I was talking with my wife last night about getting a smartphone — yes, again — because, as I told my newsletter subscribers today, I may have found a reason that actually makes having a smartphone worth the money. As we were discussing the costs of said smartphones, our Y membership came up. We weren’t … Read more
This past week, my wife published a 430-plus page novel she had been working on in one way or another for the past twenty-two years. It’s quite the milestone, and we’re keenly interested and very excited in how things progress from here. For a time, though, I had resigned myself to the prospect that her … Read more
This Kiplinger feature on MSN has a number of good ways that we waste money. Slide 12 of this series (these aren’t my favorite ways of presenting things, but I see how it generates more ad impressions for MSN!) has the following suggestion: If you’re stashing your cash in a traditional savings account earning next … Read more
The final payments on my last Prosper.com notes have finally come in, and the total value of the notes I’ve invested in is now $0.00. And it’s going to stay that way. This isn’t Prosper’s fault. It’s mine. I’ll explain. I started investing in Prosper.com notes in June of 2006, as an experiment. This was … Read more
I discovered something last night. Maybe this is old news for you, but then again, maybe not. A little less than a year ago, sixteen states banned the sale of dishwasher detergents that contain more than 0.5% phosphorus. My state is one of those states. (For the record, the states are Illinois, Indiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, … Read more
Last weekend I was looking around in a couple of stores for some CD storage. The first store I went to I actually had to ask an employee where they were because it took me so long to find where they were. “Are CDs on the way out already?” I asked only half-jokingly. The next … Read more
Are you graduating from college with a great job waiting for you? If so, congratulations! Not all of your peers are so fortunate. I went straight to graduate school after college and was a “poor student” for quite a while: another six years after graduating from college. I quadrupled my salary when I left to … Read more
You may not be able to drive off from your wedding day in an Aston Martin or have a shot at the British throne. So what? Royalty does have its privileges, but many of the same luxuries that the new Duke and Duchess of Cambridge have at their disposal are surprisingly affordable. This is a … Read more