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| Scams, and Money Saving Ideas |
| 11.24.03 (4:08 pm) [edit] |
I have to admit that I love gadgets and products, but some gadgets are stupid their buyers HAVE to be nuts!First, the unnecessary. You may see the commercials about having your invention pattented. Because many of the companies are just out to scam you, they no longer say they will help you patent the item, they just take your money to help you "take your invention to the NEXT LEVEL"... Generally, just save your money and read the book "Market it Yourself". Many people pay for a credit report. Some states allow you to get a free credit report (Georgia was one of those states). Also, if you are turned down for credit or some other issues, you may be eligible for a free report. You can even ask for this via the phone. Don't pay for what may be free! Look at this page for more information.. http://clarkhoward.com/librar... If you have a friend or relative or neighbor who has been in their house for decades, they MAY be still paying for their telephone. Some people are still renting a phone from the telephone company (as they did before the deregulation) and some have spent THOUSANDS of dollars renting phones when they could just go out and buy one for $10. Help them out by asking if you can review their phone bill. Also look at "Wiring Plans" that cover wiring in their house needing replacing. Think about it, when was the last time your wiring went bad? Inside wiring protection plans are generally a big waste of money. Now about stupid products. I know that people seem to want to spend lots of money they don't have to. A toothbrush is good for a couple months and may only cost $1 or so. Why then would someone want to spend a "boat-load" of money for tablets or a machine to clean your toothbrush? Unless you are using the brush to clean toilets, why not just throw one out and get a new one? I cannot remember any stories of people dying or getting sick from using a toothbrush for months at a time, have you? No fair quoting someone from a commercial. How much are you willing to spend to get the jar lid off a jar? There are small rubber mats that you can get a better grip on a pesky lid. Is it really worth it to buy a motorized opener? How much are you willing to pay to open a jar? I almost always buy generic or store brands when I shop. Often times they are made by the major companies and sold by stores at a discount for the cost sensitive consumer. As you may know, in the US, you can now keep your cellphone number if you change cell phone companies. Should you decide to give up your current supplier, be aware that you probably will have to change cell phones, you may have to pay an exit fee to your current provider and you may not get as good a deal as you currently have. Review all information before changing and wait a while to see if there are better deals and offers that show up soon. On my own business side, I'm waiting for my coffee bag labels and will be on the Big Island in a couple of days. THEN, the fun begins! The website will be finished soon however, I'm waiting to get the character fonts the same between the labels and the website. I should be shipping soon and in time for Christmas! |
| Shipped! |
| 11.24.03 (3:40 pm) [edit] |
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[Somewhat delayed posting] Yes, the dreaded packing is done! Thank goodness I don't have to mention that again. However, there is UNPACKING, but that is another story! I decided to ship everything via parcel post (the post office) and it will appear in Captain Cook over the next 5 weeks or so; a few boxes at a time. Saturday night I pulled an "all-nighter" and drove to my friends house for an eventual ride to the airport. I actually fell asleep waiting on one stoplight... not a pleasant experience knowing there are many more lights to go. The flight to the islands was uneventful. I carried two small bags onboard and checked two very heavy boxes. My house, the contents and my two vehicles are in my friend's hands. He and his wife will do some last minute prep things at the house and the agent will be posting the listing the first week of December. My intermediate stopover on the way to the big island is the neighbor island of Kauai. Kauai is quite famous for many movies being shot here and its beauty. As a side note, I flipped the channels on the tv and first came across the weather cannel (whose studios I passed on my way to the airport in Atlanta). Then came the Weather Channel, talking about storms back where I was. The weather HERE is fine, thank you. Then I saw the Lilo and Stitch series on another channel. The background of that show was draw from local Kauai landmarks. Flipping to another channel (I think it was Turner Classic Movies, behold, there is South Pacific which was filmed a few miles from where I am). There are photos of "Nurses Beach" on my website at http://myhawaiiansite.com on the Kauai link. For the next week I'll be taking care of a friends cottages, taking reservations and watching poodles. |
| So Tired |
| 11.08.03 (5:05 am) [edit] |
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Are y'all tire of my "I'm still packing" blogs? Imagine my side of the story :-) Perhaps I should go back and delete out all of the "I'm still packing" parts. Well, I would if I had the time. As you may not be aware... I'm still packing.... :-)Don't worry, these blogs will get shorter and more to the point over the next few weeks. Last night, a neighbor asked me to stop by, at about 9:30pm (that's when he gets home from work). I took some Kona Coffee over and he, his wife, daughter and I talked about the island. They want to visit the islands, but it appears that the sales only come up when his daughter is in school. Last weekend I went to a hamfest (a swapmeet for Ham Radio Operators) and sold about $330 worth of stuff. One item I wanted to sell was an oscilloscope (scope for short) which was on a rolling cart. everyone wanted the cart instead of the equipment. I sold the cart and brought the scope back home. Yesterday I had a mini garage sale. One guy came up and asked about the scope. It is so heavy that I decided to give it to him, rather than cart it to the dump. As he carried it to his car, another guy cam running up. "Do you have another scope? I have been looking for that model for years..." Sigh! I wonder how much money I could have sold it for? I am waffling back and forth over whether to ship my boxes via DHX (a shipping company) or the Postal Service. The postal service is easy and nearby and takes weeks to get my stuff to my post office right near my new home. DHX has an office near the airpost here and my things will arrive in Hilo, the town on the other side of the Big Island. I would ahve to rent a truck here and there to get the boxes to and from DHX. So far, the only DHX costs I know for sure are the minimum ocean charges and until I get all the boxes ready, I can't tell final costs. I suspect DHX will be cheaper. We are still talking less than $1,000 to ship the last of my "worldy possessions". Atlanta has turned cooler the past few nights and it will be in the 40's at night soon. At the moment, it is about 33 degreese on Mauna Kea on the Big Island, and before long, snow! My webpage is coming along. I've also contacted the printer to start work on the labels. Here is a trivia fact, the forn (typeface) for the website and the font for the label, may differ :-) I have to set up my desktop computer to work without a monitor. When I leave Atlanta, I promised my current big monitor to a friend. In Hawaii it may take me a while to find a good deal on another. It is too much hassle to ship monitors and this one weighs a ton. I think I'd like to try an LCD one out there. Less heat and less power draw. The current monitor (an HP C5211B) has served me well over the years and has great color and resolution. It also has RGB and the VGA subminiature plug so you can hook it up to multiple types of computer video cards. Only a week left before I leave. |
| The Call |
| 11.04.03 (7:01 am) [edit] |
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My real estate agent called to say that the seller has signed all paperwork and sent it off to the trust (who ultimately owns the property). That probably STILL means six to eight weeks before closing. I have less than two weeks left here. The house is almost on the market and the number of boxes that I will ship, is not as many as I thought. I know about what the ocean portion of the shipment will cost but need to determine the land-based costs. Measuring and totalling each box I think I have less than 43 cubic feet of boxes to ship. I have been seperating things incase I have to split the shipment and send part by the postal service. There the "media mail" is very inexpensive if you are shipping things like video tapes, film and computer CD's, etc. With a detour to Kauai along the way, I may run into a timing issue with the shipment though. I'll have to ship things just before I leave and pick them up at the dock almost immediately when arriving on the Big Island. Other than packing, there is not much else going on. I found a neat item to sell on the website and have an order in for a couple cases of "one cup coffee filters". These allow you to brew one cup of coffee with no mess and the filters are reuseable. I have used one for years and love it. Well, back to work. |
| Links in the chain |
| 11.02.03 (7:06 am) [edit] |
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This has been a month of changes with events all connected like links of a chain. The memories come fast and furiously and even I cannot keep track of them in any order. Years ago I went to a military school in Virginia. I became good friends with another student named Chuck. Chuck had a neighbor named Marc. Over the years we all became good friends. Chuck was a CBer and so was Marc. Marc then got interested in Ham Radio and I followed. Marc and I became active in the Montgomery Amateur Radio Club. Another friend named Jeff soon joined the group. Years later, Jeff's neighbor Steve appeared on the scene. Marc was working for Hewlett Packard, a place I wanted to work. The company was well respected, but I held off applying because many employees I knew had degrees of some sort. I had many jobs during those years; most having to do with telephone equipment, satellite TV, ham radio and electronics. I finally settled down in a company, which had a Hewlett Packard computer, and I became a System Manager. The owner’s daughter, her husband and I would soon co-purchase a house as an investment. Jeff was working for a modem company and soon came to work at the same company as I did. I think even Jeff's brother worked for the same place for a while. Steve, Marc, Jeff and I co-purchased a Ham Repeater (some Ham equipment). I ended up with it when I relocated to Atlanta. Over the years, Chuck and I would talk, but drifted apart. Marc and Jeff drifted apart. Ham Radio and I drifted apart. With Steve, Jeff and Marc all up the DC area and I in Atlanta, I only saw them occasionally. Jeff and I went on a trip to Hawaii, Steve ended up also at Hewlett Packard and Marc left Hewlett Packard and wended up at Agilent (the HP medical company spin-off). Jeff ended up working on Capitol Hill. On my first Hawaii trip, I met and became friends with a family on Kauai. Over the years I got his wife involved in computers and it helped her in her business. Forward to the present. Chuck is moving from the DC area to the west (Midwest?), I can't remember exactly where. I was off to a Hamfest (swap meet) yesterday to sell much of my old Hewlett Packard test equipment and yes, that old repeater that all of us had bought. I received an email from Marc that he had been planning to make a surprise visit to Atlanta on business and that we were to have lunch! Unfortunately, as he was making reservations, his Mother passed away. The Atlanta trip has been cancelled. Steve still works at Hewlett Packard, but they are still "downsizing" and many people are still concerned that their jobs will go away. Steve had his name on one such list, but lucked out; that time at least. I moved to Atlanta over ten years ago and brought with me a radio scanner. It was manually programmed with hundreds of police and fire frequencies for this area. Over the years, I guarded that scanner, replacing the batteries so as not having to manually reprogram it. Yesterday I pulled the batteries out of it and it will have now lost all of that programming. I hope to use it in Hawaii. I started going to Hawaii because I heard an airfare deal on a local radio station talk show (Clark Howard). Now I will only be able to hear his show occasionally, via the Internet. All my favorite radio stations will be left behind and the radios will soon pick up new tunes; Hawaiian tunes. It appears that classic Rock and Roll stations are few and far between in Hawaii :-) I have one more stop planned at my old office. Many of my old friends and co-workers have gone off to other jobs and other places. Me? I'm done selling at the hamfest. I made about $320 from equipment in the garage and will give away or trash the last of the stuff. I have been making great progress on the house and will have it listed within 2 weeks, when I head back out to settle on the Kona side in Hawaii. On the way, I'll be stopping by Kauai to pay my respects. My computer friend there has passed away recently. In a wry twist of fate, as I type this and mention radio stations and Rock music, the station I'm listening to plays an old Beatles hit. The lyrics are quite fitting, as they also become a link in the chain. I post them here for your consideration... [b]"There are places I remember all my life, Though some have changed Some forever, not for better Some have gone and some remain. All these places have their moments Of lovers and friends I still can recall Some are dead and some are living In my life I loved them all. And with all these friends and lovers There is no one that compares with you And these memories lose their meaning When I think of love as something new And I know I will never lose affection For people and things that went before I know'll often stop and think about them. In my life I loved you more. And I know I will never lose affection For people and things that went before I know'll often stop and think about them. In my life I loved you more In my life I loved you more."[/b] I couldn't have said it better myself... |