OK, I would like to see if I can get a discussion going on this one in the comments. Maybe some of my readers will have some insight into this issue for me. When I started this blog a few months ago I was couponing and saving money eating normal everyday food that most people eat. 80/20 hamburger, fries, mac and cheese, you get the idea and I was doing a good job at getting it for very good prices between sales and coupons. But after the 1st of the year I started a new diet, plus my wife is going to weight watchers and one thing we are seeing is that eating healthy costs a WHOLE lot more than eating the other stuff.
I don't know, and haven't been able to find if there are any coupon sites on the net for getting coupons toward the healthier food like the Jenny-O turkey products or the Laura's 93/7 lean beef but if any of you know of any please leave me some comments.
My wife and I went to the grocery today and for the first time in a long time spent around $300 for groceries. Considering my grocery bill here lately has been around that much for an entire month this was way outside of our budget but it was all foods linked to the diets we are doing and it is all pretty much healthier for us, even the snack foods we bought (rice cakes). We went between Kroger and Meijer to get the best prices on fresh fruit and vegetables since both places had different produce items on sale and then we used a few coupons (about $65 worth) but no where near what I am usually able to do.
This time I am open to any comments or suggestions on getting the grocery bill down while shopping for healthier food, and if any of you have an idea or suggestion on where to get protein bars at the best prices...
Saturday, January 8, 2011
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
Online Games.
After seeing many of the online games that people are playing now, whether on Facebook or Myspace or where ever I start to wonder why people play these games. Almost all of these "free" Facebook and Myspace games have a gimmick to get you to pay more for these games than you would to buy multiple new console games for your home gaming machine. Whether it be for gems, mushrooms, karma, gaming money, or whatever the in game currency is for each particular game it is often very expensive and very cleverly marketed to you.
One of the games I checked out it comes something like here lets build your city oh wait you can only go to level 9 without having gems to buy the level 10 upgrade, oh gems they are only ten cents each and you only need 50 gems to get the item to make your castle a level 10 and oh you only need one of those items for each thing that you want to make a level 10. So lets do some math 50gems x .10 = $5.00, now you have say 10 things to level to 10 if you want to have 1 of each leveled up so 5.00 x 10 = $50.00 and that is for 1 city... But wait you can have up to 6 cities!!!! $50.00 x 6= $300.00... Now to get the 2nd city you have to get 10 friends playing this game.. You send out say 100 invites pestering your friends to play and get enough to join you, so now you have 2 cities to spend money on (real money if you want to have all the build abilities opened up) and you could be up to $100 or more at this point depending on how far you want to build.. Now to get the 3rd through the 6th cities you can either spend many many hours online attacking wilds to hunt for the crests to get the city deeds or you can just spend gems!!! For your 3rd city you can buy these chests for only 90 gems ($9.00) that may or may not contain all of the crests to get your city and you may have to buy more than one chest. Same for the 4th city you can buy the chest for only 150 gems ($15.00) and you may have to buy more than one to get the needed crests... Now the 5th city is easier you can just cough up 1250 gems ($125.00) to buy the 5th city package, and same with the 6th city only 1080 gems ($108.00) to get your 6th city!!!!
Now somebody please tell me why people are actually DUMB enough to play these TEXT based games and ACTUALLY PAY these prices to get the stuff in game. Just from what I listed about the one game I checked out you could spend upwards of $500 on a text based game that really does nothing!! And I have spoken to some of the people in the game who have purchased the gems to play the game and they act like its COOL!! WTF Really??? for that price I could go buy a PS3
, 360
, or a Wii
and a stack of games to play! Some of the people I talked to spend hours on end on these games, my Facebook wall is usually full of game request from the different games from my friends and it gets quite annoying deleting or blocking all of them just so you can see the other stuff. Maybe I am just mad because I am not quite smart enough, or maybe mean enough to profit from mass ignorance with something like that.
Either way it really makes me wonder what people are thinking when they send money into these games to get that next level or buy that new weapon, and how many of those people can actually afford to be spending the money they are using to send these game makers instead of paying off a credit card or an old doctor bill that has been hanging over their heads..
Oh well, I just hope whomever reads this realizes what a crock those games are if they play them and use that money elsewhere..
One of the games I checked out it comes something like here lets build your city oh wait you can only go to level 9 without having gems to buy the level 10 upgrade, oh gems they are only ten cents each and you only need 50 gems to get the item to make your castle a level 10 and oh you only need one of those items for each thing that you want to make a level 10. So lets do some math 50gems x .10 = $5.00, now you have say 10 things to level to 10 if you want to have 1 of each leveled up so 5.00 x 10 = $50.00 and that is for 1 city... But wait you can have up to 6 cities!!!! $50.00 x 6= $300.00... Now to get the 2nd city you have to get 10 friends playing this game.. You send out say 100 invites pestering your friends to play and get enough to join you, so now you have 2 cities to spend money on (real money if you want to have all the build abilities opened up) and you could be up to $100 or more at this point depending on how far you want to build.. Now to get the 3rd through the 6th cities you can either spend many many hours online attacking wilds to hunt for the crests to get the city deeds or you can just spend gems!!! For your 3rd city you can buy these chests for only 90 gems ($9.00) that may or may not contain all of the crests to get your city and you may have to buy more than one chest. Same for the 4th city you can buy the chest for only 150 gems ($15.00) and you may have to buy more than one to get the needed crests... Now the 5th city is easier you can just cough up 1250 gems ($125.00) to buy the 5th city package, and same with the 6th city only 1080 gems ($108.00) to get your 6th city!!!!
Now somebody please tell me why people are actually DUMB enough to play these TEXT based games and ACTUALLY PAY these prices to get the stuff in game. Just from what I listed about the one game I checked out you could spend upwards of $500 on a text based game that really does nothing!! And I have spoken to some of the people in the game who have purchased the gems to play the game and they act like its COOL!! WTF Really??? for that price I could go buy a PS3
, 360, or a Wii and a stack of games to play! Some of the people I talked to spend hours on end on these games, my Facebook wall is usually full of game request from the different games from my friends and it gets quite annoying deleting or blocking all of them just so you can see the other stuff. Maybe I am just mad because I am not quite smart enough, or maybe mean enough to profit from mass ignorance with something like that.Either way it really makes me wonder what people are thinking when they send money into these games to get that next level or buy that new weapon, and how many of those people can actually afford to be spending the money they are using to send these game makers instead of paying off a credit card or an old doctor bill that has been hanging over their heads..
Oh well, I just hope whomever reads this realizes what a crock those games are if they play them and use that money elsewhere..
Sunday, January 2, 2011
Preparing
I know it has been a while since my last post and there is no real excuse for it other than life in general (and a heavy dose of Call of duty Black ops
) taking up my time. But in the last few days I have been reading up on a few of the blogs I like to follow and I noticed a really good article on DVM (Death Valley Mag) that kind of goes along with what I have been doing the last couple of years. Taking on your debt while preparing for disaster. I am not going to copy what he wrote over there (if you want to read it go here) but he basically says quit preparing for the apocalypse if you are not prepared for next Thursday, meaning pay off your bills and have your financial affairs in order as well as your household affairs if the SHTF. Because quite frankly at some point life will go on after most disasters and many of the debt holding companies will still be trying to collect what is owed to them.
Credit card companies still collected from displaced individuals after Katrina, they didn't pass them any breaks. Their computer are stored in bunkers to withstand all but full nuclear fallout so they will have their info on hand even after many major disasters. And it is a fairly smart idea to be prepared in all ways, not just with food or guns or water (besides think of all the survival gear you can buy if you have no debt) but to have no debts other than normal monthly utilites, at that point you are free if disaster strikes to get your household back in order.
The methods outlined in the article for becoming debt free are definitely different than those preached by Dave Ramsey
but they both outlay the same goal with the same final outcome: Freedom from the opression of debt for those who can follow the path (I am working towards it, and one day I WILL get there) and continue along that path once the debt has been eliminated.
Stay thrifty and concious of your choices. Till next time.
) taking up my time. But in the last few days I have been reading up on a few of the blogs I like to follow and I noticed a really good article on DVM (Death Valley Mag) that kind of goes along with what I have been doing the last couple of years. Taking on your debt while preparing for disaster. I am not going to copy what he wrote over there (if you want to read it go here) but he basically says quit preparing for the apocalypse if you are not prepared for next Thursday, meaning pay off your bills and have your financial affairs in order as well as your household affairs if the SHTF. Because quite frankly at some point life will go on after most disasters and many of the debt holding companies will still be trying to collect what is owed to them.Credit card companies still collected from displaced individuals after Katrina, they didn't pass them any breaks. Their computer are stored in bunkers to withstand all but full nuclear fallout so they will have their info on hand even after many major disasters. And it is a fairly smart idea to be prepared in all ways, not just with food or guns or water (besides think of all the survival gear you can buy if you have no debt) but to have no debts other than normal monthly utilites, at that point you are free if disaster strikes to get your household back in order.
The methods outlined in the article for becoming debt free are definitely different than those preached by Dave Ramsey
but they both outlay the same goal with the same final outcome: Freedom from the opression of debt for those who can follow the path (I am working towards it, and one day I WILL get there) and continue along that path once the debt has been eliminated.Stay thrifty and concious of your choices. Till next time.
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