in the mid-west had a lot to do with it as well.
2005/2006: It’s getting to be as bad as the 4th of July fireworks each year—more and more, better and better. Where does it all end? When can we say we’ve had enough?
Unfortunately, someone found the cord and plugged the Christmas Machine back in—probably a Boomer with more dollars than sense.
Can anyone venture a guess as to how much it cost for one guy to have a separate power transformer box mounted in his yard just so he could put out his VERY ostentatious display each year? Someone actually did this, and the thought makes me sick.
2007: What can I say? No job = no money to be hideously ostentatious at holiday time. Bad weather may have been a contributing factor. The lack of imagination-whetting TV shows (due to the writer’s strike) may have been another factor.
2005/2006: As if the OUTSIDE lunacy wasn’t enough, we still carry on the lunacy INSIDE with trees decorated ala Martha, presents wrapped and decorated ala Martha, and tables draped and laden ala Martha, Rachel Ray, or the HGTV “Decorating for the Holidays” show. The “baby shower” origins have been twisted and disposed of completely in the name of retail free-for-all, in hopes that merchants can wring a little black ink out for the year.
What else makes me sick is the thought of miles of colorful wrapping paper, coupled with miles of ribbons and tape, all going into the trash—but not until they’re removed from presents under the tree. It’s true, and it’s pathetic, but then someone very wisely designed the reusable gift bag. Someday, more of us will catch onto the reusable GIFT.
Someday, the dumpster in my apartment complex won’t be overflowing with crumpled and torn gift wrap, discarded trees, and large intact boxes every December 25th. Someday, parents around here will catch on to the fact that newly-gotten toys break after a week of playing with them, or worse—sink to the bottom of the toy box, forgotten, in favor of the neighbor kid’s new Nintendo Wii (which will also succumb to rough-housing).
Recently, another type of problem cropped up: where to put the new kiddie bikes. These are small apartments with no extra storage space—obviously, someone didn’t do a whole lot of planning when it came to gifts and the kids. Now, kids leave bikes out in front of their buildings, running the risk of theft or confiscation. Everyone’s rental agreement says that “anything not landscaping- or building-related gets picked up and taken away.” This means THROWN AWAY in the dumpster and money wasted yet again.
2007: Now we’re wrapping presents with reusable scrap cloth and ribbon, reusable mylar sheets, and colored cellophane, not to mention boxes that are themselves decorative. Gift bags are still a mainstay for the reuse-it crowd, but ribbon and bows have come back to the make-it-yourself days of the 70’s. Maybe someday, little bags of 9-bean soup mix and bars of homemade soap will once again become suitable stocking stuffers (if they haven’t already).
I noticed a lot fewer shows on TV pushing over-the-top holiday festivities (thanks to the writer’s strike), and those that WERE pushing were advocating a saner and mellower holiday. Paper trash seems quite a bit less this year, and (so far) only one tree made it into the dumpster—this time, it was mostly cardboard boxes, box innards, and trash bags full of paper plates that once held Christmas dinner. Overflowing it was not. One family got a wide-screen TV.
Parents around here seemed to have gotten the message about appropriate toys for an apartment with no extra storage—no new bikes, skates, or scooters visible this year, and since the Wii is still under-produced for the demand, and toy recall warnings abound, I imagine a lot of kids got books, board games, portable electronics, and back-to-basics toys like Legos, Lincoln Logs, and Tinker Toys. Clothes and school items were probably the mainstays this time.
A few TV personalities’ gift advice this year was savings bonds instead of toys. I doubt anybody here made that choice.
2005/2006: Instead of carrying all this nonsense to higher and higher heights, shouldn’t we get back to the roots of the day by honoring and gifting local babies born on Christmas Day of each year? The money we spend (or throw away) now could go a long way in helping a newborn’s college fund, or insuring a new family’s good start in life—or even help out a soon-to-be-harried mother. This, I think, would be a more sensible way to honor the birth of Jesus (or anyone else) instead of the holiday insanity we have now.
Would Jesus (or anybody else) approve of this “paying it forward” plan? I think so, especially when compared to what we do NOW. So many people complain of not having enough, yet everyone seems to have enough to throw away (in so many ways) on this spectacle of a holiday. There are many such spectacles in our calendar.
2007: What a difference a year or two makes! Take away the money, and you take away the lunacy, or so it would seem. People are fearful about what the next year will bring, and dreading what this year may have already brought them. Along with the economic downturn, we are downturning as well—to more rational thinking and spending, and getting back to basics slowly but surely. It’s about time.
2005/2006: I’d like to propose a new way to celebrate “Christmas”: plant a tree, give a gift to a local newborn or its family, and have a buffet instead of a Martha-style feast. On second thought, we’d find ways to spin THAT way out of control too.
2007: More and more people are choosing not to observe the holidays (like I do), but it’s not for religious or anti-religious grounds—rather, it’s a silent protest of the unending commercialism escalation. Another way some people are choosing to protest is by giving back—volunteering in church kitchens, shelters, retirement homes, soup kitchens, and at recent disaster areas like New Orleans, Banda Ache, and others—some people even give blood as an alternative. A new trend: a small handful of families are escaping entirely by spending their holidays at resorts in countries that don’t celebrate Christmas.
I guess I’ll just go back to long-range observation. I can hardly wait to see what new boundaries New Year’s has to bring--then there’s Valentine’s Day, St. Patrick’s Day, Easter…the list goes on, and I’ll be watching. As it is, Halloween is shaping up to be the new Christmas as far as commercialism and spending lunacy goes.
Pray with me for another writer’s strike and bad weather for next year, so we can get back to the true meaning of Christmas.
If Jesus is the reason for the season as many say, then how on earth did a baby shower get so out-of-control? Frankincense and myrrh would have never made it this year—not even as stocking stuffers!
The lunacy involving the trees and household decorations came awhile back with the entrance of Martha Stewart. From there, it went high-tech and Hollywood: outdoor lights covering every single square inch of property, in varying colors set to the beat of loud music; front lawns covered in holiday-colored props ranging from Santa and his sleigh to full-blown mockups of Santa’s workshop, complete with elves, toys, and other assorted characters; Santa portrayed as Elvis, the Grinch, a Hell’s Angel biker, an Oscar celebrity, and a robot; and gifts ranging from the simple plastic gift card all the way to cars, diamonds, fur, and plasma screen TVs that can’t fit through the front door!
2007: Not so much lunacy for trees and household décor (probably because of the writer’s strike), but the outside still got set to music via a computer software program, and one man even has his own Santa radio station that allowed you to hear his display music on your car radio. This year, there weren’t so many of these spectacles to observe—it seemed more older folks with smaller households were largely responsible for the music-timed extravaganzas, and not many younger families were involved this time. Instead of plasma TVs, the electronic must-have this year was the Nintendo Wii—it’s nice to see that even our electronic wants are finally getting smaller, with the popularity of navigation systems, all-in-one phones, and digital cameras.
2005/2006: It seems the shopping craziness this year has been detoured toward the decorating craziness, with neighbor outdoing neighbor, and whole blocks competing for attention—some even charging admission to see their displays. There was a mock-up of Hollywood and Oscar night, a mock-up of the North Pole, a mock-up of the Las Vegas strip, and a mock-up of the Trump Towers—all with Santa in the shot somewhere.
Has anyone stopped and though about the monumental amounts of energy wasted on such frivolousness, and for what? As time-consuming as it all was to build and put up, it all has to come right back down, and be stored somewhere…and then comes that dreaded electric bill.
2007: I guess the party went elsewhere—people this year tend to be more conscious of the energy bill, the energy waste, and the decadence. Some people did have the forethought to use LED lights and solar-and-battery-powered displays, but this will probably be a dying trend altogether. The ostentation, the overall cost, plus the maintenance will be too much for many of us. I’m sure the weather in the mid-west had a lot to do with it as well.
2005/2006: It’s getting to be as bad as the 4th of July fireworks each year—more and more, better and better. Where does it all end? When can we say we’ve had enough?
Unfortunately, someone found the cord and plugged the Christmas Machine back in—probably a Boomer with more dollars than sense.
Can anyone venture a guess as to how much it cost for one guy to have a separate power transformer box mounted in his yard just so he could put out his VERY ostentatious display each year? Someone actually did this, and the thought makes me sick.
2007: What can I say? No job = no money to be hideously ostentatious at holiday time. Bad weather may have been a contributing factor. The lack of imagination-whetting TV shows (due to the writer’s strike) may have been another factor.
2005/2006: As if the OUTSIDE lunacy wasn’t enough, we still carry on the lunacy INSIDE with trees decorated ala Martha, presents wrapped and decorated ala Martha, and tables draped and laden ala Martha, Rachel Ray, or the HGTV “Decorating for the Holidays” show. The “baby shower” origins have been twisted and disposed of completely in the name of retail free-for-all, in hopes that merchants can wring a little black ink out for the year.
What else makes me sick is the thought of miles of colorful wrapping paper, coupled with miles of ribbons and tape, all going into the trash—but not until they’re removed from presents under the tree. It’s true, and it’s pathetic, but then someone very wisely designed the reusable gift bag. Someday, more of us will catch onto the reusable GIFT.
Someday, the dumpster in my apartment complex won’t be overflowing with crumpled and torn gift wrap, discarded trees, and large intact boxes every December 25th. Someday, parents around here will catch on to the fact that newly-gotten toys break after a week of playing with them, or worse—sink to the bottom of the toy box, forgotten, in favor of the neighbor kid’s new Nintendo Wii (which will also succumb to rough-housing).
Recently, another type of problem cropped up: where to put the new kiddie bikes. These are small apartments with no extra storage space—obviously, someone didn’t do a whole lot of planning when it came to gifts and the kids. Now, kids leave bikes out in front of their buildings, running the risk of theft or confiscation. Everyone’s rental agreement says that “anything not landscaping- or building-related gets picked up and taken away.” This means THROWN AWAY in the dumpster and money wasted yet again.
2007: Now we’re wrapping presents with reusable scrap cloth and ribbon, reusable mylar sheets, and colored cellophane, not to mention boxes that are themselves decorative. Gift bags are still a mainstay for the reuse-it crowd, but ribbon and bows have come back to the make-it-yourself days of the 70’s. Maybe someday, little bags of 9-bean soup mix and bars of homemade soap will once again become suitable stocking stuffers (if they haven’t already).
I noticed a lot fewer shows on TV pushing over-the-top holiday festivities (thanks to the writer’s strike), and those that WERE pushing were advocating a saner and mellower holiday. Paper trash seems quite a bit less this year, and (so far) only one tree made it into the dumpster—this time, it was mostly cardboard boxes, box innards, and trash bags full of paper plates that once held Christmas dinner. Overflowing it was not. One family got a wide-screen TV.
Parents around here seemed to have gotten the message about appropriate toys for an apartment with no extra storage—no new bikes, skates, or scooters visible this year, and since the Wii is still under-produced for the demand, and toy recall warnings abound, I imagine a lot of kids got books, board games, portable electronics, and back-to-basics toys like Legos, Lincoln Logs, and Tinker Toys. Clothes and school items were probably the mainstays this time.
A few TV personalities’ gift advice this year was savings bonds instead of toys. I doubt anybody here made that choice.
2005/2006: Instead of carrying all this nonsense to higher and higher heights, shouldn’t we get back to the roots of the day by honoring and gifting local babies born on Christmas Day of each year? The money we spend (or throw away) now could go a long way in helping a newborn’s college fund, or insuring a new family’s good start in life—or even help out a soon-to-be-harried mother. This, I think, would be a more sensible way to honor the birth of Jesus (or anyone else) instead of the holiday insanity we have now.
Would Jesus (or anybody else) approve of this “paying it forward” plan? I think so, especially when compared to what we do NOW. So many people complain of not having enough, yet everyone seems to have enough to throw away (in so many ways) on this spectacle of a holiday. There are many such spectacles in our calendar.
2007: What a difference a year or two makes! Take away the money, and you take away the lunacy, or so it would seem. People are fearful about what the next year will bring, and dreading what this year may have already brought them. Along with the economic downturn, we are downturning as well—to more rational thinking and spending, and getting back to basics slowly but surely. It’s about time.
2005/2006: I’d like to propose a new way to celebrate “Christmas”: plant a tree, give a gift to a local newborn or its family, and have a buffet instead of a Martha-style feast. On second thought, we’d find ways to spin THAT way out of control too.
2007: More and more people are choosing not to observe the holidays (like I do), but it’s not for religious or anti-religious grounds—rather, it’s a silent protest of the unending commercialism escalation. Another way some people are choosing to protest is by giving back—volunteering in church kitchens, shelters, retirement homes, soup kitchens, and at recent disaster areas like New Orleans, Banda Ache, and others—some people even give blood as an alternative. A new trend: a small handful of families are escaping entirely by spending their holidays at resorts in countries that don’t celebrate Christmas.
I guess I’ll just go back to long-range observation. I can hardly wait to see what new boundaries New Year’s has to bring--then there’s Valentine’s Day, St. Patrick’s Day, Easter…the list goes on, and I’ll be watching. As it is, Halloween is shaping up to be the new Christmas as far as commercialism and spending lunacy goes.
Pray with me for another writer’s strike and bad weather for next year, so we can get back to the true meaning of Christmas.
Tuesday, December 25, 2007
For the Beginning Frugalite--Purchase or Investment?
From a reader: “Ohhhh! The marketers have been working overtime on a friend of mine. We were talking about something he had recently purchased, and he must have used the term investment no less than 10 times when he was considering his purchase.”
If something one purchases is designed to solely depreciate in value, it is not an investment! One is not "investing" but rather "consuming."
From my point of view, there are two criteria which must be met to call something an investment:
1. It has a chance of appreciating in value.
2. The owner is willing to sell, and there is a market with willing buyers (barring a market collapse).
This frame of mind goes along with the "you deserve it," or "you earned it." Maybe I have, but do I need it?
What other tricks do we use to fool us into justifying a purchase? For starters, we have a vocabulary problem when it comes to the words NEED and WANT. We also have a calculation problem when it comes to the word BARGAIN and TRUE COST. We also possess a perception problem when it comes to advertising, marketing, and just plain “being sold.”
The biggest problem we have today is with reading comprehension—especially when fine print is involved. Unfortunately, this doesn’t quite fall under the realm of purchase vs. investment.
You are absolutely right, my dear reader, when you say that an investment is not a solely depreciating asset. An investment should ideally make money FOR you, as it is intended, rather than do nothing but lose its monetary value through depreciation. Buying something that doesn’t increase in value, or ever will, is indeed standard, garden-variety consumption.
Sales people try to use this word as persuasion to get you to spend money on an item that really isn’t anything more than stuff. The word “investment” makes your purchase seem more valid—more important—and therefore, justifiable. This word is used to get you over the wall of resistance (and right into the frying pan of buyer remorse).
Next time you hear the word “investment” tacked onto the purchase persuasion of a common ordinary item, ask yourself if that item would ever make money FOR you one day by increasing value while in your possession. If not, then correct the person slinging that word around carelessly, then remind him or her that E-bay (or even yard sales) usually decides the final value for all things salable. Value guide books don’t exist for much else but vehicles and monetary instruments—everything else is decided by the highest bidder.
If something one purchases is designed to solely depreciate in value, it is not an investment! One is not "investing" but rather "consuming."
From my point of view, there are two criteria which must be met to call something an investment:
1. It has a chance of appreciating in value.
2. The owner is willing to sell, and there is a market with willing buyers (barring a market collapse).
This frame of mind goes along with the "you deserve it," or "you earned it." Maybe I have, but do I need it?
What other tricks do we use to fool us into justifying a purchase? For starters, we have a vocabulary problem when it comes to the words NEED and WANT. We also have a calculation problem when it comes to the word BARGAIN and TRUE COST. We also possess a perception problem when it comes to advertising, marketing, and just plain “being sold.”
The biggest problem we have today is with reading comprehension—especially when fine print is involved. Unfortunately, this doesn’t quite fall under the realm of purchase vs. investment.
You are absolutely right, my dear reader, when you say that an investment is not a solely depreciating asset. An investment should ideally make money FOR you, as it is intended, rather than do nothing but lose its monetary value through depreciation. Buying something that doesn’t increase in value, or ever will, is indeed standard, garden-variety consumption.
Sales people try to use this word as persuasion to get you to spend money on an item that really isn’t anything more than stuff. The word “investment” makes your purchase seem more valid—more important—and therefore, justifiable. This word is used to get you over the wall of resistance (and right into the frying pan of buyer remorse).
Next time you hear the word “investment” tacked onto the purchase persuasion of a common ordinary item, ask yourself if that item would ever make money FOR you one day by increasing value while in your possession. If not, then correct the person slinging that word around carelessly, then remind him or her that E-bay (or even yard sales) usually decides the final value for all things salable. Value guide books don’t exist for much else but vehicles and monetary instruments—everything else is decided by the highest bidder.
Monday, December 24, 2007
The Beginning Frugalite Coupon Primer
I’m writing this because so many younger people are experiencing their very first recession, and a lot of us have taken the basics for granted. Someone needs to start from the beginning, and explain as clearly as possible—this will be very important stuff to everyone in the near future. Here’s my contribution.
Coupons are nothing more than pieces of paper offered by manufacturers and stores for money off of a certain item. These represent tiny marketing and advertising gimmicks that try to persuade you to buy the item based on the promise of a discount at the register. Never mind the fact that you may not ordinarily use this product—it comes with a discount, and that should overrule any other common sense (as far as the marketing department sees it).
To make the most beneficial use of coupons, you have to have some understanding of baseball analogy, because this is the easiest way to explain it. If you understand the bases, you’ll get this too. The more bases you can use, the more effective your coupon use.
• First base—you find a coupon in the paper or junk mail, cut it out, and redeem it for the product. For most people, it ends here.
• Second base—you find a coupon, you notice an in-store sale, and combine the two at the same time (this is legal) on the same product. This results in bigger savings than just the coupon itself, and is known as a double-play.
• Third base—you have a coupon, see an in-store sale, and a buy-one-get-one-free (or a rebate) offered for the same item at the same time. Usually this combination will end up netting you the equivalent of free products after all is said and rung up. This is a triple-play.
• Home run—the planets align, the wind is from the east, and you have a coupon, an in-store sale, a buy-one-get-one-free product, AND a rebate. This rare but precious happening usually nets you a negative register receipt, meaning you’ve made more money for buying this particular item (after rebate) than you paid for it in the first place--it’s better than free.
Of course, do read the fine print on your coupons and store flyers--sometimes quantity limits are stated, and sometimes there's a cute little clause that states this offer cannot be combined with other offers. If that's the case. then you must honor the restrictions on the coupon/sale flyer.
As you can see, there are better, more effective ways to use those little paper advertising and marketing campaigns than what you’re doing now, and all it takes is a little more attention to what’s going on in your store and when—read those circulars and compare your list, your coupon stash, and your store ad, and look for ways you can make a play better than the regular first-base play.. Sure, it takes some organization and a little file-keeping, but you already have a coupon organizer, don’t you? How about a rebate organizer or a register receipt organizer?
Get started on your own year-round grocery baseball game today—or, you could do yourself one better by paying closer attention to the regular unit price of the item, the total discounted price after all sales/coupons/rebates, and the unit price of items that also do the same job. Chances are very good you can find a cheaper alternative right there on the shelf without all the paperwork hassles and quantity limits.
Coupons are nothing more than pieces of paper offered by manufacturers and stores for money off of a certain item. These represent tiny marketing and advertising gimmicks that try to persuade you to buy the item based on the promise of a discount at the register. Never mind the fact that you may not ordinarily use this product—it comes with a discount, and that should overrule any other common sense (as far as the marketing department sees it).
To make the most beneficial use of coupons, you have to have some understanding of baseball analogy, because this is the easiest way to explain it. If you understand the bases, you’ll get this too. The more bases you can use, the more effective your coupon use.
• First base—you find a coupon in the paper or junk mail, cut it out, and redeem it for the product. For most people, it ends here.
• Second base—you find a coupon, you notice an in-store sale, and combine the two at the same time (this is legal) on the same product. This results in bigger savings than just the coupon itself, and is known as a double-play.
• Third base—you have a coupon, see an in-store sale, and a buy-one-get-one-free (or a rebate) offered for the same item at the same time. Usually this combination will end up netting you the equivalent of free products after all is said and rung up. This is a triple-play.
• Home run—the planets align, the wind is from the east, and you have a coupon, an in-store sale, a buy-one-get-one-free product, AND a rebate. This rare but precious happening usually nets you a negative register receipt, meaning you’ve made more money for buying this particular item (after rebate) than you paid for it in the first place--it’s better than free.
Of course, do read the fine print on your coupons and store flyers--sometimes quantity limits are stated, and sometimes there's a cute little clause that states this offer cannot be combined with other offers. If that's the case. then you must honor the restrictions on the coupon/sale flyer.
As you can see, there are better, more effective ways to use those little paper advertising and marketing campaigns than what you’re doing now, and all it takes is a little more attention to what’s going on in your store and when—read those circulars and compare your list, your coupon stash, and your store ad, and look for ways you can make a play better than the regular first-base play.. Sure, it takes some organization and a little file-keeping, but you already have a coupon organizer, don’t you? How about a rebate organizer or a register receipt organizer?
Get started on your own year-round grocery baseball game today—or, you could do yourself one better by paying closer attention to the regular unit price of the item, the total discounted price after all sales/coupons/rebates, and the unit price of items that also do the same job. Chances are very good you can find a cheaper alternative right there on the shelf without all the paperwork hassles and quantity limits.
Sunday, December 23, 2007
Regarding Worldwide Food Inflation…
After much grumbling and hand-ringing on the Dollar Stretcher forums, I decided to write this article. I got tired of answering the same questions over and over again, and realize this may be the first recession some young frugalites have experienced. Yes, it’s true that there will be (if there isn’t already) global inflation—in food, building materials, fuel, and a host of other things. Let’s look at the sources.
1. The value of the dollar has dropped by about 1/3, and this means it will take more dollars to buy what we normally buy, on a local level as well as an international trade level. This is being allowed to happen by our Treasury and Federal Reserve to stimulate purchases from outside the country, propping up our sagging and wilting economy. Without this, we would already be in a recession…perhaps a depression right now. Business spending needs to occur, because that’s where the biggest dollars are coming into our economy—not in the grocery stores or electronics stores. We’re talking large earth-moving machines being ordered from China, and oil rig parts ordered from around the world compared to bread loaves and ground meat—see the monetary difference? Personal spending on your part doesn’t do much for the broader economy, nor the global economy. Think of this as our country’s products being on sale at 30% off to everyone but us.
2. Remember the law of supply and demand—when things are in short supply, or when demand spikes beyond supply’s capacity, the prices go up. This covers everything from oil to corn to cement to finding a decent roofer. It also doesn’t just happen here in the U.S., but worldwide. At this particular moment, we here are feeling the effects of ethanol on our economy in many ways: corn is being diverted from animal feed to fuel, because there isn’t enough domestic corn to handle both types of demand, and the price skyrocketed (causing corn growers to go where the money’s best, and that is fuel). Animal feed producers have tried to switch to other grains, but animals won’t eat just any old thing, and the prices of those grains have shot up as well—soy, rice, wheat, and others. This means the diversion of corn to fuel has affected your protein prices (turkey, chicken, beef, and pork feeds) and the end products of these animals (meat, eggs, milk products, lard, etc—and probably pork rinds and leather coats too). Since this also dragged the price of wheat up, your bread products are now being affected as well. I wouldn’t be surprised if tofu products are also higher in price, as soy prices skyrocketed too.
Let’s not forget the increased price of shipping foods around this country—higher gas prices for truckers have increased shipping costs, which are added into the retail price of those foods shipped. The further the item is shipped, the higher the added cost—item going from California to the East Coast or vice-versa cost the most, and this is why it pays to shop from local producers.
3. Politics and trade restrictions or tariffs will always get in the way—this is how we control whom we trade with and what we’re willing to trade. The corn/ethanol situation could’ve easily been solved if only Brazil was allowed to import its excess sugar ethanol to us, but no—the tariffs in place are so high as to squash that notion in the bud (yes, Virginia, we do have cane sugar industry protectionism going on in the Gulf Coast states, mainly Louisiana). For once, commodity farmers are getting their day in the sun, but it won’t last—a new Farm Bill is being hammered out in the Senate that will do away with much of the subsidies these farmers get now that the markets have taken off for their crops. As of right now, the only crops slated to lose their subsidies are cotton and rice, due to strong-arm lobbying by certain companies that comprise Big Farm—and this same protectionism and lobbying is largely what prevents us from importing cheaper food crops from other countries.
So what is a common ordinary citizen supposed to do about the things he/she cannot control in the food realm? Well, it boils down to these things:
• Use your price book to keep track of prices, so you aren’t caught unaware.
• Buy alternative products that satisfy your price and product needs just as well.
• Learn to stretch the life of the products you do buy.
• Learn to live without products that you otherwise cannot find affordable and acceptable substitutes for.
• Make your own products using affordable raw ingredients.
We cannot control the value of our dollar, the tariff system, trade policies of our country, or what’s happening in the rest of the world, but we can control what we do here at home—see the effects? We’re spending less, and our heavily consumer-dependent economy is swiftly shrinking as a result. Big business is working globally at breakneck speed to keep itself and the economy afloat. China seems to be our biggest buyer right now, and once they stop buying (which could happen after the Beijing Olympics), we’re likely going to be in the deepest economic water we’ve ever seen—probably worse than the depression of the 30’s. We’ll also have the first wave of boomers retiring in 2010, driving up Social Security taxes for the rest of us. These are also things we cannot control, so all we can do is what we can do (see list above). But what else can we do to prepare for this possibility?
1. Get out of debt and stay out of debt—have patience and learn to accept the word NO if you can’t afford something with cash.
2. Relocate to a cheaper cost-of-living location to preserve what money you still have coming in—so far, this would be Gulf Coast states and those bordering on the Mississippi River, but this may change later. If things get too bad, we may end up going back to riverboat commerce.
3. Haggle like crazy, knowing the value of something is only what the buyer attaches to it. You make the market value, not some arbitrary agent.
4. Avoid costly marketing and advertising pitfalls, including the ones on TV and on the side of the road.
5. Learn to reduce, reuse, recycle, swap, and scavenge—people throw away things with plenty of life left in them for lack of imagination.
6. Never buy anything new except food (items not home-grown) and supplements. I haven’t figured out how to buy used food yet in anything but compost form--if I do, I’ll let you know. So far, scratch-and-dent produce is as close as I can get. Don’t worry about organics—if we do go into a depression, nearly everything will become grass-fed/natural/free range, because commercial feed, pesticides, hormones, and additives will be too expensive for food growers and processors. Just think—we’ll all end up eating better as a result. How ironic is that?
Basically, you’ll have to be a black-belt frugalite. If you aren’t one already, you will be soon. You’ll have to be if you want to make it in this world, and you’ll have to teach your children so they can make it in the future, and they will have to teach their children, and so on down the family line. Let the politicians figure out the rest—after all, they’re the ones who got us INTO this mess!
1. The value of the dollar has dropped by about 1/3, and this means it will take more dollars to buy what we normally buy, on a local level as well as an international trade level. This is being allowed to happen by our Treasury and Federal Reserve to stimulate purchases from outside the country, propping up our sagging and wilting economy. Without this, we would already be in a recession…perhaps a depression right now. Business spending needs to occur, because that’s where the biggest dollars are coming into our economy—not in the grocery stores or electronics stores. We’re talking large earth-moving machines being ordered from China, and oil rig parts ordered from around the world compared to bread loaves and ground meat—see the monetary difference? Personal spending on your part doesn’t do much for the broader economy, nor the global economy. Think of this as our country’s products being on sale at 30% off to everyone but us.
2. Remember the law of supply and demand—when things are in short supply, or when demand spikes beyond supply’s capacity, the prices go up. This covers everything from oil to corn to cement to finding a decent roofer. It also doesn’t just happen here in the U.S., but worldwide. At this particular moment, we here are feeling the effects of ethanol on our economy in many ways: corn is being diverted from animal feed to fuel, because there isn’t enough domestic corn to handle both types of demand, and the price skyrocketed (causing corn growers to go where the money’s best, and that is fuel). Animal feed producers have tried to switch to other grains, but animals won’t eat just any old thing, and the prices of those grains have shot up as well—soy, rice, wheat, and others. This means the diversion of corn to fuel has affected your protein prices (turkey, chicken, beef, and pork feeds) and the end products of these animals (meat, eggs, milk products, lard, etc—and probably pork rinds and leather coats too). Since this also dragged the price of wheat up, your bread products are now being affected as well. I wouldn’t be surprised if tofu products are also higher in price, as soy prices skyrocketed too.
Let’s not forget the increased price of shipping foods around this country—higher gas prices for truckers have increased shipping costs, which are added into the retail price of those foods shipped. The further the item is shipped, the higher the added cost—item going from California to the East Coast or vice-versa cost the most, and this is why it pays to shop from local producers.
3. Politics and trade restrictions or tariffs will always get in the way—this is how we control whom we trade with and what we’re willing to trade. The corn/ethanol situation could’ve easily been solved if only Brazil was allowed to import its excess sugar ethanol to us, but no—the tariffs in place are so high as to squash that notion in the bud (yes, Virginia, we do have cane sugar industry protectionism going on in the Gulf Coast states, mainly Louisiana). For once, commodity farmers are getting their day in the sun, but it won’t last—a new Farm Bill is being hammered out in the Senate that will do away with much of the subsidies these farmers get now that the markets have taken off for their crops. As of right now, the only crops slated to lose their subsidies are cotton and rice, due to strong-arm lobbying by certain companies that comprise Big Farm—and this same protectionism and lobbying is largely what prevents us from importing cheaper food crops from other countries.
So what is a common ordinary citizen supposed to do about the things he/she cannot control in the food realm? Well, it boils down to these things:
• Use your price book to keep track of prices, so you aren’t caught unaware.
• Buy alternative products that satisfy your price and product needs just as well.
• Learn to stretch the life of the products you do buy.
• Learn to live without products that you otherwise cannot find affordable and acceptable substitutes for.
• Make your own products using affordable raw ingredients.
We cannot control the value of our dollar, the tariff system, trade policies of our country, or what’s happening in the rest of the world, but we can control what we do here at home—see the effects? We’re spending less, and our heavily consumer-dependent economy is swiftly shrinking as a result. Big business is working globally at breakneck speed to keep itself and the economy afloat. China seems to be our biggest buyer right now, and once they stop buying (which could happen after the Beijing Olympics), we’re likely going to be in the deepest economic water we’ve ever seen—probably worse than the depression of the 30’s. We’ll also have the first wave of boomers retiring in 2010, driving up Social Security taxes for the rest of us. These are also things we cannot control, so all we can do is what we can do (see list above). But what else can we do to prepare for this possibility?
1. Get out of debt and stay out of debt—have patience and learn to accept the word NO if you can’t afford something with cash.
2. Relocate to a cheaper cost-of-living location to preserve what money you still have coming in—so far, this would be Gulf Coast states and those bordering on the Mississippi River, but this may change later. If things get too bad, we may end up going back to riverboat commerce.
3. Haggle like crazy, knowing the value of something is only what the buyer attaches to it. You make the market value, not some arbitrary agent.
4. Avoid costly marketing and advertising pitfalls, including the ones on TV and on the side of the road.
5. Learn to reduce, reuse, recycle, swap, and scavenge—people throw away things with plenty of life left in them for lack of imagination.
6. Never buy anything new except food (items not home-grown) and supplements. I haven’t figured out how to buy used food yet in anything but compost form--if I do, I’ll let you know. So far, scratch-and-dent produce is as close as I can get. Don’t worry about organics—if we do go into a depression, nearly everything will become grass-fed/natural/free range, because commercial feed, pesticides, hormones, and additives will be too expensive for food growers and processors. Just think—we’ll all end up eating better as a result. How ironic is that?
Basically, you’ll have to be a black-belt frugalite. If you aren’t one already, you will be soon. You’ll have to be if you want to make it in this world, and you’ll have to teach your children so they can make it in the future, and they will have to teach their children, and so on down the family line. Let the politicians figure out the rest—after all, they’re the ones who got us INTO this mess!
Saturday, December 22, 2007
Circling the Drain--Vindication of an Education/Jobs Prediction
Here's what I originally wrote back in 2005 about the future of higher education, jobs, and what may eventually become of our working class.
Now it has come home to roost in 2007, at least in part: U.S. News & World Report. Don't say I didn't warn you well in advance--I gave you a 2-year head start.
White collar jobs will continue to go to India, China, or robots/software, high-paying (and dependable) jobs in the service sector will go to illegal immigrants (who will have been made legal by politics), and the only so-called high-paying jobs left to us will be in politics, lobbying, and the military upper ranks--illegals will fill the rank and file (we always need more cannon fodder)so we may continue going to war for resources (oil, people, food, you name it). As we sit here, the market sector (Wall St.) is getting gutted from the inside out, brokers are being replaced by technology, and firms are bankrupting themselves trying to reach for more and more profits, no matter the risk level. Paying for college will become futile at best until a Democratic/Socialist congress comes along to finish the leveling job on the playing field, creating a whole new CETA jobs generation (this is what got the hippies out of the woods and off the streets back in the 70's).
Now it has come home to roost in 2007, at least in part: U.S. News & World Report. Don't say I didn't warn you well in advance--I gave you a 2-year head start.
White collar jobs will continue to go to India, China, or robots/software, high-paying (and dependable) jobs in the service sector will go to illegal immigrants (who will have been made legal by politics), and the only so-called high-paying jobs left to us will be in politics, lobbying, and the military upper ranks--illegals will fill the rank and file (we always need more cannon fodder)so we may continue going to war for resources (oil, people, food, you name it). As we sit here, the market sector (Wall St.) is getting gutted from the inside out, brokers are being replaced by technology, and firms are bankrupting themselves trying to reach for more and more profits, no matter the risk level. Paying for college will become futile at best until a Democratic/Socialist congress comes along to finish the leveling job on the playing field, creating a whole new CETA jobs generation (this is what got the hippies out of the woods and off the streets back in the 70's).
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Food Absurdity of the Millenium
Pre-packaged, peeled hard-boiled eggs...they're free-range, of course. This rates right up there with frozen pre-cooked ground beef "crumbles" and individually wrapped peanut butter slices.
Thursday, December 13, 2007
Book Review: An Inconvenient Book
Written by Glenn Beck (yes, the guy from TV), and published by Threshold Editions, a subsidiary of Simon & Schuster, is a book filled with topics from his nightly TV show, but more in-depth.
Since he himself has A.D.D. and knows most Americans have short attention spans (that’s why they’re watching TV instead of reading books, right?), he spends about 15 minutes maximum on the topics of the day, unless he has a live interview—then, it could be 30 minutes all the way to the full hour. In his book, he spends what would amount to more than 15 minutes air time on each chosen subject, then throws in some stuff that didn’t seem to make it in the segment—or maybe I missed it (with MY short attention span).
His show is scheduled to run for an hour, but commercial time knocks that down to about 40 minutes—not enough time to spend on the multitude of topics he covers in the depth and detail he’s capable of, hence, the book. Think of both the TV show and the book as the Reader’s Digest version of crap we didn’t know about until now.
If you aren’t familiar with Glenn from TV, then I highly advice and recommend you get his book. Even if you DO watch his show, get the book anyway—he’s a thinker, and I like thinkers. Toward the end of his book, he admits to “taking a ride on the Paranoia Express” when he writes about the SPP/NAFTA-plus issue, but sometimes the Paranoia Express is the fastest, surest way to get from Point A to Point B for us geniuses. It’s only paranoia to those who don’t want to hear it, or those who aren’t ready to hear it until it becomes a crisis—then, they want it solved without any kind of personal involvement.
This book is written and laid out in the style of Jon Stewart’s tome—the book you wished you had in high school—only from a conservative point of view. Some of the topics he discusses in the book are: illegal immigration, global warming, media bias, the U.N., minimum wage, parenting, political correctness, radical Islam, body image, child molesters, and opinion polls. Not only does he talk about the problems with each, he also discusses the solution to each (and sometimes the problem’s origin, which can be a real hoot).
If you are anything like me and in search of what the liberal media, big government, and big business are carefully screening out of the news and public eye, trust Glenn to grab a shovel and start digging for the facts—then bring them to full light, courtesy of the Headline News channel. I’m just mad that he only gets an hour time slot, while Wolf Blitzer gets 3 hours to repeat his crap over and over. I am glad, though, that Glenn comes on TV at the same time as Lou Dobbs—it’s almost like a political match-up for ratings: Conservative Glenn vs. Liberal Lou. I wonder who’s winning the rating war at THAT hour!
This so-called “inconvenient book” has never been more convenient in today’s world, and sometimes facts can be rather inconvenient themselves—especially when they reveal certain people trying like hell to steer a society over a canyon edge or into a brick wall.
Glenn—is there any way to purchase a lifetime pass on your Paranoia Express? Like you, I like seeing over the horizon, and like knowing things ahead of everyone else, because then I can form strategies to defend against it (and the inept clowns who usually get picked to clean up the mess when it comes home to roost). Paranoia can sometimes be a forward-looking radar if used correctly.
Since he himself has A.D.D. and knows most Americans have short attention spans (that’s why they’re watching TV instead of reading books, right?), he spends about 15 minutes maximum on the topics of the day, unless he has a live interview—then, it could be 30 minutes all the way to the full hour. In his book, he spends what would amount to more than 15 minutes air time on each chosen subject, then throws in some stuff that didn’t seem to make it in the segment—or maybe I missed it (with MY short attention span).
His show is scheduled to run for an hour, but commercial time knocks that down to about 40 minutes—not enough time to spend on the multitude of topics he covers in the depth and detail he’s capable of, hence, the book. Think of both the TV show and the book as the Reader’s Digest version of crap we didn’t know about until now.
If you aren’t familiar with Glenn from TV, then I highly advice and recommend you get his book. Even if you DO watch his show, get the book anyway—he’s a thinker, and I like thinkers. Toward the end of his book, he admits to “taking a ride on the Paranoia Express” when he writes about the SPP/NAFTA-plus issue, but sometimes the Paranoia Express is the fastest, surest way to get from Point A to Point B for us geniuses. It’s only paranoia to those who don’t want to hear it, or those who aren’t ready to hear it until it becomes a crisis—then, they want it solved without any kind of personal involvement.
This book is written and laid out in the style of Jon Stewart’s tome—the book you wished you had in high school—only from a conservative point of view. Some of the topics he discusses in the book are: illegal immigration, global warming, media bias, the U.N., minimum wage, parenting, political correctness, radical Islam, body image, child molesters, and opinion polls. Not only does he talk about the problems with each, he also discusses the solution to each (and sometimes the problem’s origin, which can be a real hoot).
If you are anything like me and in search of what the liberal media, big government, and big business are carefully screening out of the news and public eye, trust Glenn to grab a shovel and start digging for the facts—then bring them to full light, courtesy of the Headline News channel. I’m just mad that he only gets an hour time slot, while Wolf Blitzer gets 3 hours to repeat his crap over and over. I am glad, though, that Glenn comes on TV at the same time as Lou Dobbs—it’s almost like a political match-up for ratings: Conservative Glenn vs. Liberal Lou. I wonder who’s winning the rating war at THAT hour!
This so-called “inconvenient book” has never been more convenient in today’s world, and sometimes facts can be rather inconvenient themselves—especially when they reveal certain people trying like hell to steer a society over a canyon edge or into a brick wall.
Glenn—is there any way to purchase a lifetime pass on your Paranoia Express? Like you, I like seeing over the horizon, and like knowing things ahead of everyone else, because then I can form strategies to defend against it (and the inept clowns who usually get picked to clean up the mess when it comes home to roost). Paranoia can sometimes be a forward-looking radar if used correctly.
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Quick Book Review: It's Not About Rate--The Right Way to Get a Mortgage
If you've bought a house successfully before, or have adequate knowledge to do so without the wheels coming off your finances, this book is NOT for you.
I bought this book (more like a booklet) looking for some new strategy or product that would benefit me beyond what was already being offered--this book did not contain one. Instead, it's a primer on mortgages, explains them in detail, and the ramifications of each type of mortgage and how it affects you. It also enlarges the fine print on a lot of those documents we're all forced to sign at closing.
I made a huge mistake with this one, so I'm donating it to my library--I'm sure the thousands of people who lost their homes (or are about to) can make use of it more than I can.
This is what happens when the book's contents (or at least the table of contents) aren't available on Amazon for me to peruse before buying.
I bought this book (more like a booklet) looking for some new strategy or product that would benefit me beyond what was already being offered--this book did not contain one. Instead, it's a primer on mortgages, explains them in detail, and the ramifications of each type of mortgage and how it affects you. It also enlarges the fine print on a lot of those documents we're all forced to sign at closing.
I made a huge mistake with this one, so I'm donating it to my library--I'm sure the thousands of people who lost their homes (or are about to) can make use of it more than I can.
This is what happens when the book's contents (or at least the table of contents) aren't available on Amazon for me to peruse before buying.
Friday, December 07, 2007
Celebrities Spinning Their Wheels Once Again
I wrote three times in the past about the futility of celebrities getting involved in things outside the world of entertainment--exactly where they DON'T belong!
Now, instead of Angelina wailing about Darfur and adopting babies like there's no tomorrow, we have Brad trying single-handedly to rebuild a part of New Orleans that's been declared a flood zone. He's also set on doing it with "green" houses--none of which anybody who evacuated will be able to afford, let alone get flood insurance for.
But the whole project does four things for Brad:
1. It makes him feel better.
2. It gets his name and face in front of a camera.
3. He gets time away from Angelina and the small horde of kids waiting at home.
4. It occupies him during the writer's strike--without scripts, these idiot actors have nothing to do with themselves, so they may as well plague the rest of us with their displays of useless do-gooding.
I bet Brad has a movie coming out next month, and he's trying to launch his own P.R. rocket well before the movie is scheduled for release.
There's a couple of reasons why the Lower 9th Ward never got rebuilt--rezoning and corruption--neither of which the almighty Brad and his star power can overcome. When the next Category 5 hurricane hits New Orleans, both Brad and those "green" houses will be long gone, never to reappear. Residents of the Lower 9th Ward will have lost out AGAIN!
As we witnessed with Angelina, Bono, George Clooney, and a whole host of others, there will be no follow-through on this project--once they've gotten what they came for, they're gone to the next "cause." Hell, there hasn't been any follow-through from Reverend Al Gore either, come to think about it!
You may as well give up and pack out now, Brad--we all know what you're really there for.
Now, instead of Angelina wailing about Darfur and adopting babies like there's no tomorrow, we have Brad trying single-handedly to rebuild a part of New Orleans that's been declared a flood zone. He's also set on doing it with "green" houses--none of which anybody who evacuated will be able to afford, let alone get flood insurance for.
But the whole project does four things for Brad:
1. It makes him feel better.
2. It gets his name and face in front of a camera.
3. He gets time away from Angelina and the small horde of kids waiting at home.
4. It occupies him during the writer's strike--without scripts, these idiot actors have nothing to do with themselves, so they may as well plague the rest of us with their displays of useless do-gooding.
I bet Brad has a movie coming out next month, and he's trying to launch his own P.R. rocket well before the movie is scheduled for release.
There's a couple of reasons why the Lower 9th Ward never got rebuilt--rezoning and corruption--neither of which the almighty Brad and his star power can overcome. When the next Category 5 hurricane hits New Orleans, both Brad and those "green" houses will be long gone, never to reappear. Residents of the Lower 9th Ward will have lost out AGAIN!
As we witnessed with Angelina, Bono, George Clooney, and a whole host of others, there will be no follow-through on this project--once they've gotten what they came for, they're gone to the next "cause." Hell, there hasn't been any follow-through from Reverend Al Gore either, come to think about it!
You may as well give up and pack out now, Brad--we all know what you're really there for.
Thursday, December 06, 2007
Grocery Cheat Sheet
From Yahoo News opinion page. While we await the much-anticipated NNR scores for food, another scoring method has finally been made consumer-friendly in the form of newly-created OQNI scores, or Overall Quality Nutrition Index.
I'll bet money that the OQNI scores are very similar if not identical to NNR scores, and the NNR site gives you more information that's usable NOW. Or, if you'd rather, you can use/stick to the Wenchypoo Magic 8 list: berries (blue-, straw-, and black-), plums, navel oranges, broccoli, carrots, and red peppers, along with cuts of lean meats and dark salad greens (kale, spinach, chard, collards, and romaine) until more info becomes available.
I'll bet money that the OQNI scores are very similar if not identical to NNR scores, and the NNR site gives you more information that's usable NOW. Or, if you'd rather, you can use/stick to the Wenchypoo Magic 8 list: berries (blue-, straw-, and black-), plums, navel oranges, broccoli, carrots, and red peppers, along with cuts of lean meats and dark salad greens (kale, spinach, chard, collards, and romaine) until more info becomes available.
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