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The no-pants guide to spending, saving, and thriving in the real world.

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Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-06-12

Misc

A Look Back

Misc

Homemade Cthulhu, adapted from pattern in Cree...
Image via Wikipedia

I’m on vacation this week and thought it would be nice to post a look back at some of my early posts.    These posts are some of my favorites, but were written when there were only 3 or 4 of you paying attention.

Since I know you don’t want to miss anything, here are 5 of my favorite early posts, in no particular order:

1.  Cthulhu’s Guide to Finance.  I’m more than a bit of a horror geek.  Books, movies, or games; all keep me entertained.   Over the weekend, I taught my Mom how to play Zombie Fluxx and Gloom.   When Cthulhu approached me about writing a guest post, I couldn’t refuse.

2.  Birthday Parties Are Evil.  It’s hard to remember to be cheap when your little girl is asking for a bowling party.  It can run $200 to get a dozen kids an hour of bowling and a bit of pizza.

3.  No Brakes.   This is a post about why I had a hard time coming to grips with financial responsibility.

4.  4 Ways to Flog the Inner Impulse Shopper.   Who can’t love a BDSM-themed personal finance post?  Every blog needs a dominatrix mascot, right?

5.  Fighting Evil by Phone.  In which I share the method of convincing Big Nasty Telephone Company and their Contracted, Soulless Long Distance Provider to leave me the heck alone and stop demanding $800 they refused to admit was their mistake.

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Oklahoma Tornadoes

News

English: A radar image of a supercell thunders...
A radar image of a supercell thunderstorm, which was producing tornado that was passing through Moore, Oklahoma at the time of the image. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

My heart goes out to all of the victims of yesterday’s tornado in Moore, Oklahoma.

I couldn’t imagine hearing that my kids’ school was demolished around them.  Twenty or more dead children in any community is devastating.

On top of the sheer horror of dead children, the town is nearly wiped off of the map.  Will they rebuild or cut their losses?

I hope everyone in the town was well insured, but that’s never the case.  There will be many in the town that will have lost everything: their homes, their families, their jobs.   Family is irreplaceable, but so is your home, if you don’t have insurance.    To lose it all and not even have a place to mourn….

Have you checked your insurance policy to make sure you are covered in the event of whatever natural disaster is common in your area?

To help the victims, text REDCROSS to 90999 to make a $10 donation.  It’s the least you can do.

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Yakezie Challenge – I’m In

Misc

After watching the Yakezie Challenge progress for 6 months and reading the recap, I’ve decided to participate. Maybe I’m a jerk for waiting until I saw the value instead of immediately jumping in, but I hope not.

The goal for stage 1 was to get to Alexa rank 200,000.  I’m currently at 533,108.  Six months ago, I was at about 1.8 million, so I’ve improved quite a bit on my own, but I’ve still got a ways to go.

So, here I am.

”The

Avoiding the Downside of Saving

Finance, Life

Like all good silver linings, saving often comes with a storm cloud. Too often, people fall into the trap of forgetting to live while they are digging out of debt. Once you get into the habit of spending every spare cent to pay down debt, retirement, or a college fund, it gets easy to ignore the present in favor of the future. The downside–or potential downside–to saving, debt repayment, and frugality is a deferred life. Whether it’s deferred fun, deferred education, or deferred personal development, it can be detrimental to you and your relationships.

Changing Reality
Changing Reality

My wife and I have had this conversation. We’re in the groove on our debt repayment. We are making excellent progress right now. Since we’ve got it all automated, it leaves us time to plan, dream and consider our options. We’ve been looking at converting a hobby into a business venture. Doing so will involve a $1-2000 investment. If we can make it work, my wife will be able to quit her tolerable, comfortable, soul-sucking job within a couple of years. If we can’t, she will still have moved her hobby into an advanced–and more fun–level. That’s a win either way, but our initial reaction is to postpone. We already know we’ll have to postpone the purchases until we’ve saved for it, because we refuse debt in all forms. Our initial reaction has been to postpone saving, effectively deferring development with long-term potential to improve our lives until our debt is completely gone.

We’ve been discussing this, off and on, for months. We have finally decided to start saving, but only when we have money that is purely extra and we’ve tucked money into all of our other savings goals. It’s not a perfect solution, but it seems to be an acceptable compromise given our situation and values.

Regardless of your situation, it is important to remember not to defer your life while you tackle your debt or savings goals.

Update:  This post has been included in the Carnival of Personal Finance.

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-07-03

Misc