Archives for 2008

Here’s an article from the “What were you thinking”? department: http://cbs5.com/local/auto.loan.defaults.2.645976.html Vivian Snyder bought a $100,000 BMW convertible with only $2500 per month in disability income. Somehow her income got stated as $8600 per month so that she would qualify for the lease. She definitely bears most of the responsibility for putting her entire retirement savings in the pot as her down payment and also

I, like many other people in the US, got a new insurance card on January 1st. Back in the November/December time frame I had to choose a new health plan as my company continues to tweak their offerings to try to hold costs down. I moved to the plan that didn’t require any monthly payments and from what I could see seemed to be the

Ahhh. Life is good. You know how I’ve talked about my fetish for electronics? Well, there is really no way around it. I love gadgets. I wish I could buy every new gadget that comes out but we all know that isn’t possible or even remotely intelligent. So, why is life good? My company bought me a new cel phone. It’s a million times sexier

I think I’ve mentioned this in the past, but the first quarter of the year is one of my favorite times of year, simply for the financial benefits. In the first quarter of the year I get: -My annual bonus -My annual raise -Our tax return From a financial point of view, it’s usually pretty good. I found out today that everyone gets a bonus

Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ve undoubtedly heard about the proposed tax rebate that our fearless leaders in Washington have been working on. Is this really a good thing for our economy/country? Everything I’ve been reading says that the benefit is negotiable at best. I’ve read articles that say that many of the people receiving the rebates would simply save it. That doesn’t

I finally found one. A WII, that is. I’ve been wanting to buy a Nintendo WII for quite awhile but haven’t been able to find one. Today I went to a grand opening of a Fred Meyer store and got there just in time to get the last one. I hadn’t intended on going there but heard they were having a grand opening while I

http://thinksimplenow.com/clarity/the-simple-life What can I say? This article nails it. I think about this often. Instead of trying to always have the latest and greatest, I know I need to focus on appreciating what I do have. Once you acquire something, you then have to care and feed it. It takes up space, you want to protect it, you begin to put your valuable time towards

Last night my wife, daughter and I headed out to Costco to buy a queen size bed for the lake house. We didn’t do any comparison shopping to find the best deal on the bed because we previously needed a queen size bed (for the house) and found Costco to have the best price for the quality mattress they are selling. When we got there

It’s Saturday morning and I’m finding myself sitting in my home office relaxing. It has been so long since we’ve just taken a weekend at home to relax that I have to admit, it’s kind of nice. Normally, I’d already be out working on the lake house, but we are getting so close on that, I decided to just take it easy this weekend. The

Well, our lake house is nearly complete. I hope to get a final inspection in the next few weeks. This is exciting for a number of reasons. 1) We will finally get to use the place. We’ve been working on it for so long, it almost seems weird to actually sleep there. 2) We can finally stop spending so much money on the place. I’m