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Archive for September, 2007

Stereotypes of those who use coupons?

September 29th, 2007 at 06:28 pm

I bought some groceries this morning and happened to notice one brand of shampoo on sale. I happened to also have a $1 off coupon- lucky day! However, as I proceeded through checkout, when I handed the coupon over to the cashier, he stared at it like, What. The. Heck? and then sort of stood there like he didn't know what to do. I said, half-jokingly, "It's a coupon."

"I know," he said, slowly. He finally scanned it and, bloop, off came another dollar from my total bill. But he still looked, well, confused.

"Is anything wrong?" I offered.

"No. But, like, that shampoo was already on sale," he said. Like is that a problem??? He then looked at me closely, scrutinizing my face....and if I could place a bet, I'd say he was trying to guesstimate my age. Because, as has happened in the past, cashiers have joked with me about being so young, yet already *into* coupon clipping. I typically joked back that to them to give me a break, I'm a starving student/grad student.

But now I'm a working professional. Sure, I can afford to pay full price for the shampoo. But why not shop for bargains- at any age? It's just the smart thing to do!

Joined a gym finally

September 19th, 2007 at 02:04 am

There's some purchases that are a slap on the wrist, but then there are those that are worthwhile. I am having so much trouble with the rise-and-shine-and-RUN (only end up running on weekends). I actually started looking into the nearby fitness clubs but was so annoyed by the astronomical membership fees.

Then it hit me- bonk. I've been taking a cardio class at a small martial arts studio. I signed up via the local community college, but then I thought, well how much would membership to the martial arts studio cost? So tonight I asked, and I was pleased to find it was a reasonable $79/month with no yearly commitment! In addition to all the fitness classes, they also have a small, but well-equipped gym! I snuck a peek in the room and saw it was NOT crowded; plus, those who were working out looked very normal, not like pumped-up weightlifters or cell-phone gabbing gym rats.

So I signed up for a month. I really like the non-descript aspect of hte place, the fact it's not at all crowded. It's close to work and the place I volunteer, so I should have no trouble finding time to go- hopefully!

Lazy morning, busier afternoon

September 18th, 2007 at 01:00 am

I'm such a hypocrite. After yesterday's rally cry, guess who was tucked cozy under her covers at 6AM, instead of jumping up for a run in the beautiful, brisk morning? AHHHHHH!!!!

There's always tomorrow....

Anyway, today was not all unproductive. I had the small, but always welcome, email from Pinecone, this site that pays you to take online surveys, that heralded a $5 deposit. That's lunch money! And speaking of surveys, one of the nearby pharmaceutical companies has a consumer products testing panel- and I got picked! So every so often, I'll get an email inviting me to come in a sniff a bunch of products. I get paid $10. I get $50 if I go participate in a roundtable discussion but those are held mostly during the days. There's no way I can sneak out of work for two hours =(

To top things off, somehow I got it into my cranium to finally give Ebay a go. Though, I must admit, I'm a chicken, I just started off small by listing shoes. My ultimate goal is to sell some of my designer bags but I'm scared S***less about scammers and other lawless felons (heh) that abound on Ebay. So, small steps.

Fitness Vows

September 17th, 2007 at 12:21 am

Dear Self,

Get off your butt and start jogging again. Remember how diligent you were at exercising while in graduate school? Somehow, you managed to climb out of bed at 5:45 every morning to go run 5-6 miles every day. What's going on now???

You have a stable job that is, for the most part, regular hours and no overtime.
You have considerably LESS stress than you did in graduate school; no more feelings of guilt, no more overbearing PI, no more pressure to get perfect results, no more guilt trip/ threats from assorted professors out for my thesis blood.
You live in a much safer neighborhood, with sidewalks, heck, even a nearby park and trails to run on. So why not RUN??!!

Maybe you need to go to sleep earlier instead of messing around on the compooter. Yeah, that would help =)

Do your best, don't give up, and remember that it takes a couple of weeks before running becomes "habit." Go for it!

Love,
Your brain

Plugging up the spending drain

September 15th, 2007 at 09:06 pm

Just did the budgeting for August. I use Quicken software, which allows me to allocate spending into categories. Since I am somewhat of an organization freak (I will sort the candy jar in my parent's house by color and candy type!) I create sub-categories so I know exactly what I've been buying. So here are the top five spending categories, in descending order:

clothing: handbags
groceries: myself
groceries: parents
automobile: gas
household: supplies

It irks me that handbags cost as much as they do, and are not exactly a necessity as, say, groceries. What is even more crazy is that I made about three grocery trips each week, and spent $30-50 each visit, BUT this still ended up to be less than the handbags I bought. UGH!

At least I have confidence I can control and even curb my handbag spending. It would be a lot harder to cut the costs of groceries, especially since I have to buy specific items (from the Asian market) for my parents.