Over the last few months, my wife and I have been doing a lot of traveling by car. To help pass the time on the road, we’ve been borrowing a lot of books on tape from our local library. On our most recent trip, we finished Dan Brown’s The Lost Symbol (we weren’t big fans) and have started on Ender’s Shadow (so far it’s been good). While both of the audiobooks cost us nothing, since they were from the library, we were able to spend hours enjoying a book (or not enjoying a book) at very little cost.

Imagine my surprise when I learned that The Lost Symbol cost over thirty dollars on unabridged audiobook from Amazon. Thirty dollars is a lot to spend on a book, audio or otherwise. I understand the reasoning, there’s a lot of production value that goes into converting a book to an audiobook (I thought it was a well done audiobook), but it’s actually quite cheap when you break it down to per hour costs of entertainment.

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My lovely wife got a little under the weather last week, so she reached into our medicine cabinet to find some NyQuil or Robitussin to help her beat back the cold. To her surprise, the Robitussin had expired about six months ago and she wasn’t sure how effective it was going to be. We had always heard that expired drugs and vitamins were fine, they just lost a bit of their effectiveness. As for how much? We didn’t know… so we turned to the internet.

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As the New Year kicks off to a start many of us are taking the opportunity to take stock, examine and make changes. For many this can be somewhat of a painful process. Even though change is truly a part of our lives on a daily basis and on a larger scale, there is still that stigma of change being associated with pain.

This year as we ride out this strained economy the theme for many people is “look at what I already have!”. This can apply to appreciating the family & friends in our lives as well shopping and acquiring more stuff. Here are a few ways that you can kick the Eco-simplicity habit into gear and set the mood for 2010 and beyond. And don’t forget, changes don’t have to be painful. They can bring joy as well as inspire you and those around you.

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When we needed to replace the tile floor in our master bathroom, we went to Home Depot to buy all the necessary supplies. The hardest part about replacing a tile floor is cutting the tiles! You can buy an inexpensive tool that you can use to score and snap tile, but I found that it failed miserably (I wasted half a dozen tiles). That’s why they invented the wet ceramic tile saw!

The solution? I had to get my hands on one to cut about a dozen tiles. While all the other tools for the job were relatively cheap, ceramic tile saws run upwards of $500 on eBay, a handsome sum if you’re just looking to do a small job. That’s why I try to borrow tools if I can avoid buying them. If I have to buy them, I try to buy used rather than new. If all else fails, then I buy them new from the store.

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I love the week after Christmas but before New Years because the sales are all going to be bananas, especially this year. Stores realize that all their holiday inventory isn’t even worth the shipping costs of sending it back to the warehouse. That fact is the very reason why you should go out to your local bookstore to pick up boxes of seasons greetings cards and other decorations on the cheap.

The key to getting a good on anything is to buy it when retailers want to get rid of it. Right now, they want to shed their inventory of holiday themed products. There is absolutely no value in holiday cards and lights right now! Last year we walked into a bookstore and picked up boxes of holiday cards for a dollar a piece. We didn’t need Christmas cards, the store was looking to offload them, so we bought a bunch of cute cards that normally would’ve cost us at least five times more. The best part about it is that this year we’re almost guaranteed not to send the same card as someone else.

In years past, we’ve always used this time to supplement our ornament collection. The first year we had a tree, we didn’t have many ornaments but we made it work with more lights. Then, right after Christmas, we headed towards our local Macy’s and picked up a bunch of boxes on deep discount. Nowadays, we get a lot of ornaments from our family, so it’s not something we’ll be doing this year, but now is a great time to pick up boxes of simple ornaments on the cheap.

In addition to holiday themed goods, retailers are, in general, offering crazy sales to try to drum up business. While the holiday retail sales figures aren’t released yet, stores probably expect them to be low given the economy and the huge snowstorm that hit the east two weekends ago. With that hanging over their heads, they’re cutting prices and trying to get people out to the stores to spend. If there are things you wanted, now’s the time to try to snag them on the cheap (except for appliances, you should find out your state’s cash for appliances program schedule!)

Anyone pick up any good post-holiday goodies already?

(Photo: timparkinson)

About a year and a half ago, did you know how much a barrel of oil cost? I bet you did a year and a half ago… that’s because it was big news. Around June 2008, it was over $125 a barrel. Today, a barrel is in the high seventies. With the recession, unemployment and lower oil prices (though recently they’ve been gaining compared to months ago), the idea of being “green” and ecofriendly has fallen by the wayside. The latest climategate scandal certainly didn’t help but the most recent resurgence can be attributed to the talks in Copenhagen.

In the end, it comes down to simple dollars and cents. There are several ecofriendly things you can do right now that are both simple and money saving. Let’s take a looka t some of them:
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I remember when I first heard about Restaurant.com a few years ago. Their offer back then is the same as it is now, you can buy a $25 Restaurant gift certificate for $10. Every few weeks, they run a 70% or 80% off promotion where you end up getting a $25 Restaurant gift certificate for two bucks. Two freaking dollars… three if you only use 70% off.

A few years ago, hardly anyone took them. You went on the site, did a quick search for your area, and chances are only a few obscure restaurants were available. When I first looked, I didn’t even recognize a single restaurant in the 15 miles around my zip code! That’s not to say there weren’t any popular restaurants, we just didn’t know about them.

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In a recent issue of the Retirement Millionaire, a retirement newsletter I’ve been checking out, they mentioned some frugal VOIP option I hadn’t heard of before. MagicJack is a USB based device that lets you make phone calls using your PC’s internet connection for $19.95 a year, or $1.66 a month. I currently use Skype as my VOIP service, in part because of weekly hour-long chats for the Personal Finance Hour, but that costs twice as much for unlimited US calling – $2.95 a month ($35.40, plus international fees because Skype is based outside the US).

I’m always looking for a good deal so I thought I’d take a closer look.

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Since we’ve been doing a lot of “cooking as entertainment,” my wife and I have started drinking a bit of wine to help make cooking more entertaining.

Always price conscious, we set out to buy wines that we enjoyed but didn’t bust the bank. As twenty-somethings, we really don’t need our palates reaching beyond our pocketbooks, if I may be so bold in my use of alliteration. Fortunately, our tastes are plenty satisfied with bottles that cost only in the “teens” (or less, as is the case with many Rieslings). For some of our wine-buying tips, I invite you to read an earlier post title How to Save Money on Wine.

So I wasn’t surprised to read a WSJ article that basically called wine critics full of crap. Actually, full of crap is probably a little harsh, but the point of the article was that wine critics are inconsistent, to the point of being random, and that wine ratings is big business.

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As the holiday season of sparkle and glitter quickly approaches, it’s easy to get swept up in the costly winds of buying, giving and receiving. Personally, I’ve spent way too many hours browsing the aisles (at the last minute) trying to find the perfect thing that my friend will like love not have to re-gift!! This year, instead of mindlessly scanning the shelves, take a moment and plan a gift that will create memories, warm hearts and build friendships without adding any financial stress.

Here are some of my ideas to get your creative giving juices flowing.

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