“Free” is one of my favorite four-letter words. There’s almost no other more powerful marketing word. (Except perhaps “you” because people love to have people pay attention to them.) Sadly, free isn’t free. Everything has a cost. There’s no such thing as a free lunch. It’s so very easy to be lured into doing someone … Read more
My daughter is eight. She still kind of listens to me and thinks that I actually know something. I know it will be all too quick before she thinks I’m extremely out of touch and don’t know which end of the wet paper bag to get out of. As children get older, though, they do … Read more
I was unaware of this until I read DollarVersity’s article that alerted me to a recent ruling against Visa and MasterCard which forces them to allow merchants to pass on credit card fees to their customers. The settlement was on the order of $6+ billion. The official site is here. Can a business charge a … Read more
Major appliances save a lot of effort. Even the hobbled energy-efficient ones are still better than nothing. It’s frustrating when things stop working, though. I know that we take our appliances for granted, and fixing appliances that aren’t working usually becomes a top priority very quickly. Water heaters, refrigerators, and freezers are way at the … Read more
Giving gifts to loved ones is one way that you can show how much you love them. Unfortunately, pesky things like “budget” and “fear of eventual personal bankruptcy” get in the way of buying exactly you’d like for them. Here are some tricks to getting reasonably-priced gifts for your loved ones. Buy off-peak. My wife … Read more
It’s a good idea to keep the skills you use for your job current. There are always new things to learn, and many of the skills you have now have an expiration date on them. Other skills, though, are broadly applicable to almost any career field. This means that they’re portable: you can take them … Read more
My wife and I had dental appointments this afternoon, and spent a bit of time afterwards doing some grocery shopping at Wegmans as long as we were in town. (Combining errands is one of the good ways to save money on gas.) We both love our food, so watching how much we eat out and … Read more
Mortgage rates have been in-the-basement low for quite a while. After the financial crisis and subsequent bailout of large banks in 2008 and 2009, the banks are sitting on a lot of underwater mortgages and are reluctant to repeat that mistake. They’re not lending to just anyone anymore. The is contributing to the fall in … Read more