I'm Moving...

Well the blog is moving...where? I think I'm going to move it over to WordPress.. Why? Because Blogger isn't as cool as WordPress. Granted you can easily change the template through CSS but the templates I've found aren't that great and they act funny once you upload them. I'll be making the move sometime this week, if not tonight. I doubt anyone cares because no one is really reading this...another reason why I'm heading over to WordPress. I've got another blog that's not PF related and it's been up I think shorter than this blog and I've gotten way more hits to that one. I think because of their Blog and Tag Surfers, where you can easily see other blogs that are writing about the same things you are.

I've kind of kicked this idea around for a while, cause I didn't want to leave this blog, because my adsense and other non-salary things are connected to it. But I'll just have to go in and change those things out. If I can't succesfully move the archives over, then I'll just leave this blog up and start from here over there.

Until then...

National Body Challenge 2008: The End

I realized this morning that I never did a follow up post to the National Body Challenge, which ended last weekend. And the total amount lost: 14 lbs. Which almost spreads out to about 2lbs a week over the 8 week challenge. Which is the accepted amount for healthy weight loss. I would have to say that the challenge was a success. Although I can't help but wonder if it really was the challenge, in an early post I listed my top ten learn things, but most of them can be found in any diet that promotes a healthy change. The challenge had it pros for instance, I set my own pace, there was no over head number of pounds to be reached at the end of the challenge. It was really up to me to create and stick to a diet and exercise plan, the site, TV, and emails had a lot of good tips to help that along the way. However it also had some cons, even though you could sign on the site and join discussions in the forum...it was still a bit like you were doing it alone. It was up to you to find a buddy to do with you and create that sense of community. That's one thing I have to say about weight watchers and curves...they create a sense of community. You are in a building with like minded women who all want to lose weight for different reasons and you all take comfort in that. If you are a newbie at the diet thing it could be very overwhelming, at some points I felt like the challenge was aimed at seasoned pros. And although the initial cost was free, which meant it was totally budget friendly a lot of the following details were not. Since we don't have cable I had to rely a lot of the emails and the site to gleam information. Which wasn't easy mainly cause the site had a lot of downtime and issues, which was odd since it was a Discover channel child site. Like I said I had to create my own diet and exercise plan, granted it came with a 8 week membership to a Bally Fitness, the nearest one to me is three cities away and more than 2.5 hours, I'm sorry but I want to lose weight but not that much. So I had to use my local gym and come up with something. That also went for the diet, a lot of those recipes were just not kicking it so my creativity hat came on.

So was it really the challenge? Well yes and no...the challenge gave me a reason to do the things I did...but it was really my own doing the create the change. So yay for me! Will I stay with it? I'm not sure, anything is possible. I would like to keep up the momentum but not being in my own place makes it hard to change my diet when everyone around you isn't.

Job Search: The Third Interview

Well the interview went like an interview. I didn't get a good feeling nor a bad feeling from it so I can't even start to say if I have a chance. I should know either way within a week to ten days. It took about 30 minutes, and that was because I had to do a mock memo. The position has changed a bit, but it's still something I want to go after. Instead of being in the IT department I would work part of my time in the outreach community center and the other part I would be a floater between branches. It's still part time but I get benefits because it's an upgrade in titles.

Speaking of benefits, here's theirs: I would get Vacation and Sick leave (48 hours/year), holiday pay if the holiday falls on a day I'm scheduled to work. Retirement plan, I would make a 6% pre-tax contribution, and they make a contribution also (it doesn't say how much though). Health Insurance through Blue Care HMO, with a premium of $136.09 biweekly. Also a deferred compensation program that allows employees to supplement retirement income by deferring a portion of current salary before it's taxed. They have other benefits too that aren't explained in the brochure, saving bonds, direct deposit, a credit union, employee assistance program, pre-tax health insurance premiums, internal promotion policy.

All in all I'm slightly disappointed because it's not the position I originally wanted but it's still a good deal.

Job Related News: And yet another interview!

This time I'm really excited about this interview. Why? Because it's something I would want to do. It's a position in the IT department of our main library. I would have a supervisor but it would be minimal surpevision. I really want it but if I didn't get it I would be happy to know that I at least got an interview for it. It's tomorrow so keep me in your prayers!

March 2008 Goals

Here's my March Goals:

1. Look for more places to apply: I'm kind of iffy about this one, I'm starting to get bummed out, there really aren't any jobs available here in the south. And the option of picking up and leaving isn't an option. But I'll keep at it, again one job a week, until something comes along.

2. Gain full time employment: Same as last month, I would like to have full time employment by April 1st. *sigh*

3. Step up the posting: I've got some post that I've been thinking of doing for the longest, now I just need to get on that. Last month I challenged myself on my other two blogs to post at least two times a week, and I surpassed that goal, so this month it's this blogs turn. Two posts a week.

4. Post at least another two articles to Helium: I would like to turn some of the post from here into articles and post one from their title selections. Maybe I can figure out a way to knock out two stones in one with this one.

5. Open a high interest savings account with the possibility of a checking account.: Right now I have a toss up between ING Direct Orange Savings/Electric Orange Checking and HSBC Direct Online Savings/Online Payment Account. I would keep my brick and mortar checking account and maybe set up a savings account.

6. Increase my overall net worth by 1250%: I know that might seem a lot but really its not, considering I have about $4 in my account now, that's only an increase to $50 to be in my account at the end of the month.

Goals February Review

Here's how I did on my February Goals:

1. Look for more places to apply: Met and Passed. I applied to 10 more places with in the last month.

2. Gain full time employment: I got an part time job, but have yet to gain full time employment.

3. Find more ways to bring in non-salary income: Counting the Part Time job towards this goal as well. I've tried to doing surveys, and have found one thing out I'm not a survey type of person. Through CashCrate.com I've only qualified for 1 and earned a total of .80 (wow!) and it was irritating, it was a movie survey and basically it was trying to get me to see this one movie, it was very bias to that one movie. I still need to go through Linkworth's and start implementing that, so I'm going to say this is 70% done.

4. Post more articles on Helium: 100% I posted a total of two articles this month.

Am I the Only One Who Thinks Some THings Happen for a Reason?

I know I'm not, but I can't help to think sometimes I am. This morning I talked about the lows and highs I went through these past couple of days. I'm sure you might recall me posting about how I turned down the Edward Jones job. Well after I did I sort of regretted it, but I didn't pay it no mind. Because I often regret choices I make. I'm use to it right about now. Well this one wouldn't go away and something about just kept nagging me. Well this morning when I went to check my many emails, I found a email from Edward Jones asking me to reconsider the possibility, adn you know what I am?

I'm not positive on what I'll do but I'm going to take a closer look at it this time around for sure.

Vacationing from The Edge: Mood Swings

It's amazing how one can go from a high to a low in space of a day. Well maybe in the space of a weekend. Last week I wrote how I had gotten a part time job, well I still have it, she just pushed back my start date. I was suppose to start this morning, but she wasn't quite ready for me. Hopefully I can start next week. Then my dad did my taxes, I was slated to get almost $300 back from Federal and just over $200 from state. Which I was glad to get, since I had only worked technically part time the whole year. Well they rejected both state and federal and my dad had to re-file for me, the problem? There had been a tax update within the week he had did my mom's and sisters and mines. That update affected me and the tax limit bracket I guess I was in, thus I get nothing from federal and only $54 from state, that's a big difference. Although I wasn't that upset because taxes are something you should never count on having. The government is to fickle to rely on, so oh well.

So I was bit bummed about that, I was going to use half of the money to pay off some debt, but oh well. I'll just use half of that to start the high yield savings accounts. Later that day the post came, and I must admit I love getting mail, even if it's just junk mail. I like it to see my name on it, it's weird I know. I don't necessarily like to get bills, but it is mail so I'm torn on it. Well yesterday there were several things for me, I felt so special. There was a first class envelope with no returned address, some samples I had sent off for, a coupon for free kid's yogurt, and a letter from my student loans provider.

Of course I was curious over the first class mail, no one ever sends me something so important it has to come in a priority mail envelope, not even my college degree was sent in one. So I tore it open, and it was a letter from some government agency conducting a survey. The survey was about how American students pay for secondary education. In gratitude they send you a $30 check after you finish it, since it was a web survey I logged on and completed the survey in about 25 mins. So in about four weeks I should be getting a $30 check. That of course lifted my spirits.

The samples and the coupon lifted my spirits even more, another thing I love is free stuff. I'm really excited to try the kid's yogurt. Even though I'm no where near a kid, the things they put out for kids tend to be more nutritious than the things they put out for grown ups. This one has less sugar than normal yogurt and plus its free.

But the biggest boost was the letter from the student loaner, I thought it was just my monthly statement that they send. But no it was a letter say that two of my loans were being dropped because of no disbursal. For some reason when you graduate in December they still give you financial aid for the spring semester. I had to wait for my alma matter to say I was no longer enrolled before they took away the loans. So a total of $2,751 was dropped from my total debt. Bringing my total to $15,190.98 in student loans and $17,904.00 in total debt. That's not bad, compared to some other's (got to stay positive.)

Well with all that good news coming back to back how could I get into a low? Well I received an email from one of the jobs I applied to and they decided to go with some one else, oh well. Then I sent an email to my mom asking what's the hold up on that job. Apparently they too went with someone else but that person declined the offer. So I'm just going to go ahead a say I didn't get that one. My mom thinks I should send an email to the head inquiring about the job and how I would really love to work for them, but I'm like I wasn't there first choice and they aren't my first choice, I'm not going to "beg" them for the job when I don't really want it. So back to the hardcore grind of applying for non-existent jobs.

I think the good and the bad have just even me out, I'm bummed but not to bummed. I would really like to get started some where in a job, just to give myself something else to think about.

Some Things I Wish I Knew Then That I Know Now

I honestly don't know who said hindsight was 20/20 but sometimes I like to think they were just a clueless about things like I am sometimes. As I come up on my second month of being a college graduate, there are more and more things I wish I had known when I was in my second month of high school graduation bliss that I now know now. But isn't that the case for a lot of people? To keep it in tune with this blog, there are some financial things I wish had known then.

Not all banks are the same.

When I entered college I had a savings account at a then local bank, but when I went to my student orientation, there were sales reps for Wachovia. They were offering free student checking to all students who signed up through them. I had no clue what all entailed in a checking account but it was free and I got checks. So I signed up and a month or so later I got my card, only to find that my name was spelled wrong. After five years, two cards, numerous calls to customer services, and conversations with bank tellers, my name is still spelled wrong. I wished I would have known that not all banks are the same, and I should do some research to find the one that works for me. I've written a total of five checks from that bank in five years, and maybe withdrawn money from a teller once every blue moon. If I would have did a little research even say after my first year, I might have stumbled on some of PF blogs now and been a bit better off now. But I also would have come across high yield accounts, which would have been a good thing.

Not all credit cards are the same.

I hate to admit that the only reason I got my credit cards is because I was tempted with a free shirt, now I still wear my shirt and in way I kind of don't regret it. But again research would have helped a long ways. Compared the rates and find the one that was right for me. I lucked out that the cards I did get were the ones for me with pretty good rates.

The art of saving for the long haul

I've tried multiple times to save, and always ended up saving for short term purpose. Usually to buy something for myself. It never occurred to me to save for the long haul, to plan for longer than an end of a semester. An emergency fund would have come in handy right about now, but then again I didn't know what that was and how to go about it.

Investing in the future and myself

I always thought you had to be a 30 something with a full time job before you could even think about investing. Even now I'm not so sure that's the case. But I know it's not, it just seems like something that's so overwhelming that you need at least 30 years of knowledge just to read through the literature. But here's where PF bloggers come in handy again, by no means are they all knowing. But they probably read more books about the subject then you have, when I'm trying to learn something new, I peruse the blogs read for the basics and then read the literature for myself. By doing this I'm not going into the book blindly, I have some handle on the lingo and the basic structure. It helps.

The difference between a spending plan and a budget

I thought I knew what a budget was, but really I was creating spending plans. I've realize that a combination of both works for me. I budget how much money goes into each category and then devise a spending plan of how to spend that allotted amount, with an eye to save as much from each that I can.

These are just a few things I wish someone had felt the need to tell me before I waved my parents goodbye that August morn.

Vacationing From the Edge: Preparing to Buy the Plane Ticket Back Home

Yesterday I told you that I was able to get a part time job, which is the first part in what I am now thinking of me returning from the edge of sanity (hence this blog post title). If you recall I already have a preliminary working budget, (and also here) where I figured out that I would need $23,769.60 (after taxes), or rather about $1,980.80 (after taxes) a month. I already planned on getting a part time job, although be it I had planned on getting one after I got a full time job, but I'm looking at in a positive light. I was mighty fortunate to find this job and to have my boss understand that I am still looking for a full time job and is more than willing to accommodate this. I'm more than excited to work for such a wonderful group of ladies and want to do my best to help them expand their business. At the rate it is now, it more than compensates for the pay I was looking for in a part time job. So in the grand scheme of things, I might be going about it in a backwards fashion but it'll balance out in the end.

I'm still waiting on the teacher position and I hope to hear something this upcoming week. I'm not all that confident that I will get the position and am still actively looking. I received an email from a former work colleague who asked if I had found work and he would be keeping his eyes opened for anything. So keep the fingers crossed, I still have six days before the end of the month to find full time work in order to meet one of my monthly goals.

Despite the fact that I don't have the full time job I still wanted to come up with a plan of action to jump start my personal finances. I know me if I don't think of it before hand then I'll just go on as before. The first thing I have put down is I can't loan money out, I won't be bringing a lot in so I need to be able to control where that money goes. You might have noticed I put back up my progress bars, although they have been paired down quite a back. I have a bar for Other debt (debt not related to student loans), Student Loans, Car Fund, and Apartment Fund, I might be putting one up for Savings as well.

Other Debt

I currently have $2,713.02 in other debt not related to student loans: credit card 1 ($1,468.00), credit card 2 ($ 777.19), class ring payment ($137.83), and medical bills ($330.00). I plan to get rid of this first for a couple of reasons the main one being it's the smallest amount and I could in theory (if it doesn't grow) knock this one out with in the year.

Student Loans

I currently have $ 17,192.00 in student loans and $749.98 in interest on those loans. I still have four months left on my grace periods and I haven't consolidated it yet either. Which I will be doing most likely in the last month of my grace period. I've already started the process of looking up different options. I have all my loans through the College Foundation of my state, and they boost that they save you money on your consolidation loan, which I would think they all did but guess not.

Car Fund

I live in the south and it's not easy to live in the south without a car. I would like to manage to do without a monthly car payment but I am so particular in what I want: small to medium size and mid-90's to early 00's that I'm more than likely going to have to have a car payment. If I could keep it to under $350 a month I would be good. I've set a $2,000 limit for the down payment. I don't really want to use the whole amount on just the down payment, but on all the other things that goes with starting insurance, tags and licensure, and the payment for driver's license. I've managed to put it off for 23 years I don't think I push my luck any more. Plus I'm getting a bit tired of depending on others for rides.

Apartment Fund

This is the biggest for me, other than getting rid of the debt of course, I need my own place. More for keeping my elusive sanity. I've set a goal of $3,000 for application fees, security deposit, first and last months rents, utilities deposits, first round of food stocking, furnishings, and a house warming party. A friend of mines advised me to have at $1,000 set aside to do the first four items on the list but I like to have a little insurance so I added another $500 to it and the rest of the $1,500 is to do the food stocking, furnishings, and the party all on a low cost budget of course. I would like to find a two bedroom in a decent and safe neighborhood under $600 which I can do, the only aspect would be the commute. Honestly I would be willing to do a longer than average commute if I found my dream apartment. I know with the gas crisis that's a big pf no-no but sometimes it's about filling a want rather than a need.

The Plan

Well like I've said there isn't going to be a lot of money coming in just yet, but I would like to start paying down some debt and saving some money. So the first thing to be paid will be the other debt in a SanityGurl fashioned snowball plan. The class ring payment, then the medical bills, then credit card 2 and credit card 1. There's tons of information on handling a snowball debt plan, which was first thought of (I believe) by a guy name Dave Ramsey. A lot pf bloggers would go with the Highest interest method (I'll discuss at another time along with the snowball debt method) but my credit cards don't have high interest rates and the amount is not that great.I plan to pay off the class payment in full and then take that amount and split equally amongst the other debts on top of the minimum. So in a way I'm doing it the way he prescribes but I'm not over paying just one and not the others. Hopefully buy the end of my grace period in the end of June I will have paid off the class ring and the medical bills, and made a noticeable dent in the credit card debt. I no longer use my credit cards so I don't see it growing much outside of the interest. At the same time I'm paying out for debt I want to make equal payment into a savings account. I plan on opening an high yield one, (another topic for another day) and have three sub-accounts, Car Fund, Apartment Fund, and Savings. I think this is a good start, don't you? It helps that my mom is allowing me to stay here rent free, although I'll still give her some kind of money to help out.

Job Search: Part time job

Well the interview went well, better than expected (sort of). She offered me the job right there, and as I thought low pay and no benefits. But it's okay. Because know there will be some kind of income coming in, which means I will have some personal finances, not much but some. I'm excited, can you tell? So what's the job? It's an office assistant for a beauty consultant firm. I get to do all the things I love to do. I'll be an assistant, web designing, marketing, organizing, PR(ing), inventory, customer relations, accounting, product buying and more. And a few things I don't like answering phones, not one of my favorite things to do but I'll do it. Right now it's only two days a week, it might increase to more days if I'm needed.

It's going to take an initial large sum of hours to get started, mainly because they have been with out an assistant and the head admitted that she had no system so she's opened to suggestions (yay!) and you can totally tell. The first thing is to do an overhaul inventory, it's suppose to be done every January but that didn't happened. She's willing to work with me once I find a full time job to adjust my hours, which is a good thing. I would hate to leave her in a lurch if I were to get a position soon.

So right now I'm probably looking at about $400 a month from this position, like I said not a lot but it's something. I still haven't heard something from my mom's job, hopefully I'll hear something next week. I honestly don't know why they are lagging. It's almost not worth it, but right now that pay is to much to pass up. The next thing to happen is me making a action plan to get the most out of the pay for this part time job.

Job Search: Another Interview

Today I have another interview, for an office assistant. I don't know how much it's for and I don't even know if there are any benefits. Somehow I doubt it. Why am I pursuing this position? Well the lady who I would be working for is a contact of my mom's. She told my mom she was looking for an office assistant and my mom suggested me. So there is a rather good chance that I will get, but the real question is for how long will I keep it. I'm still going to be looking for a better job, I know this just isn't the one for me.

I'm meeting with her this afternoon to discuss the position, I'll let you guys know how everything turns out.

In other news, I've kinda come at a stall point for things to write in this blog. It's not easy to keep an PF blog, when you don't have PFs. I've actually stopped hardcore reading the many PF blogs I fav. Mainly cause I haven't found blogs that are really talking to me. It might be where I'm looking, but I'm not finding any PF blogs for single recent college grads, especially women. What does that mean? That there aren't any other single female recent grads that take an interest in the pfs? Or does it mean that these people just don't write about it? Like I said it could be where I'm looking. I would like to find some blogs that really are aimed at a person such as me. I'm sorry I can't really get into a blog that talks about family life with a husband/wife/significant other and their kids/lack there of. I'm 23 I'm not looking for a family life just yet.

I would also like to find blogs that don't force their opinions onto their readers. Not that there is wrong with having opinions but some bloggers have strong opinions and they don't take the time to address the other side. I guess that's what I'm suppose to do but if your going to tell me your opinion it would be nice to see your take on the other side to show that you aware of it.

Sorry about that rant, it's just something I've been thinking about.

Suze Orman's Women and Money

The other day I was lucky enough to be reading several of my PF blogs and saw that Oprah was giving away a free copy of Suze Orman's book, Women and Money. The download was until the end of Valentine's Day, so sorry if you missed it. I've seen her book on other's blog and was a bit curious as to what was detailed inside. But since my local library did not have it, and I haven't been able to get to the main library, I just put it on my wish to read list. Well God most definitely works in mysterious ways. How else could you explain this gracious gift? Well I plan on start reading it today and will be sharing my thoughts through out the course of it.

Does anyone else have any good personal finance books they would like to suggest?

Until next time,

*Notice the name change? Yeah I'm still crafting my blog identity...which will explain the template changes and what not...sorry, Hopefully I'll hit on the perfect combination soon!

Happy Valentine's Day!

I know it's only two hours away from the end of the day, sorry about the late posting. I made a promise to my website readers to have an update by today and I've been working on that all day. I just got finished with that and halfway through the day I thought it would be good to take a five hour nap. But anyhow Happy Valentine's day, I hope yours was filled with love and appreciation. Did anyone do anything special today?

Helium

As promised in this post, here is a detail post about the new service called Helium. Basically Helium is a website were writers go and post articles on a wide range of things. There is three aspects of Helium and how it can earn you money. Here's a quick break down:

1. Write and Rate: This aspect of Helium is quite easy. First after signing up, you can go in to main part of Helium and find a channel you like, Arts and Humanities, Politics, Science, whatever you can think of there's a spot for it. Once you choose a channel you will find different prompts under the channel. For instance under the Society and Lifestyle channel, you have four major sub-channels: African-American Issues, Lifestyle, Racism, and Society & Lifestyle (other). In the sub-channels you will find topics to write on. Examples in African-American Issues: Barack Obama: Christian or Radical liberal?, Lifestyle: Living unconventional lifestyles, Racism: Passing on our prejudice is a disservice to our children, and S & L (other): Dating and the disabled. Once you find the topic you want to write on, you write. I suggest you write in a word processing program of some sort, that has a good spell and grammar check. Usually there is a word limit of 1200 or more, but sometimes it's less. After you wrote your article, re-read a couple of times, just like any other writing. And then go back to the site, click on the topic and it will take you to the page where you can post your article. After you go through the posting process, you will be taking to two articles on the same topic. Your asked to read both articles and rate which one is better than the other. After you post your first article you can start rating others.

How do you earn money? You can earn money from this by writing good articles and writing a lot of them. Just like you rated the other articles, someone else is rating yours. And the higher it goes the more it earns. So the more articles you have out there that are well-written, the more money your going to earn. Right now they are doing a reward-athon, the more articles you post under a certain criteria you earn stars, after you earn a star you get paid a certain amount for every article you post, if you post more articles that meet the criteria more stars, more money.

2. The Marketplace: If you are looking to earn a lot of money quickly, then this is the aspect of Helium you want to pay attention to. In the Marketplace you will find postings from editors and publishers on all sorts of topics. They post the topic and the amount they will pay for the article, for example one of the latest was from a children's magazine looking for mystery stories (even a chance for it to be turned into a series.) If they chose your story, they were going to pay $50 for one. There are pay-outs from as low as $16 to as high as $150 an article. Because of the high pay-outs, these articles are highly competitive (they also have expiring dates- so read the whole post before starting something.).

How do you earn money? Pick a title and write some of the best stuff you've every written before. You could earn up to $150 for just one article. But remember that this section is very competitive and the titles needed can be scarce sometimes.

3. Contests: This is kind of self-explanatory. A collection of writing competitions for many different topics. It's basically like the Write and Rate section, except you have less choice in the subject manner, and it deals with a point system. You collect points by writing as many highly rated articles as you can, under the channel (which has several different titles to chose from.) But if any of your articles drop below the top 50% points will be taken away from you.

How do you earn money? Like the first two, write good articles. First prize is $75, 2nd is $25, 3rd is $10, and 4th is $5.

So with a good combination of all three, you could really make a killing do what you like best writing. Is it worth the time and effort? I think it is, if you enjoy writing, then you really aren't going to be to bothered about the time and effort it takes to craft a good article. It's going to come natural to you. And like I said if you find a good combination of the three aspects, then yeah it could be worth it. Plus you are putting your name out there, publishers are looking at this site too. There are tons of success stories form people who were picked up full time (well freelance full time) from magazines.

Losing Weight: Update

Well it's been one whole month since I started the National Body Challenge. And I thought I would do a post about how I'm doing and share some of the tips that I've kind of collected throughout the challenge. Well first off I've lost some weight, not substantial, which is to be expected. Since the goal of the Challenge is really to get you more healthy, not necessarily help you lose tons of weight really fast. So some is better than none, right? I have three more weeks left before the Challenge ends, it's going to be interesting to see what happens then. Hopefully I will have a job by then and if it's the school one, then I'm definitely going to be losing some weight running after them children.

Here is a short list of some of the tips I've managed to collect.

1. There's a difference between rewarding yourself with a treat and binging. In reality you can eat almost anything, but the key is to eat in moderation. Never deprive yourself of something you love, in the long run your going to do more damage to yourself. I'll never give up three things: sugar, bread and tea. I need them to survive, which is why any diet that cuts those out is not the diet for me.

2. When a craving comes...distract it by eating some soup (which is more filling then most other foods), a salad (which will help you fill up with less calories and knock three servings of vegetables), and nuts (when kept in moderate potion size, they can really give you a boost in between meals)

3. Be a mindful eater, once you get an handle of be aware of calories and setting your daily calorie intake you'll hone a skill of knowing which foods will do you good and the portion size of food. You'll also learn which foods will tend to make you overeat. For me it's sweet breads, it's like a tingling in my mouth, once I have one I have to have another and another.

4. An exercise doesn't have to be some pre-planned can't change the routine hour long deal. As long as your active in some kind of way, that's better then being inactive. Granted as you start to get more and more use to being active, you should explore different exercise types and routines to find the best one for you and do that one. And don't skip out of exercising if you don't have the full hour or so...if you have 20 minutes 10 minutes of weights and 10 minutes of cardio will do.

5. Getting thin and staying thin is not an impossible dream. If your willing to understand your habits and change them, then you can get thin and stay thin. That's what this challenge is all about, understanding your habits and changing the ones that need to change and getting new ones.

6. Know what your triggers are. This is really the apex of the challenge to me. We all do things because of triggers, something we see, smell, hear, taster, feel, triggers something in our brains that makes us do something. Understanding those triggers help you control your habits.

7. Variation is good. Change things up a bit, some of the diets out now a day, calls for eating certain foods over and over again. Which is why diets usually don't work for me. I don't like restrictions on what I can and can't eat and when I can and can't eat something. If I want to eat a slice of pizza for breakfast, pancakes for lunch and a small salad for dinner, then I should be able to as long as I've chosen healthy choices then what's the big deal.

8. Fast food places are not the diet devil. That said, they aren't a diet haven either. But if you know how to navigate the menu then you should at least be safe for a while. Whenever possible go with grilled or roasted chicken (with out any mayo or mayo-based special sauce), baked potatoes (exclude sour cream and cheese sauce), go for deli sandwiches, if your getting a pizza go with veggie toppings instead of the meat lover's special, try and have a small salad with every lunch and dinner meal, if you just got have that burger, go with a kiddie sized plain burger, and if you get the meal you could even get fruit for desert.

9. Set your goals. Before you start any weight loss plan, you really need to know what your goal is. Saying I want to lose wright just doesn't cut. And be realistic, everyone agrees that losing 1 to 2 pounds is an healthy pace, when making permanent life changes it's best to do it slowly.

10. Stay strong in the grocery store. Have a plan, never shop when hungry, shop along the sides and the back, and take the time to read the labels. Compare the labels of brands to find the one that's nutritional right for you. Since I'm lactose intolerant, I have to do this any way. Just because it says low fat, how low is it really. And if it's something you will eat with another item, how would that factor. I heart instant mashed potatoes, so I compared the brands till I found one that had the lowest calories, fat, and sodium, but was higher in iron (I'm anemic as well). Do a couple of items every shopping trip until you've gone through your regular items, for instance one trip do crackers, and the next trip do pasta sauce. And do this every so often, companies change up their ingredients sometimes and new brands come out every so often.

Some of these tips are kinda common place now a days in the dieting world, but these are my take on them and the ones that really have helped me along the way.

Job Related News: The Interview

Well I went to the interview. I was a bit early, but no harm in that right? Once they were ready for me, I was given a tour. Although it was a quick tour cause I've been there times before. Then I observed one of the teachers with a kid. This one kid was one of the aggressive kids, there are a total of four of these kids. He wasn't that aggressive and he didn't have a "tantrum", so it wasn't that bad. After about twenty minutes of that I had my interview with two of consultants. I think it went fine, I was asked about my ability to be silly in front of others...I held back a sarcastic look...I think there's a bit dramaticization (is that a word) to me that I can be silly in front of others...Although it's not like I'm use to being such a way in front of others. I only had one question to ask of them, and that was the training process...there's a probationary time of one month before I would be by myself on the schedule. As I walked around I got second thoughts, I was still doubting myself. But then I came home and saw a comment from my friend on my personal blog about the interview and that made me smile. I didn't ask about the salary but my mom told me later.

The base pay of $22,000 (I think the last time I said this was the highest well that's for assistant teachers, but because I have a four degree I can be a teacher) a year (before taxes), is still less then what I want to making (which is probably what I would get yet is still much better than the $18,000 base for the assistant teacher), roughly $1,833.33 a month.

The highest is $26,000 a year before taxes, which is roughly $2,166.67 pre-tax. That's almost $200 surplus and also a no need for a part time job. Which would be a good thing to cover some of the unknowns that I wasn't able to accurately depict in my preliminary budget.

(Just for kicks, the median would be $24,000 a year, $2,000 a month, a $19.20 surplus...it's a surplus not much but it's something. I would probably still get a part-time job but probably after a few months...like a summer job or something.)

So if they gave me the job at the base pay I would still need to get a part time job that would net me just short of $200 a month. Which isn't that bad...I mean if I got a job at say for instance Walgreens at minimum wage, $6.15/hr (NC's minimum) and work for two days a week Saturday and Sunday (although I've always been told not to work on Sunday that whole Christian thing *shrugs her shoulders* I needs the money to get out of here...I'll do it.) a total of 16 hours a weekend. That's just short of $400 a month (that's $200 more than what I've guessed I would need.), and $4,723.20 annually pre-tax, that's a good chunk of extra cash. So if I chose to do the job as a summer job (starting in May and going to the end of July), I could still make $1,771.20 pre-tax, and only have to make up another $228 (perhaps in non-salary ways).

But this is all contingent on me actually getting the job. This is as much planning have done concerning this job and as much as I'm going to do until I get a job offer (which wouldn't be sometime in the next week or so). I'm trying to be positive, but I swear it's the waiting that kills me. I wish they would just tell you right there if you got it or not. All my other jobs were like that...although for all my other jobs I didn't really have an interview either. I just put in an application and it was a "When an you start" deal. Oh I miss those days.

Well I'm off to watch something on the telly. Has anyone tried the Thule trail game yet?

Job related news...

Well I got an interview tomorrow for the school thingy. As of now I'm not nervous, I've been trying to keep my mind off it. Which meant listening to music and sleeping all day. Which is why I'm just now posting something. My mom was able to give me some pointer of the questions they might ask tomorrow, there's only one or two that I might have to tell a slight half-truth on...like why I want to work there...I can't tell the whole truth which would be cause I want a job and this is the currently only option right now. That might not go over so well. I'm kinda ready to get it over with. My mom said that they are looking to hire two or three people, they had an interview today, I'm tomorrow, another one is after me and then two more next week. So I probably won't hear anything until next week at the earliest.

Wish me luck!

A Trip Down Memory Lane and Freebies

Do you guys remember the Oregon Trail game? Well someone has down a more up-to-date version of it, I don't know if you've heard of it, Thule Trail. It's basis is similar to the old game, you're on a cross-country trip with other people. But instead of the settlers heading to the west, you and some friends are heading to a music festival. There are still some similarities, you chose what occupation you want to be, you chose who is in the car with you. You have to stock up on things before living the first city, you can go hunting for food, and people still get sick. Yet there are some differences that adds the more modern touch to it. First you can chose to be a student, slacker, or a professional. Then you chose your vehicle: a SUV, a turbo wagon, or a hybrid sedan. You have a choice to stock up on music, magazines, car parts, gas, bags of groceries, and pellets. Instead of shooting deer for food on the road, you shot images of different fast food (at the end of the "hunting trip" it tells you how many bags of groceries you filled up.). I wasn't able to finish the whole game cause it froze on me and then I exited out. But on my cross-country trip, I took my friends "I", "J", "J2", and "N". I was about two cities away from the end, "I" was the only one to get sick (no surprise there she gets sick in real life easily), someone gave "N" a purple nurple because he didn't like the music that was being played. "J2" kept finding money in odd places and "J" kept falling asleep (which she was in the shotgun spot and thus the navigator [in my head] and I kept getting lost...I wonder why?). I picked up a hitchhiker who then stole $160 from me. I won $150 in a skiing contest and lost a kayaking contest (but that was when it froze). Despite all that happen my car morale was ecstatic. As I played I came up with several ways you could apply this game to personal finances that I'll go over in another post. So if you get a free moment or find yourself a bit bored...go check it out and tell me how your trip went.

In this post I mentioned my music subscription Ruckus, well they just sent out this thing saying they need more people to sign up. So I'm doing my part in spreading the news. If you haven't heard about Ruckus let me tell you. It's basically like Napster but for college students only. You need to have a valid college email to sign up with. I signed up in November, I put that I graduated in '07,and they haven't canceled the subscription (although on their help page it says alumni can continue with a $7.99 subscription, still cheaper then Napster). I don't know how they make sure you are still in college cause they don't send out emails or anything. The reason why I like Ruckus is because it's free, like I said it's like Napster with their $9.95 to download music to your computer that you have to update every month, but with Ruckus it's free. It also takes up less space on your hard drive. They have a to-go program as well, instead of the $14.99 ($14.95 for Rhapsody) it's $20/term (Spring= Jan. to May, Summer= June - July, and Fall= Aug.- Dec.), which breaks down to $4 a month for Fall and Spring and 10 a month for Summer...still cheaper than Napster or Rhapsody. I've been able to rebuild most of my library, there are some songs they don't have, but that's just like both Napster and Rhapsody. There was song that one had that they the other didn't and vice versa. The reason behind Ruckus is pretty admirable, he (the creator) wants to keep Ruckus free for as long as possible, because he wants to stop poor college students illegally downloading music. Something he use to do, he's been clean for only four months and one week. You can watch videos on there too. So I imply you to take a look and seriously think about getting a subscription...(unfortunately or fortunately [ however you look at it] it's not I-pod compatible.)

Well that's all I have right now for the freebies...once I find more I'll let you guys know. Anyone else have some cool freebies?

Goals: February

Well as promise here are my February goals. Since it's a short month, I have to be very selective of what I want to accomplish.

1. Look for more places to apply: This month I want to apply for at least one job a week. I don't want to over do it and have too many resumes out there. There's four weeks in this month so that's another four places I have to find to apply.

2. Gain full time employment: I still haven't heard from my mom's boss. I'm not relying on getting that position, since they can be so iffy. However I would like to have a job before March 1st.

3. Find more ways to bring in non-salary income:I've place ads on the blog from Adsense and the Amazon Associates, but until this blog starts gaining more views I don't plan on seeing any revenue from them in who know's when. I have applied for an online tutoring job, which I need to finish the subject test for. I've also signed up with Linkworth, another advertising deal. And the other day I created an account with CashCrate.com. I'm going to look into survey sites, any suggestions?

4. Post more articles on Helium: This kinda goes with #3 and I'm dedicating a separate post for this one with more details about what Helium is.

Along with my personal goals and writings goals, these are my February goals. Not much but enough to at least keep me busy. Anyone else have February goals?

Goals: January

I just like everyone else tend to make some sort of New Years Resolutions, although I'm not into the label New Years Resolutions. I rather call them goals. Nevertheless, when the new year came about I too was busy making goals. I probably should have posted these goals sometime in the early month, but I like to take the whole month of December too come up with my yearly goals. Unfortunately this December was hectic and busy and I just couldn't wrapped my head around what was happening in the future. I however I was able to make some small goals for January and I wanted to share with you on how I've done so far.

1. Look for places to apply: 100%. Although this is currently an ongoing goal until I find employment. As it stands I have applied to a total of 8 places (although I pretty sure that the number is higher but I can't remember nor find my list as of now.)


2. Start Reading Personal Finance Blogs: 100%. I've started a good blogroll of pf blogs that I tune into everyday. I am still looking for more, especially those with my audience in mind. I haven;t really found any of those. The ones I have found, deal with couples (married and not and with and without kids) or single-parent families since I'm single and without kids, I have to be very selective with what I take from them.


3. Research different savings venues: semi-done. Since I am still without a job I haven't really done that much research into my savings options.


4. Research different retirement venues: I want to have a good knowledge of retirement fund terms so that I know what I want when I look at my employer's benefits package. Semi-Done!


5. Set up a preliminary budget: This was really so I know how much I income I will need to accomplish certain goals. Done!


6. Keep the bank account in the positive: Although there isn't much in there it's still positive> Done!

Summary: I didn't really have that many financial goals for this month since I don't have much finance to deal with. But the ones I did have, I've manage to complete about 80% of them. But that means the ones that weren't completed have to be pushed to February.

Since January is now over I can share with you my 2008 goals as they stand now:

1. Get a decent paying job - if need be get a part time job


2. Get own apartment


3. Get license and car (I've managed to put this off until now, but it's starting to become more of an hassle to be in the south without a reliable mode of transportation.


4. Open an high-yield savings account (which with the stock issues now I need to get on this as soon as possible)

5. Monetary goals: I'm holding off on making these until I receive employment and I have an knowledge of my expected income.

With that in mind, what are my February goals? Still working on those. I should have them ready by tomorrow if not Monday at the latest.

The Job Search: an Update

Although yesterday's post could be seen as an update of search for my job search, but it was more like a post for posing an question for this subject. I decided to go for the job. After posting a similar post on a more friend's only post, a friend of mines gave this advice:

There's something that both Nana and Momma have told me over the years that may apply here: If you really want a job, some things just won't matter.
When it comes to dealing with potty issues, I'm pretty sure you'd be fine after you got used to it.
You're resiliant and I think you'd probably get into the swing of things after a few weeks. Also, you have your mom. She's been doing this for I dunno how long, so at least you aren't going in completely new to the whole thing and you have someone to go to when you get nervous. I've heard you talk passionately about some of these kids- about them as people and about the way they're treated at home. You care. That right there makes you more qualified than some people I've seen in a similar job posistion.
I've got faith you can do this.

I really took this to heart. Sometimes I don't always have self-confidence in my own skills and capabilities. It's always great to have a love one say I know you can do it. Last night I wrote up a cover letter (which was a bit of a hard thing, because I wasn't quite sure what she wanted they are so lax and not all that professional so I was afraid of over doing or not doing it good enough.) This afternoon I sent it alone with my resume to her. I haven't heard anything but I figure they are waiting for others to apply to. Now that I have it in my mind I really want this job. It's less then what I want to making, the highest would be $22,000 a year (before taxes), roughly $1,833.33 a month. When I started my job searching I did a preliminary budget, and all though there were a good amount of unknowns, I have figured I would need at least $23,769.60 (after taxes), breaking it down to about $1,980.80 (after taxes) a month. That means if I got this job I would have to find a part-time job that would net me roughly less than $2,000 extra a year ($147.74 extra a month). That's not that much more of a gap. But that's going with the idea that they would give the highest. I highly doubt that, since I don't have any experience per se.

I've already started thinking of some ways to try to earn the extra $200 a month. I would hope that the revenues from this site would help, but I'm still too new on the scene. Plus I haven't done any advertising for the blog, I'm waiting to I can regular post about personal finances (which means I need to get a job to have finances in which to talk about) But until then, I have to look to other means. In this post I gave some ways I was trying to earn some money. One of them was the selling of my paperbacks online. Yeah that didn't work out so well. I did a price check on the ones I have and saw that people were selling them for pennies. Granted I hadn't spent a lot on some of them, but I wasn't willing to let them go for pennies. So I've rethought the idea, there is a used bookstore, Edward McKays, (which when I was looking for the link for them I saw they were hiring...I applied for 20 hours, unfortunately it doesn't say how much the pay but I think that would be a good part time job.) I could sell back some books there. Although I think I would get cash and book credit, which is good that way I could use the credits to buy more books and not spend any more money. New books, without spending any money...works for me!

I could also try and find some seasonal work, which means I would have to temporarily cut back on some of the budgetary items, savings, until I found such a job and then put all the earnings from that job to it's respective areas. This would be a last resort scenario sense I need the money right now.

Tomorrow I'll give an general goal update.

And yet another Job Decision needs to be made.

My mom works at a school for autism kids. Well they are hiring, and at first the job they were offering was for a part-time teacher for 1 to 4.5 yr kids. It was 30 hours a week, at $13 a hr. plus benefits, the kids would be both "normal" and autistic. Many of my friends know I have a slight unnatural fear of kids. I like them okay I just can't handle them for long periods of time. But I was willing to take this job, cause one it would be easy to get to work. If my mom goes I go, which is a big thing because I don't have a car to provide my own transportation. Plus it was a job which meant money would be coming in. And at this junction I need money. I wanted to have a job before February...but since that's tomorrow...I need to kick things into an higher gear.

So I sent my resume to my mom so that she could give it to the head boss. Well today my mom sent me an email saying that the teacher who I would be working with has decided that they don't want another person in there. Which doesn't make sense to me, why didn't they say something before and just not have the job offered. So the boss has decided to do another job offering, instead of being just in one class I would be doing 1:1 with some students plus work in several different classrooms. I would basically be a private tutor for autistic kids. I believe that the pay is slightly higher and I think it might even be full time, not sure. And while the aspect of working with autistic children might be admirable I'm not sure about the whole idea of it. I mean I loved working with my mom when we worked with two of her kids especially the one little girl. But what if I got saddled with one that was destructive to themselves and others, I couldn't handle that. And what if I had to help them learn how to use the potty, or if they had a bathroom accident? Its different when it's a toddler then when it's a kid that's 10. Not only that but the working condition isn't all that great. The people there, especially some of the management are basically not cut out to be in the positions they have. And I don't handle poor management well, I run right over them I can't help it I just do.

So if there is anyone out there actually reading this I would like your thoughts on this conundrum. There doesn't seem to be another option in the horizon and I have bills to pay and a sanity to keep. But just at the same time is this not a similar problem that I found in the Edward Jones job offer?

Credit Cards vs. Debit Cards

This morning as I was going through my blogroll I came across a post at FiveCentNickel, which was titled Yet another Reason Credit Cards are better than Debit Cards. I've noticed a lot of personal finance bloggers who have blogged about this one aspect of PF. I personally think the argument is moot. But if I have to take a side, I would go with Debit Cards are "better" for me, I don't like the idea of psychologically paying for something twice (once when I receive the item and then again when I pay my credit card bill). Also I think it's more rewarding to save up for something and pay for it with my own money.

The basis of his post was that someone in a company had made a major mistake and overcharged their customers. This caused a huge wave of problems for some of them. I'm sorry but it doesn't matter if you have a credit card or a debit card, getting overcharged for anything is not a good thing. Well FCN says that this proves that credit cards are better because those who had credit cards on file it wasn't a big deal, the company refunded the money and they went on with their life. But those who had debit cards on file, some of them occurred overdraft funds and some had bounced checks. Another problem I had with the post was one of the comments that said it was harder to deal with this sort of mistake or bank fraud with a debit card versus a credit card.

I had two major problems with this reasoning:
1. I think the post was a bit biased from FCN perspective, he took for granted that everyone who has a credit card had the room on the card for such a charge as well as any other automatic (or non-automatic) charges to occur, and those who had debit cards didn't have the extra cash. Last time I check, once you maxed out a credit card...that's it no more free money. Granted the debit card you have a limit of overdraft fees you can occur (for some accounts) and it too will be freeze. In this aspect neither one wins out.

2. He says those who had a credit card got repaid and life went on...again looking at the note before...I'm sure not every one's life was that happy cherry. He also leaves out the fact that those who had debit cards got their money back as well. Again granted those who occurred fees and other problems have more to deal with, getting it all straighten out, but those who had the same problem with credit cards have to go through the same deal. So again neither one wins out.

As far as the comment about dealing with the mistake, their basis was that you wouldn't know about a identity theft occurrence until the end of the month for a debit card, when your statement arrived. But with a credit card, you would notice it sooner because the card would get denied...

Okay, umm...this gave me paused. First off, if you are waiting for a monthly statement to arrive to check your accounts, in this age of online banking, then something is quite literally wrong. Even if you don't have access to a computer with Internet, most places offer telebanking to check your accounts. And what if you are like FCN who had a decent balance, your card wouldn't have been denied and thus you still wouldn't have known until the statement arrived. Identity theft is such a major problem now a days, keeping a close eye on your accounts is just plain smart.

Dealing with identity theft through credit cards or debit cards is no real difference, especially with more and more banks offering identity theft protection programs, just like credit cards. (Side notes, both sides charge you for the protection so for those who don't have it...they are still S.O.L. be it they have credit cards or debit cards.) And it's not that easy, no matter what the t.v. says, to deal with identity theft. It's a long and tedious battle, depending on how much money you have.

Having a debit card doesn't make you more vulnerable to identity theft. If you don't practice safe spending and aren't aware of your money and the accounts, then you put your own self up for risk, it doesn't matter what you have in your wallet.

I know that a lot of people have their reason for choosing to carry and use a credit card, but there are just that many people who prefer debit cards. Like I said I think the argument is moot. For every supposed con there is for using debit cards, there's a con for a credit card. For this situation, FCN chalks this up for a win for credit cards, but there are way too many factors he didn't take into consideration. The situation was bad no matter how you look at it, but those who were able take the hit with out it being much of a hassle to fix had it easier, and that goes for credit card and debit card holders.

Let It Sleet, Let It Sleet...Let It Sleet? part II

So as promised her are some more pictures from the ice "storm" of 2008. I decided to go for a walk around the property and find some really nice shots. This was after I had just played three hours on Guild Wars...I needed the exercise. This time I tried to make sure they weren't blurry!

As you can see it's already starting to melt away, it stopped sleeting a couple of hours ago. Easy come easy go.

My mom's car again

The back patio

close up

This isn't showing the ice, but this sign is right behind our property. I personally think it's rather a great sign!

Even though there wasn't a lot and it didn't last for long someone was still able to make snowman.

The last one's are my favorite.

Let It Sleet, Let It Sleet...Let It Sleet?

Today I woke up to our first ice "storm" since my freshman year in college back in 2003. It didn't do much but it's still sleeting as we speak so it might get worse. But it's also starting to warm up. Here are some of the pictures I took... (Sorry but some of them are a bit blurry, it was still sleeting when I took them.)

This was taken from the Living Room Window.

Taken from the front door, that's my Mom's car.

Someone had already made footprints...I wanted to be the first.

The hedge right next to our door.

Shot of my Mom's car.

A sky shot

A close up of the car

A blurry close up

My sleeve

My footprint

Our back patio

Another picture of the back patio

I'll try to take some more pics as the day goes by. I have to go out later to do the laundry. Our laundry "room" is sort of detached from the house, off the back patio. Today was a snow day so both my mom and my brother are home, talk about family time.

Job Search: Hard Decision Made and Back to the Grind

Well after much debate with myself and some discussion with my mom. I opted to not take the job with Edward Jones. This was a major decision for me and I'm one of those people who always like to think of all the pros and cons before I make a decision. I thought I would share them with you all...so you can see what I was thinking.

The Pros:

1. It was a job which there would income coming in

2. The work entailed some interest for me...basically it would be a continuation of the things I want to eventually do with this blog, financial advising.

3. They were willing to train me to become a financial advisor and pay me for my training.

4. I would basically starting my own business and they would hire me an assistant to help maintain the office.

5. The pay was more than I was looking for...just over $30,000 plus bonuses. Their benefits packages was pretty good to... the basic included basic life insurance, basic accidental death and dismemberment insurance, income continuation plan for short-term disability, profit sharing and tuition reimbursement. (They also have optional medical and dental insurance, long-term disability, supplemental life insurance, supplemental accidental death and dismemberment insurance, dependent life insurance, long-term care insurance, health care reimbursement account, dependent day care reimbursement account, 401(k) plan, after-tax plan and investment savings plan.)

So those are some good pros...but what made me decide to go the other way

The Cons:

1. Ultimately this is a sales job...something I don't really want my whole job to be about. I know that almost all jobs has some sort of sales to it. But in order to be successful in this job you had to be a successful salesperson.

2. It's a career oriented job. I'm not looking for a career just yet. I want to go back to school in a year or two and I don't think I could just walk away from this in that time frame.

3. I would be responsible for my paycheck. They only pay you the salary for the first month, after that it's really up to you to have built a sizable business to start making a income.

4. I can't really see myself doing this for long, it seems very stressful and I wouldn't be able to do that and school, plus continue on working on my writing.

5. I'm just too young to start to settle into such a career path.

So five cons and five pros...you can see how I was in a bit of a fix. But I realized that it wasn't really about how many was in each list but how much they each weighed in my life. This is where it really pays to know your life dreams and goals. Granted one of my life dreams is to become financially stable but I don't want to sacrifice other dreams to be financially stable. In my life the Cons weighed more than the Pros. While I feel a little disappoint that I'm not posting about a new job, I'm comforted by the fact that I hadn't sold my soul for money. It's a good feeling.

Job Search: Potential Job?

I finally got up the nerve to call the lady back from Edward Jones. Unfortunately she wasn't there so I left her a message. She then called me back and I didn't hear the phone ring so I missed it. But she did leave a message and I'm suppose to call her back tomorrow morning and we are to have a discussion. I'm thinking they have some sort of entry level position. I don't really know how I feel about it.

On the one had I'm excited about a potential job, on the other hand I'm nervous that I'm getting my hopes up for nothing. So I've been trying my best not to think about it. I told my mom about the other day, and my sister. My mom was like okay well maybe they have a entry level position, just call her back and see what she has to say. My sister was less supportive, saying that I wasn't qualified. I don't know what they are looking for so I don't know if I'm qualified or not.

I'm really ready for a job cause I'm ready to start anew. I know I'm kinda asking for a lot, everyone's saying it's gonna take a while before I can actually get something. My dad has been looking for work for five years. I don't know what all he's applied for but I'm hoping my luck will be different.

On a side note, my mom *suggested* that I think about just going back to school...possibly in another state. I've been thinking about it, but it might not be as easy as everyone seems to think. It's much harder to get into grad school plus find money to do it. Besides I haven't a clue really what I want to go back for. That's why I took the year off to try and figure it out.

Losing Weight at a Discount

You know sometimes it pays to click on a random ad. Today when I logged onto my music "subscription", Ruckus (I'll tell you about that at another time) there was an ad for the National Body Challenge. For a while now I have been trying to lose a decent amount of weight, for various reasons. I can't claim to have tried many different diets, my Mom can though. You see I have an unnatural fear of vegetables. It goes behind the whole not liking vegetables, no they actually cause me fear. Over the years I've been trying to ad more and different types of vegetables, but it's going very slowly. At present I can stomach peas, corn, small doses of Alfredo drenched broccoli, onions, small amounts of carrots and that's about it.

I have tried two of the main stream diets, Weight Watchers and Slim Fast. I have strong opinions of both, the main one being they aren't budget/frugal friendly. Weight Watchers basis of going to meetings is a good one, I mean it's much easier when you feel like you have to answer to someone. And even though they say it's about community, come on who isn't going to be a little competitive in an area like that. Slim Fast, is advertised as free, which in a way they have one up on Weight Watchers, you can easily go online and use their tools and website for free. (Weight Watchers online tools is part of their Weight Watchers Online program and cost roughly the same as going to the meetings programs.) But Slim Fast is really geared around their products that are not cheap at all. It's hard to substitute regular food when they say have a Slim Fast Meal Replacement bar for Lunch...well does that mean for us normal folks?

So at first I was a bit skeptical of the NBC program. So I clicked on the ad and it took me to the Discovery health website, so far so good. So why am I psyched about this challenge. Well for starters its completely free. The package is amazing to be free, you get:

1. An 8-week free membership to a Bally Total Fitness
2. Customized meal plans
3. Progressive fitness plans, tailored to you by professional experts
4. Diverse community support (It's called the National Body Challenge for a reason.)
5. Individualized weight and fitness trackers
6. Various videos and interactive tools
7. Plus more!

There is one set back...it's only a 8 week challenge From January 5 2008 to March 2 2008. But I'm sure the information you learn both on the website and on TV you can easily take it with you to keep for life. Another important note is that the you can potential register anytime doing the 8 weeks but the 8 week pass to Bally Fitness is available until the 15 of January (11:59pm).

If your reading this after the end of it...don't worry it's a yearly thing. If I have a great experience this year, I plan on doing it again next year.

Personal Vices

Everyone has a vice or two that cause them money every single paycheck. It's our guilty pleasure, or gift to ourselves for being us. And most people always find it way to account for these vices. But when you are strap for cash or looking to get out of debt, vices can be the bane of your existence.

My vices are gadgets and books, and recently e-books and music. I like to think I am on top of my vices, every now and then I go a bit overboard but not often.

I heart gadgets, I'm a total Generation Y type of gal. If it flashes and does cool things then I'm all for it. The latest gadgets I bought was my cell phone and laptop. I had never own a personal computer before in my life. When I came to college my dad bought me a used PC desktop and used one of the old monitors we had around the house and it lasted me all the way until that summer before it died. Then I went to a rental place a rented a laptop...I went through two of them before the last one fell apart due to shoddy workman ship. My Jr. year a friend of my dad's gifted me with their old PC desktop and it last for 1.5 years, I loved that thing it was the best computer I ever had. But then my dorm room had a surged and it crashed...well after waiting for several months and using my dad's old laptop I had finally had enough money in a paycheck to buy me one. I researched it as good as I could. And ended up with a Toshiba Satellite A135-S4527. It cost me less than $600, and it was more advanced than my two friends Dell laptops that they had both purchased last August (one had went into debt to get and the other one had their parent pay for it.)

Before that I saved for a whole semester to get my self a Nintendo DS and three games. I was so excited to get, again my own personal game console ( I had shared a Sega and a original Nintendo with my sister and my brother had a Playstation 2). Out of the three games I bought I mastered one in less than two months, the other two I got bored with extremely fast and traded them in. I got some more games and one for X-mas but I haven't mastered them either. Since last march I think I've played my game maybe a handful of times. Recently I've been thinking about selling it on Amazon or Ebay. But every time I think about it I remembered how I saved and how I know it's just because I haven't bought a new game for it that I don't play it.

I haven't bought a new book or e-book since October and I won my video mp3 player and I canceled my music subscription back when I bought me laptop...I have Vista and the To-go feature doesn't work with the Vista.

I know that in the upcoming months that these holds on my vices will have to continue but I must confess I look forward to the day when I can dip my toes in them once again.

Happy Birthday to Me

Today is my 23rd birthday, it feels weird. I didn't do anything out of the ordinary, I hate it when my birthday falls on a weekday, not to mention that I have no money to go and splurge on myself. I know there are tons of things to do for free, but not here in the south and definately not during the monf January. Now next week around Martin Luther King's birthday then yeah I'm sure there will be loads of free things. But that's one of the things that can lead to not liking the fact that your birthday is only two weeks after Christmas. A lot of people think you can just lump it all together but I figure if I can't lump your birthday in with the closet national holiday than neither should you being lumping mines.

But other than that I am happy to see another year, I am happy to have my family around for another year. 2007 was not the year I wanted it to be but I survived it and I can only go int o 2008 with a positive outlook.

In other news, I have gotten another email from Edward Jones about a possible job, I know I should get in touch with the lady. It's a job, but I don't know if I am truly qualfied to work there. So I am going to sleep on it and perhaps call them tomorrow morning. I know I can't dally to long or I might be passing up a good chance. I know I can learn and excel anything I put my mind to, dealing with other people's finances? *sigh* that's a big thing.

Well I'm off to do something...maybe this weekend I'll do something festive for my birthday.

Vacationing From the Edge: The Reasons part 2

In the last part of the Vacationing From the Edge series I talked about my low-self esteem issues. Today's post will cover the Dreamer part.

Dreamer

Being a dreamer is a permanent characteristic for me, so I'm going to preface this with a I don't see me ever not being a dreamer. Some times my dreams get lost amongst reality and some times I prefer my dream world over this real world. And this has really caused a lot of my problems to date but I don't see me forsaking my dreams to become financially stable.

For starters being a dreamer helps me cope with life. I mean life is not a easy thing to deal with. Because with life you have death and that's not a real awesome thing to think about (Unless you are a Goth- I'm not...nothing against them.) Being from a barely above poverty line family I got use to drowning everything and everyone out when things got bad. But as I've gotten older I know and understand that things could have gotten a lot worse.

How does that translate to my personal financial predicament? Well often it means I set to high of a goal for me to obtain in the small amount of time I give myself, which means I usually fail. And I've talked about that already and how that affects me so no repeats. But one of the truly big dream that I have that affects me the most is that I want my family to be happy and stress free. I know there are some going...Wait you can't put that all on yourself...you gonna drive yourself crazy trying to do that. Hence the title of the blog. Well I've been trying for 20-something years and I've not manage to do it. My family is miserable or anything they just aren't as happy as they could be, if we all weren't financially burden.

Often I catch myself daydreaming while others are living their life. And over the few weeks I've been here trying to find work I have come to some decisions.

It's time to stop living in the dream world solely, I think it's fine for me to visit at least once a day. I'm very creative...creativity is an extension of my soul. I need it to survive which means I need to dream to come up with new ideas of creativity. From writing to photography, digital arts to sculpture, painting to basket weaving. I've done it all and I'm always interested in coming up with new ways to express my creativity. I've come up with a list of new hobbies I want to try that I'll post about later.

I don't look at being a dreamer as being a negative thing, but I do understand the part it had to buying me the ticket to the edge.

The Job Search

As you know I am currently unemployed. Which is a major bummer. After having a solid job for fours years straight I got use to having one. It's weird I always thought I would prefer not to have to have a job but now that I don't I want one. It sucks not having money. Not because I want to buy stuff, cause I don't. I've had plenty of chances to spend the little bit of money I have on frivolous things but just haven't been in the mood to be a consumer.

But I have been proactive, as much as I can be without a car to go searching for work. I have actively applied for four different positions in the last three days. All at local colleges and one at a bank for a financial advisor (on the job training). I have a phone call coming in for the bank to talk about a interview set up so let's keep our fingers crossed. I would like to have some sort of employment before the first of February.

In the mean time I have been looking around for other ways I can make some cash while I wait. I've signed up for Google Adsense and Amazon Associates for this blog, and I'm thinking about put my other blog and website on the account. I have a website for my fictional writing and I get a pretty steady stream of business on there. I have some diehard readers that come by on the regular. Speaking of writing I've been looking for competitions to enter to gain some revenue plus get my name out there. Anything and everything (that's legal of course) I'm looking into.

I have a massive paperback collection. About five or so boxes worth of books in my parents storage. They have been in there over a year now. I figured since I haven't really missed them I can start selling them on Amazon, they are all in excellent order. I was taught how to maintain a paperback collection and how to repair said paperbacks for commercial resale. So my paperbacks are practically like new. At least they were before going into storage, there is no telling how they are now. But I have some books that I kept out of storage that I can start with.

I'll keep you all posted about how this all works out.