Facie’s Ramblings

I spent bits and pieces of the past week gathering tax papers in "anticipation" of our accountant coming to get all our crap this weekend. On Saturday, the 1st, I could not understand why one of our banks had yet to send us an interest statement for our interest checking and money market accounts, when I had thought everything had to be in our possession by the 31st. Then an awful thought occurred to me, which I was certain could not be the case: What if we had not earned enough interest last year to actually get an interest statement from the bank? Nah, I was fairly certain you needed to earn at least $10 to get a statement, and surely we had earned that . Spoiler alert: We did not! This may not seem a like a big deal, but since we started saving money many years ago, we had typically earned a decent amount of interest. I know the interest rates have been quite low for the past few years, but I still thought we were making some money. So I logged into my account, and saw...

Over the years, Kohl's has been one of my favorite department stores. The biggest reason? It is a stand-alone store and not in a mall. Have I mentioned how much I hate malls? And shopping in general, for that matter? Back in August, I found a nice hooded navy cardigan for J that I thought would be great for school and that she actually liked (the non-hooded version she was much less impressed with). Unfortunately, the medium (8 to 10) size barely fit her, and there was no large. But Kohl's has this neat little kiosk in its store that allows you to order the size or color of an item that is not in the store, and said item will be shipped to your house for free. And for charge customers, it could not be easier to do. You just pop your Kohl's card in, and your info is already there; you just have to touch your way to the item you want. I ordered the large (12 to 14) hooded navy cardigan at the kiosk in about two minutes flat, and was almost excited when it arrived at my ho...

Wonder how many people will be enticed by that title?! As an aside, for some reason, my blog got 120 hits in a 24-hour period. No idea why. Since I discovered the stats tool thingy, I have averaged close to 500 hits a month; some days I get only a few hits, and other days this blog sees several dozen visitors. But 120 in one day? That is weird. Anyway, I had to share this recent shopping experience. First of all, I am not a fan of shopping. I am what several of my guy friends call a guy's girl; I would much rather watch a sporting event (football and hockey, mostly) than do anything girly. And when it comes to shopping (which, to review, I hate), Kohl's and Target are my two favorite stores because I am very anti-mall (all those stores just overwhelm me) and I can get almost everything I need at those two places anyway. So when I realized I had to buy a new bathing suit (thanks to the super-chlorinated, bathing-suit eating pool where Jordan and I swim), I knew a trip to Koh...

I sent Jordan to school today (Friday) with turkey pepperoni. A smarter, less controversial parent would not have done so, but my kid wanted the pepperoni, and she is not doing anything wrong! And now that the kids know the Lenten guidelines, they really should leave her alone. Will they? Well, I guess we will find out. To follow up from earlier this week, the girls at Jordan's table (including Jordan) did meet with the principal on Monday, although no one admitted to taking the sandwich or seeing anything. Regardless, I consider the issue closed, and I hope whoever took it will learn something from this. One of the moms did email me asking what went on, as her kid was apparently upset by the principal confrontation. I emailed her back what I knew, saying that most parents would be concerned if their kid's lunch was taken. I also said it was good for the kids to hear the correct guidelines (of course, Jordan brought in the guidelines and shared them with the kids at lunch pri...

I have a bunch of thoughts swimming around my head. But since they center around things that are currently perplexing and/or bothering me, I am forgoing a "random ramblings" post title. Here goes nothing. I love Joe Paterno. But I am not sure if he should keep on coaching. On the one hand, he has done so much for the school, and he really is a great, funny (at least he was when I met him about eight years ago) guy. But on the other hand, considering he is almost 84 and seems to have lost a bit of his step, shouldn't he hang it up? Is there an intelligent reason that about 13 million people are still paying off last year's Christmas purchases? I saw this stat on the local news and was appalled. Other than someone's buying a car or perhaps a computer, IMHO there are no other purchases that should not have been paid off within a few months (for the record, if I get to the point where I have to carry a credit card balance, it would not be for gifts, but I am tryin...

Over the years, I have often wondered about people who have gotten in over their heads. The ones who just before payday have about $25 in their checking accounts. The ones who have no savings to speak of. The ones who carry balances on their credit cards. Although I know most every situation is different, I have to think that some of those aforementioned people think it will all work out somehow (e.g., they will win the lottery or get a 40 percent pay raise). I also think some people are living for the moment and not really sure if they will be around tomorrow, next month, or next year, so they figure why bother planning for the far future. Even though I have been critical of those kinds of people over the years, I'm afraid my current situation and how I am dealing with it puts me in the same neighborhood (well, at least the same town or county) as those people. When this past weekend my little brother said I had turned into a democrat, it was like a slap in the face to me. Nothing...

I read an article in the P-G yesterday that said what I have been feeling for months. In a nutshell, those of us who bought homes that were no more than what we could afford, pay our mortgage and taxes on time, save money every month, and just live beneath our means in general are getting the shaft. I do feel sorry for people in bad situations, especially those who did not live above their means and unfortunately found themselves with, say, a medical condition and poor/no health insurance or out of work. But I have a lot trouble sympathizing with families who earn 30, 40, 50k a year, buy a 200k house, drive nice cars and take yearly beach vacations and then cry because they got in over their heads. I know someone who recently lost his job. He has blown through his savings as well as his retirement. I asked what he was going to do, until he finds another job, and he said he is hopeful it will work out. It is nice to have a good attitude; certainly worrying about it isn't going to ge...

So I am probably about 2/3 of the way through Dave Ramsey's The Total Money Makeover, (thanks to my friends Ashley and Heather sending me a copy). The good news is I have already achieved baby step 1, which is to have a $1,000 emergency fund. For someone like me, who obsesses about money and cares very little about material things, this was not difficult to do. I think having an emergency fund is very important, and I do agree with Dave that you should get one started even if you have debt, something I disagreed with probably six months ago until I read an article he wrote in Readers Digest. Emergencies can and do come up, so get to it if you are not doing it now. Alas, step 2, snowball all your debt but your mortgage as fast as you can, is where I start to run into trouble (yes, I did not get very far before hitting a roadblock). I have accumulated more than an emergency fund, but according to Dave, I should use some of my extra money to pay off my non-mortgage debt. The thought o...