socially acceptable stealing…right or wrong?

February 22, 2012 in life

Who’s been burgled?  Really, who hasn’t been burgled?  Being a victim of theft is anger-inducing and scary…and no one likes to think of themselves that way.  But in reality, we’re all thieves…we’re all guilty of stealing something – even though those thefts might be of the socially acceptable variety.

“Seriously Kris”, you might be thinking.  ”I don’t steal anything.”  I challenge you!  I will hazard to guess that you might be guilty of one of the following…and not even think of it in terms of stealing.  Let me do a quick breakdown for you…

Scenario 1:  Your waiter brings the check and it’s wrong.  You pay and leave without fixing the bill.

Not a big deal, you might think.  The restaurant will eat the cost and no one will know.  Is it a big deal?  BIG DEAL!  BIG DEAL!  It is a big deal if the waiter gave you the wrong check…because it comes out of that waiter’s pocket.  I used to work at a happy hour joint where the checks were very similar – a couple beers, some rolls of sushi, some sake and that was it.  I would have 10-13 tables at the same time.  Once in a while, at the end of happy hour when everyone would decide to leave at the same time, I would mix up checks and give them to the wrong table.  99% of the time, the table that got the lesser check would pay with cash and bolt out the door, while the table with the bigger check would flag me down to correct the problem.  What happened?  I paid for my mistake.  Came right out of my pocket at the end of the night.  My mistake, for sure, but I still cursed the person who knowingly paid less and left, thinking they got away cheap that day.  Bad karma my man.  Bad karma.

Scenario 2:  Using someone else’s unprotected wifi.

Is it cool to use the wifi of someone who doesn’t password-protect it?  I asked my husband for his answer, and he says, “That’s the great question of modern times.  Sometimes people don’t think it’ll extend past their house.  Other people intentionally leave it unlocked cause they feel they might as well share.  I think that if they don’t bother to lock down their network, no harm no foul.  The real harm happens when people use unprotected networks to pirate movies and music, and the actual owners might end up going to court over it.  That’s not cool.”

Scenario 3:  Starbucks – The Ghetto Latte:  getting an iced espresso and filling with milk from counter.

This is an ongoing debate – the Ghetto Latte.  The Consumerist reported that Starbucks has actually “condoned the ghetto latte”.  Some barista’s I’ve read (comments abound on this topic) will give you decaf if you do this.  Others (like my husband) will shrug their shoulders and say whatever.  (What my husband actually said was “Eh. Starbucks will just raise their prices on all drinks to make up for it.”  Which is exactly what they did…)  Legally, no barista can do anything about it.  Starbucks says that it leaves the decision on drink-customization up to the customer.  Who’s in the wrong here?  Don’t know, really, on this one.  All I know is that my mocha is now five cents more expensive because of it.  Not cool, to me.

Scenario 4:  Restaurant brings the wrong food to your table and you take it.

Restaurants employs servers, hosts, bartenders.  They also employ food runners to take food to tables.  Sometimes these food runners make mistakes, and when they bring that steak to your table and you don’t tell them it’s not yours and proceed to eat it…well then, that’s not cool.  Because the actual table who ordered it will get furious that their steak never arrives, the server will be utterly confused as to where the steak went off to, the cooks will be pissed that they have to remake something in the middle of the food rush, and the manager will be pissed that they have to comp some steak that some a-hole ate in addition to his ordered pizza.  The customer who has to wait for another steak doesn’t tip the server, the manager writes up the food runner for making a $45 mistake, the cooks get berated by the chef for a $45 food loss…and everyone winds up unhappy.  So please, just tell that nice boy/girl that you ordered a pizza not a steak, and don’t be that guy who ruins everyone’s night.

Scenario 5:  Stealing pens

Uncool man.  Those pens that you get from your server to sign your credit card check?  Don’t take it.  When you’re at the mall and you’re shopping?  Don’t shoplift the sales clerk’s pen.  Just stop taking people’s pens.  I don’t care how cool it is.  It’s not cool to take it.

Scenario 6:  Returning used goods to Nordstrom

Here’s a good one!  Nordstom’s return policy is epic.  But when does epic become a victim?

I have a dress I bought from Nordstrom.  I thought it looked great on, then I looked at the pictures from my sister’s wedding that I wore it in.  I look like I gained 50 pounds and somehow became a giant Asian Chewbacca.  Needless to say, I.  Hate.  The.  Dress.  But I spent $175 on it.  I wore it.  I took pictures in it.  I burned those pictures.  I hate it.  Do I return it?

I didn’t, but when I called to find out if I could…I was told politely that Nordstrom has a very forgiving return policy.  Personally I couldn’t do it.  But I know that others can, and damn if I really didn’t want to.  $175 is a nice chunk of change!

Would you have returned it?

In Reality…

Socially acceptable theft abounds.  There are other example I have forgotten, they’re so small (to me).  Let’s be honest here, after all, sometimes frugality wins over morality…

Have you ever committed socially acceptable theft?

game plan

February 21, 2012 in life

Do you have a game plan for your life?  The idea/goal that you run your life by, thinking that the life you are living subscribes to the “rules” you’ve set it run by?

Then have you had fate laugh in your face for thinking you know better than destiny?

Ha!  (I’m fate, laughing in your face.)

Life #1:  Some people take things for granted.  They assume things to be, well, what they assume.  Not a great idea.

Life #2:  Other people decide to make their own fate by, say, working toward their goals, making it (almost) impossible not to achieve them.  Kudos to those people!

Life #3:  Other people do a mixture – work toward what they think their goal is, but always keeping an open mind about other opportunities.  I think that most of the PF community falls in this category.

The best thing about life is that you can constantly work at changing which one you live – maybe you were always a Life #1 person, then you realized that you needed to take charge of your life more, so you become Life #3.  Or maybe you’re a Life #2, and decide to become a Life #1.

Examples:

Life #1:

Case in point.  Me!  My husband told me this weekend that the one thing he thought was for sure when we moved back to Hawaii was that I would have a job working for my family.  This “for sure” thing, that seems like a for sure indeed, is not a for sure.  Surely not.  We are struggling to figure out what to do now that our “for sure” source of income has sort of put me on welfare.

Life #2:

Case in Point.  Something like a doctor or a lawyer – They know what they want to do.  They go to school for it.  They study for it.  They become it.  It’s a game plan, set in motion at an early age, that has an expected affect.  Someone studies to become a pediatrician.  They become a pediatrician.  Someone studies to become a lawyer.  They become a lawyer.  Unless something happens or they change their mind, their career paths are sort of a fate of their own making.

Life #3:

Case in Point #1.  Any PF blogger.  Heck, any blogger, really.  Take for instance, Crystal at Budgeting in the Fun Stuff.  She was working a customer service job, plugging along while she wrote.  Then she realized there was a market niche for blog ad services.  Then she realized she was making way more money at her side hobby than her real job.  Bam!  There was an opportunity, she took it, and now she is making her own fate.

Case in Point #2.  Another PF blogger…Ninja at Punch Debt in the Face.  He went to college, found a good job, found a beautiful wife, and plugged along until Bam!  He got the idea for MANteresting, and couldn’t pass up that opportunity.  Hopefully for him, his venture will pay off big time.

What’s your point Kris?

Well, my main point is that I’ve been pretty dumb. I’ve let assumptions rule my life for the last 6 years, and I am paying dearly for it now.  I am Life #1, and I aim to become Life #3.  I haven’t advanced my career in any way for the last 6 years, haven’t worked on myself – professionally.  It’s sort of sad, really.  I took a test for a placement agency and I did poorly.  Poorly!  How did I do so poorly when I was an Executive Assistant for multi-multi-multi-millionaires for years?!?  Oh yeah, that was 7 years ago.  Right.

So I’m working on becoming LIfe #3.  I like the sound of Life #3.  It’s sort of musical.  And much less shady like life #1.  I’m looking into certifications that will help my resume.  Looking into online courses that will help refresh my admittedly lazy skills.  And hopefully once this next baby is born, I will emerge all butterfly-like with a new resume, new outlook, new certifications, and (maybe) a new (or old) state to call home.  But that’s fodder for another day.

What life are you living?

interweb reflection

February 17, 2012 in interweb reflection

I’m waiting to hear from the company I want to work for that I didn’t get the job.  They said they’d get back to everyone by the end of this week.  I’m sure I didn’t get it – even though I’m overqualified, even though I had 2 letters of reference (one directly sent to the president of the company from a personal friend of his) – because it is such a prestigious place to work and the benefits are amazing.  There is a very likely chance that there are hundreds of applications for this same position – from people who are just as if not more qualified than me.

If I don’t get it, I’m planning on just being a SAHM until our next baby is about 3-4 months old – then I’ll job hunt like a madman until I find anything that hires me within the salary range I’m looking for.  I ended up turning down the part-time job I was offered because it would have caused us to incur additional monthly expenses of $1000.  I would have been bringing in $1000-1200 a month, and would pay $1000 for the privilege of working.  That was just ridiculous.

Anyway, I hope everyone has a great weekend.  Here are some interesting things from around the interwebs this week.

Sam posted Tips For Finding Love and Getting Good Service From The Bartender With Red Hair on Untemplater.  Be nice to your bartender and tip well!

Ninja created MANteresting.  Go pin things that boys and their toys would love.

EE Musings wrote about Finding Your Healthy Balance.  Need to work on that one!

In honor of Valentine’s Day, femmefrugality wrote about Sugar Babies…Love or Prostitution?

And because the bloggess is amazing, go take a look at Juanita the Weasel.

 

ridiculous things i will spend money on

February 16, 2012 in budget, life

Yesterday J. Money posted 7 Hilarious Ways to Waste Money.  I am right with him that I will never spend $50,000 on a diamond encrusted cellphone, no matter how much money I have!  I do however disagree with him on the $1,000 sundae…if I had the dough I’d splurge on that.  Like, if I had multi-millions.  I’m a big fan of food though.  A huge fan.  Which led me to wonder…realistically…

What do I spend my money on that others wouldn’t?

well hello there

From the blogosphere…

Newlyweds on a Budget is spending their money on a new place.  They hate the shack they live in, and to them that increase in lifestyle enjoyment is more important that saving money and living in a place they loathe.  People think they should just suck it up and live small to decrease debt.  I say if you’re miserable where you are, spend a little more to make yourself happy.  If you’re miserable, your misery will have a cascading effect on the rest of your life.

Fabulously Broke in the City decided that $40 on a sweater isn’t worth as much to her as $40 on food would.  I totally concur.

Financial Samurai decided that spending an extra $5 on tip for a bartender is worth the good bartender karma that is thrown back his way.  As a former bartender, I completely agree.  You give me an extra $5, I’ll give you a smile and your drink will come faster.  Oh, but it doesn’t work if you’re mean or an a-hole.  Just saying, it takes a lot more than $5 to overcome that.

And in my household…

 Organic Milk Our baby is 20 months old, and has been on cows milk since he turned 1.  Before that he only drank breast milk.  I can’t, in good faith, give him milk that is from cows that have been given growth hormones – especially while he is so young.  His body, his hormones – everything is at a critical stage of development right now, and that makes us as parents want to give him things to put in his body that has as few chemicals and hormones as possible.

New Mexico Green Chile:  So my husband is from New Mexico, played for UNM band, cheered on the Lobos, and is a fan of all things chile.  In fact, he just spent 5 min explaining the different between “chili” and “chile” to me (even though he’s told me this at least 100 times in the past 11 years), and I sort of tuned him out.  But!  I do share a portion of his devotion to the Real Deal…and if you’re ever in New Mexico hit up the green chile cheeseburger if you like heat.  Like, really spicy.  So that’s why when I saw New Mexico Green Chile’s at Whole Foods, I did in fact spring for some to roast and make into his beloved burger.  Cause I’m a good wife like that.

Truffle Salt:  It’s just…so good.  Want to impress a date?  Get a good movie, make some popcorn, toss it with some truffle salt and parmesan cheese, and you’ve got a winner.  However you describe “winning” to be.

How to Speak Wookiee: A Manual for Intergalactic Communication (Star Wars)

If you have or know of a child age 1-99, get them this book.  I think that’s about all I need to say on that subject, because seriously.  Who doesn’t want to learn how to speak Wookiee?

My son Loves it.  Loves.  And the best part is that it doesn’t play some annoying song that will get stuck in your head like all the rest of the baby/toddler kids stuff does…it is enormously amusing for all ages.

Tiffany’s:  My husband will spend money on Tiffany’s jewelry for me because I love the blue box, and he loves the feeling of giving me the blue box.  It’s not often, it’s never super extravagant.  I think the most he’s spent on jewelry there (besides my engagement ring) is $300.  But it’s beautiful and I love it and it makes me so happy, which makes him happy.  It’s ridiculous, but I love it.

So what about you, my dear friends?  What do you spend money on that others would deem…unnecessary?

 

(sponsored link regarding the Lobos:  Ticketamerica.com has New Mexico Lobos, San Diego State Aztecs, TCU Horned Frogs tickets for all dates and times. We carry a large selection.)

 new mexico lobos mens basketball tickets  - san diego state aztecs mens basketball tickets - tcu horned frogs mens basketball tickets

valentine’s day slutty brownies

February 14, 2012 in food, recipe

oh hi. don't pretend like you don't want me.

It’s no secret on this blog that I am unemployed and money crunching like cookie monster on a cookie binge.  It’s also no secret that it’s Valentine’s Day.  So what does an unemployed girl do for her husband when money is an object?  Make slutty brownies, of course!

A friend of mine posted this recipe on Facebook, which is where my husband saw it and decided that some slutty brownies was all he wanted for Valentine’s Day.  It’s been making the rounds on Pinterest, from a blog called “What’s Gaby Cooking“.  She got them from The Londoner.  Both women are beautiful, have beautiful blogs, and I sort of want to follow them around town like a sad mommy stalker trying to gather up the lingering dusts of coolness that fall from them as they walk.  Sort of the way I feel about her.

Anyway, enough about my girl crushes.  On to food crushes.

cookie dough...

Read the rest of this entry →

personal finance tag

February 13, 2012 in Uncategorized

It’s been a weekend of blog swapping and other things!  If you missed my first blog swap, hit up John at Married with Debt  to check it out.  Then, if you missed my first guest blog post (!!), hit up Andi at Meal Plan Rescue to find my tips to find a good CSA box.

And even more, there is the personal finance tag that is going around (my god I’ve never been so social in my life!), which you can find below.  These are bloggers I’ve met either through the Yakezie Network, or through Edward Antrobus’s 3K challenge.  They’re good peeps, check them out!

Personal Finance Tag

So I was recently “tagged” by my friend John at Married (with debt).

To play, I have to:

  1. Post these rules.
  2. Answer the 11 questions from the person who tagged you.
  3. Create 11 new questions for the people you tag.
  4. Tag 11 people and link them to your post.
  5. Let them know that you tagged them.
Here are the answers to the questions John posted:
    1. What is your money philosophy in one sentence?  No one is in control of your finances but yourself.  
    2. Have you ever had a crazy adventure? If so, describe.  Adventure?  Either roaming around Europe for a month with my boyfriend, or roaming around NYC with him.  Now a crazy adventure?  Those usually involved lots of alcohol, barhopping, and possibly singing karaoke with a crazy old hawaiian man.  
    3. Did you get an allowance as a child?  I was paid to scrub the floors at my dad’s office  for 5 cents an hour.  It went up to 25 cents (when I was 8), then $1 as I grew up (when I was 12). I was given $20/month in high school.  
    4. What is the biggest personal finance problem facing America (or your country) today?  Honestly, it’s lifestyle inflation.  When I was a kid I used to play with sticks and stones.  Now, kids have all sorts of crazy toys.  People my age spend a ton of money on “necessary” stuff – like internet access and new iPhones.  We do too, and it’s crazy money for that stuff.  There’s going to be more “necessary” stuff popping up in the future – companies are really good at convincing us we need things.  The amount of things we “can’t live without” these days is so much higher than it was 10 years ago.
    5. Name the most famous person you’ve ever met.  Desmond Tutu.  If we’re talking Hollywood famous, then Billy Bob Thornton or the Rock. 
    6. What did you most want to be when you grow up?  a nurse
    7. What is your most embarrassing guilty pleasure?  Paris Hilton’s song “Stars are Blind”.  It’s a favorite karaoke song.
    8. If you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be?  Besides Hawaii?  Paris.  
    9. What’s your biggest financial pet peeve?  credit card debt.  I don’t understand it.  
    10. What do you think the biggest news story of 2012 will be?  Who the next president will be
    11. If you found out you had 6 months to live, what would you do with your life?  Honestly, I’m 4 months pregnant right now, so for the next 5 I’d be working on getting my family ready for my demise, and for the month after that I’d be spending as much time with my husband and sons as possible.  I’d write letters for them to read as they grow up, and make sure there was financial and emotional help for my husband.  I imagine that would include moving to the mainland to be nearer to his family.  (this answer was not the whimsical, fantasy answer this question usually expects…)
Here are my questions!
  1. What is the charity nearest and dearest to your heart?
  2. What is your “safe” retirement number?
  3. What comes first, paying for your kids education or your retirement?
  4. How are you spending valentine’s day?
  5. Do you pay the extra money to eat organically or local?
  6. What’s your most successful investment so far?
  7. What’s your dream way of making passive income?
  8. If there was one thing you could change about yourself, what would that be?
  9. What is one thing you try to do everyday?
  10. What is your “safe” emergency fund number?
  11. Would your problems be solved if you made double what you do today?

And here is who I’ve tagged…if they want to play!

Making Sense of Cents 

Modest Money

Discovering Adulthood

Odd Cents

Counting Our Pennies

Money Smart Guides

When Life Gives You Lemons

Musings of An Abstract Aucklander

Super Frugalette

Jai Catalano

Edward Antrobus

the best budget traveling tip i ever learned

February 10, 2012 in budget, life

The following is a guest post from  John at Married (with Debt), as part of the Yakezie Blog Swap. I wrote a post on the same topic on Married (with Debt), so make sure to check it out here.

The best budget travel tip I ever learned happened to be a double edged-sword, meaning it both saved me money and provided me with a deeper and more authentic travel experience than I would have received without it.

a couch and a pillow is all you need

While most money-saving travel tips end up leaving you feeling cheap or cheated out of an experience, using a free service like Couchsurfing or Tripping to connect you with people who actually live in your destination will instead make you feel smarter for saving money in a way that enhances your vacation or holiday.

That’s because sites like these are filled with people who are eager to open their spare bedrooms and their cities to you. Most of what I am going to cover pertains to Couchsurfing, as it is the only service I have used. But I understand other sites like Tripping to work essentially the same way.

Read the rest of this entry →

lesson learned

February 9, 2012 in life

I wish I knew how to teach my son the lessons he needs to know. The reality is that I don’t even know where to start.  So I thought of the best and worst words of wisdom I ever reviewed. Surprisingly, or not, the best and worst were exactly polar opposites of the same idea:  the idea of responsibility and being accountable for ones actions.

When I was in high school, I had a friend that had a crush on me.  He was very good at chemistry; I was very very bad at it. Science, for some reason my brain cannot wrap my mind around science.  Strangely I am great at math, but terrible at science. But I digress. So my friend had a crush on me and was also so good at chemistry he would sell the answers to the tests.  One night after he had called to talk to me, my mom said, “oh, he has a crush on you.”. “I guess,” I answered. “you should use him to pass chemistry.”. I looked at her in amazement, yes she was serious. This is also the woman who likes to play the weak woman card to get men to help her carry things. I’ve always remembered this as being one of the worst pieces of advice you could give someone, especially a daughter. Telling a girl that she should use her sexuality to manipulate men is definitely teaching her not to take responsibility for herself.   That was by far the worst piece of advice I have ever been given.

The best advice was when I was pregnant with our son. I’m a terribly selfish person, and I really like my sleep. I had never been around kids before, and didn’t particularly care for most I had come in contact with.  The idea of having a child,  therefore freaked me out. One day I turned to my husband and said, “what if I hate this?  What if I give birth, take one look at him and ask the doctor to put him back? What are we going to do if I hate being a mother?”.  I expected him to tell me the normal stuff, the stuff about how the first moment I see him I’ll fall in love. But he didn’t. What he told me was, “you’ll suck it up and deal with it.  We’re adults. We made a decision and we’ll deal with that decision responsibly like adults. Because that’s  what adults do.”.

Thats what I am:  An adult. And while thankfully my son did turn out to be my greatest joy, there are other, thankless, responsibilities that I remember to deal with as an adult. I don’t need to turn to a man to save me, don’t need to use my feminine wiles to get through life. It’s interesting how two pieces of advice can be so drastically different than each other.

What’s the best an worst advice you ever received?

charitable spending

February 8, 2012 in budget, life

A few days ago I wrote about charitable giving, and talked about, basically, how much my husband and I are terrible at giving to charities.  Certain events nowadays have pushed me to give money, but alas I have hesitated for various reasons or another.  Hesitated at charitable giving, that is.

Now charitable spending…that’s a different matter.  

It’s easier to give to charities under the guise of spending.  ”I need to eat, I might as well eat for a cause.”  ”I needed a new pair of shoes, I might as well buy one from the Salvation Army.”  ”My son needs entertaining, I might as well let him play a game that might win him a cheap plastic toy as long as the proceeds go to x charity.”

Does anyone else do that?  

Read the rest of this entry →

squeaky wheels get a punch in the face

February 7, 2012 in life

I shouldn’t blog grumpy, but here I am doing it.  I’m also late in posting this…makes me grumpy.  I forgot to give my son his breakfast before he rushed out the door…grumpy.  My stupid landlords are making getting internet difficult…grumpy.

But what I was thinking about the other night, that was making me really grumpy, is squeaky wheels.  Most specifically, squeaky wheels getting more oil.

In my opinion, squeaky wheels deserve a punch in the face.  (Yes, I did claim inspiration from Ninja.)

My husband and I have some very religious relatives.  The older generation is comprised of religious leaders, missionaries, and definite believers in Christ and the goodness of Christianity.  My husband and I aren’t any of the above…but that’s fine.  To each their own.  But being very good Christians as well as just having giving hearts, those relatives decided to help out (financially) one of our generation who they viewed as being in need.  Note this is the first time this has happened.  

The elders gathered as much money as they could spare to give to this couple.  These people are small business owners who have had a range of bad luck recently – from business problems to medical accidents.  The family decided to help them out.

The thing that makes me upset in all this is that these people are some of the most ungrateful, selfish people I have ever had the chance to meet.  (Facebook…don’t use it unless you mean for people to really see your true self.)  They complain about everything…about the government (obamacare is whack and is a travesty for small business owners everywhere…then they get hurt…and complain about not having health care and how the government can’t even help its own citizens), they complain about the state (state government is trying to kill small businesses by increasing min wage!), to each other (have you ever seen a marriage almost self-destruct on Facebook?).

They complain about everything.  And because they complain, loudly, about the unfairness of the world to them, people have decided to donate money to them.

I want to punch those squeaky wheels in the face.   Read the rest of this entry →