Comfort Blanket

Radio waves

Photo by Martin Herrera

I think it is safe to say that I am addicted to listening to the radio, and so I have to add this as another square in the patchwork that makes up my personal comfort blanket. This might seem an odd confession after my earlier post on silence but the two can live side by side quite nicely. After all, silence can be a rich and intense experience and is best served in small and delicate portions. Too much and you can be overwhelmed and bowled over. It is also a bit of an acquired taste - not everyone relishes some of the questions it asks of you.

Radio has been my constant companion all through my life. My earliest memories all have a radio burbling away in the background. I know that my mum had the radio on every day from the moment she woke up. I suspect it was like a friend to her, a known and trusted voice keeping her company. For her it was always the home service, which eventually became radio 4. And as a result I have fond memories of those big old radios that had to be tuned by turning a knob - and for some distant or weak stations it could be a tricky and skilled exercise to get it just right. Then there were all of those exotic sounding station names that ranged across the face of the dial and the globe - like Hilversum. Now for all I know Hilversum is some ghastly dump of a town with pitiful weather, a dull view and a low average IQ but whatever it is like in reality it will forever be etched into my memories.

There is so much to commend listening to the radio. I can't sit still for long enough to watch much television. I find I get twitchy and need to be off doing something instead of sitting there being spoonfed, so radio suits me perfectly. And these are some of the reasons I love it:

• As some or other famous person observed once, "the pictures are better on radio". Your imagination is called on to do some of the work and that is never a bad thing.
• You can do pretty much anything and still listen to the radio. You may sometimes need to tailor your listening to the activity or maybe vice versa, but I think generally speaking your favourite station is usually the best because you are so used to its intonations and rhythms. So you can zone in and out and still get the reassurance of it in the background.
• I find if I am doing something creative I need music - predominantly classical but sometimes I find I need rock music. 
• It is a reliable constant soundtrack for your life. Whatever happens, its always there. What more reliable friend has there ever been?

My listening habits change through the years. It's true that through my teenage years I drifted into radio 1 but even then I always did find a space for radio 4 too. Lately I've found more time for classical music. From time to time I suffer bouts of insomnia for several nights in a row, and I'm always reliant on the radio to keep me sane. If I'm wide awake there's always something to listen to somewhere, but if I'm trying to sleep then a radio set to the lowest level (so I can hear the cadences but not the detail) is often the final soothing option to get me off to sleep. And if you are ill, maybe burning up with a fever and unable to sleep the radio can be the only thing you can tolerate. You can still enjoy it with your eyes closed and tucked up under a pile of blankets.

I confess I am known to have radios on in every room in the house so I can go from room to room and task to task and not miss a moment. Life was a bit confusing for a while when DAB radio came in and the small but significant time delay became apparent - the echoing effect created by one digital and one analogue radio tuned to the same station and in close proximity is quite disturbing.

If you feel the need to be really anoraky about the whole thing there is a fantastic yearly publication called the Radio Listeners Guide (there is a tv equivalent too). You get reviews of every type of radio as well as a great raft of information on satellite and internet radio, digital radio mondiale, short wave radio... Its geeky but it is also incredibly useful if you are going to buy a new radio. I had some specific requirements for a new bedside clock radio, including the ability to plug your ipod in - and lo, it came up trumps!

Book review - "Thrifty ways for modern days"

Photo by givepeasachance

When I was in my local library recently I came across another money saving guide - "Thrifty ways for modern days" by Martin Lewis. He has a popular website "Money Saving Expert.com" which is certainly worth a look. He also provides a weekly email with up to the minute money saving tips and offers. As I write there are print out vouchers for various pizza restaurants, money off train fares and cheap flights to New Zealand and Australia.

There are quite a lot of similar sites, and ones that go further and really are nothing more than an advertising portal offering seductive freebies and deals that then get you suckered into something you probably didn't want in the first place. These other sites I definitely would not go out of my way to recommend. They are there to drag you into spending money not saving it, and to be honest the amount of time you end up wasting reading interminable lists, clicking through to other sites, and filling in forms - well, I'd rather use my time more profitably. However, it is worth looking at the Money Saving Expert offers and tips, as long as you keep a sense of proportion and don't go after lots of free handcream you don't want etc. If all your freebies sit in a cupboard for 12 months until they lose their scent or colour then they were a waste of time.

The book wasn't exactly what I was expecting, although thinking it through I'm not that clear what I was expecting. The Money Saving Expert website is quite a flash, brash site with lots of links and banners and colour, and a smattering of 'shock, horror!' headlines. The book is a different kettle of fish. It is small but chunky with no pictures and printed on probably the cheapest paper they could find. All is explained at the start. The book is a collection of the 'old style' wisdom from one of the site's discussion boards. So this is all the stuff your granny or great granny either told you about or took for granted as the sensible way to do things. Martin Lewis is quite up front in saying that he isn't a full on old styler. He uses some of the tips but others he admits he "looks askance at".

He opens with a quick chapter on basic money and budget advice. Its the usual stuff of know your finances, understand how much you spend on what and how to cut back. After that the rest of the book is basically a selection of tips from the old styler discussion board. There is a range of chapters including clothes, grow your own, presents and gifts and recipes, amongst others. Really, this book is valuable in the same way all these books are - you pick out the things that appeal to you and ignore the rest. You won't be able to use each and every one so I'm grateful that he didn't go for a silly title like "100 ways to save money" because when it comes down to it you might only find a handful that work for you.

There were things I baulked at:

• For example, suggestions like filling your pockets with the sachets of salt and sauce from burger bars or the tea bags provided in hotel rooms.My old fashioned view on that is that it is stealing, and my granny would certainly not have included it as a recommendation for thrifty living. 
• While I am all for home made gifts if they are done well, and effort and love has been put into them, I don't feel the same way about a suggestion to make shortbread for your friends and put it in a pretty box. It's one thing to spend several hours carefully knitting a scarf, but it's a whole other thing to knock something off at minimal cost and minimal effort. It just looks cheap. If I got something like that as a present I know I'd feel a bit insulted, because a friend who does that is saying "I was only willing to spend a few pence for you, you're not worth any more than that". I think it would be different if I knew they were absolutely poor as church mice, but otherwise it strikes me as rude and penny-pinching.
• People love to suggest things like print out your own gift labels or wrapping paper. Making your own is one thing, but to be honest things like labels are so cheap you'd probably spend a lot more on ink in your printer if you printed them out. Sometimes it is easy to think that because you don't see the cost at the time that something is therefore free. Some common sense is needed at times, because people seem to get so carried away by scrimping that they lose sight of the bigger picture.

But it is easy to carp and criticise and point at the silly bits - you can do that with any money saving book on the market. Overall it is a useful little book, although I think everything is there on the website anyway. There are some good recipes and I particularly liked to be reminded of the simple cheap things you can use instead of expensive cleaning products - vinegar, bicarbonate of soda etc. 

Getting into the zone

So, enough of the silence. It's a valuable thing but a bit too much of it and people start to poke you in the ribs in case that glazed look is actually a bit more serious than they first thought.

An essential part of my personal comfort blanket is the various 'hobbies' and 'interests' that I am ... well, quite frankly obsessed with. I have put 'hobbies' and 'interests' because as soon as I typed them I realised how much those words have acquired such a lame and tame reputation, a patina of amateur dabbling. I'm sure there's a place too for such dalliances, but I'm thinking of something far more intense.

Many visitors to this blog have probably arrived via my other blog, which records my progress through a City & Guilds course in textile art. Give me anything to do with art, especially textile art and I can find my way into that zone. I can lose myself so completely that nothing else seems to exist. The rest of the world is a distant blur and time disappears.

Many psychologists believe that having a "thing", a subject, a hobby that can totally absorb you is a very valuable and healthy thing. The pyschologist "Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi studied those states in which people report feelings of concentration and deep enjoyment. His studies revealed that what makes experience genuinely satisfying is 'flow' - a state of concentration so focused that it amounts to complete absorption in an activity and results in the achievement of a perfect state of happiness" (quote from a review of his book "Flow"). He then extended this to taking that feeling of absorption and finding it in or applying it to other parts of your life, and thereby finding true happiness.

It seems to be a fascinating mix of finding complete immersion in something - almost as if you were underwater and could no longer breath ordinary air, but can only breath your activity - and finding a zen like state of mindful concentration. Being mindful seems primarily to be giving your concentration to something and giving that activity (however ordinary or however complex) the honour and respect of your undivided focus. It's also about being in the present moment and living your experience rather than forever experiencing everything as either memory or intention.

In order to feel happiness we need to have things we can affect and have an impact on. We need to be able to make choices and have an element of control. Without this we feel helpless and give up, feeling that nothing we do is going to make any difference. We really need interests to give us a focus rather than leaving our minds to endlessly drift without purpose. We need to be able to see ourselves making some progress and have new targets to aim for.

Being able to immerse yourself in something you love seems to build a synergy where one thing builds on another and sometimes the results seem far beyond anything you thought you could ever achieve. If you add to that mix some phases of apparently aimless daydreaming then you start to get a potent ferment where new ideas can just erupt like lava. It's interesting that the intensity of being in the zone somehow improves by being complimented with its opposite. Periods of intense focus somehow need the balance of times when you let your head do its own thing. Apparently then neural connections can happen that you would not have consciously thought of, and perhaps an element of one obsession suddenly illuminates part of another.

So, I hope your comfort blanket includes a hobby you really love. If you forever push it to one side, thinking it is selfish or self indulgent, then maybe think again. Your happiness may depend on it!

Silence ...

Photo by Guy Tetreault

Silence has a valuable place to play in my personal comfort blanket. It comes with some caveats though.

1. Does it really exist? I don't mean that as some sort of deep existentialist question or as one of those too clever by far eastern mystical cosmic questions ... "what is the sound of one hand clapping?". No, what I mean is there isn't really very much of the pure unadulterated stuff about. As soon as you turn off your radio, tv or ipod, or climb into the hills, or sit in a Quaker meeting, you realise that silence is actually usually full of noise. For instance, sitting in a Quaker meeting you become aware of a myriad of other sounds - someone's breathing, a clock ticking, distant traffic, your own heartbeat. Or climbing up a hill - when you reach the top there's the sound of the breeze and birdsong, but not silence.

So, the first caveat is that it's a relative thing. Therefore the silence you find is more of an absence of the usual sounds we fill our private space with. I suppose in a way it is literally expanding your own mini universe past your radio and out to hear what sounds the further world is making. And in expanding that universe there comes the chance to expand your mind a little.

Speaking personally I have no idea what complete silence sounds like as I have a permanent ringing in my ears. But before you start thinking how awful etc, don't because it's not like that for me. Luckily I've had it as long as I can remember so it is just normality for me. This might sound odd but I was in my 20's before I realised this wasn't the way most people experience the world. So the quieter it is the louder my ears buzz, so I really can only imagine what pure silence is like.

2. Which brings us neatly to the second caveat - that lack of the sounds we are used to and find comforting can be profoundly disturbing at times. Taking away all those protective noises that keep us safe and make us feel normal and connected to our world, well, take those away and you are left alone with your thoughts. Not always a good place to be.

Becoming acquainted with silence might therefore have to be done in small steps but I think it can be a very profound exercise. Many religious and spiritual paths use silence as a tool to discover deeper truths. There are the silent orders of Catholic monks and nuns, the Quakers who hold their meetings in silence, and the meditation techniques of the eastern religions. All are using silence as a way to access some deeper meaning, some new insights, some guidance.

Even if you don't use silence for prayer or meditation I think there is still something to gain by breaking into our normal routines. That change of pace shakes things up and opens up new possibilities. I'm sure as well that the old adage "a change is as good as a rest" is just as pertinent for your brain as for your body. A rest from the same old radio station might just give your head an opportunity to think along different lines - and who knows what inspiration could germinate from that?

Tales of caution, tales of hope

As ever, I stand before you as a living embodiment of both thrift and excess, sinner and saint (guffaw!), an example of things that work and moments of failure.

Some things have gone well. For example, my letter to Thames Water persuaded them that their huge increase of 26% was a bit over the top. They have adjusted their increase to the figure I proposed - so hooray! It's always worth challenging these things if you feel they are out of line. At worst you lose the cost of a stamp or the price of the phone-call. I haven't heard anything from BT yet. I may just have to send the letter again in case the naughty snow ate it.

That pesky snow - it has a lot to answer for. The slippy slidey roads meant that my weekly grocery delivery was canceled so I had to plod down to the supermarket and do things the old fashioned way with a trolley. Things started off fine, but then it's not so hard to keep sensible in the fruit and veg section. I mean, there's a limit to the degree of wild expenditure you can splash out on a few turnips and a bag of mushrooms. However, I regret to say that I fell prey to some really delicious looking biscuits, a magazine and one or two other bits and bobs. OK I stocked up on some freezer essentials, replenished my herbs and spices and bought a few cleaning materials, but even I was taken aback to find I'd spent 50% more than my on-line shop would have been.

With head drooping as I trudged back to the car, I resolved to tell this tale just to show that it is the easiest thing in the world to spend a lot more when you are in the shop and face to face with all of their marketing might than just shopping on-line from a list of necessities.

But it was a salutary lesson and the melting snow has brought a return to prudence. I will not be downhearted - I enjoyed the biscuits a lot, and the magazine is still good reading so maybe the occasional little splurge in the depth of winter isn't too much of an indiscretion.

"How to feed your family a healthy, balanced diet..." - book review

This is a straight forward, no nonsense, does what it says on the cover sort of book. There no frills, no fancy pictures, no chapter after chapter of preaching and ranting, just the necessary facts. There are about 250 pages and about the same number of recipes so you really don't get short changed - that's approximately 4p a recipe.

I suppose I would class this book as a poor woman's Barefoot Contessa (comfort viewing at its most delightful - try the UK TV food channel at 6.30 on a weekday evening if you've not caught her before). Neither of them like wasting time on fancy ways of cooking or lengthy techniques if there's an easy way of achieving the same ends. If it tastes as good frozen or from a tin then use it! The difference is the Barefoot Contessa doesn't lose an opportunity to add a slug of cream or a chug or wine or a dozen eggs to anything in a pot in front of her, ... and she favours huge pieces of expensive meat. Gill Holcombe on the other hand writes a practical book of good tasting home cooked food, simple easy ingredients and all for an average cost of £30 per week for a family of four.

This book will really suit quite a lot of people:

• If you are fed up of tv dinners from a plastic tray and want to start cooking for yourself, and haven't cooked much since home economics at school - this is for you
• If you are a student heading for uni for the first time - this is for you
• If you are stuck in a bit of a rut and need to add some variety while keeping things uncomplicated - this is for you
• If you are bored of trying to cook designer dishes that take so long you are not hungry by the time they are cooked - this is for you

You know what? I like this book. It came as a breath of fresh air after struggling through "The Spend Less Handbook". It is balanced, sensible, easy to read and easy to follow, and if your food bill is getting out of hand and you need to bring yourself in line this book has five week's worth of cost effective meal plans, and stacks of alternatives. There's everything from main meals, snacks, puddings and cakes. You could do a whole lot worse than pop out and buy "How to feed your family ... " by Gill Holcombe.

Every coin has two sides

Photo by mixed.media

Sometimes, perhaps most of the time, making a choice isn't a cut and dried, black and white thing. More often you are wisest to consider all the pros and cons in the round and then work out the best fit with an honest assessment of not only your needs, but also your own particular strengths and weaknesses. I think the use of credit cards and of direct debits comes very neatly into this category. But first indulge me while I have a tiny moan (it's ever so quick), harking back to the previous post...

The more I mull over "The Spend Less Handbook" (see previous post for full review) the more irritated I feel with it. It is a book full of dictatorial statements - never buy anything with credit cards, switch all your payments to direct debits. There's very little that gives you the range of good and bad and then allows you to make your choice - which may be different from my choice for perfectly valid reasons. Do it her way or else you'll be poor and sorry, and possibly even spanked quite hard. I suppose it made her book easier and quicker to write - 365 reasoned and balanced arguments might have weighed in too heavily. Back to the fray ...

Credit cards can indeed be a slippery slope, if you are stuck with a ridiculously high rate, don't keep a track of your purchases (whether as a deliberate policy or through carelessness) and aren't organised enough to pay even the minimum amount on time. So if you are poor at paperwork or prone to buying things on impulse or having delicious little sprees then perhaps credit cards would be better prised out of your hands and wallet and therapeutically sliced asunder with big shiny scissors. But buying with a credit card can also be a good thing. You get an extra level of consumer protection. Think back to all those stories of holiday firms going bust or furniture firms going under. The people who got their money back were the folks who'd paid by credit card. All of the sensible people paying with cash or direct from their bank accounts were left high and dry - no holiday, no new sofa, no refund. Its just not as easy as saying credit cards are too bad for your health.

Photo by The urban snapper

Direct debits might seem less obviously bad but I have my reservations about their benefits. OK, fine, they are a godsend if you do forget to pay bills easily, if you tend to write your shopping list on the back of the electricity bill and then throw it away when you get home, or if you have so many bills to settle that it would take you a day to sit down and get them stowed away. But all too often there's a sting in the tail, and I think they can be just as tricky as credit cards if you don't keep your wits about you. Let me take a couple of examples of my own: 

I recently had both my phone bill and my water bill in the same batch of post. Both casually informed me there was nothing I need do but my direct debit would be going up in both cases. That's nice of them, they do all the work and I don't need to worry. Or do I? For a start I think those big statements telling you there is nothing you need to do should be banned and replaced by a warning to check the new figure and make sure you are happy with it. Why take their word for it?

I looked at my phone bill which is normally pretty low as we don't make too many calls, don't stay chatting for hours and our daughter isn't a teenager yet. On first glance it didn't seem such a big deal but then I looked again and worked out the percentage increase - a ludicrous 41%! And no, we hadn't started using the phone 41% more or even any more as it happens. Two things were going on, and both fit into the category of "naughty" as far as I am concerned:

• First of all this bill had come out a couple of weeks earlier than the usual quarterly date. This meant that only two of the direct debit payments due in the quarter showed up instead of three. That made it look as if we were slightly in debit.
• Secondly they were doing what I fear most of the utility companies do all too often - putting the amount up by over the odds so they get the benefit of those few extra pounds instead of you. Then at some point you build up quite a bit of credit and you finally get round to asking for it back. Miraculously it always seems to be that they owe you money but very rarely the other way round.

A while back I hadn't really been keeping much of an eye on the electricity bill, but when I went back over three years bills there was only one quarter out of twelve when we owed them money - for every other quarter we were in credit and they were happily earning interest on money that wasn't theirs - and we weren't.

As for the water bill, they were implementing a 26% increase in the direct debit, while their prices had only gone up by 7% and our actual usage has been declining overall, (although it always seems to rise a little in the first half of the year). So factor in an increase of 5% for increased use and that still means they think increasing their charges by over twice as much as you could logically argue is fair.

So while the press burbles on about how you pay less for paying by direct debit and the utilities smile and look magnanimous, they are actually raking in vast amounts of interest on the money they sneakily borrow from all of us. Of course we pay less for direct debits - the utility companies can make up the difference with the interest they earn on all the overpayments they enforce. I have half a mind to go back to paying on receipt of a monthly bill (actual reading not estimated of course). At least then we'd just be paying for exactly what we have used and nothing else.

"The Spend Less Handbook" - book review

"The Spend Less Handbook - 365 tips for a better quality of life while actually spending less" by Rebecca Ash, is a book of three parts. In part 1 Rebecca  outlines the moral and ecological arguments, demonstrating why we are buying more but not feeling any happier. Personally I found it a little on the preachy and strident side in a few places and that might put some people off right out of the starting blocks, but it is a solid 50 pages of facts about consumerism, and its effects on us and the planet. Part 2 is brief - 7 snappy rules to help you live better and spend less.

Part 3 comprises the 365 tips. I got the distinct impression that the author originally had perhaps 250 to 300 tips at most and then someone decided it would look more catchy to stretch these to 365, presumably hoping that most people will assume this is one of those books where you can put one thing into action every day for a year, thereby creating a  year of bite-sized savings. If you are assuming that you will be disappointed, unless you are quite happy to downsize your house one day, try squatting the next and move abroad a week later.

The author would have been better served producing 300 really good quality tips rather than trying to eke things out to 365 and ending up looking frankly silly in places. For example, tip 211 - "Flying first class is surely unnecessary unless you really, really need to", I think I was on to that one already. Or maybe, tip 348 "it may actually pay you to look for ways to earn significant amounts of money while actually working less" - and that's all you get, there is no more substance to that gem, and certainly no guidance on how to do it. That one left me more than a bit baffled. Where did she get it from? Does she really think that we are all dumbly stuck in 9 to 5 jobs when there are hundreds of other 'magic' jobs out there paying more and only expecting you to turn up for the mornings?

I find it a bit disingenuous that the back cover claims "every tip will save you between £5 and £50,000". Quite a lot of the tips are very worthy in themselves but are more about being happy with what you are and have rather than saving actual pennies and pounds. "Feeling proud of the person you are" and "Stand up straight and wear your clothes and your life with elegance and pride" may be fine enough, if a little simplistic, as statements but they won't directly save you money. Anyone who is really struggling for every penny and picks up this book will probably put it down again fairly promptly, finding those sort of sentiments glib and unhelpful. If all of your few clothes are worn thin and sagging, then being told to wear them with elegance and pride might just stick in your craw a little. This is a very middle class book, and unfortunately it sounds as though the author is utterly unaware of this.

There are plenty of perfectly sensible tips such as don't buy a brand new car because you immediately lose a lot of money due to depreciation and go to price comparison websites for mortgage deals, holidays, the best savings rates etc. However, these sensible tips are also peppered between some that are disturbingly niave and simplistic, and there is a distinct lack of balancing the pros and cons of most of the bright suggestions. This is a little dangerous - you get one short, sensible tip, and not much further on you get another tip proposing something that could potentially lose you money if you get it wrong. I felt uncomfortable that the sensible tips are giving some credence to the more complex ones. I feel an example is needed:

Rebecca is very keen on the idea of selling up and moving abroad, of finding the perfect sunset and a cheap villa and living the good life. Admittedly she does say that her thoughts are meant as inspiration and not a comprehensive guide, but at the same time it is written in a tone that implies that anyone who doesn't see this as the ideal answer must be some kind of idiot. "Sell up your expensive home in the UK and you might find you have enough money to start a new life abroad doing the work you want to do". You might also find that if you have stayed away from the UK for 2 years and then need to return in an emergency, when you get back you won't be eligible for any state aid for 6 months. You'll have to pay all your own medical bills, and you won't be given temporary housing if you have nowhere to live etc. British citizen or not you'll have to fend for yourself without any safety net. These places are cheap for a reason, because there are big catches and risks involved. It's just not so simple Rebecca!

I think the best thing you get from this book is the repeated questioning of the status quo of your life. Are you really happy doing things this way? What would happen if you did this or that instead? Frankly the rest of it is rather pedestrian at best and pie in the sky folly at worst. Personally I think India Knight's "The Thrift Book" beats this one hands down any day.

Some of my biggest failings

OK, first up, this is financial failings only, haven't got all day to confess the multitude of things I am totally rubbish at doing or not doing. Second up, I don't want you to go away with the impression that I have set up my pulpit and am preaching to you poor sinners from a position of saintly glory. One of the main reasons for setting up this blog was because I need to keep putting things right in my own wallet and I frequently let myself down in moments of weakness or a lack of concentration, so I need to keep on nudging myself back to the straight and narrow.

photo by jbcurio

You know how sometimes when you are browsing through blog after blog you can get a bit fed up with all of the people who are going on and on about their marvellous and thoroughly wholesome lives - "got up at 4am,enjoyed fabulous dawn chorus, painted masterpiece of dawn chorus, made wholesome buns for the kids to take to school, spent the day making loads of beautiful things to sell on Etsy, collected kids from school, skipped all the way home laughing and joking, ...", yadda, yadda, yadda. I far prefer the (mainly British) blogs where you get a glimpse of something a bit more lifelike - tired and grumpy kids, the cake that burnt or came out like a piece of sheet metal (if you got round to making one in the first place!), the beautiful piece of sewing that got accidentally sewn to the tablecloth wasting hours of sewing time and yards of irreplacable cloth ... They are much more my sort of thing, they remind me of home.

Anyway, wasting time rambling and moaning so lets crack on:

1. Magazines - magazines lure me in month after month. They look so enticing with their glossy covers and fabulous photographs and promises of redecorating your house on a budget. It's so easy to just pop one into the basket before the checkout (another good reason to try and do all your shopping online and avoid the temptation in the first place). It has always been a pretty obvious potential money drain but it really came home to me some while back when I was having a sort out. I was going through a pile of old magazines pulling out articles and photos that I wanted to keep. The pile was getting quite high so I quickly totted up how many there were and multiplied that by the average cost of a magazine these days (not cheap and we're not talking about "OK" or "Womans Weekly" here). It was a hefty sum and I could have bought a lot of hardback books for the same money that would have lasted longer and been of more use. Or saved the money and not spent it at all. I still fall into the temptation from time to time, but some of the time I do manage to stop myself by remembering that only 3 to 5 of these magazines equals one nice hardback book.




photo by bravenewtraveler




2. Loading up the basket - I'm referring to online baskets here. It's not an issue for the weekly grocery shop, but when I shop online for, say, craft materials I often find myself feeling that just ordering one item looks a bit mean. Someone has to pack up your parcel and send it off so I often find myself thinking I should put a few more items in to make it worth the while of the packer - ummmm, dumb I know. There's also the nagging feeling that I need to make the most of the postage or buy enough to qualify for free postage. It's still a hard one to crack.
3. Failure to check how much is already on the credit card - this is particularly slack. Sometimes if I 'need' something right then and there it's far better to not check how much is already on the card bill for this month. If I don't look it's not there right? And I know full well if I look I'll probably come to my senses and put the purchase off for another month or two at least ... and sometimes that ends up meaning I never buy it and probably never miss it.

photo by szlea

Oh, there are more but I think three is just right and not too greedy don't you? The point is, the theory is all very obvious and sensible but sometimes putting things into practice and taking a dose of your own medicine is a whole other thing. And it feels good to 'fess up. And hopefully makes you feel a bit better too. But that's no excuse for any of us to stop trying, eh?

Computer thrift ... in various guises

This post is a bit of a smorgasbord (what a satisfying word that is...) of ways to use your computer more thriftily. There's a bit of this and a bit of that.

Thrifty printing - saving ink, saving the pennies
All of those ink cartridges we get through are expensive items, so anything that can reduce the amount of ink used (especially when it's not a fancy document for public consumption) has to be good right? There are at least two good things you can do to save using ink unnecessarily:

1. Reset your printing options to use less ink. In Word you select "File", "Print", "Properties", and then the graphics tab. You can then reset the resolution to a lower level so it sprays out fewer dots to make each letter.
2. Download a new font called the ecofont:

This new font has been created by a Dutch company called Spranq, and the enlarged version above shows how it uses less ink by leaving tiny holes in each letter - these cannot be seen at normal font sizes. You can download it by following this link DOWNLOAD ECOFONT. I think it would also look pretty good with the holes visible - they look like all of those lights around a vanity mirror.

Don't lose money by being a victim
An important way to save money is to protect it in the first place and protect your computer from all the nasty viruses and hackers and general internet ne'er-do-wells who lurk in darkened doorways. There are many good ways to do this and most are far beyond my knowledge. However I can strongly recommend a company called Firetrust. They produce several really valuable products designed to keep you and your computer safe as you surf stylishly from blog to blog. I have used their products for many years and found them both reliable and a godsend.

I am going to particularly recommend their Mailwasher programme as this has served me well for over 10 years and I would not willingly be without it. In simple terms it checks your incoming emails before they are downloaded from your email service provider and highlights the naughty and the nasty. It is easy to use. It already knows where a lot of bad stuff comes from but it also has a very easy way of letting you mark emails as "good" or "spam". This way you can delete or bounce back the vulgar, the vile and the villanous. The result - you don't have to look at nasty stuff or timewasting messages. You also avoid letting in emails to your inbox that may have viruses or spying programmes secretly attached, and that will potentially save you a lot of grief and a lot of money. So, if you are fed up of your inbox filling up with ugly looking trash give it an early spring clean - it'll thank you one day, when it learns to talk.

FIRETRUST'S MAILWASHER

Shop smart
There are many ways to save money by shopping online, several of which I have referred to in previous posts. I am just going to mention a couple of new ones.


1. Internet Cashback enables you to earn varying amounts of cashback when you purchase from a range of retailers via the links from the Internet Cashback site. This includes many big names (Asda, Boots, M & S, Tesco to name but a few). This is a great idea with the following caveats:

a) Be strong, be organised - it is so easy to get drawn into buying things just because they are bargains or because we will get a nice wad of cash in return. I know its obvious, but if you don't need it in the first place don't buy it - you'll give yourself a much bigger cashback cheque that way. It is so easy to get carried away. But of course if you are buying anyway you might as well earn some cashback.

b) When I first clicked on the "cashback shops" link near the top of their page I was a bit underwhelmed - not many shops there I thought. D'uh, just me being a bit slow - these are just the "featured" shops. Click through the letters and you will see loads of familiar names.

c) Do be careful to follow their instructions. If you don't go via their links you won't get your cashback, and who'll be sorry then, hmmm?

2. Save buckets
No, no, no, - it's not the latest version of save the whale. Rest easy, buckets are not an endangered species. This is a price comparison site, like Kelko or Pricerunner. I have used it a few times and find it pretty easy and reliable. Nothing fancy just quite straightforward:

SAVEBUCKETS.CO.UK