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Black Friday Mayhem
On Friday, I pepper-sprayed a small crowd of people so I could get a cheap XBox 360.
Well, I didn’t, but some woman in Los Angeles can truthfully say that today.
On Friday, I slept in a bit, had some breakfast, and played with my kids. I only shopped at stored whose name ended in “.com”, and didn’t do much of that.
My wife, on the other hand, couldn’t resist the siren call of the sales. Not that I fought it.
We’ve been planning to replace an old, failing TV for a while. Friday turned into a good day to pick up a high-definition, widescreen(not a big screen) TV. The paper said that sale started at 10PM, so my wife got there early enough to get in line and find out the sale actually started at midnight. She and my brother took turns standing in line while the other shopped.
In my mind, shopping major sales early in the morning with 5000 people who wish they’d have thought of bringing pepper spray is just an example of Hell beta-testing a new level of pain.
At one store, she said the customers were elbowing each other out of the way to get some scrapbooking gadget hanging on a display, so my wife ducked down to grab the extras off of the bottom shelf, reaching between people’s legs to do so. Certainly smarter than the competition, but still nuts.
She left the house at 9, shopped until about 2, came home to sleep for a couple of hours, then went out to hit the 5AM sales for round 2. She left with a budget of a few hundred dollars to pick up our new TV, finish our Christmas shopping, a bunch of scrapbooking stuff, and a new winter jacket for one of our brats.
12 hours and $830 later, she was done.
That was just under twice our budget.
That’s like going out for cocktails and waking up in the bathroom of a Tijuana cathouse, covered in ice, with a new social disease and no kidneys. Sure, you probably had a good time, but was it worth it?
Thankfully, we are at a place where this money is coming out of our debt snowball, not accumulating more debt.
Unfortunately, this is going to cost us a month of our debt repayment plan.
Black Friday just isn’t worth it. Yes, you can find some huge deals, but you’ve got to fight rude crowds and the risk of buying more than you intended is very real. Next year, it’s not going to happen at our house. If my wife insists, she’ll do the shopping with cash. We can’t afford to do it this way again.
How did your Black Friday go?
Saturday Roundup
- Image via Wikipedia
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Day 18 of the 30 Day Compact. We’re doing well, but not perfect. My cousin is getting married next week, and I’m not going to buy used for that. That makes it 1 purchase so far this month, not counting food or consumable hygiene items. That’s not too bad!
The Best Posts of the Week:
Yahoo put 1000 computers to work for 23 days and found that the 2 quadrillionth digit of pi is 0. Just for the geek of it.
If you are habitually late, you are rude and selfish. Don’t leave other people waiting for you.
Just letting my inner survivalist out for a minute: Always watch what’s going on around you and don’t put yourself in a situation that makes you an easy victim. I strongly recommend a “Refuse to Be a Victim” class for everyone, especially–to let out my inner chauvanist–women.
For Halloween this year, I think I’m going to go as sexy Big Bird.
And finally, how much of your weekly 168 hours are you wasting?
Finally, a list of the carnivals I’ve participated in:
Nada. I forgot to submit any posts to any carnivals last week. I’m a sad clown.
Does Money Make Miley Cyrus Act Crazy?
If you’re like millions of people who saw Miley Cyrus’s performance at the MTV Video Music Awards recently, you’ve probably wondered what the effect of massive success on the music and acting star. Cyrus seems to be
doing everything possible to remake her image in the exact opposite of her squeaky clean mold that Disney and other companies have created for her over the last several years. (A rumor has it that Disney even created a contractual obligation for Cyrus to maintain a certain haircut during her “Hannah Montana” television show.) There’s a sense of someone taking on their first sense of independence, and running with it — the star seemed to be sending the message to the audience that she was not going to live according to the expectations of others anymore, and from the look of it, they got that message loud and clear.
The horrified looks of Rihanna, Drake, and Will Smith aside, the real question people had is whether the massive financial rewards of Cyrus’ singing career can explain her crazy behavior. Cyrus is said to be worth about $100,000,000 — certainly a fortune by any standards. And since she is still struggling with the problems of young adulthood — forming an identity, understanding her values and taking a place in society, it’s very likely that her finances contribute to at least some of her behavior.This effect of money can come from many different areas of life. For one, many people who become wealthy at a young age are suddenly struck with the fact that they have no need to work, but who often want to develop a career and contribute to society. Take Steve Jobs for example, who at 31 years old was fired from Apple Inc. by the company’s board of directors. Jobs had in fact started the company himself, and was worth well over a hundred million dollars by that time. And yet, feeling like contributing to society was more important to his life than resting on his laurels, Jobs started a new company, NeXT, where he hoped to contribute inexpensive computers to universities.
The fact that Cyrus is barely into her 20s should tell you something about how much time she has to develop her career. She has enough to retire at an age when most people are just starting their first real job. And that is a tough position to be in. If she is hoping to push her singing and acting career well into adulthood — as most artists would like to — it may be that she is trying to make her mark now. Think of it a bit like Bob Dylan in 1964, releasing electric music for the first time, when before that point he was primarily known as a folk singer making gentle acoustic music.
Dylan’s idea may have been a bit like what Cyrus’ is. That is to say, maybe Miley Cyrus is trying to avoid becoming a has-been, a relic of the 2000’s who burned out playing inoffensive pop music. If this is the case, Cyrus may be able to shift her career into a different mode by showing herself to be an uncompromising artist. Remember that even the greats of the past — Frank Sinatra for example — were once viewed as essentially music for teenagers, and not serious artists. Sinatra even suffered career failure in his 20’s when his audience grew up and moved on to other things. But he came back to record success when he began allowing his music to mature and his ideas to gain focus. If Cyrus can pull such a move, she may not be remembered as a teeny-bopper, but as a serious artist.
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Payday Loans Suck
- Image by vonglee via Flickr
A few weeks ago, I was approached about placing ads on this site. I was excited when I read the email. It came from a real domain, didn’t involve any Nigerian princes or wire transfers for overpayments.
Over the course of the email conversation, it was determined that, for a fee, I would place some links in a few archived posts. It would just be links to improve search engine ranking, without being an eyesore for my current readers. I don’t have a problem with that. The intrusiveness is similar to Chitika ads, which are only visible to search traffic. It’s a nice way to advertise: monetization without alienation.
Then I saw the links. I was being offered money to promote payday loans.
Payday loans offer to loan you–for example–$100 for the low(snort) price of just $25. That’s not bad. Only 25%. I know some credit cards that aren’t that good. The catch is that the loan is due in full in 2 weeks. That gives it an APR(Annual Percentage Rate) of 650%. That’s not so good.
When you payback the loan, your paycheck is pre-spent by whatever you borrowed, plus the pound of flesh fee and you are that much more likely to need their services again, digging you even deeper.
It’s not like the target demographic is terribly affluent. These are people who not only can’t make ends meet, but also can’t acquire traditional credit. They are left paying this insulting fee.
I consider payday lending companies to be immoral, unethical and generally, more than a bit dishonest. These are the people who give decent, hardworking capitalists a bad name. I’d rather go to a mob loan shark. He’s at least honest about what he is.
They got shot down.
Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy making money. I also enjoy the money I make here.
But not at the expense of my soul or my integrity.
Missing Money
Last week, I checked my credit card account only to discover I was over budget by nearly $1000.
What.
The.
Heck?
It threw me into a bit of a panic. How could we possibly have spent an extra grand without knowing it?
We didn’t buy new furniture. We didn’t buy new computers. We didn’t buy a new car. We didn’t take any trips.
Oh, wait.
I did take a trip. I went to work headquarters for three days. That’s about a $500 mileage allowance, plus three days of restaurant meals.
I forgot to file my expense report.
That’s where my money went.
Somehow, in all of life’s wonderful hustle, I neglected to ask my company for the almost $1000 they owe me. That’s an oversight, for sure.
Luckily, we keep that much padding in our other accounts, so I don’t have to pay interest on that money, but still.
That’s my money and I forgot about it.
I’m so not happy with myself.
What’s worse, is that even though I figured out the problem last week, I still haven’t gotten that expense report filed.
It’s not procrastination, I swear. I’ve just been absentminded and keep forgetting to do it. Right now, I’ve got “EXPENSE REPORT” written on my whiteboard to remind me to file it.
Cuz I’m going to do it tomorrow.
