Well, that's an improvement

Previously I wrote about how I spent a bzillion dollars on clothes. Actually, it was $175 for clothes and $125 for a pair of clogs. Well, I checked the Dankso outlet page today (danskooutlet.com, for the curious) and they had the exact shoes I wanted for $40 less! So I bought those and am going to send the other ones back. Hooray for abusing Zappos' free returns policy ;) I like Zappos but most everything I want there seems to be full price. So I'm pretty satisfied with my mad shopping skillz - although I would have been more satisfied had I checked the outlet page BEFORE I bought the other ones!

Festival of Under 30 Finances up at Beachgirl's Budget Blog

Check it out here! This is our last festival of the year but there are many more great things to come next year.

Sweet Fancy Moses I'd Better Never Need Any More Clothes

I just spent $175 on clothes!

This is a lot of money for me. I do not, as a routine, spend very much on clothes. Most of my shirts were $10 or less, pants $15 or less, and bought in bunches when Old Navy has a sale. But I am beginning to realize that as a grown-up I should own more grown-up clothes for work, and thus I purchased: two tops that could be worn out in the evening or to work, two pairs of nice pants, a nice skirt, a long-sleeved shirt, and four bras. (BTW, if any other ladies are shopping, Lane Bryant has a buy-2-get-2-free bra sale, and with the coupon code 050001521 you can get $25 off $75, $50 off $150 or $75 off $225.) This is in addition to four pairs of nice pants that I recently bought. So I feel pretty well stocked - nearly every shirt I own is solid colored, so I think I am OK in the shirts department. My coworkers were making fun of my pants though since they are a mite too short and I look like I grew out of them a little.

I am also going to buy a pair of Dansko clogs, since it has been pointed out to me that frugality has apparently made me mismatch (all of my pants are dark colored and the shoes I wear at work now are grey, and this seems to be bad.) So I am going to bite the bullet and buy FULL PRICE shoes. I do so love my Dansko shoes though, so I am not going to cheap out and buy something else as they will indeed last for a bzillion years.

On a random note, if you have switched to the new Blogger, what has your experience been? I just see notes about blogs going down when they switch, and that also seems bad.

Maybe they think I deserve another

I just got a call from KeyBank asking if Miss Booykin was there.. We won't get into the last name mangling. It was another guy asking politely if I'd received my Nano from the promotion some months ago. This is odd because they have already called me twice, once just to say "hi" and once to ask if I'd gotten the Nano. I wonder what they would do if I said I hadn't gotten it - send me another? Do they have extras?

Finally, Pinecone pays by Paypal

Last night I got my very first $5 payment from Pinecone by Paypal. I'd been hoping that this would happen for a while - partially because when I get those little checks in the mail, they tend to be subsumed into general spending. But most of the money I get for various activities (PayPerPost, surveys, etc) by Paypal goes into my savings account - I don't think I'll miss the odd $5 here and there, but my savings account notices them!

Got a National City account? Get a $50 Visa GC for opening a Sharebuilder account

This was in my "messages" on my CashDuck bank account online - they have a promotion with Sharebuilder for a $50 Visa gift card after placing one trade. I always forget about the Sharebuilder bonuses and always mean to do another, so I went ahead and did it now with $10 of money from the CashDuck account.

Just visit www.NationalCity.com/GiftOfStock

and enter the code: ncgift06 if it isn't already entered.

Verdict: Paying $15,000 to parents is OK, $170 per month to boyfriend is bad!

Having recently posted about how I'm planning on paying back my parents for $15k in student loans, and about how I'll be paying about $170 more of the rent for my boyfriend once I start my more lucrative new job, it seems that parents win hands down. However, if you read the tenor of the comments on both posts, it's a little unsettling.

Giving $15k to my parents in a short period of time is evidently commendable, such that someone will be along to give me a prize any moment now, but giving my boyfriend $170 a month is dangerous to my health and may actually kill me.

Just an observation.

I Tried A Bunch of Advertising Methods, and Surprise Surprise Some Of Them Don't Work

I've been advertising for CashDuck for about six weeks now, and I thought I'd post my thoughts about what methods worked and didn't work, both in terms of how many people signed up and how much it cost. The only way I know where people come from is what they put in the "How did you hear about CashDuck?" spot, so efficacy is more or less estimated.

1. PayPerPost

Yes, I actually put up some post offers on PayPerPost. I did it in two batches for a total of eight bought posts. I offered $4 per post - the total, including fees, was $20 for 3 posts and $30 for 5 posts.

Was it worth it? Um, not really. The first round was very disappointing - one of the posts got it all wrong on what the site is about, and another post literally just copied the explanatory text and added some stuff. (Including the part where I suggested that they put up a referral banner and earn 10% of anyone who signed up under them - I intended that they would do that in the post, since the first time I didn't require a picture.) Only one actually was any good and I think I got a few users out of that. The reason I'm so annoyed about those is that I emailed PayPerPost to say that those posts were unacceptable, and they told me that they would reject them, but not to worry since their regular quality control should take them out anyway. They're still there.

The second round was somewhat better, and I got some users, but it was underwhelming writing to say the least. The big downside of PayPerPost is that a lot of these blogs really do seem like they were started just to do PayPerPost - or they have so little traffic it's hardly worth it. The posts went up two weeks ago and two of the posts in the second round have only 15 views! So considering how much it cost ($50) I don't think I'll be doing PayPerPost again.

2. Google AdWords

This was relatively easy to setup, and with a monthly budget of only $15, I think it's been reasonably worthwhile. I have a cost-per-click of about 40 cents for the words I chose, and although I can't precisely track whether they actually used the AdWords link if they state that they found it through searching, I have noticed a lot more people saying that they found it on Google. Given the low cost I think it's worth it to keep on, but it's not the best bang for my buck.

3. Ask.com Sponsored Listings

I actually was called by a rep from Ask.com pushing this product - it's basically Google Adwords, with a slightly longer area of text for the ad. You set a daily budget and when you run low, they auto-charge your credit card. Big downside - there doesn't seem to be a way to just cancel the campaign and use up the remaining funds. I was going to take it down, but then I got auto-charged another $25, so I guess I'll wait to cancel the campaign until it gets close to empty again. I have a budget of $2 a day, which is usually about 5 clicks. I don't think this has worked particularly well, but I could also have chosen better keywords.

4. Project Wonderful

This is really a cool site. Basically what you are doing is purchasing ads (tiny ads, regular span ads, and skyscrapers) on various sites, many of which are comics or something similar. I imagine as they expand their advertising base, different kinds of sites will come in, but right now it's pretty much advertising for the 18-to-30 market. You bid on ads on a cost-per-day basis, and whenever your bid is the high bidder, that's when your ad runs and you get charged. So if you bid twenty cents a day, but someone else has bid a maximum of 30 cents, you won't be the high bidder right then - but you will when the 30 cent bid runs out. You can set a time for the bid to expire, or a maximum cost. I like to put up bids for ten or twenty cents, with a maximum of $1 or $2 - since there aren't a lot of paying advertisers on the site right now, you could probably get an ad on more than half the sites for ten or twenty cents a day. I got the biggest boost in traffic from one site - I noticed a lot of people were coming from this site, which was one I'd actually bid 50 cents on. I went to the site and lo and behold, the comic owner was so happy that I'd paid for his hosting for the next two months that he'd gone to CashDuck and written a little review about it, and encouraged his users to try it out! So that was definitely worth it, and I was happy that he was happy for my patronage. I found a post on a forum where people were bitching about my ads (apparently they look "old-internet") which kind of took the wind out of my sails, but I am back in the game now. You can also post ads for free, if you're the first to bid. I've spent about $75 at Project Wonderful so far and been quite pleased with the results.

5. 50,000 banner impressions at Keenspot

Keenspot is a consortium of comics - when you buy impressions, your ad shows up on all of them. This was at a rate of $1 per thousand so I spent $50. I think this has been pretty effective, I've seen several people mention it in their signup, but what I think will really pay off is the fact that I'm reaching groups of people who weren't already out looking for ways to make money. (The issue sometimes with using things like AdWords is that I get lumped in with sites that are actual scams - and then it rubs off on me.) So since it's not presented that way, I think they are more apt to get into it and tell their friends, which will have ramifications beyond just those initial signups. This was also very easy to setup - they have an insertion order form right there on the website so you just give them the banner, the link, and the money, and it starts running.

6. 50,000 banner impressions at Blank Label Comics

Blank Label Comics is another comics consortion - can you tell what kind of demographic I'm going for? ;) This is also $1 per thousand so I spent $50. This has been somewhat more successful at initial signups than Keenspot, since the sites are somewhat higher traffic, but I'm probably burning through those impressions a lot faster.

But the ultimate winner of the ad-off is...

7. Regular banner ad on a single site for one day

I purchased the right to the top spot on SomethingPositive.net, a popular comic which I read regularly, and so do about a bzillion other people. (They get about a million hits a day.) I commissioned a banner ad from the artist and he did a great job, see here:



I thought that was just the funniest shit ever, and apparently so did a lot of people, because I got more than a HUNDRED signups off this ONE ad. This was run on Dec. 12th - I immediately signed up for a day in January and one in February. I'm still getting a few scattered signups that state that's where they saw it. Cost for this ad: $40 for the artist to draw the banner, and $35 for the actual ad space. The extra two days is another $70, but I think it'll definitely be worth it.

Well, I am pleasantly surprised

Last year I got a $200 Target gift card from the surgeons as a holiday gift and so did everyone else. I thought that was very nice of them as apparently they didn't do this before a couple years ago - the department used to give everyone something but stopped, so our division is picking up the tab instead. I was kind of curious though as to whether they'd give me one this year, since I'm leaving in two weeks - it's basically, is this a thank you for past performance, or for future performance?

As my coworker put it though, "I think it's just about Christmas."

So I'm glad that they did give me a gift, since there was some issues with getting a free hat (on a day when everyone who works here was supposed to get a hat) for a different coworker who was actually in the process of being let go at the time. You would think that they'd give her a damn hat at least if they won't retain her job, but there were issues. So I am glad that stinginess didn't win out this time, and they didn't think, oh, we don't have to give her a gift because what do we care if she is happy since she is leaving.

Now of course, what do I buy with it? I feel a little silly buying household necessities with a gift, but I already bought all my Christmas presents and recently bought new clothes, and we were just at Target and spent $50, and we already bought the wedding present for the wedding that we're going to soon. I guess I'll just tuck it away.. although I feel pretty certain I could spend it easily if it were, y'know, absolutely necessary that I do so. ;)

Festival of Under 30 Finances up today!

Check out today's Festival of Under 30 Finances hosted today at Money and Values. She's also starting up her own carnival on ethical considerations related to personal finance, so stop by and see!

Splitting my raise

So as I have previously written before, I'll be getting a new job in January which comes with a $1000-per-month pay raise. A common piece of advice is that you should save half of any raise for retirement, so that you won't feel the pinch because you'll be setting aside an increase instead of taking more money out of the budget. Well, that's what I'm going to do too - put $500 per month into my supplemental 403(b) plan. The other $500 is going to be used for two things - funding my Roth on a monthly basis, and replacing the lost income because I am going to ask my boyfriend to contribute less to the household expenses. Boyfriend is a graduate student, and my raise is almost as much as he takes in in a month - hey pays his half of rent, his half of the cell phone bill, pays me back for the parking pass which comes out of my paycheck (long story) and pays the cable bill, and all that adds up to a little less than half his take home pay (and he only gets paid nine months of the year.) So I felt it was only fair to pass along some of my good fortune to him and instead of asking him for $422 per month, he is going to give me $250 and continue to pay the cable bill. So I will be using some of my raise to replace that money in my budget - overall, the actual amount of money I have to spend will not really change, it'll just be going in a different direction, and Boyfriend will actually be able to save some money. (Now on to convincing him to open a Roth...)

The long story about the parking passes is that since I am a staff member and he is a lowly student, he is not eligible for as good of a grade of parking pass as I am. The campus proper and the medical center are all on the same parking pass system, but an A pass on the medical center campus means you park in a garage, whereas an A pass on the campus itself means you park in the nice faculty garages instead of an open lot. So he actually parks in nicer spaces than do some of the visiting lecturers and the older grad students. For the low low price of $48 a month of course. So the pass is in my name, but has his car on it, so that he can park in the good spaces and not have to walk far to class. :)

Oh, and shameless plug - make $15 in 5 minutes on CashDuck! Sign up, fill out the Medical Hair Restoration offer on the front of the View Offers page (anyone with a valid address is fine) and then do the zip submits (they're their own section on the pull down menu) - there are about 14 of them and they pay 50 cents each, you just put in your zip code. Then put in a withdraw request for your money and it'll be paid on the next cycle. =)

Suze Orman doesn't think anyone can afford anything

If you watch the Suze Orman show, you've probably seen the new segment Can I Afford It, where somebody basically asks, given my financial situation, do you think I can afford this item? I've seen it several times now and I'm starting to see a pattern..

Basically, Suze doesn't think anybody can afford expensive TVs, watches, jewelry, cars, anything that you might classify as a luxury item. She doesn't approve much though - on the last show, she told a single mom she couldn't afford daycare for her twins. Well, what is this lady supposed to do then? Quit her job and not be able to afford anything? I saw two instances of her telling someone not to get a fancy TV - one was a college student for whom this would have essentially been two months of income, and that was reasonable, but the other was a 50 year old lady with over $550k in the bank whose TV was on its last legs. Seriously, if someone with half a million dollars can't afford a $2,000 TV, what hope is there for the rest of us? She did eventually OK the purchase of a TV for this lady, but asked her to spend as little as possible on it.

Overall it seems not to actually matter how much money you have, when it comes to a luxury item - Suze doesn't think you can ever afford it. Another caller I remember wanted to buy a thousand-dollar watch, for of course the wrong reasons (she thought it would help her look good compared to her wealthy bosses) but she could easily afford it. Suze said she wasn't allowed to buy it though - she is really blurring the line between what can these people afford, and whether it's a good idea to spend the money. She also told a woman with over a million that she couldn't afford a $4,000 purse.

Of course, then there are just some people with no clue. One woman called in asking if she could afford a 30 foot sailboat - she had the $30k for the boat in savings, but would have to pay $420 a month for the marina fees. But this lady only brought home $1600 a month! I think she definitely would regret paying a quarter of her money for this boat. And there was another woman who wanted to buy a Quizno's franchise - but didn't have enough in savings to do it, or any idea where the money to pay the employees or keep the lights on would come from. She also said she'd never worked in the food business, so she probably has no idea what kind of costs go into running one. Clearly this woman cannot afford it from a financial perspective, as she doesn't have the money to pay even the startup fees, but she also can't afford to try to run this business even if she got a loan because she'd run through all the money immediately and have no plan. Who knows where she got the idea to buy a Quizno's franchise - wouldn't be surprised if she did some research on the costs and decided on it because the upfront cost was lower or something - but clearly she thought that it would start raking in the bucks immediately and she wouldn't have to front anything.

Last day to submit for the Festival of Under 30 Finances! Do it now!

Click here to submit a post to the Festival of Under 30 Finances. Bloggers of any age can contribute!

This week's host is Money and Values, and she asks:

In selecting a career path (or particular jobs), how have you balanced wanting work that's interesting and fulfilling, and wanting a job that pays well? Is one or the other more important to you, and why? Have you found ways to try to incorporate both?

Head on over!

Cool law resource

Check out the transcripts of Nolo.com's weekly podcasts on various legal topics - whether dads get a worse shake in divorces, consenting to Breathalyzer tests, etc. I just bought a legal guide for small businesses, and used their LLC Maker, as I get all legal-y to protect CashDuck (since the business literally owns more than I do.)

Ha Ha

So the epilogue of the story with BoA is that I decided not to transfer to Chase, but to get another 0% deal, and I opened up a Discover card for a 13-month transfer at 0% with no fees. Can't beat that deal.

I was explaining how the balance transfer arbitrage game works to a friend of mine and I said that I really wanted to pay down my current card so I could start playing it. Then it occurred to me that I am dumb. All I have to do, to play this game right now, is to pay the minimums every month on this 0% deal I have going, and put the rest into savings where it will earn interest. Then at the end, I can pay it off with the money I have saved up, and I'll have earned some money in the meantime. So I will probably do that. But once it's paid off, I can get a 0% on something else, and do it for real. Hooray!

I'm also considering getting a mailbox at the local UPS store - I'm just paranoid now because a multi-thousand-dollar check from one of my CashDuck ad networks didn't materialize, and it was mailed on Nov. 30th. See, I don't have a particularly large mailbox, and sometimes the mailman (if we get the lazy one) just puts the mail into the holding hooks underneath. And occasionally mail gets picked up by the wind and scattered down the street. I contacted my guy at the ad network and told him that, and he is going to put a stop payment on the check and add the amount to the next check, which should be cut in a few days. Hopefully nothing happens to THAT check because it is twice as large as the first! I am beginning to really appreciate the networks that pay by Paypal or direct deposit - not only faster, but less worrisome.

The luxury of being able to retire when you want

In my division at work there are a couple of people that are pretty much pariahs. No one wants to include them in anything (in fact, I've specifically been told to exclude them from certain projects) and they don't associate with the top brass (who barely tolerates their existence.) The whole situation just makes me sad - I mean, I think that these people should have been fired ten years ago because they simply aren't any good at their job, but since they are still here through the goodwill of one person or another they live on the fringes of our little society and some people are just mean to them. I like them as people well enough, but they are both rather incompetent and I dread having to work with them on anything. Who wants to live like that though? Who wants to go to work every day knowing that at least half the people you work with wish you were gone, and that no one includes you in anything, and your superiors don't acknowledge your existence? If it were me, I would have moved on long ago. But the people I am thinking of are effectively stuck in our division for two reasons:

1. They don't have enough (or any) skills, so they are unable to be hired elsewhere.

2. They are only a couple of years away from retirement and getting the full pension.

These ladies are lucky to be backed by a nice pension, but that pension's value is severely cut if you don't stay on for at least 30 years. They each have a couple of years to go, so since they have neither the skills to get a new job nor the savings to quit on their reduced pension, they have to stay in a group which really makes it difficult for them to have a happy work life.

This is one reason I'm really glad that I opted for the "give me the money" pension plan here, because I know that I would also be similarly motivated to stay on past whatever milestones in order to get that benefit. That's part of the point of the pension system - to motivate employees to stay - but now it's trapping these ladies because they can't afford to go.

It's My Birthday And I Will Eat Whoppers and Pistachios For Breakfast If I Want To

There are some downsides to being an adult, but this is not one of them.

I Cannot Believe This Shit

OK, well I called them and told them about how I made a payment, but because of faulty imports into the system, it was paid to Chase at a defunct account number. The lady kept putting me on hold and then coming back with some gem like "we're not showing any payments made in November, but I do have one in October" OVER AND OVER. After about 20 minutes of round and round, she did waive the late fee, but guess what? Despite the fact that it was THEIR faulty system, my balance transfer deal is now expired. I asked to speak to a supervisor and she told me that basically the credit cards division can't see anything that the banking division does, so I need written records from the banking division that they did something wrong and that the banking division has to attest that it was sent to Chase, because even though I can pull up the screen on my own, the supervisor in the credit cards division can't.

This is bullshit. I am pulling some money out of savings, paying off the Christmas gifts on my Chase card, and transferring the whole thing back to Chase. I can get 1.9% fixed for 6 months which I think is long enough to pay it off. I am getting the hell out of Bank of America. I really liked MBNA but they got up in some bad business.

OK, I figured out why I sent the payment to Chase..

Because the payee is nicknamed "Stockback", but goes to Chase (where I used to have this card, before the program went to MBNA) and has an account number that is no longer valid. God only knows how Chase processed it in the first place. Now I definitely have ammo to call them on.

Some things are not worth cheaping out on

On my way to work this morning it was snowing a little, and had been for a while, and I got an unprecedented opportunity to observe the drive shaft configurations of the cars passing me. (IE, which set of their wheels was spinning while the other stayed put.) Looks like the tire places are going to have a banner weekend, assuming that these people don't get into car crashes on the highways while getting there. Tires are one thing I hope you all don't hold out on - I bet a lot of the people I passed this morning greatly wished they'd had un-bald tires.

On another subject, my supervisor stopped by and remarked to me, "You're 22, right? Would you donate a kidney to your 72-year-old grandpa?" When it comes down to cold calculations, it probably doesn't make sense for most people to do that when the ages are what they are. But for me, my grandfather is currently 93 years old - so if I had been 22 when he was 72, he would still be alive when I was 43. Having your grandfather around to see your own kids grow up seems like a worthwhile trade for one kidney. Hey, you have two anyway. Would I do that? Probably not now at my grandparents' current ages, but if they were in their early 70's I'd definitely do it. Would you do it?

Wonder what's on The Donald's mind?

I ran across this while reading a business blog - Donald Trump's blog. It's contributed to by others as well, but it's interesting reading. He goes off on lawsuits over kids playing tag, men's body image, and more non-business topics. I guess I never thought about Trump having opinions on things other than business, but there's a lot of things to opine on in this world.

Do you check vending machines for change?

This is a habit I've had since I was a kid - I pick up loose change wherever I find it. Usually whenever I buy something from the vending machines downstairs, I check all the machines as I'm walking out to see if there's any change there. Usually it goes into my purse, and then into my piggy bank at home.

I think I started this when I was a kid mostly because I loved coins, especially silver coins. Pennies just didn't seem worth the while. I used to sell stuff I found on the street to the other kids on the street and buy Bubble Tape with it. When you are a kid with no allowance, it takes a lot of crap on the street to buy you a 75 cent roll of Bubble Tape. However, I recall eating a lot of Bubble Tape as a kid so I must have done OK.

Some of my frugal habits have started rubbing off on my coworkers. One of the student workers has started bringing in a can of Chunky soup every day - she got the idea one day when she was hungry and didn't have any money on her, so I pulled open my desk drawer and offered her a can from my selection. (She still usually comes in and asks for a bowl and spoon though - I am the queen of disposables.) I also only buy a bottle of Powerade maybe once a week or less. The rest of the time, I use the same bottle over and over with Crystal Light in it instead of Powerade. Better for me (a bottle of regular Powerade is about 160 calories, whereas a bottle of Crystal Light is 10) and better for my wallet (Powerade is $1 a bottle; Crystal Light is about $4 for 14 packets, and the water is free.)

All that frugality pays off though - yesterday was Boyfriend's and my two year anniversary and we went to The Melting Pot, a swanky fondue restaurant. Total bill was about $120 but I paid for it straight out of checking. (And then on the ride home we had a conversation about how we could make it cheaper if we ordered separate entrees instead of the two person one, didn't get lobster tail or filet mignon, and didn't get salads.)

I Missed A Credit Card Payment

I seriously feel sick. Apparently last month, when I transferred the $82 from my bill paying account into Bank of America to pay the MBNA card, I sent it to Chase instead. I have no idea why. So when I logged in today and saw that my balance on the MBNA card had gone up, I thought that maybe they had not transferred the 0% balance correctly - but no, I have a $39 late fee because I did not make any payments in November.

I am really out of sorts over this. I have never missed a payment in my life! And this is mostly because Bank of America is stupid and won't let me make payments on the MBNA card from another bank - I have to transfer it into my BoA account and then pay from that. Otherwise it would have just gone automatically like all the other bills.

I doubt they would waive my late fee and I don't want to call them and ask because it is in fact my fault, but I am really upset because I thought I had everything covered last month.

EDIT: By clicking on the wrong link, I found a way to use MBNA's old system, so I can use another bank. I put in a payment today, and already put in a request to transfer a payment into the BoA account. I am only five days late so I hope it doesn't go on my credit report but it is still very nerve-wracking.

OK, OK, I bought some damn pants

I finally went and bought some pants online while home for Thanksgiving. (What, you think I actually shop in real stores?) I bought 5 pairs which were on sale for $20 each, and then used a $25 off $100 coupon so the total including shipping was only $80. Not too shabby. Unfortunately, while four of the pairs are great and fit fine, one of the pairs is completely the wrong item - wrong size, wrong style, wrong color - probably someone else has my pants and I have theirs. So I am peeved about this, because I can justify spending the five bucks to mail something back when I just didn't like it, but when it was their fault? They'd better refund me the shipping. I will mail those back tomorrow. Hopefully they still even have the original pants I ordered - they were very spiffy pinstripes. I also bought some new shirts over Thanksgiving and I am planning on getting new shoes, so I may actually look like a real adult for my new job. (To give you a visual, I am kind of short, have pink cheeks and freckles, and don't wear any jewelry other than rings. I REALLY look my age.)

My coworker finally bought some more crickets for the gecko - this is again three weeks that he was without food, and she bought him the tiny crickets. Which would be fine if she fed him twice a week but the little guy needs some MEAT in his belly. I really fear that he will starve to death without me coming in and looking at him every day - not that my looking at him helps care for him, but it reminds my coworker that he exists because she doesn't look at him.

Christmas shopping is done - I think I spent about $350 total which is not too bad considering I had about nine people to shop for, and Boyfriend got about $150 of presents since his birthday was also recently. I am terrible at keeping surprises - I usually give him his presents as soon as they arrive in the mail.

My other big purchase was a small non-powered treadmill - between CashDuck and Boyfriend's finals, we haven't been to the gym in a LONG time, so I broke down and bought a $150 treadmill just to walk on while watching some TV or something. I probably won't give up my gym membership though, since I don't have a pool or weight machines at home, and $34 a month is not that bad in the world of health club memberships.

Festival of Under 30 Finances is up at Student of Finance!

Check out the Festival - this edition is hosted by Student of Finance, who asked a great question about prenups. You'll be surprised by the answers she got!