"money" Category Archives (123 entries)
Information on saving money or really cheap (or free) deals. Obviously many of these offers may have expired, ended, been discontinued and their links may not work any more.Where Do People Spend Their Money?
The New York Times did a really cool graphic last week on what Americans spend their money on. It's a big graphic and you can zoom in (one level) to read the parts you can't see and the colors indicate change in prices over the last year. I really like the way they did it.
I've say it's very Edward Tufte, except for the odd shapes of all the pieces. He would have put it down differently, something more symmetrical (or square) so that you could have more easily compared milk to dry cleaning.
I found this at Get Rich Slowly.
Read or leave comments (or trackbacks/pings)Posted by Gary on Tuesday at 7:34 PM on May 13, 2008.
Related categories: money
Thanks for the 1 comments/trackbacks from: kilax
Free Star Wars Book (MP3, PDF, Kindle or Sony eBook)
I saw this on SlickDeals.net, get a free Star Wars book "Legacy of the Force: Betrayal") PDF, MP3, Kindle or Sony eBook through Tuesday, May 13, 2008. (If that link doesn't work try this link).
It looks like it's part 1 of a "Legacy of the Force" series that they're trying to promote, book 9 comes out on the 13th. The series is supposed to cover a "new era in the Star Wars universe and features the beloved characters from the original trilogy, answering the questions of what happened to Han, Luke and Leia after the conclusion of Star Wars: Episode VI Return of the Jedi".
Posted by Gary on Thursday at 5:58 PM on May 1, 2008.
Related categories: books, money, movies
ATM Machines in Costa Rica (or 'A banking adventure')
So the Automatic Teller Machines have been when I generally use for ca$h when I travel. Travelers Checks have always been a hassle. Charging always works well too, I never seem to get any related fees (or the little fees I get are pretty minimal). And the exchange rate is usually really good on the charge or ATM cards.
But the only ATMs in the southern Nicoya Peninsula appear to Banco Nacional and they don't like my card (they list my network). But it might just be their machines, since those machines are pretty inconsistent: sometimes it asks me for the language, sometimes it still gives me Spanish, sometimes the network just times out and other times it gives me a useless message (like 'you can only take out between $10 and $200 per day', but that's all I was trying to do).
So going inside the banco is a trip, guards with shotguns and you walk into a decompression-type chamber (closed in while they x-ray you, and then they open the second door, imagine walking into an ultra-secure government facility). Then it's kinda set up like the DMV (Department of Motor Vehicles) and you wait and try to communicate what you want. They have this neat system that you can phone in for live translation for English/Spanish, and when I say "neat" I mean if it worked. So after several tries, we determined that their ATM system was so crappy no one could say if it did / would / could work with the US.
So we decided to do a cash advance instead, we didn't know what the fees would be but we needed some more cash; not everyone takes charges and many charge premiums (and I think some discounts are because the money never gets reported somewhere down the line). This still took a while and they do everything in triplicate down there but I think it'd be hard for people to cheat the system since there are so many checks and balances.
Once we got much more north the other ATMs took our cards just fine (I had a problem in Jaco once and I think it was the same bank but I just went to a different companies machine and it worked fine).
Here's the problem: Being curious of the fees of the Visa cash advance, we got on-line to check and discovered that the advance was done twice on the card, the fee was done twice and since it went over the card limit, tacked on another $39 fee. FYI, the cash advance fee was only $12.58 for $400 (and the back charged a dollar). The bank's already been e-mailed and it'll probably be fine from here.
PLEASE Leave comments (or trackbacks/pings)Posted by Gary on Tuesday at 9:37 PM on April 15, 2008.
Related categories: Costa Rica 2008, money
Blocking E-Mail Spam
I'm a huge fan of SpamArrest, a mail program that uses challenge/response CAPTCHAs to only allow mail from humans, instead of from spammers. It works great but the price has gone up from $60 for two years to $90, so I'm checking for other options. It's only an additional $30 but if the price jump is $30 (or worse, 50%) every 2 years, it's gonna get kinda pricey in the next few renewal cycles. The price jump is kind of large after a few years especially since I know many of their costs should have gone down (disk space, servers and bandwidth); the software is already written and has had minimal user changes over the last two years.
Honestly, I'm sure it saves me more way than $45 a year worth of time. But can something save me more time, I know in the past MailBlocks saved me more time. So I'm looking for suggestions for some other Challenge/Responce mail system.
There is one thing I really dislike about SpamArrest, while I can use any mail client to read my mail, to check and approve spam I have to go to their web site and that takes a lot of time (and this is a feature I miss from the now deceased MailBlocks). The reason I have to check it is for mailings from new companies that I deal with and for people who don't pay attention to the e-mail that gets mail back to them immediately to ask them to confirm they are human (I even have info about me and a picture of me in the e-mail so they know it's really me).
In the meantime, I'm using my free gMail account. I want to see how well that works, they give me all sorts of space for free and it's pretty fast and it works well on cellphones (their client, their web interface and should work with phone clients). They've got a fancy web interface and plain web interface so it works pretty well everywhere. Although, with my client I can't see the spam folder there either. Google lets you create additional addresses for the same account and have decent filters. Plus, they will let you use your own domain if you'd like to; so if it really works out, I'll attach my GaryLaPointe.com domain to it and use it for my mail (as long as that supports IMAP). And if it works as well for me, it's free! There's some weird mapping between GMail and the Mac Mail.app (I think by default you get duplicates of the mailboxes) but there's some work arounds, or maybe the new Mail.app in Panther fixes it...
Also, I figure after trying it for a few months, SpamArrest might send me a promo to lure me back. If that's the case I'll know I've done due diligence to try another option and I'll have possibly saved a few bucks in the mean time.
Actually, I have one other minor complaint about SpamArrest, the interface could be faster. There's something about the web interface that slows things down. I notice when I travel, it's unbearably slow and I'm not sure why. But it's a huge minus when I travel...
I do get some referral dollar$ from SpamArrest (maybe $8.75 a year?), so I figure if I'm sending clients to them, so are others (therefore, they're likely growing).
PLEASE Leave comments (or trackbacks/pings)Posted by Gary on Saturday at 7:00 PM on March 15, 2008.
Related categories: money, web sites
Gas at an all time high...
I can't believe these prices. I only paid $3.23 yesterday but I paid $3.25 on Friday. I think that's the highest I've ever paid. And "they" say it's going to keep going up...
I'm so glad I don't drive far. Generally, less than a tank gets me through the week.
Posted by Gary on Wednesday at 8:49 PM on March 12, 2008.
Related categories: money
Thanks for the 2 comments/trackbacks from: Lillasyster: Mercedes
Free Credit Karma
So I found a free offer code for CreditKarma. They're offering free daily credit scores (from TransUnion). Use code CKFRND as invitation code at https://www.CreditKarma.com/ (I'm not certain I should be giving this code out, so I'm not hot-linking the site address) I found this at SlickDeals.net. The site is appears to besponsored by advertising and you will not be required to enter your credit card information or sign up for trial offers, but you will receive relevant partner offers (i.e. junk mail) based on your profile. This will not affect your credit rating (other than you paying attention to it).
I've always wondered how much my credit score fluctuates but even when I've had free offers before, but I've never bothered to log on every day to check. This looks like that on-line they give you a nice progressive graph from when you started (it's hard to tell since I'm just on day one), hopefully it keeps a daily tally even when I don't log in. Plus, they rank you to national stats and other members; their community has a some good credit, I actually score better nationally than with their membership (and I've got great credit).
UPDATE: So I've done this for a few days and it looks like the graph is just going to get me monthly averages, although it appears to pull the score daily (but it hasn't changed for me yet).
UPDATE 2: I did ask for a credit increase on Wednesday, I was charging a few vacations so I wanted some wiggle room and I noticed my score went down three points today. I'm not sure if that's for the credit check or the one vacation I already charged and sine it's raised my debt level a tiny bit...
PLEASE Leave comments (or trackbacks/pings)Posted by Gary on Saturday at 1:49 PM on February 16, 2008.
Related categories: money, web sites
Did they cancel "How I Met Your Mother"?
At Amazon Unbox they have 4 FREE missing episode of 'How I Met Your Mother'! At least I don't think I've seen them before. You can download these to your Windows based computer or TiVo for free! The 4 missing episodes cover Marshal and Lily's honeymoon...
You can get the Infamous "Robin Sparkles" video too!
UPDATE (Sunday evening): So I finally watched these "episodes". They weren't real episodes, they were just a few minutes long and they were "videos" of they're honeymoon. They're pretty bad too, but then again aren't home movies supposed to be? I'm not sure what kind of promotion they shot these for, but they end with a still frame with an advertisement for the show. It was the fact that these appeared to be "lost" episodes that made me ask if the show was canceled, since these aren't much more than some kind of odd promo/commercial I retract the original question.
Posted by Gary on Saturday at 1:03 PM on February 9, 2008.
Related categories: money, television
Thanks for the 1 comments/trackbacks from: kapgar
United Airlines to charge $25 for checking extra bags
As reported on msnbc.com, United Airlines will charge fliers an extra $25 per bag to check more than one bag starting May 5th, 2008 ("silver" and "premier" frequent-fliers will not be charged).
It's a bit, but it's cheaper than paying the overages for the first bag being over the weight limit. If your itinerary includes international flights you will (may?) still be able to check the second bag for free; this will help me, probably more than half my air travel is international.
Found at DealMac.com.
PLEASE Leave comments (or trackbacks/pings)Posted by Gary on Wednesday at 6:32 PM on February 6, 2008.
Related categories: money
Local Homeless People
So I was Burger King today and once in a while I'll see one of the local homeless people in there (usually it's when it's really cold out), I think there's 3 in particular that I recognize. Today, all three were in there (actually one was on the was out as one came in) which I thought was strange since I've been at BK a little more than usual lately and today it's nowhere near as cold as it has been. Two are schizophrenic, not that I'm qualified to judge, and the other is kinda quiet. The one guy just seems to drink his coffee and step outside for a smoke and talks to himself, he seems to be the most well off, I've even seen him get a beer or two at the bar before (it's possible this guy isn't homeless). The quiet guy seems to have all his stuff with him (3 big bags) and he must have been there for a while, I saw someone ask him to leave after a while. The woman, I've seen her pull stuff out of the trash, and she asked me for my left over fries one time and I gave he those and some cash. Today I intentionally left my uneaten onion rings and my half-eaten Whopper on my tray at the table and she had grabbed it before I got out the door; I'm not sure why it's a problem for me to just offer her a few dollars.
When I'm out of town if someone asks nice (even semi-nice) for some money, I'm easy to cough up a buck or two; and in some places, that's every block or so. I always make sure I have some cash on me for that reason. But the local homeless, I never know how to deal with them, actually they've never asked for money at the Burger King but I'd be glad to give them some money, but I hate to offer and for some reason I'd hate them expect it from then on (not that it'd really be a problem).
If I'm somewhere around town and someone asks for cash, I'm more likely to buy them a meal if there's an opportunity, I'd rather spend $5-10 on a meal then hand them a few dollars cash if I can (especially if I can smell alcohol or see bloodshot eyes).
It's when it's the locals that I see often when it throws me. And I'm not sure why this keeps me so off balance...?
It all makes me sad and feel pretty ungrateful when I complain about stuff in the wonderful life that I have. I've got a nice paying job, no debt (other than my house) and I've been doing pretty good at saving for my retirement someday. I give money to the shelter when they are doing fund raisers and to school when they're having auctions and other things when they are happening around town; I could do more I'm sure, but I could certainly doing less too.
PLEASE Leave comments (or trackbacks/pings)Posted by Gary on Sunday at 2:17 PM on January 27, 2008.
Related categories: money, people
Understanding Social Security
So I went to the Social Security Office with my Mom today. There are just so many (too many) scenerios with all of it! It's interesting how they talk about it, they think of everything as the number of checks you get, not so much as the money you get (months, not dollars). If you work more after you retire, they hold back checks, not dollars. It's odd, but I guess every job has it's own language.
My Mother did make a decision today. As a bonus, it's the same one I would have told her to do if she had asked me to make the decision so that worked out well. Without getting into too much of my mother's details:
It's an interesting thing to keep in mind that you can start collecting SS but keep working. I think once you start to collect SS, if you makes more than $13k a year they start to give you less money. For every $2 you makes over that amount, they give you a dollar less. So pretty much once you hit that dollar amount, your salary is cut in half (sort of taxed at 50%). I'd try harder talk he into working working to earn that much per year since you don't get as much value but then she'd lose her health benefits and that's got some value these days.
None of the above is to be considered retirement advice; I do not work in the financial sector nor do I portray someone who does. :)
Posted by Gary on Thursday at 9:44 PM on January 17, 2008.
Related categories: money
Gas Prices and Food Prices
I know everyone keeps their eyes open for good gas prices and will hit one gas station over another since it's a few pennies different. I'm sure some people sometimes waste gas by driving a little farther. I know I'm always happy when I can save a few pennies per gallon (I usually fill up on Tuesdays since I'm usually over by some cheap stations). Here's something to keep in mind, 6 cents more a gallon (if it's around $3) is only a 2% difference (12 cents more a gallon is only 4%).
Normally, when I eat at McDonald's I get a number 3 meal (Quarter Pounder - no pickle, no mustard which includes a 20 oz soda and medium fry). At the McDonald's by work (Plymouth/Beech, Redford, MI) it's $4.77 (tax included); at the McD's by my house (Michigan/Greenfield in Dearborn) it's $5.36 (tax included). That's a 59 cent difference! That's 12% more at the more expensive McDonald's. FYI, both the McD's I'm referring to have been renovated in the last few years and the cheaper one has a playland.
So keep in mind if your $3 gallon of gas was 12% more at a nearby location it would 36 cents more per gallon! Now it's not cost effective for me to take the time (and gas) to drive home to save 60 cents, but maybe I should check out the other two nearby McDonald's to see what they charge. Plus Kelly always refers to the Redoford one as an expensive one (that's the one I say is cheap).
When they talk about fuel price gouging, maybe we should consider all types of fuel...
Read or leave comments (or trackbacks/pings)Posted by Gary on Monday at 12:43 PM on January 14, 2008.
Related categories: Dearborn, food + drink, michigan, money
Thanks for the 2 comments/trackbacks from: ajooja: Robin
Skype update
So I've always liked Skype it's a great backup for my phone and it's great for calling home when I'm on vacation. At 2.1 cents per minute, it's hard to beat the price as long as you've got a semi-decent internet connection. Not that I talk a lot when I travel but I always feel like I'm being initiated when trying to figure out long distance calling when in a foreign country. They 2.1 cents is just for calls to the US, other countries have different rates.
The goofy* thing is that it's 2.1 cents to call the US wherever I am, from next door, Egypt or Costa Rica it's all 2.1 cents! But with the same reasoning it's 6.4 cents to call Costa Rica, that's if I'm here in Michigan or down there. Of course if I'm calling someone else's Skype computer it's free from anywhere to anywhere.
I just upgraded to the new Mac version, I was 1.1 versions behind. I think the call quality is significantly better and I noticed the touch tones work better, so now I can call my (misplaced) cell phone and listen to my messages.
* - It's not really goofy, it's what they pay for phone calls at the destination, the Internet probably doesn't cost Skype any more regardless of where I'm calling from.
PLEASE Leave comments (or trackbacks/pings)Posted by Gary on Saturday at 8:45 PM on November 24, 2007.
Related categories: Costa Rica, money
Exchange Rates in Costa Rica
So the exchange rates are pretty good for people from the US traveling to Costa Rica these days. You can see from the graph it's been going up ever since my first trip in 1999, prices have gone up there too, especially costs for tourist type things, but it's still been a decent value. Especially when you compare it to Britain or Canadian exchange rates, where the dollar has considerably dropped in value lately. It hasn't really changed much since my last trip but it should be pretty good for my next one, it's about 520 to $1.00 today.
1000 CRC = $ USD Currency data courtesy coinmill.com |
Posted by Gary on Saturday at 11:40 AM on November 17, 2007.
Related categories: Costa Rica, Costa Rica 2007, money
Thanks for the 1 comments/trackbacks from: seo
Free magazine subscription to Details, Lucky or Teen Vogue
Get a free magazine subscription to Details, Lucky or Teen Vogue from Amazon.
What is the catch? None. We are pleased to offer you the benefits of our partnership with top magazine publishers. Your credit card will not be billed for this subscription, and there is no automatic renewal.
And get a free digital subscription to MacWorld (from Zinio digital Magazines).
Read or leave comments (or trackbacks/pings)Posted by Gary on Monday at 5:52 PM on November 5, 2007.
Related categories: general, money
Thanks for the 2 comments/trackbacks from: kj: Kurt V.
Fined $222,000 for sharing music.
So MacWorld reports that 'a U.S. jury found her guilty of copyright infringement and fined her a total of $222,000'.
The U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota could have fined Jammie Thomas as much as $3.6 million, but opted not to. The mother of two was found guilty of stealing and giving away via Internet peer-to-peer Internet file-sharing service Kazaa a total of 24 songs from companies including Capitol Records, Sony BMG Music Entertainment and Warner Bros. Records.Did you see the important part? It was only 24 songs!!! Ouch! I assumed it was thousands of songs when I saw the fine...- Macworld Oct. 5, 2007
I'd really like to comment that all of that is pretty harsh. But she was breaking the law so I guess there isn't much to say. Actually, I will make a comment, file-sharing is bad, but she'd have to share an awful lot for the record companies to lose that much money. Although, 24 songs is probably what they specifically proved, she may have done thousands of others that they just didn't have the details on (but that would probably be inadmissible too). How would you even pay a fine like that?
Posted by Gary on Friday at 6:23 PM on October 5, 2007.
Related categories: money, music
Get Paid $9557 to Sleep!
So you have to spend 47 consecutive days and nights living at the hospital in your own room but it does pay you $9557. I thought it might be interesting, especially if out of a job (or really bored). But here's the downside:
You will not know what time it is during the 47-day study, and the room has no windows, clocks, TV, and you will not be allowed to bring devices that tell time. You will also not have access to a telephone during the 47-day study.Holy cow! I think it's really a suicide study. Or some kind of reality TV show. I've got to assume that means no 'net access either!!!
You will be told when to go to sleep and when to wake up, when to shower, and when to eat your meals. You will also have to take performance tests on a computer in your room many times each day. In between these study activities you will have free time, but your free time will be interrupted frequently.Actually, it does say "at no time are you being recorded on video or audiotape" so I guess it's not a reality show. All the info is in the SlickDeals post if you're interested... Read or leave comments (or trackbacks/pings)
Posted by Gary on Thursday at 9:48 PM on September 27, 2007.
Related categories: money
Thanks for the 3 comments/trackbacks from: ajooja: Lindsay: Leroy
Amazon MP3 store - 89 cent songs!
So Amazon opened the Amazon MP3 store which has been getting some good reviews and (most importantly) it semi-integrates by pushing your purchases into your iTunes which is great for automatic syncing with your iPod. They've had tracks for download for ages, but this is their big jump into the market (you do need their downloader for this).
I actually spotting it yesterday when searching for some music but I didn't realize the format change of my search results indicated a whole new service. I did notice that the tracks were only 89 cents though!
Keep in might for 89 cents they are a dime less than the iTunes music store for regular tracks but since there is no encryption (DRM) and it's encoded at a higher quality (even than Apple I believe) these are 40 cents less than Apple's $1.29 a song. That's about 1/3 less if you've been getting the DRM-free higher quality songs (and that's what I've been getting lately). And they are MP3s, so they play on just about anything (but higher quality does mean larger songs). Buying whole albums will generally discount the price.
There are exceptions to the 89 cent price for the individual songs, but I can't figure out the rules to tell you. And like the iTunes store I believe there are tracks that can't be purchased separately from the album, I thought I saw that yesterday but I can't find an example of that today.
And to be fair to Apple, their DRM free $1.29 songs are generally much cheaper if you buy the whole album (the 14 track One Cell in the Sea - by A Fine Frenzy is only $7.99 (which I think is the same as the iTunes DRM version) which is the same price as the Amazon mp3 store, except Amazon doesn't appear to give you the booklet.
So the end result, IMHO, it'll never beat the seamlessness of the iTunes Music Store but but with it's downloader (which does give you a free song), Amazon mp3 might be a good alternative or at least a second place to check when shopping for songs. If you're not an iPod user it's probably a great place to consider for your mp3 shopping (I think the downloader will push the tracks to other players but since I don't have any I"m not certain). The downloader does work pretty good, I did try it. It would be nice if it were smart enough to add it to an "Amazon Playlist".
I fully expect to see them selling movies, television, music videos, audio books or distributing podcasts via the same mechanism in the future....
Read or leave comments (or trackbacks/pings)Posted by Gary on Wednesday at 3:37 PM on September 26, 2007.
Related categories: apple, money, music, portable, web sites
Thanks for the 1 comments/trackbacks from: kilax
Tech Deals Today
These deals probably won't last (especially the cables) but I thought I'd mention them:
I just bought two of the travel kits (and a few for work), I've bought multiple names from Yahoo! in the past and I've bought lots of books using these coupons so they're all pretty good deals.
(None of the above are affiliate links - I just thought the cables were a great deal to mention so I threw in a few others).
Posted by Gary on Saturday at 11:20 AM on September 15, 2007.
Related categories: money, technology
More winners!
So I mentioned the other day that as an assignment I made the students in the Tech Leadership class I taught write a grant (submitting was optional) and three students won. I just found out there was a fourth winner!!!! That's brings the class total up to about $5,300. I think only seven applied so that's awesome (at most ten applied since that's all I had in the class).
I'm so geeked!!!
Read or leave comments (or trackbacks/pings)Posted by Gary on Tuesday at 11:18 PM on September 4, 2007.
Related categories: general, money
Thanks for the 1 comments/trackbacks from: kapgar
Free Magazines
So someone mentioned AdPerk as a way to get free magazines. As of today the only have Dwell and Popular Science. I sat down and watched a few videos (10-15 minutes?) while eating breakfast and earned a free subscription to Popular Science. If they had a little more selection of videos it'd be more interesting. They did make me answer a very easy CAPTCHA at the end of each one (no swirly colors, just tilted letters). It was really easy and painless and it worked on my Apple Macintosh with Safari (you can't always count on that).
The downside is the magazines they have (and plan to offer) aren't particularly expensive or anything. I'm not interested in Dwell so I have no reason to go back to their site anytime soon. I don't think I can earn and save points for the future or at least I could watch for now...
I have a few suggestions for them:
Read or leave comments (or trackbacks/pings)
Posted by Gary on Sunday at 11:11 AM on September 2, 2007.
Related categories: money
Thanks for the 1 comments/trackbacks from: Casey
eBay faux pa
Uh oh! I just bid a maximum of 50 dollars instead of 50 cents on an eBay item! I sure hope not many other people bid on this item. At first I freaked since I thought that was my bid, and then I remembered it'd bid up to that amount. There's only a little bit of time left so cross your fingers for me!
LATER: Whew! No one bid higher than the 50 cents!!! It was just for a Beowulf (Neil Gaiman and Roger Avery) movie tie-in advance six page comic that I thought might be interesting. This guy was charging a little more for shipping ($4) than the others so no one even beat my 50 cent bid....
Posted by Gary on Saturday at 8:08 PM on September 1, 2007.
Related categories: money
Thanks for the 1 comments/trackbacks from: ajooja
Teachers are Winners
So I teach a Leadership in Technology graduate class at a local university in the summer. One of the assignments is to write a grant; there is a $1,500 grant due at that time, so the timing is perfect. We review them in class, make suggestions, and we evaluate each other's grants using the actual grant rubric. And then I grade it based on the same criteria of the grant.
I think about seven of them applied, not everyone could apply, you needed to be an employed K-12 educator and you need to be a member of the organization we applied to (which costs $40-ish). You probably see where this story is going...
The other day I got an e-mail telling me that one of the students was awarded one of the grants. I was pretty excited, I wanted to write the rest of the class but I was too busy at that moment. When I looked at my mail later I had a message that one of the other students had also won a grant! So I sat down to write the rest of the class, while I was writing I got a third message telling me another student had won!!! I was floored. I'd guess they only awarded 25-35 of these grants and we got three of them! I think the three of them totaled about $3,800, that's all equipment they'll be able to buy for their school classrooms and use for the project they wrote and any other uses they'll come up with.
As a result of winning they'll also have to present at the next conference (which they get to go for free) and maybe write a short article for the newsletter. Very exciting!
Posted by Gary on Saturday at 4:37 PM on September 1, 2007.
Related categories: general, money
Thanks for the 2 comments/trackbacks from: Gary Said...: Ariana
PayPal Suggestion
If you use PayPal, this suggestion is for you as an individual (not for the PayPal company itself). PayPal lets you add several e-mail addresses to your account to send/receive money. My suggestion is to add a few other addresses that you use to your account. If someone sends you money to one of these other addresses it's way easier to claim it!
And I also think it might be better for you if your current e-mail account ever goes under, the other e-mail will already be on file.
I just had the first problem, and PayPal phone support resolved it for me pretty quick (if I would have shut up and stopped asking questions they probably would have resolved it even faster).
Posted by Gary on Thursday at 10:50 PM on July 19, 2007.
Related categories: money, web sites
$150 in Free Gift Cards
I can't promise long this offer will last, but I personally have done it before. They really gave me the 15,000 points!
This gets you $110-$150 in free gift cards (Target, Macy's, Amazon, Best Buy, Circuit City, Home Depot and many more) after applying for a card from CitiBank (and after making one purchase). Really the only way you get $150 is with a few certain stores, but you can mix and match and probably get $125+ pretty easily from the stores above. I got this offer from SlickDeals.net
Step 1 - Turn off your pop up blockers (or use Internet Explorer)
Step 2 - Go to this link
Step 3 - Click on "Apply Now"
Step 4 - Follow step 5 very carefully.
Step 5 - Then close the application window, a popup with a new $150 gift card offer will appear. (If you don't follow these instructions it's only for $80-$100 in gift cards).
Posted by Gary on Saturday at 4:50 PM on May 19, 2007.
Related categories: money
Thanks for the 3 comments/trackbacks from: Robyn: Mia: Gary LaPointe
Free Skype On Mother's Day
On Mother's Day (May 13) you can make unlimited free Calls (from US/Canada Skype) to anywhere in the world!!! Check out the Skype page for more details. Actually, it's not really unlimited it's only 200 minutes free, but that's still a pretty good deal.
Post edited to not incorrectly refer to "today" as Mother's Day... Offer valid from May 13th 2007, 5:00 am (Eastern Time GMT-5.00) to May 14th 2007 4:59 am (Eastern Time GMT-5.00)
Posted by Gary on Sunday at 5:55 PM on May 6, 2007.
Related categories: friends + family, holidays + events, money
Thanks for the 2 comments/trackbacks from: Missy: Gary LaPointe
Free Comic Book Day
Today is Free Comic Book Day so head on up to your local participating store and get some free comics.
Free Comic Book Day is an annual promotional effort by the North American comic book industry to help bring new readers into independent comic book store.My local store is Green Brain in Dearborm (MI) and they've always got lots of freebies and this year they have guest Scott McCloud signing autographs.
From Wikipedia
It's all sorts of comics, don't just think Archie and Spiderman, scroll down the Green Brain page to see everything they have going on (and how to get more free comics) so stop by and get a few...
I'm on my way right now...
Posted by Gary on Saturday at 11:19 AM on May 5, 2007.
Related categories: Dearborn, books, money
Comcast Cable and Internet
So I've gotten more than a few people hitting my site from search engines from the word "Comcast" and since I just adjusted my plan (again) I thought I'd mention my current Comcast plans and maybe save y'all a few bucks. First I'll mention that I try to pay attention to recurring costs and utilities especially paying attention to my cable / internet bills since they are more of a luxury that heat or electricity.
If you don't care about (possibly) saving money, don't read the rest of this...
Cable TV - I generally just get econo-basic, it's generally available on most cable systems (I think many cities/townships require a cheap plan in the contract), it's just generally the first 20-30 channels on the cable system, it's on $12 (on my system) and usually doesn't require a cable box (on most systems). I don't want many more channels than that so it suites me fine. I think the next package up these days is $29.99 so that's a big jump if I don't want all those channels anyways. Here's the thing if you want internet, the prices there quote for internet are $15 more if you don't have cable so it's really $3 cheaper to have cable TV with your cable internet.
Remember, just because one sales person doesn't know about a service doesn't mean it doesn't exist. If someone can't help you, call back later and check with them.
HD TV - So on top of the econo-basic I pay $7 a month for an HD box (it just jumped up from $5), this gets me most of the major networks and a few more channels in HD. Please note, I do not have a HD TV, so I don't get the full benefit, but it does look like it's DVD quality (it's definitely better than digital cable).
Cable Internet - Every 6 to 12 months I call and complain about the rates ($43 a month 6,000 down/384 up). I mention other offers (competing companies and DSL) and they usually drop my bill about $5-$15 a month for the next 6-12 months. Last time I called they offered me the deluxe service for $30 a month and this was 8,000 down/768 up so I took the offer. It's normally $53 a month but it was a promotion and this expired this week so I canceled it. I do notice it's a little slower (I actually think it's the slower up speed that I'm noticing) but I'm debating if it's worth $120 a year for the faster speed...
And don't forget you can buy your own cable modem and save $3-$5 a month. If signing up for new service (via Best Buy, Circuit City, CompUSA, etc.) you can generally get these for free after rebate so it's really worth doing...
Here's the thing when I called yesterday to change the plan they said they didn't have any other packages (besides these 6,000 and 8,000) but I just checked my bill to verify these costs for this post and I seen they have a 4,000 (4 meg) plan (the bill was clarifying the names of the new plans starting May 1). FYI, they usually offer a $25 service too that's 384 down (I think it's 384 up), that's not too fast but it's better than dial-up (and it's always on).
UPDATE: Tonight, no one seemed to think the 384 down service still exists, which is very funny since they just renamed it to "Economy". So I've had two people tell me the Performance Lite at 4,000 (4 Meg) is $25 ($24.95 actually) in my area so I switched to it (that would really be some savings from $43 a month). But when they switched me I'm just getting 384 up and down, I've had this happen before when they've offered plans to me. So, it turns out that he thought that it's an either the Economy (384 down) or the Performance Lite (4,000 down); both are $25 a month, I will be calling back in a few weeks to double-check that is really the case. But they did give me $5 off a month for the next 12 months for the time it took (about 50 minutes) so that's something; I'd rather have had 4,000 down for $25 a month...
So the end result of tonight's call is that 4,000 down for $24.95 (performance lite from Comcast) is not an option in my area but it might be in yours (or a similar plan from your company). Just test it while you're on the phone to make sure it's really that fast before you hang up...
Posted by Gary on Wednesday at 10:42 PM on May 2, 2007.
Related categories: general, money, television
Thanks for the 2 comments/trackbacks from: Carol: DS0816
Complete My Album - New iTunes Feature
It's about time! Now you can go back and buy the rest of an iTunes album at a discount if you previously bought one song. Just go to the iTunes Music Store and in the upper right choose “Complete My Album”.
This is great mainly for several reasons: If you bought one song off an album that had 12 songs on it (for $9.99) you can now get the other 11 for $9.00 instead of having to buy the whole album (it looks like it's full credit). Also, if you bought one song off an album and some of the songs were “album only” purchases you now have the option to get rest since you're actually buying the whole album. For a 10 song album, it really doesn't make a difference. Not all artists are doing this and you only have six months to get your missing albums, but it's a nice option if you regretted not getting it in the first place. FYI, they did grandfather in all the old albums you bought more than six months ago (so you can still get the missing ones).
I'm not sure if this will help if you bought a pre-release single since I haven't bought that many. I'm pretty sure a few of the songs on the list are ones I've (purchased) for free, but I could be mistaken. And I know there are a few that I didn't purchase off the album they are showing, I must have bought off some other album or special purchase mix that iTunes offered (iTunes Originals or something).
PLEASE Leave comments (or trackbacks/pings)Posted by Gary on Thursday at 10:47 PM on March 29, 2007.
Related categories: apple, money, music
Auction Tonight
Usually I post this earlier but I forgot this year. Tonight is the South Redford Schools Auction (actually it's run by another organization but it's for the schools) and you can always get a pretty good deal on donated items so if you're not doing anything tonight...
As usual a basket with a few Cat in the Hat goodies that includes a visit from the Cat in the Hat for a party or just to read stories. I've been doing this one the past few years.
New this year (and I'm going to start doing this one) is a basket of goodies from my vacation to Costa Rica. Bags of coffee, some muchs, chocolate covered beans, a hand made box (with a toucan on it) and a few other oddities. Assuming this sells, I think I'm going to make a package of stuff each time I go on a trip from now on.
Read or leave comments (or trackbacks/pings)Posted by Gary on Friday at 1:29 PM on March 23, 2007.
Related categories: money
Thanks for the 1 comments/trackbacks from: Gary Said...
$400 bucks a month (or a free car) to drive around a car with advertising.
Get a free car or get $400 a month to drive yours. If you get a car from them it looks like it cover maintenance and tires too. I'm not sure how I feel about this but if it was a product I loved and I could make (up to) $400 a month, that doesn't seem to bad.
If you are chosen, you will receive a new car, wrapped in an attractive advertisement, to use for two years or you will be given the option to wrap the vehicle that you currently own and get paid up to $400 a month.I could drive something like a TiVo, Apple, SixApart
I gotta figure if you get paid you have to claim it, if you're just driving their car it might not count as income (plus you get service) so it just depends on what you're looking for. I might fill out one of these profiles, it's not like I have to take it if they offer me.
They used to do with years ago with VolksWagon Beetles and Kool cigarettes, I'm not sure what the pay-out was then but they were always interesting to see (been googling for a few minutes now, can't find an image of that to show).
Read or leave comments (or trackbacks/pings)Posted by Gary on Sunday at 12:19 PM on February 18, 2007.
Related categories: money, web sites
Thanks for the 1 comments/trackbacks from: Omni
300 Free Text Messages a month from Sprint for College Students
If you are a college student you can get 300 free text messages from Sprint every month for a year. Just take your ID to a Sprint store. (Don't forget to cancel in a year!)
From SlickDeals.net.
PLEASE Leave comments (or trackbacks/pings)Posted by Gary on Saturday at 12:09 PM on February 17, 2007.
Related categories: money
iLike Music (especially FREE music)
So I keep forgetting to mentioned that I found iLike, it's kind of a music social networking site.
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My iLike page is at http://ilike.com/user/garylapointe
They just keep adding new features that they're pretty god a keeping you up-to-date on the iLike Blog. And they've got a widget for your web page (which I'm hoping is showing up on your screen as you read this) and it'll even let you play my recently played songs as you read this post!
What I don't like about it is it calculates favorites based on the songs in iTunes on your hard drive and not what's on your iPod (even if this was some manual option I had to select I could deal with it). I've got a 60 GB iPod, I don't have that much room on my laptop to carry around all my music on it all the time (besides I've probably got it with me on my iPod). So really what it thinks is my favorite is what I've bought from the iTunes store that's on my laptop and played the most (on the laptop or the iPod). So Conjure One is what it lists as my absolute favorite and while I like them a lot they wouldn't be listed as my favorite. And when I was playing a lot of Christmas music (which I also had on my laptop) it push that up on my favorite list (I see Kenny G is still high in my rankings because of Christmas.
Posted by Gary on Sunday at 3:29 PM on February 4, 2007.
Related categories: apple, money, music, web sites
I love my iPhone
So I really like my iPhone. It's the Linksys CIT200 iPhone and works with Skype and you'd might not even realize it was a real phone. It looks more like a generic Nokia cell phone than a home phone and it works great. Actually, the one thing that makes it “not normal” (which doesn't bother me as much as others on-line) is if you are manually dialing you need to dial the “+1” before all calls, to me it's slightly silly, you should be able to configure it to have a default country (and area) code.
You can see all the people you have on your Skype list on the display of the phone so you just scroll down and pick who you want to call. I've wandered all over the condo and it's clear everywhere (I'm on the 3rd/4th floor and it's clear on the first level too!). It's got a headset jack on it, a great speaker phone and supports call waiting. From the USB base the plugs into the computer it even has a button to press so you can page the phone so you can't misplace it. You do need to route the audio on the computer so it properly goes to the phone (Skype has audio settings but it seems like the computer overrides them).
I initially set up Skype when I dropped my land-line phone. I wanted a way to make phone calls in case I forgot my phone somewhere (or it broke) and wanted an easy backup. Plus when I'm out of the country if I have interent access, I can make phone-calls to the US very inexpensively (2.1 cents a minute).
If you use Skype it's a must have, if you don't have Skype and you need an extra phone line in the house get Skype and pay for unlimited outgoing calls to land-lines in the US and Canada for $30 a year. If you don't get a phone like this you just use a headset on the computer.
What don't I like about my iPhone? It's got a crappy wallpaper background and while they have several to choose from, none are a plain background so it's always hard to read the screen. The “+1” is a minor annoyance, but since I really don't use it that much, it's okay. The audio configuration is mildly annoying, I'm hoping an update fixes that (update: I did just install the Jan 22, 2007 update and the audio confusion seems better, we'll see how it feels after a few days).
PLEASE Leave comments (or trackbacks/pings)Posted by Gary on Sunday at 12:53 PM on February 4, 2007.
Related categories: money, reviews, technology