Wisdom from The Action Wisdom In Action

From Steadfast Finances. No, it wasn't me--but my parents did.

"During another weekend road trip to visit the family for Mother’s Day, I always make it a habit to drop in on Grandma and soak in a few hours worth of knowledge she’s accumulated over her near 75 years.

Gifts were exchanged, I overindulged in home cookin’, but in the end, I sat with a piece of paper scribbling notes on what it was like for her (and other family members) to live through the Great Depression.

I’m fortunate that I haven’t felt the effects of the recession, so I thought it would be interesting to get her point of view since she lived through one of the harshest periods of American history.

In the end, I wasn’t exactly surprised because I’ve heard many of these frugal living rules over and over again, but it’s finally nice to get them down on paper.

I hope you can learn as much from her wisdom as I have over the years.

1. Save a dollar for every dollar you spend. I’m a big believer in the Pay-As-You-Go rule, but if you allow more cash to go out of your door than goes under your mattress, you’re asking for trouble.

2. New doesn’t automatically mean better. New this and shiny that may get you a lot of attention and give you a feeling of importance, but new stuff usually costs more than old stuff. Slightly used, gently used, or just plain used will often to the job.

3. Be thankful for what you have. All of us have complained about eating leftovers when we didn’t want to or complained about eating the same thing three times a week, but there are quite a few people in this world that might not know where the next meal will come from. Just be thankful you have what you have … if you have it.

4. Learn how to fix/maintain what you have. Nothing can be more frustrating than having a piece of machinery, whether it be your car or your laptop, that you rely upon, paid good money for, and have to pay someone to repair it. Eliminating the need for the repairman will save you countless hours and dollars over the years.

5. Waste not, want not! If you’re discarding a substantial portion of what you bought (or made yourself), you’re essentially throwing money in the garbage can. Either cut back on what you’re making, or find ways to reuse it at a later date.

6. Make cheap food taste like a million bucks. I probably violate this suggestion most of all because I’m a wannabe chef, but during my college years, my food budget rarely exceeded $100 per month. Learning how to make good eats on the cheap will save you thousands per year if you can learn a few cooking basics.

7. Don’t pay for what you can do/make for yourself. It seems like an odd question to ask, but why would you pay someone to do something that you can do for yourself. I understand that we’re all super busy and we may not be an expert in everything that modern society pushes upon us, but thanks to the Internet (praise be Google!), you can find a DIY video for almost anything on your Honey Do List.

8. Preparation can keep you from being blown off course. Many times during your life you’ll face some type of adversity. The more prepared you are to handle it, the better off you’ll be at weathering the storm. As the old adage goes: you can’t control the wind, but you can adjust your sails!

9. Family time is fun time. I’m one of the least social members of my family, but nothing beats a classic game of Monopoly with the folks. This weekend happened to be catching up over baseball games on TV and lots of hanging out in the kitchen. Funny how positive social interactions work aren’t they?

10. Make your big purchases off season. One of my cardinal rules of shopping (which I loathe to do) is buy most of my winter clothing in April. This way, the retailers are desperate just to break even on their investment and clear the excess inventory to make way for Spring/Summer months. This works equally well when buying summer clothing in November.

11. Marry someone who complements your weak points. No this doesn’t mean someone who will say “good job” each time you do a good deed. Not that kind of compliment. In a complementary relationship, your strong suits will make up for your companion’s weaknesses and vice versa. In the end, the marriage is stronger than the two individuals!

12. Exchange time, skills or service as currency. If you know how to play the piano and your neighbors want their kid to learn to play piano, find something they have that you want.

13. Learn to preserve and store food. Even if you’re not into growing your own food, it never hurts to buy in bulk and keep it frozen for a few months.

14. Start a garden and pay yourself for growing your own food. Why pay a grocery store for food that you can grow yourself? Many people these days are under the false impression that gardening is too difficult to try and best left to the hippies and hillbillies. Hardly the case since Michelle Obama and started a victory garden on White House grounds.

15. Credit cards are the devil. If you tell my Grandma that you bought her Christmas present on credit, you better hope you got your fill of pumpkin pie prior to opening gifts. Chances are, she’ll cut you off and give you a 10 minute lecture from Proverbs. Most old school consumers won’t even think about buying something unless they pay in cash.

16. Patience is a virtue. Be patient, save your pennies, and wait until they turn to dollars. Paying cash is the only way to go. I admit, this doesn’t translate well to 2009, but if you can rely upon your debit card more than your credit card, you’re on the right path.

17. Work hard, and work often. My family wasn’t exactly the affluent type back in the day, so I’m glad to have some of that blue collar mentality rubbed off on me. I never really understood what it meant to say “I built that” or “I made that from scratch” when I was a kid, but I certainly learned what those phrases meant once I became a bit older.

18. At the end of the day, think how to make tomorrow a little better. This phrase is fairly common, but it’s been sitting on my grandfather’s antique desk for as long as I can remember. Probably longer than I’ve been alive. But to me, it’s a testament to how both of grandparents lived their lives. Over time, little improvements add up a lot quicker than you think.

19. Envy is still a sin. Even though I’m the blaspheming evolutionist of the family, it doesn’t mean I don’t pay attention to sound advice. Believe it or not, the Bible has really good tips on debt avoidance and the “debt is slavery” principle.

20. Speak convincingly and be a leader. We all know a hierarchy exists in most families, and if that happens to be you, don’t be afraid to voice your opinion. Even if you hurt a few feelings here and there, they’re family and they’ll eventually forgive you."

From Deal Breaker. Here's a glimpse of what's in store for 2011 and beyond.

"The most alarming thing about the state issue is the level of complacency,” Meredith Whitney told correspondent Steve Kroft on 60 Minutes. Whitney is warning about a financial meltdown in state and local governments. “It has tentacles as wide as anything I’ve seen. I think next to housing this is the single most important issue in the United States, and certainly the largest threat to the U.S. economy,” she told Kroft. Asked why people aren’t paying attention, Whitney said, “‘Cause they don’t pay attention until they have to.”…”The lack of transparency with the state disclosure is the worst I have ever seen,” Whitney said.

“Ultimately we have to use what’s publicly available data and a lot of it is as old as June 2008. So that’s before the financial collapse in the fall of 2008.” Whitney believes the states will find a way to honor their debts, but she’s afraid some local governments which depend on their state for a third of their revenues will get squeezed as the states are forced to tighten their belts. She’s convinced that some cities and counties will be unable to meet their obligations to municipal bond holders who financed their debt.

“There’s not a doubt in my mind that you will see a spate of municipal bond defaults,” Whitney predicted. Asked how many is a “spate,” Whitney said, “You could see 50 sizeable defaults. Fifty to 100 sizeable defaults. More. This will amount to hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of defaults."

Happy New Year. Would the last one out of California please turn out the lights?

Seriously--if you don't know the shape your state is in financially, then you're the one who's going to suffer most: higher taxes, higher fees, higher prices, less supply, less choice, fewer government services, and a social safety net full of gaping holes. If our federal and state governments keep dropping the fiscal ball, here's what you can do for yourself (besides move to a more responsible state).

Remember how I was always yelling about filling the pantry a year or two ago? This is why.

From the Huffington Post. Photo gallery--see link for more.

From CNN Money.

"The legislation provides for 13 more months to apply for extended jobless benefits, but not everyone who's unemployed will be eligible for these extended benefits.

In fact, residents in at least five states won't have access to the same level of unemployment benefits as their peers nationwide.

That's because the unemployment rate in those states is improving, so, according to federal law, the jobless there can't receive checks for as long as those in harder-hit states."

Surprise! The 99-weekers are done. I mentioned this stuff when the legislation first passed a week ago. CNN is just now getting this picture?

"Here's how the system works: The jobless collect up to 26 weeks of state benefits before shifting to the extended federal program. Federal benefits consist of up to 53 weeks of emergency compensation, which is divided into four tiers, and up to another 20 weeks of extended benefits. The maximum is 99 weeks.

But not everyone can collect benefits for that long. Extended benefits, as well as the last two tiers of emergency compensation, are tied to state unemployment rates. So as their state job picture brightens, the jobless stop qualifying for long-term benefits.

To be eligible for the fourth tier of emergency benefits, which last up to six weeks, the average state's unemployment rate must be above 8.5% for three months. Similarly, states lose their eligibility for the third tier of benefits, which last up to 13 weeks, if their rate falls below 6%. Extended benefits have a more complicated formula tied to different gauges of unemployment."

Either they find work, or they accept the new reality--frugality and a one-income family.

"Those in the midst of a tier can continue to collect benefits until they exhaust that tier, but they cannot advance to the next level. This does not sit well with those who cannot find a job."

...

"Those that had opposed continuing benefits say another extension would be too expensive and would dissuade people from finding jobs.

Advocates argue that the safety net has always existed during periods of high national unemployment. The Obama administration echoes their position, saying that people will naturally fall off the rolls as state unemployment rates improve."

Poverty should be uncomfortable--Ben Franklin. Why should it be uncomfortable? To encourage you to work hard to get out and stay out of it--it should be something you avoid, not embrace! These people have already had a nearly two-year paid vacation--how much more do they want?

From the Wall St. Journal.

"Few devices know more personal details about people than the smartphones in their pockets: phone numbers, current location, often the owner's real name—even a unique ID number that can never be changed or turned off.

These phones don't keep secrets. They are sharing this personal data widely and regularly, a Wall Street Journal investigation has found.

An examination of 101 popular smartphone "apps"—games and other software applications for iPhone and Android phones—showed that 56 transmitted the phone's unique device ID to other companies without users' awareness or consent. Forty-seven apps transmitted the phone's location in some way. Five sent age, gender and other personal details to outsiders.

The findings reveal the intrusive effort by online-tracking companies to gather personal data about people in order to flesh out detailed dossiers on them."

Got no job? Blame Facebook, your smart phone, and all your other social outlets, as well as your credit record. Big Brother is watching you in every way except standing right in front of you. Employers and insurers are buying these dossiers from marketers to background-check you out before offering you a job or policy. Your social life may be what's killing you.

"In the world of mobile, there is no anonymity," says Michael Becker of the Mobile Marketing Association, an industry trade group. A cellphone is "always with us. It's always on."

...

"One iPhone app, Pumpkin Maker (a pumpkin-carving game), transmits location to an ad network without asking permission. Apple declines to comment on whether the app violated its rules.

Smartphone users are all but powerless to limit the tracking. With few exceptions, app users can't "opt out" of phone tracking, as is possible, in limited form, on regular computers. On computers it is also possible to block or delete "cookies," which are tiny tracking files. These techniques generally don't work on cellphone apps."

...

"Many apps don't offer even a basic form of consumer protection: written privacy policies. Forty-five of the 101 apps didn't provide privacy policies on their websites or inside the apps at the time of testing. Neither Apple nor Google requires app privacy policies.

To expose the information being shared by smartphone apps, the Journal designed a system to intercept and record the data they transmit, then decoded the data stream. The research covered 50 iPhone apps and 50 on phones using Google's Android operating system.

The Journal also tested its own iPhone app; it didn't send information to outsiders. The Journal doesn't have an Android phone app.

Among all apps tested, the most widely shared detail was the unique ID number assigned to every phone. It is effectively a "supercookie," says Vishal Gurbuxani, co-founder of Mobclix Inc., an exchange for mobile advertisers.

On iPhones, this number is the "UDID," or Unique Device Identifier. Android IDs go by other names. These IDs are set by phone makers, carriers or makers of the operating system, and typically can't be blocked or deleted.

"The great thing about mobile is you can't clear a UDID like you can a cookie," says Meghan O'Holleran of Traffic Marketplace, an Internet ad network that is expanding into mobile apps. "That's how we track everything."

Now you see that smart phone really wasn't such a smart purchase after all. To top it off, most of the electronic manufacturers and service providers are defense contractors, which means they get money from Uncle Sam...to do his bidding, which is entailed in the Patriot Act.

"Neither Apple nor Google requires apps to ask permission to access some forms of the device ID, or to send it to outsiders. When smartphone users let an app see their location, apps generally don't disclose if they will pass the location to ad companies.

Lack of standard practices means different companies treat the same information differently. For example, Apple says that, internally, it treats the iPhone's UDID as "personally identifiable information." That's because, Apple says, it can be combined with other personal details about people—such as names or email addresses—that Apple has via the App Store or its iTunes music services. By contrast, Google and most app makers don't consider device IDs to be identifying information.

A growing industry is assembling this data into profiles of cellphone users. Mobclix, the ad exchange, matches more than 25 ad networks with some 15,000 apps seeking advertisers. The Palo Alto, Calif., company collects phone IDs, encodes them (to obscure the number), and assigns them to interest categories based on what apps people download and how much time they spend using an app, among other factors.

By tracking a phone's location, Mobclix also makes a "best guess" of where a person lives, says Mr. Gurbuxani, the Mobclix executive. Mobclix then matches that location with spending and demographic data from Nielsen Co.

In roughly a quarter-second, Mobclix can place a user in one of 150 "segments" it offers to advertisers, from "green enthusiasts" to "soccer moms." For example, "die hard gamers" are 15-to-25-year-old males with more than 20 apps on their phones who use an app for more than 20 minutes at a time.

Mobclix says its system is powerful, but that its categories are broad enough to not identify individuals. "It's about how you track people better," Mr. Gurbuxani says."

...

"Other apps transmitted more data. The Android app for social-network site MySpace sent age and gender, along with a device ID, to Millennial Media, a big ad network.

In its software-kit instructions, Millennial Media lists 11 types of information about people that developers may transmit to "help Millennial provide more relevant ads." They include age, gender, income, ethnicity, sexual orientation and political views. In a re-test with a more complete profile, MySpace also sent a user's income, ethnicity and parental status."

More M-A-R-K-E-T-I-N-G and less privacy. You privacy really does depend on you and what you do with it. the only difference between us and Britain is Britain has the guts to show their cameras in plain sight on every street corner.

A suggestion: when you aren't actively using your phone for conversation, turn it off. The hidden GPS inside can't track you, and marketers can't find you. If a call or text comes in, it can go to voice mail and you can answer it later. Limit the time you use the phone to limit your exposure to date hunters (including the government).

"Apple has signaled that it has ideas for targeting people more closely. In a patent application filed this past May, Apple outlined a system for placing and pricing ads based on a person's "web history or search history" and "the contents of a media library." For example, home-improvement advertisers might pay more to reach a person who downloaded do-it-yourself TV shows, the document says.

The patent application also lists another possible way to target people with ads: the contents of a friend's media library.

How would Apple learn who a cellphone user's friends are, and what kinds of media they prefer? The patent says Apple could tap "known connections on one or more social-networking websites" or "publicly available information or private databases describing purchasing decisions, brand preferences," and other data. In September, Apple introduced a social-networking service within iTunes, called Ping, that lets users share music preferences with friends. Apple declined to comment.

Tech companies file patents on blue-sky concepts all the time, and it isn't clear whether Apple will follow through on these ideas. If it did, it would be an evolution for Chief Executive Steve Jobs, who has spoken out against intrusive tracking. At a tech conference in June, he complained about apps "that want to take a lot of your personal data and suck it up."

Everybody's making money off you but you...and me. I have no ads on this site.

From CNN Money.

"In the period between Thanksgiving and New Year's, American households generate 25% more waste. That's about 1 million extra tons of trash each year, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

That includes everything from food to wrapping paper, holiday decorations, packaging, and old cellphones and laptops that are unceremoniously dumped as soon as the latest models emerge from under the Christmas tree."

...

"Linda Gabor, vice president of marketing for Call2Recycle, which operates a free rechargeable battery and cell phone collection program in North America says that during this season of giving, people should also give some thought to the waste they create.

"After all the gifts are opened on Christmas, this is one last gift that people can give each other that doesn't require any ribbons or bows," said Gabor. "Cut down on trash, recycle and and properly dispose your garbage."

Despite the annual surge in waste during the holidays, Gabor and Berry are encouraged by the recent trends.

In 2008, Americans generated about 250 million tons of trash and recycled and composted 83 million tons of this material, at about a 33.2% percent recycling rate, according to the latest available data from the EPA."

...

"Here are a few simple ways to reduce your holiday waste:

* Christmas trees: Many people think they are helping the environment by not buying a real Christmas tree. Not true, said Berry. "There are 500,000 acres of farmland in North America dedicated to Christmas trees," she said. "When you buy a real tree, you are buying it from one of these farms and not from a national forest." Also, for every tree that's cut down, the farmer will plant three to four new trees. "So you are not contributing to deforestation," she said.

After Christmas, it's important to properly dispose of your tree. Tree recycling programs vary from state to state. The mulch from the recycled tree has many uses, Berry said. You can take it back to your house and use it in your backyard. It's also used in community pathways in parks and in playgrounds. Additionally, Christmas trees are being used on beachfronts as part of erosion protection measures.

* At parties: Lots of leftover food winds up in the trash. Instead, stock up on doggy bags and send leftovers home with the guests. Also, Berry suggests holiday party hosts set up a recycling bin right next to the trash bin to make it convenient for people to separate the garbage from the recycling.

* When gift wrapping: Most of us probably don't realize that the cute shiny wrapping paper is generally not recyclable. It contains dyes and other difficult-to-process additives. Eco-friendly wrapping paper is a better option although it is more expensive that regular wrapping paper, said Berry. Other common-sense tips -- bunch gifts together and use one sheet of wrapping paper. "Old maps or book pages are other creative solutions that don't look tacky," she said.

* When traveling: Many environmentally-conscious holiday travelers already participate in programs that let them use their air miles to offset their carbon footprint. But for those who don't participate, Berry has other tips. "We consume a lot of products en route, such as bottled water, soda, chips and we simply throw these away in the trash at the airport," she said. Some carriers have in-flight recycling programs. But if they don't, simply carry your trash with you and put it in a recycling bin at the airport, if there is one, or once you get home.

* Holiday lights: Always recycle your old Christmas lights. Berry said consumers can find several resources on how to do that through her company or by simply doing a little research."

Speaking of holiday trash, here's what I had to deal with back when I lived in an apartment: Post-Holiday Commentary 2005-2006-2007, Post-Holiday Commentary 2008, Post-Holiday Commentary 2009. Since I now live in a house, the post-holiday commentary will be restricted to my neighbor--other than that, I'm surrounded by retirees whose kids left the nest long ago. As it is, this neighbor regularly overflows her weekly trash (with only one kid), so I'm anxious to see what damage they can do over Christmas.

Back when we lived with the in-laws (eons ago), whatever didn't get saved for next year got burned in the fireplace--the wrapping paper made for some colorful flames.

Needless to say, the people I feel most sorry for over the holidays aren't the poor people, but the trash haulers and dump workers.

From the Indy Channel.com (Indiana)

"A cashier at the Marion Walmart has been arrested, accused of scamming customers out of store gift cards.

Alicia Bussard, 20, of Jonesboro, was arrested during her shift Wednesday night on a preliminary charge of theft.

Marion police said that on at least five occasions, Bussard told customers that they had used up the balance on their gift cards, when in fact, there was money remaining.

Bussard then used $36.33 from the cards, which ranged from 98 cents to $16.72, to buy items for herself."

Know your balance--better yet, use them up in one shot.

From the IU Newsroom (Indiana State University). Here's another way to look at protein sources...like roadkill, bugs, or dumpster food.

"Designed on one hand to examine food preferences, delicacies and taboos tied to some of the world's most unusual sources of sustenance, the first-ever offering of the course was also crafted to connect the simple acts of eating, no matter how unusual the product or preparation, with the supper table's intricate links to culture, identity, politics and economics, Atalay said.

"From Indiana to India, the course has sought to explore ways people are working to preserve their food cultures," she said. "In doing so, students also receive training in core anthropology concepts and basic research skills that are cornerstones of anthropological thought and practice."

The 18 teams, each consisting of five students, will present their research findings through explanatory posters, informative video segments and through discussions about their experiments. One such experiment, Atalay mentioned, was conducted by a "road kill" team that videotaped the process of finding, skinning and preparing their discovery.

"I thought the students would learn better from presenting their research in a public format, rather than in a standard paper, so the content of their presentations is aimed to be informative and cover all aspects of the bizarre food they have chosen," she said. "The themes range through historical, economic, cultural, even scandals and schemes related to the food. The class also focused a great deal on "heritage foods" and the way that globalization is changing and homogenizing what people eat, while in other cases it is responsible for introducing new foods where they've never been eaten."

IU's Mathers Museum is located at 416 N. Indiana Ave., and students in the class will be on hand from noon until 2 p.m. on Tuesday, Dec. 7, to discuss their projects. Entry to the museum and to the project discussion area is free."

Wow--it's a freebie entertainment option with a little global cultural lesson on what makes food all in one!

From Time.

"The quote, from a NY Times piece about cord cutters who are dropping cable TV, comes from the president of a company that expects to sell 500,000 digital antennas this year, up from 385,000 in 2009.

The obvious attraction of these antennas is that, once purchased, they bring totally free TV viewing into the household. That might seem miraculous to the average consumer, spending $2,000 a year on cable, Internet, and other services, but in ye olden times most people watched TV in their homes at no charge whatsoever.

With all the money the consumer is not spending on pay TV, he now has the freedom and some extra dollars to pick and choose to pay for other content he actually wants—not that just happens to be part of some bundle of channels decreed by a cable company. When you do the math, it's readily apparent that by dropping cable you can buy a lot of other content. If your monthly cable bill was $40, that's around $500 a year after taxes and fees. And that's $500 you might choose to spend (or save) in lots of different ways."

From MSN Money.

"China's boom may very well conceal an artificially inflated economy that falls back to Earth sooner or later. But whether you agree or disagree with its policies, China is becoming too influential to ignore -- and so are its consumers. Keep in mind, consumerism as we know it in the West is practically brand new in China. Yet that's why it's interesting to watch how the Chinese approach the kind of materialism that has clearly gotten the West into trouble."

...

"And, for now, most Chinese consumers are still uncorrupted by easy credit, must-have marketing and other double-edged attributes of affluent societies. While they have their own values and cultural touch points, Chinese consumers today are also similar to Americans in the 1950s and '60s: somewhat naïve and probably too trusting, yet buoyant, proud and fueled by optimism.

So how do they shop? Some Chinese habits are quite familiar. They research products on the Internet and pay a lot of attention to word-of-mouth recommendations. But they're also careful and deliberate about spending, which is why McKinsey says they're "among the world's most pragmatic consumers."

No Black Friday or Cyber Monday for them! I bet they don't have half the "holidays" we do--days designed by marketing departments like Hallmark and others just to get us to go out and buy something to celebrate with. I bet they don't have a Mother's Day, a Valentine's Day, a St. Patrick's Day, a Halloween, a President's Day, an Easter, a Labor Day (they could probably use one of those), a Secretary's Day, or any other greeting-card-fueled day that drives us to shop.

"Chinese consumers don't gorge on debt. China's financial system isn't yet geared to consumers, and credit is a lot harder to get than it is in the West. Yet even as it becomes available to higher-income consumers, they're not biting. "Consumers elsewhere tend to trade up as they get wealthier," according to the McKinsey report. "Some start relying on credit, often spending more than they can afford. Not in China. Consumers there remain very concerned about financial stability and spend within their means." It will be interesting to see if Chinese consumers retain that discipline as their nation gets wealthier. They seem to be off to a good start.

If they "trade up" to more expensive goods, they also "trade down" on other things to help pay for the indulgence. McKinsey's survey found that in three-quarters of urban households, Chinese consumers said they had traded up in at least one product category -- buying a more expensive product or brand than they used to buy. But the majority of those people also spent less on other products to finance the upgrades. Many white-collar men spent more on restaurant meals, for instance, often to impress clients or business colleagues. But most of those big spenders also cut back on things like personal-care products or snacks to balance out the spending. More than 80% of trade-up demand for higher-quality clothing and shoes came from working-class people trying to craft a more impressive professional image -- and they, too, gave up a variety of other things to pay for it. Such tradeoffs might seem like an obvious choice -- except we all know how hard it can be to give up even small luxuries once we've gotten used to them.

They budget first and buy second (or don't buy at all). McKinsey reports that the typical Chinese family determines how much it can afford to spend, then lists the things it wants to buy, and finally holds a "beauty contest" to determine which products on the wish list are most appealing. Those are the ones they buy.
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Many Americans budget just as carefully, but far too many of us buy extra stuff anyway, because we feel entitled to it or it just makes us feel better.

It's second nature in America to push a cart through the aisles of Target or Home Depot, filling it with little things we never intended to buy or even thought of before we got to the store.

They spend months researching purchases. Many Chinese families in the market for a computer spend three to six months deciding which model to buy, visiting a store four or five times to check out the offerings. Other big-ticket items get just as much scrutiny, and Chinese shoppers also deliberate carefully over everyday things like food, drinks and health and beauty items. Many shopping trips, in fact, are just for research, with nobody actually buying anything. Western-style marketers, no doubt, will work hard to make Chinese shoppers less careful and more impulsive -- and McKinsey does in fact report that "emotional" purchases are on the rise. The race is on to see if we become more like them, or persuade them to become more like us."

In other words, THEY'RE FRUGAL just like we used to be, and need to be again. When their citizens are buying brand new Buicks for cash, you know they got it goin' on!

No, it's not a landfill. Instead of the priest-advocated and church-sanctioned stealing, why not just take what others are throwing away? I'm sitting on a carport full of next year's wood just for the asking, because someone else was throwing it away.

Most of my clothing and linens are stuff people left behind in laundromats, in the laundry room trash can, and/or in the dumpster at my old apartment. I haven't bought a washcloth in years, yet I have quite a pile of them.

Most of my furniture is cast-offs found on the street (fixed up, of course), parked outside the apartment dumpster, or stuff left behind from evictions.

That dumpster also very thoughtfully provided me with enough charitable donations (in the form of stuff others could use) to write off against some taxes--mostly baby stuff, kids' stuff, and clothes that didn't fit me or Hubby. Two clean double strollers, a high chair, and a fur-lined leather coat were my biggest finds, and the thrift store I donated them to was happy to receive them, along with all the other treasures I brought in.

I'm sure it's the same for other frugalites. There's no need to steal anything if you just ask, or just look in the right places. Ah, but then there's the mentality...what are people stealing? Where are they spending the money they make? Nine time out of 10 it's misallocated into computer bling, car bling, ear bling, nail bling, or cellphone bling when it should be spent on decent food, housing, and utilities.

Decadence causes it's own deprivation in the end (witness Congress). I've since turned my operations over to a budding millionaire-wannabe that works around the corner from the apartment complex--he got his Christmas presents from the same dumpster this year. He also checked the overflowing holiday aftermath that usually occurs over there.

His own useful-to-someone-else overflow is being sold on E-bay, courtesy of his father-in-law.

Happy Holidays in the Winter of Our Discontent (or rather, dis-content).

From the Grand Views. I'm one of them, and so are the people who eventually bought my donated items.

"Americans throw away 25 million tons of refuse every year, putting it either in the trash can or recycling bin. Not all trash is useless. Some people, like Searles, protest this excess by living off it - everything from the furniture they sit on to the food they eat."

...

"Searles said more than half of what they own came from a dumpster, but she said they mostly look for food. They're not looking for a half-eaten hamburger thrown out from a fast food joint. They get their groceries from the same stores as everyone else, but they get theirs from the dumpster. "A lot of times they throw away quantities - packaged quantities - of food," Searles said. "Say there's a bag of oranges and one orange will be moldy in the entire bag, so you just throw out the moldy one and you're good."

...

""Getting into food politics coincided with meeting people who already dumpster dove," Searles said. "They showed me how to dumpster dive, where good places were and how to judge what is good food in the trash." Searles said getting meat can be dangerous. She usually only gets it in the dead of winter, but getting produce is like shopping in the store. "You don't want stuff that's smashed. You don't want stuff that's laying on the bottom of the dumpster," Searles said. "Other than that, if it looks like food, it's food."

...

"They wouldn't name their favorite spots to dumpster dive. They said they don't want the businesses to lock the dumpsters, but their favorites are smaller grocery stores and bakeries that don't have trash compactors. Lewis said the couple forages enough food that they spend around $15 a month on groceries. Most of that, he said, is spent on oils and seasonings to cook the food they find. Lewis said some people refuse to dumpster dive for food, but will explore dumpsters at bookstores or thrift stores. He said that a few years ago a friend found a working seven-disc DVD player after Drake students moved out for the summer. Some people even take furniture from the dumpster and refinish it and sell it, he said.
Searles said, "If they make it, you can find it in the trash."

...

"The biggest problem would come if you make a mess. But if you're smart, you wouldn't," Lewis said. Searles said they follow a dumpster-diving etiquette, which involves leaving the area cleaner than they found it and not taking more than they can use. Searles looked around her living room and pointed out a Hawaiian flower picture on the wall, the light bulb in the lamp, some toys on the mantle and a blue plasma lightning lamp. She said all the items came from a dumpster."

She sounds like she's been to my old apartment complex's dumpster. I look around my own living room, and only the couch is new--the rest is either hand-me-downs, curbside finds, stuff in the apartment complex dumpster or laundry room trash can, stuff given to me, stuff I bought used, or stuff I found up in the attic when we bought the house.

Other dumpster-diving articles: Dumpster Dive With Panache, Dumpster Divers--The Gourmands of Garbage, Holiday Dinner From the Dumpster.

From the Dollar Stretcher.

" 1. Don't buy food you do not like. I find a lot of vegetables and fruits in their original package. Why? Because obviously a lot of people try to eat healthy and then buy food they don't like/eat. Stop that! It is a waste of money. If you don't like apples and carrots, you will not eat them, so do not buy them.

2. Stop buying sweets/cakes/cookies. It is a totally waste of money to throw sweets/cake/cookies away because you decide to stay healthy or slim down. Don't buy them in the first place. If you do anyway, at least give them away (kids, work, friends).

3. Not liking a present does not mean throwing it away is a good option. Either sell it on eBay or wherever, give it to someone else or keep it and give it away as present (don't forget to write down who gave it to you, so you don't return it to the giver). Furthermore, tell the person who gave it to you that you did not like it or tell them what you like next time around. During Christmas season, I find presents still wrapped in the wastebasket. I am always happy about them, but they were not meant for me to be happy!

4. Christmas waste is most interesting. You not only find presents, but also you find tons of food and even more cookies and sweets, given by loving relatives. If you don't feel like eating them, why not bring them to work or freeze them. Someone spend a lot of money, time and love to make them! The same goes for chocolate Easter bunnies. The chocolate can be used for something else (cookies, cakes, etc.) or just give it to a kid/mother that you know.

5. Don't take hotel give-aways or samples if you won't use them. Why do people take shampoo, soap, sewing-kits, etc. from hotels and then throw them away unused? Give them to friends, family, or homeless shelters. Someone will enjoy them. The same is true for all samples.

6. Someone can always benefit from useable clothing. I understand that it is easier to throw clothes away, but why not give them to shelters, churches or other non-profit organizations when still useable or sell them on Internet. If it is new and you find out you do not like it, just bring it back to the store to get your money back instead of keeping it and then throwing it away with its tag still on it. I'll have towels and pillowcases till the end of my days (and they all had still tags on them) and I am not even 30!

7. Throwing away coins doesn't add up. I am aware that coins are somehow annoying, but do you have to throw them away? How about collecting them in a jar or give them to charity? Even if it is foreign money, some charities don't mind that at all.

8. Don't throw away half-empty bottles of cosmetics, shampoo and lotion. I find half-empty bottles all the time. You can always put the bottles upside down to get more lotion, shampoo, etc. out of it or cut them in half. You can really save a lot of money this way (and help the environment).

9. Children's toys can always find a new home. Except when broken, these should not end in the dumpster.

10. Old magazines shouldn't be thrown out. Maybe someone at work or a friend would like to read the newer/latest issue of a magazine? How about using them to wrap gifts (some ads are nicer than wrapping paper)?

11. Wrapping-paper can usually be used more than once. Ever considered that? And how about using newspapers or magazines instead?

12. Plants should be given away, not thrown away. When not dead, why not give them to someone that either likes plants or has a garden to put them in. My mother has a whole orchid collection by now and she did not buy one of them."

Regarding #11--my mother saved wrapping paper and bows every year, and we reused those things until there was nothing left of them. Then one year, my older sister got one of those bow making contraptions, and then saving ribbon became the name of the game. Saving boxes was ALWAYS part of the game.

Something I learned from apartment complex dumpster diving: residents sure are wasteful! I could've completely furnished (plus food) half the apartments there with the stuff these people threw out. A complete daycare center could've been outfitted with the kiddy stuff tossed out (but managed to save most of it, and washed it up and donated it to the thrift store). Whatever I could get into my car got washed up and donated, if it wasn't something I kept for myself.

Ask me when the last time was that I actually paid for a washcloth or a rug. I either found them in the dumpster, or they got left behind in the laundry room. As far as towels go, I haven't had to pay for a bath towel in 20 years--they keep finding me in the trash.

Living small: minimizing the impact on resources—yours and the planet’s. It has nothing to do with the size of anything in particular; it has more to do with what you do without to get along just fine day-to-day.

Here are some examples of living small:

· No cell phone--saves money and keeps your life intrusion-free.

· No dishwasher--washing dishes really doesn't take that long, especially when you have help.

· Few coupons--they take a LOT of time to cut, sort, and file, and not very many are useful.

· No microwave--these cost money, like a dishwasher, and it's an excuse for not cooking from scratch.

· No cable--television is the biggest time- and money-sucker in the US.

· No lawn watering--the grass is still alive, just dormant. Watering costs more, takes time, and makes your grass weak and less resilient as it 'learns' to expect water.

· No unproductive relationships--if someone is just a drain on you, cut bait. Emotional vampires drain your energy.

Living small has nothing to do with storage space, buying less, or living single. It has to do with ways to preserve your personal time, energy, and ultimately, money. What can YOU do to lessen your consumption footprint in your life—what would you rather do without to gain time, energy, money, or satisfaction?

From the NY Times. Looks like people are going to have to come to grips with reality--the 1-income family is here to stay, and so is frugality. What's coming to stay along with it: high food prices and the introduction of food sold by the kilo instead of the pound.

"The longer people stay out of work, the more trouble they have finding new work. That is a fact of life that much of Europe, with its underclass of permanently idle workers, knows all too well. But it is a lesson that the United States seems to be just learning."

...

"So the legions of long-term unemployed will probably be idle for significantly longer than their counterparts in past recessions, reducing their chances of eventually finding a job even when the economy becomes more robust.

“I am so worried somebody will look at me and say, ‘Oh, he’s probably lost his edge,’ ” said Tim Smyth, 51, a New York television producer who has been unable to find work since 2008, despite having two decades of experience at places like Nickelodeon and the Food Network. “I mean, I know it’s not true, but I’m afraid I might say the same thing if I were interviewing someone I didn’t know very well who’s been out of work this long.”

Mr. Smyth’s anxieties are not unfounded. New data from the Labor Department, provided to The New York Times, shows that people out of work fewer than five weeks are more than three times as likely to find a job in the coming month than people who have been out of work for over a year, with a re-employment rate of 30.7 percent versus 8.7 percent, respectively.

Likewise, previous economic studies, many based on Europe’s job market struggles, have shown that people who become disconnected from the work force have more trouble getting hired, probably because of some combination of stigma, discouragement and deterioration of their skills."

...

"Several factors lead to this downward spiral of the unemployed.

In some cases, the long-term unemployed were poor performers in their previous positions and among the first to be terminated when the recession began. These people are weak job candidates with less impressive résumés and references.

In other instances, those who lost jobs may have been good workers but were laid off from occupations or industries that are in permanent decline, like manufacturing.

But economists have tried to control for these selection issues, and studies comparing the fates of similar workers have also shown that the experience of unemployment itself damages job prospects.

If jobless workers had been in sales, for instance, their customers might have moved on. Or perhaps the list of contacts they could turn to for leads is obsolete. Mr. Smyth, for example, says that so many of his former co-workers have been displaced that he is no longer sure whom to call on about openings.

In particularly dynamic industries, like software engineering, unemployed workers might also miss out on new developments and fail to develop the skills required.

Still, this explanation probably applies to only a small slice of the country’s 6.2 million long-term unemployed."

Could it be that too many people were gratuitously hired in the first place...maybe even for the tax credits?

"It does not help when job seekers are repeatedly rejected — or worse, ignored. Constant rejection not only discourages workers from job-hunting as intensively, but also makes people less confident when they do land interviews. A Pew Social Trends report found that the long-term unemployed were significantly more likely to say they had lost some of their self-respect than their counterparts with shorter spells of joblessness.

“People don’t have money to keep up appearances important for job hunting,” said Katherine S. Newman, a sociology professor at Princeton. “They can’t go to the dentist. They can’t get new clothes. They gain weight and look out of shape, since unemployment is such a stressful experience. All that is held against them when there is such an enormous range of workers to choose from.”

That's why this would've been the prime opportunity to go back to school, but nobody saved any money for this rainy day, and has insufficient credit to finance it.

"Direct employment programs — like the public works projects of the New Deal and World War II — may be the fastest way to put people back to work, economists say. But those raise concerns of crowding out businesses and displacing other workers. Also the approach, which smacks of socialism to some, seems politically untenable at the moment.

One possible compromise might be broader-scale retraining and apprenticeship programs, suggests Lawrence Katz, a labor economist at Harvard.

“That’s better than having more people just go on disability as a last resort, and then basically never return to work in their life, which many will do,” he said. The Obama administration has recently thrown its support behind an effort to overhaul community college retraining programs.

“One of the reasons to focus on training for workers, even if you’re not training workers for new jobs, is that when you have workers who have not been in a job for a long time, you need to do all you can to get them to look and feel job-ready when the openings do eventually come back,” said Betsey Stevenson, the Labor Department’s chief economist.

The real threat, economists say, is that America, like some of its Old World peers, may simply become accustomed to a large class of idled workers.

“After a while, a lot of European countries just got used to having 8 or 9 percent unemployment, where they just said, ‘Hey, that’s about good enough,’ ” said Gary Burtless, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. “If the unemployment rates here stay high but remain relatively stable, people may not worry so much that that’ll be their fate this month or next year. And all these unemployed people will fall from the front of their mind, and that’s it for them.”

In the Italian town I lived in for 3 years, there were legions of card-players in the park: men who fell off the employment rolls some years back, and never got back on. I hear Britain's teeming with these sorts of people who are "perpetually on the dole" or never-ending welfare for generations. We already went there and did that, and thankfully found some sort of reform--more reform needs to happen, I think, because loopholes have been found and enlarged within the new system.

Meanwhile, here's what happened to the rest of the workforce--they either got replaced by software, off-shored, outsourced, or were gratuitous hires in the first place, and had no compelling reason to be kept around.

If you ever wanted to see where we’re likely headed with the economy, oil use, work life, and self-sustainability, you should look to the Amish and their culture. Their past represents our possible future, and provides some wonderful clues about how to deal with it.

Some surprising and interesting facts about the Amish people:

· A fine distinction has been made between ownership and use. They can ride in or hire combustion-powered vehicles (with non-Amish drivers) to travel in, as long as they don’t own or operate them without special permission of the church. Certain work crews (construction-related) have special permission to lease work vehicles, operate heavy equipment and electrically powered tools as necessary for their job, as long as they don’t tap into the power lines from outside, or the 110-volt power from outlets.

· Most families have scaled back or abandoned farming completely, due to skyrocketing prices of land, equipment, and supplies. Population strains within communities have placed a high demand for farmland, right along with developers from the encroaching “outside” world. Being penned-in by land availability and affordability, church, and family constraints, most have turned to business for their livelihood. Amish micro-enterprises abound in large cultural homelands such as Lancaster, PA and others.

· Education beyond 8th grade home schooling is forbidden. Training for a specific job or job component is allowed, as long as it isn’t formal (for a degree program), and is available by other means (OJT, apprenticeship, workshops/seminars, etc.), because it’s feared that a formal education would encourage leaving the farm and community. Any occupation requiring the use of force (military, police, etc.) is forbidden. Membership in unions and engaging in litigation is also forbidden; it is seen as a horrific waste of money and resources.

· Amish workers and employers are exempt from Social Security and Medicare tax. Their culture does not allow for paying into or drawing from the system, because extended family and the church serve as their means of social support in times of need or disability/old age. They are also exempt from military service because they believe in non-resistance.

· Most Amish micro-enterprises are home-based, providing for a family/culture/church woven network in their daily lives. Men and women are encouraged into business equally, but family and church must take priority over economic needs (time off for weddings/funerals/Amish holidays/barn-raisings, etc.). Business is considered a “sideline” to their traditional farming work, despite many families leaving farming as their mainstay.

· If some component of business requires the use of electronics or combustion, they can contract it out to other firms—even non-Amish ones. They are also allowed to use “non-native” materials (not found on the farm) such as plastics, fiberglass, etc. with church permission. By outsourcing such things, the boss can work right alongside the employees--ensuring immediate access to production, staff, and customers throughout the day. If an electrically-powered item is absolutely essential to their business, an electrical source is created through the in-line use of a diesel engine, hydraulic and air generators, and an inverter—this cumbersome arrangement is called “Amish electricity” because it produces the power they need, albeit inefficiently, without tapping into the forbidden power lines or outlets of the outside world.

· With the declining availability and outright extinction of some elements of their lives, such as buggy parts, horse plow equipment, etc., these people have made an ingenious bargain with the modern world: they can take modern equipment and “modify” it for their use, with church permission.

· Since most work takes place during the light hours, industrious use of solar energy abounds in the form of skylights. A few Amish families have been given church permission to explore the modification, refinement, and creation of solar panels to use and sell. For the most part, sweat equity, propane, kerosene, natural gas, and firewood remain their energy sources.

· Participation in local and regional business associations (Chamber of Commerce, Rotary, etc.) is looked down on, but not forbidden, if used solely as a networking vehicle. Political participation is also looked down on, except when the goal is to become familiar with and voice concerns about regulations and ordinances. Voting at national elections is permitted and voluntary. Lobbying is forbidden. Local craft guilds are the preferred way of communing, networking, and learning.

Clever ingenuity has been the by-product of a population kept small and relatively quiet by church laws and cultural taboos…ingenuity we can all benefit from. Swaying church permissions, meant to keep people and businesses “small”, have helped rather than hindered their usher into the modern world, all in the name of encouraging enterprise.

It would seem to the average reader that the Amish have it together in the modern world, even though their lifestyle harkens back to the Elizabethan Era in Europe (1600’s). We would do a lot for ourselves by taking heed of what these fine people have to offer in the way of possible solutions to our impending problems--if only we’d look back in time for innovation inspiration. What DID people do before the advent of 110-volt power, refined oil, the various social service systems, and disposable “stuff”?

Perhaps the Amish hold many answers to some of our future pressing problems, like questionable oil supplies, environmental poisoning, Social Security and Medicare deficits, skyrocketing education costs, corporate greed, and self-sufficiency in general. Perhaps we outsiders need to look to the past for our future needs…or maybe the past is slowly, cleverly building itself to accommodate bits of the future on limited terms. So much of their “restrictions” make a lot of sense, and for logical reasons (church aside).

It’s interesting how some things in their world mesh with things in our world. Problems that we have incurred in the outside world have also been incurred and “cured” inside, such as:

· Corporate greed—when the Amish sense that they have too much (money, work, overhead), they either divide the business and sell divisions, turn divisions over to relatives, or sell off the entire business. The church lets them know when they’ve grown too big for their britches, but the church smiles upon success with humility. Unbridled growth is unsustainable, and only leads to waning demand and “Been-There-Done-That” Syndrome.

· Clutter and excess—drawing a fine line between ownership and use, they tend to keep down the number of things they own and may not use every day, keeping farm clutter to a minimum (as well as liability). Merely getting to use something to get a job done, rather than keeping around “just in case they need it again” saves space, money, and headaches.

· Over-education—in today’s world, more and more people spend more and more money to garner degrees for jobs that can be performed well without those pieces of paper…and then those jobs disappear, leading to yet more and different degrees. A basic education and hands-on training are sufficient for most jobs in this country, but it won’t make the kind of money we demand from the start for those jobs. A particular thorn in this area is the advent of women returning to the workplace…many women pursue expensive degrees, only to leave the workforce a few years later to raise children. At some point, we have to ask ourselves: is the return on education investment worth it in the end, or are we spending more for that degree than we wind up making in the workforce?

· Over-work—the Amish have made this part of their lives, yet we haven’t really begun to benefit in large numbers from the flexible hours and access to family that a home-based business brings. We prefer to indenture ourselves to corporations on their terms, and merely hope for the best when it comes to leaving our kids in the daycare and public school systems. Work has become the center of our lives, rather than the home and family.

· Insufficient government funds—we are currently facing a crisis of monumental proportion when it comes to the Boomer generation, retirement, and health care in regard to unfunded retirement and Medicare needs. Our current system is a pay-as-you-go one, meaning current workers pay taxes for current retirees and Medicare recipients to collect checks and benefits from. When the number of workers dwindles and the numbers of retirees and medically needy balloons, the payroll taxes will increase to accommodate their social service needs…and your paycheck decreases as a result. By relying less on others and more on our own resources, we can ease this burden somewhat, even though the money paid into the system already will be lost forever.

· Declining natural resources—there is talk that the current global oil supply will last for another 30 years or so, that oil drillers are already having a hard time finding and getting oil out of the ground, and OPEC certainly cannot keep up with current and future demands. If this is the case, we need to find large-scale inexpensive viable alternatives now, and something other than the expensive substitutes we currently have available as options.

By modifying existing equipment, the Amish have made clever use of hydraulics and pneumatics to avoid using the one power source forbidden by the church. By employing the use of modified equipment, and working with the sun, we would save tons of generated energy from outside and personal energy from within

· Over-globalization--Rather than making contentious trade deals and questionable ad campaigns in pursuit of the almighty dollar, and succumbing to a 24-7 world in all its different time zones, perhaps we should be thinking about going back to work with nature and providing for ourselves what we really need right here at home. Over-technology, over-ownership, and unsustainability contribute to this need for global profit reach, and we need to ask ourselves what we’ll do with it all when the power goes out.

We need to get creative again, make ample use of what we already have, and satisfy demand here at home, rather than covering the globe with things nobody wants or needs (complete with culture-targeted slick marketing). Working efficiently within daylight hours and personal constraints leaves plenty of time to attend to other priorities, like family, home, and church, and working close to home insures easy access to family—the top priority.

· Over-regulation—by recognizing that government only serves as an interfering body when it comes to daily work, spiritual and home life, the Amish seceded from the outside world into one where their church and service to God is the regulator…no vote, no committee. Since coming to America to escape religious persecution by both Catholics and Protestants, a compact has been struck with Uncle Sam: no interference, except where elements of the outside world come onto the farm or into the business (zoning, health inspections for food-related businesses, sales taxes, business sign sizing, and payroll taxes for non-Amish employees). The church takes care of the rest.

Persecuted in Europe…settled and thriving in America…the Amish have been with us since before the Declaration of Independence was signed. They will likely still be here when the rest of us burn out and move on. Who knows? They may be our only guiding force in the end for flipping the dependency switch on technology once and for all.

From the Globe and Mail.

"Just a year ago, 15,000 of the world’s leaders, diplomats, and UN officials were gearing up to descend on Copenhagen to forge a global treaty that would save the planet."

...

"After two weeks of chaos, the talks collapsed in a smouldering heap of wreckage. The only surprise was that this outcome should have come as a surprise to so many intelligent people. These people actually seemed to believe that experts and politicians have supernatural powers to predict the future and control the climate. They believed that experts know how fast temperatures will rise by when, and what the consequences will be, and that we know what to do about it. They believed that despite the recent abject failure of Kyoto (to say nothing of other well-intentioned international treaties), the nations of the world would willingly join hands and sacrifice their sovereignty in order to sign on to a vast scheme of unimaginable scope, untold cost and certain damage to their own interests.

Copenhagen was not a political breakdown. It was an intellectual breakdown so astonishing that future generations will marvel at our blind credulity. Copenhagen was a classic case of the emperor with no clothes."

...

"The delusional dream of global action to combat climate change is dead. Barack Obama’s cap-and-trade scheme is dead. Chicago’s carbon-trading market is dead. The European Union’s supposed reduction in carbon emissions has been exposed as a giant fraud. (The EU is actually responsible for 40 per cent more CO2 today than it was in 1990, if you count the goods and services it consumed as opposed to the ones that it produced.) Public interest in climate change has plunged, and the media have radically reduced their climate coverage.

The biggest loser is the environmental movement. For years, its activists neglected almost everything but climate change. They behaved as if they’d cornered the market on wisdom, truth and certainty, and they demonized anyone who dared to disagree. They got a fabulous free ride from politicians and the media, who parroted their claims like Sunday-school children reciting Scripture. No interest group in modern times has been so free from skepticism, scrutiny or simple accountability as the environmental establishment."

...

"Now that global warming has stopped sucking all the oxygen out of the room, some of those who care about the planet will turn to other – and more pressing – problems. There are plenty. Humans are encroaching everywhere on habitats and species. Don’t worry about the polar bears, which have survived hundreds of thousands of years of melting and freezing ice. Worry instead about the lions and tigers, which face extinction within our lifetime. Their problem isn’t climate change. It’s us."

...

"Then there are the lions. They’re not as scarce as tigers – yet – but their habitats are ideal for ranching, and they face increasing pressure from population growth. Or how about the bluefin tuna? This one is close to home – we catch them and sell them to Japan – and Canada is on the wrong side of the issue. If the World Wildlife Fund could whip up as much alarm over the bluefin tuna as it tried to whip up over fictitious drowning polar bears, I might even be persuaded to send them money again."

Lions and tigers and bears--oh my!

"Before they were sucked into the giant vortex of global warming, environmentalists did useful things. They protested against massive Third World dams that would ruin both natural and human habitats. They warned about invasive species and diseases that could tear through our forests and wreck our water systems. They fought for national parks and greenbelts and protected areas. They talked about the big things too – such as how the world could feed another three billion people without destroying all the rain forests and running out of water. They believed in conservation – conserving this beautiful planet of ours from the worst of human despoliation – rather than false claims to scientific certainty about the future, unenforceable treaties and radical utopian social reform.

“How high a price must the world pay for green folly?” asked the thinker Walter Russell Mead. “How many years will be lost, how much credibility forfeited, how much money wasted before we have an environmental movement that has the intellectual rigour, political wisdom and mature, sober judgment needed to address the great issues we face?”

The answer is too high, too many and too much. Please grow up, people. You have important work to do."

They're too busy ushering in the tiny house movement. Governments are too busy ushering in the bailout movement. Even Al Gore has moved on to the electric car and residential fuel cell movement.

Yep, Wenchypoo and Wenchmaster skip the holiday hullabaloo altogether and here’s why:

• We have no children to obligate us to participate.

• We have no friends or relatives that need impressing.

• We’re Atheist, but that doesn’t even matter. Most of what we consider “holidays” are actually Catholic railroad-equivalents to original Pagan holidays.

• Holidays have become excuses to consume, wildly distorting the original meaning for celebrating these particular events.

• Most holiday traditions have become rip-offs.

• We have cats that climb Christmas trees, steal turkey from the table, walk through the Easter egg dye, etc. On second thought, I guess we DO have kids…

• A lot of holiday stuff just gets thrown (wrapping) out or flushed down the toilet (food), and it costs money.

• What do you get people who already have everything, besides more of it? This is pointless and senseless.

• We “celebrate” all year round, so why are some particular calendar days so special? They aren’t. Examples:

Halloween: why should we contribute to the dental delinquency of minors?

Thanksgiving: turkey is always cheapest the rest of the year, so we eat it all year round--same for sweet potatoes, canned pumpkin, and all the rest.

Christmas: we give and receive gifts all year round, and find shopping bargains all year round, so why save it up for one day? Besides, the ritual of dragging out the decorations, decorating tree, house, and gifts, then turning around and putting it all back has become VERY tedious, to say the least, and an exercise in futility. Let's not forget all the excess trash we generate when we throw away the wrapping paper and boxes, and for what? These rituals have all become fuel for the Consumer Machine.

Remember when holidays (originally Holy Days) meant something? Families used to gather together from far reaches of the country, perhaps attend some religious service or other, and have a nice meal afterward—the intent being to gather and share a meal.

What has happened since those good ol’ days? Everything. Mostly, business picked up the scent of profit, and followed it to the current conclusion.

Rather than participate in all this madness we call holidays, we just sit them out and focus on the days that are meaningful to us: birthdays and anniversaries. Gift-giving in both our families has been boiled down from the frivolous to the practical, then to the spiritual. When we need what we need, we go out and get it instead of saving it up for some trumped-up “holiday.” What WE wait for is sales, not invented special reasons to buy...you know, those Hallmark days.

My dad used to complain about how President’s Day and Veteran’s Day became excuses for stores to have white sales. “We fought for your freedom to go out and buy discounted bed sheets, by golly, starting with George Washington!”

The fact that we’re Atheist doesn’t really matter in this issue, because if we believed in a god, we’d pay homage and honor him every day, as a good believer would. Attending services once or twice a year doesn’t adequately pay homage for a true believer, I think.

As I’ve written before, when it comes to holiday food, especially whole turkeys, many of them are rip-offs. Hollow carcasses ridden with ice don’t make for a pretty picture at the register or for the cost per serving—especially when sold by the pound. Besides, turkey is cheap year-round—sometimes cheaper at any other time of year besides November. Obviously they freeze well, so why save up the turkey-buying for November?

The same holds true for lamb, ham, pumpkin pie, sweet potato pies and casserole, and all the other food rituals we save for special days.

To waste our time spending good money on things that nobody really needs or wants, or that aren’t really worth the money in the first place, is truly a waste that we no longer care to indulge in or afford. To have no real reason for indulging is another reason why we just sit them out and watch you guys go bananas over at the mall or over in the turkey aisle. My favorite is the fistfights that break out at WallyWorld over some outdated and heavily-marked-down electronic doodad or other, or the poor people who get trampled by the crowd gathered outside the stores at 4 a.m. when the doors suddenly open. I watch these disgusting displays of greed and hedonism from the comfort of my own home, and for some odd reason, these things make the evening news every year!

What you think is a discount to you is still someone else’s profit. Why give them the chance to profit, when you yourself could reap the rewards of re-thinking and scaling back. Screw social expectations and put yourself and your family first. Choose what means the most to you and go with it.

As for me, I’m going to “hell” (if you believe in it) with a fistful of pumpkin pie and a smile on my face, regardless of time of year. If you care to join me, do bring some whipped cream. Satan asks if anyone’s bringing a covered dish. :)

~~I'm dreaming of a Black Friday and Cyber Monday where nobody shows up.~~

It's free to you, free to the recipient, never expires or charges fees, and lets the recipient get whatever he wants from the stocks. Best of all, it's fraud-free.

Drumroll please...

It's a PUBLIC LIBRARY card.

From Sify News (Britain). This economy has produced a race to the bottom for all of us, hasn't it? And I'm here to help you get there faster and with money still left in your pocket.

"If you have got it, flaunt it' is passe now, because for Britons, it's not being wealthy that's in vogue anymore but being frugal.

A survey for price comparison website uSwitch found that just four per cent of people would talk openly about something they paid a lot of money for but 96 per cent said they would proudly show off a bargain.

And 88 per cent think it is acceptable, even desirable, to talk about ways in which they have cut back to save money.

"Keeping up with the Joneses no longer means competing for the most lavish lifestyle - it's about being seen to be poor and proud," The Daily Express quoted Ann Robinson, of uSwitch, as saying.

"While bragging about money or expensive purchases is frowned upon, boasting about nabbing a bargain or talking about how little you earn is in keeping with the times. We are wearing our frugality like a badge of honour."

He who dies with the most savings wins! :)