Thinking outside the coupon binder

My friend Mike recently posted a note on his Facebook page that made me very happy.  He gave me permission to repost it here; it brings up some coupon issues that I hadn't thought of before, and he's come up with a creative solution for several nagging issues in one neat package.  I love it.

It all started with my internet friend who runs this blog thing (she's a very cool individual, regardless of the coupon thing):

The Angry Cheapskate

It didn't really resonate with me at first since, as a single guy, I don't buy that much coupon related stuff. (food items and paper goods, and toothpaste, etc.) Stuff I buy at the grocery store tends to last me a while because I'm the only one using it. Saving fifty cents on trash bags every three months isn't that massive an incentive to me in the long run. I did, however, pass the URL on to a coworker that has a six person family (husband and four kids plus her). She had been talking about that coupon based reality show (barf) on TV, and I said something along the lines of "Here, check out the blog and maybe you'll get some ideas." Like everybody about now, she was looking at ways to economize a bit and with four kids heavily into the tween/teen years, she needs it. (one just got accepted to NC State, so college tuition looms heavily as well)

At first she kind of dismissed the idea as something old ladies do in the checkout line in front of you and bottleneck the line, but it wasn't long until she had a big binder full of coupons to organize her weekly clippings. Suddenly she (like my bloggy friend) was reporting savings weekly in the one to two hundred dollar range depending on what she bought and what the deals were that week. Sure, she has indeed ended up with thirty pounds of pasta during one shopping adventure, but with the kids, it won't last as long as you might think and it was nearly free when she was done. It is a bit of work to make sure you go to the right store for the right deal, scour the papers and fliers and keep everything organized, but you can't dismiss the results. I encourage anybody, especially with a big family, to check out Chellie's blog and try it out for yourself.

This all led to a discussion at lunch one day about just how much we spend on going "out" to lunch. When you add it up, it's astounding, especially when you consider the relative quality of the food. Not a great situation at all looking at cost/benefit ratio. Now that we are getting older and, let's face it, ain't nobody getting any smaller/healthier, the quality of food issue really sticks out. Over the next few lunches we hatched a mash-up of the coupon and lunch issues and have decided to maximize food dollars with the coupons, and then use the fresh food and cooking it ourselves to maximize the food quality as well. We figure that with careful shopping, coupons and buying healthy fruits, veggies and chicken with some other carefully selected meats tossed into the menu, we can do this for about sixty bucks a week for 5-6 people. If you consider that we spend on average ten dollars a day (and I bet you do too if you eat at places with anything above a dollar menu, and if you're eating dollar menu you know what quality you're getting there) eating out during the week. For me that's fifty a week, minimum. That works out to $200 a month I'm blowing on lunch. That could be going to something useful, like lottery tickets. Or, you know, gas or retirement or something silly.

We have equipped the office break area with items like a crock pot (that I had just sitting around in my house), flatware (from the dollar store), plates, baskets to hang veggies and produce, toaster oven, and other such cookware for little to no real investment. We have worked out a menu that calls for salads a couple days of the week with fresh produce, crock-pot (slow cooker to some of you) dishes that we can set-and-forget in the morning, things that freeze well to keep in the freezer before preparation. It's a work in progress, but it's promising. We eat well with freshly prepared foods, better nutrition, more portion and calorie control and we still set aside one day a week to do shopping and eat "out" just to give us a break from the office. All that and our personal budgets will be much happier for it. Especially after garden season cranks up here. Fruits and veggies out the ying-yang from family gardens and farmers markets will really max out the budget nicely all summer.

Add this to the walking course we've mapped out through the neighborhoods around the office, and hopefully we'll all be healthier and slimmer in a few months to come. Again, it's a work in progress, so things will get massaged and tweaked as we go, but overall it's a workable plan with good short and long term benefits. It's not like we come up with good, workable, beneficial plans here very often, so it's kind of a new area for us.

Now, my thoughts:

Resurrecting a dead computer using a puppy

So your trusty computer seems to have bit the dust.  Maybe your hard drive failed, maybe something went horribly wrong with Windows, or maybe you just can't figure out what the hell is wrong.

If the computer at least has power going to it, and as long as it's not beeping incessantly when you try to turn it on, chances are you can get it back up and running with a nifty little program called Puppy Linux.  It's free, and it turns quite a few useless machines into usable computers in no time.

First - what Puppy is: it's an operating system, much like the Windows XP/Vista most are used to using, that runs off a CD or a USB drive.  It doesn't need to access a hard drive at all, which makes this perfect for computer problems involving a bad hard drive or a messed up Windows installation.  It's a version of Linux (obviously); a safe operating system that is less prone to virus and malware infection.  Some versions of Linux are much more "technical" than Windows, but this version is easy to use for most everyone. 

What it isn't: Puppy isn't Windows.  It isn't exactly like the computer screen you're used to, though it's close.  Not every program out there works on Linux, so you may not be able to play some games or run certain programs.  This isn't a long-term solution for every computer user.  It also doesn't fix the underlying computer problem.  If your hard drive is toast, Puppy won't magically fix it.  You've got to take care of that on your own.

When Andy's computer suddenly crapped out Sunday afternoon, I went through the usual steps I take to try and fix a messed up computer.  I opened it up and made sure everything was plugged in where it was supposed to be, I checked to see if any parts were running too hot, I unplugged and replugged some parts, and we still had a computer that wouldn't start Windows.  After doing some other technical stuff involving the BIOS, I conceded that Windows XP was probably corrupted.  It took about an hour to check everything I wanted to check and at that point I grabbed a CD with Puppy Linux on it.  I put that in his CD drive, had the computer boot from the disc, and a few minutes later Andy was surfing the web.  Now he's able to use his computer for most everyday tasks like using the internet while I work on determining exactly what the problem is (with help from my supergenius friend Michael, who knows how to fix any computer problem on the planet).

What you should do right now:
Download a copy of Puppy Linux.  Even if you may never need to use it, it's free and it doesn't hurt to keep a copy on hand just in case.  You can download it directly to a thumb drive if you have one (and they're so cheap anymore it's not a bad idea), or you can download it to your computer and put it on a CD.
If you're going to put it on a CD, you need to use burning software to do so.  Active ISO Burner is free and works just fine.  That's what I use.  Install Active ISO, download Puppy, put a CD in your CD drive, open Active ISO, and drag the Puppy file right onto the Active ISO screen.  It will take several minutes, but it'll load that baby right onto the CD.  Once it's done, put the CD in a case, label the case so you know what it is, and put it somewhere safe in case you ever need it.

What to do if your computer craps out:
Dig up that Puppy CD or thumb drive.  Put the CD or thumb drive into your computer.
Try to turn on your computer.  As soon as the fans start whirring, hit the DEL key or the F2 key (depending on your computer) repeatedly until a screen comes up that says something about BIOS at the top.
Use your arrow keys to navigate over to the Boot menu and press Enter.
This will bring up a screen that allows you to change where your computer tries to boot (start) from - you'll see options like Hard Drive, CD-ROM Drive, Removable Devices, and so on.
At this point you'll want to change the first option on the list to whatever type of media you have Puppy on.  If you made a CD, change the first item on the list to CD-ROM Drive.  If you put it on a thumb drive, change the first item to Removable Devices.
When you've changed it so the first item on the list is CD-ROM Drive or Removable Devices, press the F10 key to save your changes and exit this screen. A screen will come up asking to confirm that you want to save and exit; choose Yes. You can change all of this back later as needed - just follow the same directions above to make Hard Drive the first choice on the list.
Your computer should restart itself now - just let it do its thing.  Instead of the normal screen you're used to when the computer starts, you'll get a screen similar to the image at the beginning of this post: a cute cartoon puppy head.  That's Puppy Linux starting, and if you see that you're in good shape!
Let Puppy start up (it takes a few minutes the first time you use it) and once it's loaded it will walk you through setting the time zones and the graphics settings with a few on-screen prompts.  It's very simple.
Next, look for a globe icon on the desktop; it should be labeled as Browse or HTML or something similar depending on which version of Puppy you're using.  Click on that once (everything is single-click in Puppy, which takes some getting used to), and it will walk you through getting connected to the internet.

In no more than 10 minutes, you should have gone from a dead computer to a working computer that's connected to the internet.  Now you can search online for help on determining what your exact computer problem is, or you can look for the nearest computer shop so you can take your machine in to be fixed.
The best part, in my opinion, is that if you're looking at an expensive problem and you're on a budget, or if you can't get the machine fixed right away for whatever reason, Puppy will allow you to use your computer until you can get the repairs done.  In many cases, it will also allow you to retrieve files from your hard drive (assuming your hard drive itself didn't crash & burn) and move them to a thumb drive so you don't risk losing important or sentimental data like photos, music, spreadsheets, etc.

Puppy desktop - it's quite similar to Windows and you shouldn't have any trouble navigating it!

Puppy won't resurrect every dead computer.  If it won't power up at all, take the computer to a professional for help.  If you can't even get the BIOS screen to load, take it to a shop or a knowledgeable friend.  Some problems like a bad power supply are even beyond Puppy's abilities.  In many cases, though, this free piece of software will at least provide a temporary solution to major computer issues.  Now go download Puppy!

Fabulous gifts without breaking the bank

I'm a huge fan of Christmas.  The indulgent food, the festive atmosphere, the family gatherings - those are all awesome, but my favorite part of the season has to be the presents.

It's the giving gifts part I like, actually.  Sure, I like getting presents, but gifting to others is where I have the most fun.

Once the summer begins winding down, I begin the hunt for the perfect gift for everyone on my list.  I'm not much of a gift-card-giver; I really enjoy searching high and low for a gift that my recipient will use and enjoy.  A big part of the hunt is finding those gifts while staying firmly within my budget and, being a cheapskate, my budget is tighter than Robert Plant's jeans (look it up, people).  This is not to say that I give shitty dollar store presents; I do my best to balance thoughtful gifts with a budget I can afford.

This Christmas I decided to put together a gift basket for each of my immediate family members.  Of course, being that I come from a large, close-knit family, "immediate" really means like 10 people.  There are also a handful of close-but-not-immediate family members that I wanted to include on my list as well, so staying in budget was even more important.

What goes in a gift basket?  Well, most anything, really.  They're easy to personalize and easy to scale.
Let's start with Andy's mom.  His family is more low-key about the holidays and they only exchange small gifts.  I put together this modest basket:

A scented candle, some lotion, some body wash, a bag of Ricola drops for the winter season, and a big handful of Hershey kisses scattered about.  There's also a holiday card (from TinyPrints.com - shameless plug!).  A basket like this is great for a woman who likes to pamper herself and lends itself well to recipients from co-workers to a future mother in law.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, baskets are good for kids too.

My 9 year old niece is at that odd age where she's just getting into the nearly-teen type stuff but not quite ready for grown-up beauty items.  I filled her basket with some smaller bottles of body wash, lotion, and body spray along with a couple nail polishes, a fleece blanket in her favorite color, some hair bands, some candy, and the Despicable Me DVD.  I tried to balance fun kid stuff (candy, Silly Bandz, hair bands in bright colors) with slightly more "grown up" items.
Behind my niece's basket you can see a veritable army of others all ready for the rest of my loved ones - each basket filled with various gifts from fancy lotions to scissors to mixed nuts depending on the recipient.

How to keep costs down?

• I found the baskets at the dollar store.  They're small, sturdy plastic tubs (for lack of a better term) with handles that can be re-used in a million different ways.  They cost, believe or not, one dollar each.  Cuz I got them at the dollar store.
• The tissue paper and wrapping paper were free after sale & coupon, and I made sure to get enough that I can still use them next year.
• By combining coupons with great sales, I was able to get at least 90% of the items in the baskets for no cost to me but tax.  When a quality body wash is free to me or better, like the Olay, I'll get as many as I can.  If I can get six pair of scissors for free, I'll get all six pair because between couponing family members and crafty family members, I know they'll be welcome gifts.
• By utilizing coupons combined with sales as effectively as possible, this freed up a ton of room in my budget for gifts that I can't find for free.  I've never seen a coupon for savings bonds, but because I saved so much elsewhere I was able to get my baby nephew a little something his parents can put aside for him to enjoy later. 
• Small touches make a world of difference.  A basket with random crap thrown in it isn't a great gift.  A basket that's neatly arranged is a good gift.  A basket that's neatly arranged and "filled out" with a handful of candy, an inexpensive & useful gadget (a wooden spoon or two for an avid cook, a small container of holiday sprinkles for a baker, a lip balm for winter gifts), and/or a heartfelt card is a great gift.  You don't have to go all Martha Stewart, but a bit of personalization and a little presentation goes a long way without busting your budget.

I had a lot of fun searching out things to fill the baskets with and in putting them together.  This is one trick I'm definitely keeping up my sleeve for upcoming birthdays and holidays!