Janie Parrish

We are all pinching pennies these days. The use of coupons is on the rise big time, online and off. I know I don’t pay full price for anything that I purchase, and that is the bottom line. There are deals out there, it pays to be a smart and educated consumer, the Internet has certainly made that a much easier task to take on. With online promotions, free shipping, coupon codes and the like, there is no reason not to take advantage of all that is out there just for the taking.

This will be an interesting Christmas season with the economy still in crisis and people still losing their jobs and homes. Retail will be cut throat to say the least this holiday shopping season. To make it even a harder pill to swallow, we are all hearing that we are in for a hard winter, so heating fuel bills are going to be outrageous soon I fear.

One thing that I do to save money is to order my personal checks online from Mypersonalchecks.com. My bank used to offer free checks with my current checking account, but times are changing and they are now charging for the checks and the deposit tickets as well. I still have to use a paper check at times, but not nearly as much as I used to a few years ago when I finally smarted up and started using my debit card for most things.

I love using my Yahoo Instant Messenger. It gives the opportunity to chat with so many of my close friends and family members quick and easy. I spend more time on my IM than I do on the phone. Works for me! Right now I have Verizon DSL but am seriously looking into switching to Hughes Net to see what broadband is all about. But no matter what I’ll always rely on my Yahoo IM>

With money being so tight I know very well that I am not the only one looking for ways to save my hard earned money in a variety of ways. I’ve contacted my cell phone provider and had my minutes reduced to save a few bucks. I’ve cut back by down sizing my package with my satellite provider and I am now in the process of looking at ways to save some money on my Internet usage.

I’ve seen commercials in the past for Hughes Internet and decided to check out their website to see what they were all about. HughesNet is currently offering 1 month free and a free standard installation, which is a $199 value to be saved right now. There is also an offer for a $100 rebate. I’ve always been curious about having a Satellite Internet versus my current DSL connection and now might be a good time to see if HughesNet Internet would be a good choice for me and my needs.

Cutting back is the right thing to do these days. I hate to think what this holiday season will bring, as far as gift giving goes. Retail lost money last year, except for WalMart of course. I can only imagine how it will fair this year with things showing no signs of improvement for the vast majority of us all.

I hope to be able to get my annual flu shot early this year and get it out of the way. I’m hoping that the vaccine for the Swine Flu is readily available so that I can take advantage of that as well. These are scary times to get any type of flu.

I’ve always wanted to go back to school and further my education. It’s too bad that I didn’t take advantage and appreciate what my high school teachers were trying to teach me back then. The old saying that “Youth is wasted on the young” certainly comes to mind. I have found myself very interested in history these past few years. I love reading history based novels and they really have spiked my interest in the past big time. If nothing else I’d love to take some college courses just to learn for the sake of learning. But school takes money and money is a big issue right now with me and just about everyone else.

I could take advantage of some of the debt consolidation services that are being widely advertised and used by so many during these trying economic times. I found that Consolidatedcredit.org is a one stop debt solution center and have helped numerous students with their educational costs. They have an interesting debt consolidation guide for people just like me that can’t afford to dish out all that it takes to go back to college. I found it interesting that 79% of college students have credit cards and that 32% have four or more cards in their names. That is a lot of credit cards for these young students.

I’ll have to start looking and digging a bit deeper into going back to school. I really think that I’d enjoy it and it would be a challenge worth while for me to attempt.