Spring is coming: Top 5 easiest plants for the frugal family

So you plan on starting a little garden to help reduce your grocery bill. Or maybe you're just looking for a fun way to spend a couple of hours in the sun with your family. Or maybe you're overly concerned with exactly how organic is organic these days. Or maybe you're just a little nutsy and you're incredibly worried about unlabeled GE food stuffs creeping up onto your grocers food shelves without you knowing about it full well in advance.

Great! But there are some guidelines you should follow. If you're an experienced gardener, you know what you're doing. You'll be growing corn, apples, lettuce, carrots and watermelons and feeding the whole block with friendly donations. But a lot of us, either through the ignorance of inexperience or being strapped for time need to keep it simple and easy. We need to do some easy things on our fire escape, deck or patio.

Far too often I've seen inexperienced neighbors go for a project that ultimately fails because they lack the time, energy and knowledge to go after it with the right tools and mindset. The project likely yields little to no bounty and they end up with a lot of wasted time and energy. Maybe a sunburn, too. You'd be pasty white after six months huddled next to a furnace, too.

So I've drawn up a short list. All of these plants require little maintenance, cost and knowledge to produce impressive harvests. I've also taken nutrition and quantity of harvest into account. While eggplant and mushrooms are great tasting and really simple to grow, they don't exactly give up a whole lot of vitamins, minerals and calories.

Get these as seeds and start them yourself or get them from a garden supply store as seedlings in a months time. But either way keep a budget in mind, both money and time wise. Never bite off more than you can chew or you'll just end up wasting your hard earned money and time off!

1. Strawberry
   Description: There are a boatload of varieties available in both seed and seedling form, but the type you should probably be looking for as a frugal gardener should be the "surecrop", "garden" and "wild" variants. They'll produce berries that are much smaller to the ones you're used to seeing at the mega-mart, but chances are you'll find them a hundred fold better tasting. They're relatively hardy, small plants. They produce tiny white flowers and self pollinate. But there's nothing wrong with a healthy bee population.
   Planting time: Early to mid spring
   Harvest time: Mid summer
   Tips: Don't go crazy on the soil. Strawberries like light, loose soil with plenty of room. So before transplanting to an outdoor garden make sure to loosen up the surrounding soil with a spade. Strawberries like frequent watering, so if you live somewhere besides Florida or Washington, you'll need to keep an eye on them as the spring rains dry up.
   
   Birds and squirrels love strawberries too. While I don't mind sharing, you may. To help preserve your harvest once you begin to see tiny green berries, run some chicken wire above the plants with at least an inch or two of breathing room. That'll prevent beaks and little hands from grabbing your hard work.
   
   
2. Tomato
   Description: Undoubtedly one of the most favorite patio foodstuff plants in North America. Tomatoes come in a whole boatload of varities. Plum, beefsteak, antique, cherry, heirloom, big boy, golden rave, rossa, et cetera. All are excellent and easy to grow. But if you're a first timer, you probably should stick to the smaller, more well known types. Good starters include cherry and grape tomatoes.
   Planting time: Mid spring to mid summer, mid spring being the best.
   Harvest time: Mid to late summer, late summer being the best.
   Tips: Give young tomato plants lots of support with tomato cages (bought from gardening stores) and trellises. Tomatoes like lots of sun, so make sure to put them in the sunniest spot of your garden where they can receive 7 or more hours daily. Plant them into very moist, warm soil with lots of organic matter. For more tips see wikihow.
   
   
3. Radish
   Description: I used to hate these little roots as a kid, but now I absolutely adore them. They're sweet, they're spicy. They're crunch, but they're crisp and moist. There are only a few mainstream types of radishes, but they're all more or less the same difficulty level.
   Planting time: Early spring or mid fall
   Harvest time: 25 - 35 days after planting
   Tips: Radishes like cool, but not cold weather. So spring in New England is the perfect time to start these bad boys. They like to be planted in very loose soil with a good amount of organic matter like leaves or compost. Plant as many of these as you can, their fast turn around rate will likely give you the best return on your investment. For more tips see eHow.
   
   
4. Carrots
   Description: Like the radish, carrots are roots and prefer to grow in cooler climates. While all types are very hardy, weather resistant and taste great the "Red Core Chantenay."
   Planting time: Early to mid spring
   Harvest time: 50 - 60 days after planting.
   Tips: Carrots may be very hardy buggers, but keep them wet as fluctuating water levels will cause the carrots to crack. To harvest, simply grab the plant and pull it out of the ground. If washed and trimmed of leafy greens carrots keep for months in the vegetable drawer. They are also excellent freezer fare, if kept in air tight freezer bags in the very back. For more tips see eHow.
   
   
5. Herbs
   Description: Will of course vary greatly!
   Planting time: Indoors, anytime. Outdoors? Mid spring for most.
   Harvest time: As needed!
   Tips: Herbs are by far the easiest plants you can grow and they can be kept year around if you have a sunny windowsill. Since they're not going to produce any vegetables, fruits or berries you only have to worry about watering them and making sure they don't go to waste. By far, if you're looking for a return on your investment, these are your best bet. Fresh herbs at the mega mart can get up to 5 bucks a bouquet.
   
   Good types to start with include rosemary, sage and thyme. They also typically tend to be the most expensive if bought at the grocery store. All are excellent with meats and fish. If grilling, throw some sprigs or leaves on the coals and close the lid.
   
   

So long as you keep a realistic attitude and a watchful eye you can get some great results with a little bit of hard work and diligence. Just go into the venture with expectations kept and check and you'll likely come out with a freezer full of food to get you through next winter!

Spring is coming: DIY Countertop Greenhouse

March is right around the corner and the days are getting warmer and warmer. And while even as I speak snow is falling outside my home office window, I know that soon all of this dreary white weather is going the way of falling leaves and foliage. People who are serious about gardening in my neighborhood typically gear up this time of year, starting their seedlings in front of sunny windowsills and cleaning out the potting sheds.

I've had some conversations with my neighbors. We're all more or less in the same boat of being financially strapped. I've heard time and time again that they're planning on really getting serious with a garden this year to reduce their bills.

A lot of frugal folk like to promote the idea that growing a lot of your own food can help reduce your over all grocery bill at the end of the month. I don't exactly subscribe to this ideal quite yet, but I think it's an interesting premise. The main problem I see with it is I believe a lot of people see the costs of seeds, the cost of produce at the mega-mart and draw the obvious cost connections in their heads. A single seed packet may cost $1.00 and contain enough for 50 tomato plants!

But I think far too many people neglect to take into consideration the other costs of growing your own produce. A short list includes:

• Tools (spades, hoes, rakes, watering cans, et cetera)
  
• Water (especially if you live in a drought prone region)
• Soil and nutrients (especially if you live in less than ideal growing conditions such as the middle of Arizona or northern New England)
• Pestic
  
• Potting accessories (Pots, seedling pots, trellises, et cetera)
  
• Time (time is money, after all)
• Seeds / Seedlings
  

At this moment in time I think that growing your own produce costs pound for pound the equivalent of buying it at your local produce stand or mega-mart. Which is not to say that I'm against home gardening to shore up one's food budget. I'm just saying that one has to enter the situation realistically without expectations of a greatly reduced grocery bill.

If you're planning on gardening this coming spring, I don't think frugality should be at the front of your mind. I think the gardener should be more concerned with the experience and the ability to control the quality of the food than anything. Not to mention that you're decreasing your carbon footprint a considerable amount if you're not buying as many food stuffs that come in via gas guzzling tractor trailers.

Plus, if you're one of those organic nuts you can assure yourself that your tomato, even if it might not look terribly pretty, was grown with as little impact on your garden space as possible.

The growing season is tricky, however. Especially in the northern United States, the time when you should have seedlings ready to go into the ground, there's still a couple of inches of snow covering the ground. So what I've found it that a lot of people set their future meals in front of drafty window sills and hope for the best. Which gives them a head start on the season, sure. But not nearly as much as they should be given.

Which is why I began to research small, compact greenhouses. I'm not talking about the variety that I'll construct in the backyard with lumber and sheets of very expensive glass, but small, self contained units that would only hold one or two plants. Something that I can easily carry out onto my deck on sunny, warmer days and take in at night. Or put in front of a sunny windowsill on especially cold days. And since a greenhouse is by definition an enclosed space, I won't have to worry about my cats getting a little hungry.

My logic is it'll be far more economical to construct several of these versus one large unit. And since it won't be exposed to the elements, I won't have to worry about weather proofing it. Which would add a hefty price tag to just about anything. Sealant is expensive. Once the fear of frost has completely left the picture, a small unit can be easily stored for next year and the plants transplanted to a proper garden.

In my travels I found this lovely little creation. Made out of a small amount of lumber, some Plexiglas and a couple of screws it hardly disrupts a tight budget at all, costing less than $20 to construct from start to finish. And if you're the type of household who typically has stuff from excessive years laying around, you might not need anything at all. Off the top of my head I can confirm that the only thing I likely need to construct one of these beauties this instant is a couple of sheets of Plexiglas and maybe a couple of hours to myself to get started.

Maybe some heavy duty band aids for when I invariably injure myself. And apology flowers to the neighbors, for the loud swearing that would likely ensue immediately afterward. Which can be grown in the thing that caused the swearing in the first place. See? It's a lovely cycle.

So will I be growing things this year? Yes. Our garden already has a large number of bulbs, chives, strawberries and flat leaf parsley ready to resprout. And I will be growing some one shot stuff like tomatoes and peppers. But I'm not expecting miracle yields to put me on the fast track to easy street. I'd be happy if I break even. I think that's good enough.

Borrowing from friends and family

I was watching one of the multitude of doomsday documentaries out there a couple of weeks ago on The History Channel. Within the documentary they examined the psychological affect of an "end of the world" scenario on the average John and Sally Smith. It dealt more or less with how they'd respond to knowing that the world was undoubtedly and unavoidably coming to some sort of end. There were a few responses that cut against the curb, such as "I'd party and never stop!" or "I'd pray!" But the vast majority of people (something like 85%) chose the obvious, and in my opinion, wisest road.

They said when polled that they'd spend their last remaining hours or days with their friends and family, in the comfort of their own homes. The poll surpassed nationality, race and creed. It seems most people, regardless of their upbringing would prefer to spend time with their close friends and family if for some peculiar reason the cosmos spat out a "The End" card for our planet.

The answer is pretty obvious and dull, but the message it conveys says a lot about our society. We're social animals built for a social world. It's why humanity can construct tools like jackhammers, supertankers, space shuttles and cherry pitters. We feel the most at ease and comfortable if we're near the rest of the pack. We have someone to watch our backs if the going gets rough. Everything in our lives is in someway connected to our closest social interactions, so it kind of makes sense that personal finance, being what it is relied heavily on our interactions with the rest of the family group.

You trust your friends and family, probably implicitly. The feeling is quite likely mutual. I'm not talking about Larry in the next cubicle over that you trade email addresses with, but mom, dad and grandpa, your best friends, your siblings. You trust that they would never do you any sort of harm that wasn't in your best interest and they likely feel the same way about you. That is after all what being a family is supposed to be.

So when you're navigating the world at large and you encounter a little difficulty, it makes sense to return to the people you feel most comfortable with. If you're in the middle of a disastrous break up, it's a good thing to ask for your best friend's advice. If your house burns down in the middle of the night, mom and dad likely have a pull out couch for you to crash on until the house insurance pays off.

Or when you hit the iceberg of epic debt, it makes sense to ask Aunt Susy (who has a house in the Hamptons) if she can spare a couple of bucks to help you out. Right?

Wrong. I subscribe to the philosophy that one should never, ever borrow any appreciable amount of money from a friend or family member. Unless the circumstance is extraordinarily dire (like you need to be bailed out of jail, or you have an attorney knocking on your door), it should never even be considered an option.

It's true that friends and family are there to help you out when times get rough, but far too few people realize how much strain a personal loan between friends can cause. I blogged about a similar circumstance a couple of weeks ago in regards to the dangers of co-signing on home, car or a small business loan. While the subject of borrowing money is a lot more subjective than co-signing, the underlying facts remain the same. You are putting someone you care about the most in a compromised situation.

They may quite willingly shell out the dough or dish out an autograph for the bank. And you may fully expect to return their favor in full. You might even plan to give them a little interest for their trouble. But what happens when the unexpected occurs? What if immediately after borrowing $5,000 from Aunt Susy your office down sizes you?

Sure, good ole' Aunt Susy won't expect the money back after you've lost your job. But what if after that your car needs a new set of tires? The unexpected happens on a daily basis and you may be fully justified in not being able to pay the loan back. But Aunt Susy doesn't see that. She'll pick up on the major things, but not the daily brick-a-brak of daily life. It's hard to blow off a car loan. If you're a couple of days late they start angry calls, charging fees and fines and sending collection letters. But chances are if Aunt Susy doesn't see a dime she'll stay quiet for a long time because of the pre-existing relationship.

And when she speaks up? Oh boy, she's probably been bottling it up for quite sometime. When it comes to borrowing money from friends and family, both parties must be prepared to either lose the money or lose the relationship.

There's absolutely never a guarantee that'll ever happen, a relationship ending over money. But does it sound terribly difficult to imagine? Most marriages that collapse under their own weight do so over money. Is a relationship with one's best friend or brother that much different?

News: Below 30,000 in the hole!

A short time ago you may have noticed a momentary lapse in my blogging. This was due to my not having time to eat or sleep, let alone manage a personal finance blog effectively. I was essentially busting my hump at one of my jobs. It's the time of year for inventory at Bed Bath and Beyond, so my services as a sleep deprived counting money were required for the good of the company. It's okay, there were only four snow and ice storms while we were commuting 2 - 3 hours at a time.

I ended up working an enormous amount of overtime and scoring quite the spicy check. As such we were able to throw a little bit extra at our debt last Sunday. And despite a timing war with our checking and savings accounts, causing a couple of overdraft fees we managed to throw a full extra thousand dollars at our American Express green card.

That'll shut the credit collectors up, I think. Let "Sarah" in New Delhi mull that over next time she decides to call and bug me.

Which brings us to roughly 29k in the red. That's quite the improvement from our original figure of 35k a relatively short time ago. There should be an even more drastic reduction in two months time. And beyond that my income will hopefully be increasing two fold, due to the busier spring real estate market.

So here's to busting your hump and having only a pretty pay stub to show for it!

Chase: Damned if I do, damned if I don't.

My household handles all of its finances every Sunday evening after dinner. At this point in the week all of the direct deposits and checks have usually been cashed and we've received all of the bills we're going to be paying that particular week. So we get together in front of the warm glow of the computer monitor and throw an Excel work book onto the fire.

The Sunday before last our lovely and elaborate budget informed us that we were supposed to be sending out one of our car payments that particular week, that of our 99' Mercury Sable. So we rifle through the mail and come up with nothing from Chase, the bank who handles that particular automobile. We have the money, we have the check, we have the stamp. But no bill. So, thinking that it simply went out late we vow that the instant we receive the bill we will pay it and send it on its merry way the very next morning.

At this point it is worth mentioning that this is the only way we can pay intelligently. There is a fee associated with every other payment option. We'd absolutely love to pay our statement online and save them the cost of paper. It'd get them the money faster and save everyone mail costs. But nooooo, they want to charge $15 for every online transaction. That's an extra $540 on a three year loan!

Suffice to say the statement does not arrive. Last Sunday afternoon the phone rings.

MSB: Hello?
Chase: Hello! May I speak with [pause] Mr. Gawdbwa?
MSB: I'm Mr. Godbois, yes.
Chase: Sorry about that, sir. This is Billy from Chase Auto Finance. My system is telling me that you're past due on your 99' Mercury Sable payment. I'm calling to rectify this issue for you.
MSB: We were aware we owed you our monthly payment, but we never received our statement.
Chase: Has this happened in the past, sir?
MSB: Our statement usually arrives later than we'd appreciate, but no. This is the first time that we've failed to receive it.
Chase: Oh! I'm so sorry. My terminal is saying we mailed it, but I'll mail out another invoice right away. You'll have it within 2 - 7 business days.
MSB: Thanks... I appreciate it.

Keep in mind this fine gentleman said 2 - 7 business days to receive another statement. This is all he mentions. He does not offer to waive the fees associated with other payment options so we can get the money to them at that instant, he does not mention incurring late fees on the account and he sure as heck does not mention our account being forwarded to collections.

Today, Wednesday afternoon our phone rings again.

Chase Recording: Good afternoon. Please wait while I connect you.
[2 minute pause]
Chase Recording: I'm sorry. I'm still trying to connect you.
[2 minute pause]
Chase Recording: -rying to connect you. Please hold, we know your time is val-...
[30 second pause]
Chase: Hello?
MSB: Hello.
Chase: Mr. Ghadbwo?
MSB: .... Mr. Godbois, yes.
Chase: Hello. My name is Rowanda. First I must assure you that this conversation will be recorded for quality assurance purposes and this is an attempt to collect a debt.
MSB: .... that's fine.
Chase: My terminal is showing that you are delinquent in your account, for your 99' Mercury Sable. I'm looking to secure a payment.
MSB: ..... (I'm a little taken back) I spoke with an associate Sunday in regards to my not receiving my statement.
Chase: Yes, sir.
MSB: He said we'd receive a new statement within 2 - 7 business days.
Chase: Yes, sir. We have not received your payment.
MSB: ... (a pause while I look at a wall calendar) It is Wednesday, February 20th. I spoke with this gentleman late Sunday afternoon.
Chase: (sounding a little annoyed) Yes. Sir.
MSB: Considering Sunday was not a business day and neither was Monday, due to it being President's day weekend, how is it physically possible for you to mail me a new invoice, for me to receive it, pay it, and then mail it back, and for you receive it, cash the check, and mark it in your system as paid, all within two business days. When you are located where?
Chase: Phoenix, Arizona.
MSB: Right. Do you see where I'm coming from?
Chase: Yes. Sir. Your account is still delinquent. You incurred a late fee today of $12.95. I'm looking to secure payment.
MSB: You're charging me $13 for not paying an invoice I never received, as well as for an invoice that in all likelihood is still in Phoenix, Arizona. Correct?
Chase: $12.95, yes sir. I'm looking to secure payment.
MSB: That's fine.
Chase: My records show me that on December 2nd you asked about setting up an online payment plan?
MSB: Yes, but I decided not to. Because it'll cost me $15 on top of the $12.95 I apparently owe Chase.
Chase: (a little laugh) I can secure payment over the phone, sir.
MSB: On December 2nd I asked about that as well. That also costs $15.
Chase: Sir, you will incur fines if your account remains delinquent. In 10 days your late fees will be $60. These cannot be waived.
MSB: I have every intention of paying. But isn't Chase putting me between a rock and a hard place? I have three payment options, all of which result in me paying more than my monthly due, all because you failed to send me my first invoice. And then, completely understandably, failed to send me my second invoice and receive it within a day and half.
Chase: I'm not twisting your arm, sir. I'm just doing my job. I understand.
MSB: I know, I'm sorry. But is seems that your employer is, no?
Chase: ....Yes, sir.
MSB: Can I just send my own check and reference my account number, instead of waiting for a replacement invoice that may never appear?
Chase: One moment.
[Puts me on hold for 5 minutes]
Chase: Sir? Yes. (she provides me with the address and my account number, but warns me not to do this sort of thing regularly, I should always mail my payment coupon in with my payment)

So what lesson does one learn? Well, besides the obvious "don't ever do business with Chase Auto Finance again" conclusion, one should be quite vigilant about paying invoices that do not exist.

And what did I find in the mail today, moments after it arrived? My original statement, fresh from the mailman. I'm sure I'll receive it's replacement sometime in April.

Charities

When I was a good deal younger I spent my fair amount of time watching television, like any normal child. Sure, the vast majority of the programming I was interested in wasn't exactly normal for a kid who should have been watching Transformers or Tiny Toons, but television is more or less television when you boil it down to photons and electrons, isn't it? I watched a lot of entertainment geared toward those much older than I. Documentaries and news programs were pretty much standard, very rarely did I ever opt to flip on a cartoon instead of say, The World Before Man: The Cambrian Explosion.

Which is fine. My parents didn't seem to terribly mind me being exposed to educational material on a daily basis, and it did help my grades in the end of things. But it meant that I was exposed to a large amount of advertising geared toward adults of the intellectual variety. Which meant scores of banks, software and travel advertisements.

But on occasion I'd see an ad depicting a lonely, starving and filthy child in a third world country and a large, white, fat man begging you to shell out a couple of bucks a day to pay for the little kid's booster shots so he can be healthy enough to write you a thank you letter in broken English. I'd occasionally ask my mom if we could sponsor a child in Malaysia or Chad, or where ever the big, fat white people decided to beg from, while holding a shivering, starving child.

The first several times she brushed it off, telling me that maybe for my birthday she'd surprise me, or that she'd talk to my father about it. But nothing really materialized out of my pestering. I never received a letter with a postage stamp from Burma or Costa Rica. We never put an expensive toy in the Toys for Tots bin at the grocery store. At the most we'd donate a couple of cans of soup at a food drive, but that was pretty much it. So I kept asking.

One day my mother and father sat me down, put on their parenting hats and gently informed me that we couldn't do what I was asking for. Why? I asked, more curious than anything. Who didn't want to help those less fortunate? Were they some sort of monsters? Or were they just incredibly selfish?

Well, my mother began. We can't afford to.

Can't afford to? We couldn't afford to buy one toy for the big box outside the grocery store? Or one coat for welfare?

No, my father began with a sad little laugh. You'd probably see it next time we go "shopping."

I was too young to really realize what my father meant back then. I was just a stupid little kid. So I left it at that. I only really realized what they meant as I grew up and began to become more observant of the world around me and how most of my class mates were different. Their parents didn't shop with brightly colored stamps. They always had newer, less worn in clothing. Their holiday presents were much more elaborate than anything I'd ever experienced.

The truth of the matter was my parents were dirt poor almost all of the time. We shopped with food stamps, we received federal food stuffs, my holiday season was populated by Toys for Tots and we "shopped" for my winter coats at our local welfare office. Despite both being fully employed year round, my parents were always struggling to be in the black at the end of the month.

The only time I saw anyone in my family give to a charity was when my father died. My since disowned "aunts" decided to donate $100 in my father's name to a diabetes foundation, instead of helping my struggling mother pay for his funeral (at the time, unknown to me my mother was very much in debt, due to my father's expensive medical issues).

So, suffice to say donations and charities are still a sensitive subject for me. I really don't like giving or receiving pity or handouts. It leaves a bad taste in my mouth, like admitting defeat, or that one party is inferior to the needy group. As arrogant as I may be, I don't like to think I'm better or inferior to anyone else. But it's been seared into my mind.

The moment I left the nest I became bogged down in my own financial woes and it's continued to this day. I've only started to work myself out of the enormous multi-generational slump. To this day I've never really given charity more than a couple of dollars a whack, and even then I feel forced and awkward. Like I'm a bad person if I avoid eye contact with the old army vet looking for handouts outside of the grocery store. Or screening my calls because the local police department needs money to host youth activities.

Which is not to say that I'm against charity. Quite the contrary, I'd love to help the local SPCA or help diabetes research, or provide some manner of relief to those in situations I've found myself in. I just don't like being approached and being put on the spot and guilt tripped while I barely have enough as it is.

But at what point is it wise to start channeling a portion of my income into a worth while cause? When my debt has been entirely eliminated? But at that point, wouldn't it be more wise to invest the same amount of money, so I'm capable of donating even more in the future? And what would do the greater good, giving gift cards to grocery stores to the homeless, or kibble and blankets to the SPCA? Or a big check to the Wildlife Conservation Fund, but be unable to see the results and potentially risk it being lost to administrative drivel?

Tax Rebate Calculator

I subscribe to a great many financial advice blogs through my RSS reader. This morning while reading my daily allotment of news and recent happenings I came upon J.D.'s post at Get Rich Slowly in regards to an economic stimulus tax rebate calculator.

I've gathered that a lot of people are curious as to just how much money they're going to receive from this little piece of legislation. Heck, more than half the hits I've received from Google in the past three weeks have been people searching for more information about the topic and what, precisely is the deal with all this money potentially coming this way.

As far as I'm aware this is probably the most accurate calculator to determine how much of a refund you're going to receive. If anyone has a better one, please feel free to share.

Taking your car the extra mile

When I read this article I immediately was reminded of the old Married... With Children episode where Al's trusty Dodge's odometer rolled over the million mile mark to zero. The joke was that Al's much beloved car was all that he could afford, so he ran it ragged forgoing all comfort, "common sense" and repairs. This sounds pretty in character, considering his son Bud often described on how to live frugal, such as making a hearty soup from the remains of an M&M found under the fridge.

While I don't think I'll ever let myself reach that level of destitute, and with all comic relief aside, Mister Bundy's logic seems to have played out well in reality.

About a month ago I blogged about what a steady discipline can do when it comes to buying and leasing new cars and the kind of money someone can save if they simply buy a car and go against the popular trend of buying another one immediately after paying it off. Sure, I'm absolutely certain that Frank Oresnik had to put his fair share of repairs into the '91 Ford pick up that he so loved. Heck, he had so many oil changes (300+!) that the plug on the drain pan had to be rethreaded a number of times.

But the pick up served him well. It's maintenance costs likely never exceeded what it would have cost him for monthly payments on a newer model. It really does to show you what kind of abuse, wear and tear many automobiles are designed to really take before shutting down altogether.

Junk Mail

There are probably very few advertisement mediums loathed more than unsolicited email. They waste time, energy and inbox space to an extraordinary degree. Not to mention that a good number of them can serve as embarrassing billboards to your unhealthy habits and vices, should someone peep over your shoulder while you're rifling through your email.

It's become such a nuisance that Fortune 500 companies have broken into the brotherhood of money because of their elaborate spam eliminating mechanisms. Corporations invest millions on weapon grade spam filters and governments have invested even more in tracking down and punishing those who would dare defile our virtual mailboxes with smut, offers for prescription drugs and stock "advice."

Even in the age of six gigabyte inboxes and spam filters intelligent enough to run a small nation's power grid, people still whine and complain about one or two flirtatious advertisements slipping in under the radar. I believe this is a little absurd. Unsolicited email does indeed drain a lot of money from our pockets, both willingly and unwillingly. But there's an even greater danger out there than that.

Unsolicited postal mail. On any given day, chances are you will receive far more cold hard, physical junkmail than you will its virtual counterpart. Think about it. Which one upsets you the most? The one that you can quite easily delete in a fraction of a second, or the one composed out of non biodegradable dyes and the shredded remnants of a Maine forest? You'd be surprised at the number of people who wouldn't chose the ladder.

Why is this? Because we've grown accustomed to unsolicited snail mail showing up in our mailboxes day after day after day. It's been going on for decades upon decades. Unsolicited email on the other hand has only been around for a relatively short time. We've become complacent with paper junk mail, essentially rolling over while the wave over takes us. Because after all, all we have to do is toss it in the trash and that's the end of it. But what happens to it after that? Will we haul the trash bag to the curb and pay the sanitary worker to haul it away for us? Will it sit in a landfill for the next ten years, releasing those lovely dyes into an already struggling wetland?

Or will the odd piece of junk mail catch our eye and lure us into making a purchase we never thought of, don't need and don't really want? Living an eco-frugal life style is difficult. It's nigh impossible when you're lost in a sea of brightly colored pamphlets, made of the pulped remains of a maple tree, commanding you to spend sixteen low, low payments of $19.99 for a new recliner. With no interest for one year nonetheless!

I recently received an offer for a Mastercard. The card itself was rather mediocre with its crummy interest rate and rewards program. But I had opened it on a whim. Within it, quite to my horror I found a significant quantity of the application already filled out for me, in a nice printed font. I guess they figured it'd encourage me to sign up, since all I had to do was plug in a couple of fields and off it went.

But the problem was, many of the prefilled fields contained personal information. Such as my home phone number, my birth date, my mother's maiden name, the last four digits of my social security number and a whole slew of other sensitive bits. What if I had thrown this out without opening it and some unsavory character found it? Granted, it's not outright identity theft, but it would have given a potential crook a lot of material to work with, should I become a target.

Suffice to say, junk mail is dangerous. It's wasteful, leads to unnecessary spending and can be a potential platform for identity theft.

How do you stop junk mail before it hits your mailbox? Easy.

• Everyone under the sun will sell your contact information. Whenever you fill out anything from a warranty card to a donation pledge write "Do not sell my address" in clear print somewhere visible on the card, envelope or invoice.
  
  
• When filling out warranty cards, do not fill out "voluntary" questionnaires that involve your income, age, race and other easily sold market niche preferences. They don't need the information to provide you with support should their product decide to become faulty.
  
  
• Credit card corporations sell your contact information more than they sell credit card subscriptions. When signing up for a new card inform the representative that you only wish to receive your billing statement, nothing more.
  
  
• America Online is still clutching to the old days of mailing you upgrade and free trial discs. Call 1-800-605-4297 to opt out.
  
  
• When donating money, filling out a warranty card, or filling out any other piece of information that you suspect may be sold without your consent, make a deliberate error. Add an incorrect middle initial, switch "drive" to "street" on your address, spell your first name in a strange fashion (i.e. Johnny becomes Johnee, et cetera.). Keep a spreadsheet as to what you do and what junk mail you receive. You'll be able to figure out who is selling your address the most so you can rectify the issue.
  

Are you already receiving your own fair share of unsolicited snail mail? There are a couple of ways to get out of the vicious cycle. And a few less than useful ways that'll make you feel a little better about the situation.

• Contact the DMA (Direct Marketing Association) and opt out of mailers.
  
  
• Cross out the bar code and your address on the offending junkmail. Write "Refused: Return to sender" on it and put it into the out bin.
  
  
• Open the offending junk mail. If it's a credit card offer or magazine subscription they will include a prepaid envelope to mail any associated paperwork back. Stuff the envelope with garbage (such as other pieces of junk mail) and send it back. They'll be forced to pay postage. While they won't stop, if you send them back regularly you'll cost them a significant amount of money in postage.

Have some other ideas as to how to handle junk mail? Post it in the comments section!

Video Roundup: Credit, debt and the whole shebang

There was a period this winter when I simply did not watch television. Which is not to say that I'm one of those folk who like to pretend that I'm awesome because I prefer books and newspapers. But because of two very important factors sort of beyond my own control.

When we were living beyond our means we signed a contract with our cable provider and the good folks at TiVo. So we've been unable to cut those expenses completely from our budget. We signed a binding contract informing them that we'd pay a certain rate. If we broke it we'd incur all sorts of lovely fees and fines, which essentially would make the whole cancellation process moot. I love television, cable and having a DVR. But it's spoiled me a little.

Now I cannot stand watching commercials. So when our TiVo started to malfunction and not record properly, I found myself at a loss. I could watch straight television. But who has time to sit through commercials and arrange their schedule to catch programs? Not me, that's for sure. Working two jobs made it nigh impossible to watch anything besides the morning and evening news.

So we simply stopped watching television. Then we rediscovered the brilliance of having a broadband connection. Soon I was watching full length documentaries on Google Video and all my favorite programs from the network websites. Our living room for half the year is a 3 season porch, so eventually we just stopped going into the living room, leaving the TV in the cold. Another reason not to watch television.

Now that we've moved the television to our winter living room and fixed the TiVo I often find myself watching internet programming more often than not. Since I'm nerdy you should know for certain that I'm going to watch documentaries most of the time.

Here's a short list I've compiled in my journeys that coincides with the niche this blog occupies. I've found them invaluable, I think you will too.

• Videojug: Credit and debt defined
• Videojug: Managing debt
• Videojug: Financing your car
• Google Video: Money as Debt
• YouTube: Destination Debt

While they're all very informative and a good way to spend a couple of minutes Destination Debt is probably the best out of them all, detailing how predatory and manipulative credit card corporations can be, especially to college students. Sounds kind of familiar, doesn't it?