H A P P Y B I R T
H D A Y!!!
Credit
Cards
I’ve
already covered how I feel about credit cards and credit card debt. You may recall in my first blog I talked
about how we pay off our credit card each month. And, in my second blog entry I challenged
readers to go without their plastic money for a week.
I’ve
had another opportunity to go without my credit card. Last weekend we received a call from our
credit union asking us to verify a number of recent purchases. Guess what?
There was one purchase we didn’t recognize... it was a $450+ purchase
made in California for building supplies…made at 7:30 in the morning. NOPE – wasn’t
us - and with that our credit card account was frozen. While I feel really good about the constant
vigilance of our credit card company to look for fraud, it makes me feel very
uneasy to see just how easy it is for folks to rip off someone else’s account.
*Note: Turns out that it wasn’t fraudulent activity
afterall….it was a bill we didn’t recognize, but in the end legitimate. Nonetheless, our old cards have been shredded
and we’re awaiting new ones.
Cost
Cutting and Coupons
Cost
cutting and coupons go hand-in-hand.
I’ll admit something; I’m excellent at cost cutting, but I’m not very
good at the coupon cutting. My mother
was a pro at coupon cutting. It was more
or less her other job. She’d spend hours
each week cutting coupons and organizing them by categories. Then when we went shopping she’d whip out her
coupon organizer (which wasn’t terribly organized) and find which commodity
went with each coupon. While it was
insanely time consuming (and kind of drove me batty), she was able to save
significant sums of money on our grocery bill.
I
think coupons can be extremely effective and I know many people who have saved
significant sums of money by using coupons on a regular basis. I want to share two websites for coupons. One website ranks the top ten coupon services
and the other website ranks the top 25 money saving coupon blogs. Click on the hyperlinks below for more information:
Carpooling/Commute
Options
Depending
on where you live, carpooling or other commute options can either be quite
practical, or downright difficult. I
live in the latter category. Carpooling
happens where I live, but it isn’t really incentivized or in any way built into
the infrastructure. When I lived in
Washington state, at the base of the Olympic peninsula, there were two things I
remember about carpooling. First, there were these state established carpool
parking areas, scattered about the region.
Next along the I-5 corridor, there were lanes especially designated for
carpooling. Carpooling was much more
practical, and as a result, used quite a bit.
Commute
options is as it sounds…an option or an alternative to the “normal” way of
transporting oneself. We do have a
“Commute Options” week where I live, but I feel like the participation rate
amongst community members isn’t that high.
The primary reason is that there just aren’t a lot of good alternatives
to driving one’s car. There is public
transportation, but it’s not very convenient, dial-a-ride service, taxi transportation
and there are those who are compelled to transporting oneself by personal steam
(i.e.,walk, run, bike, skate, scooter). By
and large, the vast majority of people drive their car, day in and day out.
I
just learned that the Oregon Department of Transportation sponsors a program
called “Drive Less Connect”. Who knew?
The things one learns when one starts to write a blog and enjoys sharing
resources with others! The huge bummer
about Drive Less Connect…is that it doesn’t serve the county I live in. Here are two links you might have interest in. The first is a short youtube video about this program and the second is the website.
Conserving
This
goes without saying. Conserving our
precious natural resources; conserving our commodities, conserving in general
is a fundamental principle in our golden living. What this means on a day-to-day level is
this: we consciously and conscientiously think about the things we buy, whether
it be food, clothing, electronics, household good, etc. We have a set of guiding principles, and then
once we buy, we use what we buy wisely.
At the end (if there is an endpoint), we might compost, donate or
re-purpose before we ever think about discarding.
CouchSurfing
I’ve
already talking quite a bit about CouchSurfing.
It is a fascinating social phenomenon.
Perhaps it’s not for everyone; but we really, really enjoy both being a
host and “surfers”. As hosts and as
surfers we don’t just willy-nilly take everyone who asks to stay with us and we
don’t just willy-nilly stay in any old place.
No, we try to be judicious and prudent and selective, not only for
reasons of personal security and safety, but because we want the interchange to
be interesting. Again, as I mentioned,
CouchSurfing is much more popular in non-USA countries and amongst the younger
generation. However, as US citizens that
don’t quite meet the criteria for “the younger generation”, we plan to continue
with our CouchSurfing experiences.
Creativity
Creativity
is essential for solving problems, especially ones that involve living on a
golden shoestring. It seems like there’s
never enough money to do that which we want, but there is….there really
is. One needs to be creative and think
differently than expected. How???
Buy
less
Buy
used
Don’t
buy (barter, share)
Walk
Use
a Bike (no matter your age!)
Carpool
Plant
a garden
Cook
at home
--------------------
You
guessed, it…after the “C’s”, comes “D”.
I think next week I’ll focus on debt related issues…and whatever else
comes to mind -- or whatever else you’d
like to discuss.
It's time for a
disclaimer:
I’m not a financial
planner, nor am I a business guru. What I am is a very practical person with
(as my mother always said) “a good head on her shoulders”. I have good common
sense and am old enough to trust my inner core and follow my instincts.
Great post! I really like to use mobile apps for couponing. That way I don't have to waste time cutting paper coupons. Here's a list:
ReplyDeletehttp://money.msn.com/saving-money-tips/post.aspx?post=4d9e00b7-308e-4b9b-b636-5a23bd998b65
Thanks so much for mobile app link.
DeleteBy the way, right after I published this blog entry I realized that I hadn't paid tribute to the fact that today is Father's Day. Happy Father's Day to all the dad/dad-type figures out there!