Living for today - Planning for Tomorrow
The time has finally come. Our little girl is growing up and is entering kindergarten this Sept. While I am feeling many emotions ranging from fear of the unknown to happiness that my daughter is growing up, I also feel a bit of excitement that we’ll be seeing a very large expense reduced. For the last couple years we have been paying over $800 per
We all know someone that doesn’t save a dime. Maybe that’s you? The reasons people cite for putting off saving are many. There is only one problem with all of these reasons. No matter how good your reason is, your future self won’t accept it. The best reason in the world won’t help you pay your bills when you are older. That really good reason
Over the last year I’ve been involved in a community decision to upgrade a shared water system in our neighborhood out at the lake. I had absolutely no idea what kind of high stakes drama I would be involved with when we made the decision to build our place out there. In the last year I’ve seen grown men and women so angry that you’d
Wow. July is finally upon us. For months now, we’ve been making plans for various exciting events this month. For starters, it’s our daughter’s 5th birthday this month. Instead of spending a ton of money on a huge party, we have decided to take a little bit more reserved approach. We have invited just a couple of our daughter’s friends and their families out to
With the price of everything going up, I’ve been very conscious of our energy use both in our cars, and in our home. I’ve always been one of those people that turns lights off anywhere that they aren’t necessary. We have been very good about only using lights in the rooms that we are in over the years. Having a five year old running around
For the last couple of years I’ve been thinking about when our furnace would finally quit. The way my luck goes, it will die in the middle of winter so I decided to shop for a furnace during the slower months for heating companies. I was able to work with two neighbors to pool our business together. We had a few hvac companies come out
Gas prices suck. For many people, who have built their lives around long distance travel and large vehicles, gas prices really suck. I’ve been reading lots of articles about people who travel 120+ miles round trip to their jobs every day. Ouch. Most of those people aren’t driving hybrids either. I’m sure just about everyone has made their way to the Internet looking for ways
A friend of mine sent me his horoscope today. It reads: Wow. I haven’t seen a horoscope so directed at consumerism before. I think the horoscope gods should consider rotating this horoscope each month. You can’t tell me that Taurus’ are the only ones that need to hear this message.
About 6 months or so ago my neighbor told me that he wanted to get rid of a weight set that was taking up space in his garage. He had purchased this about 9 months before that and had probably paid in the neighborhood of $600-700 for everything. I asked him how much he wanted for it and he said, "Oh, just give me $200
Something that has always interested me is people’s connection to "stuff". Don’t get me wrong. I have the same issues as everyone else. If I’ve paid money for something, I feel a strange obligation to keep it for as long as I’m breathing. Lately I’ve really been trying to call myself to the carpet when I think I need to keep something indefinitely. What I
