Simple Life

Fast Cash

nobody@vox.com(Cheapo Groovo) — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 08:02:56 -0700

1. Offer Seasonal Work to Your Neighborhood and/or Surrounding Area

Use your time off from your main job to offer your seasonal labor services to your neighbors and, time-permitting, residents in close-by neighborhoods. Seasonal work includes raking leaves, mowing lawns, or shoveling snow.

The best way is to blanket your target neighborhood with 200-400 flyers, offering your services for an appropriate amount per lawn, driveway, etc. depending upon its size and the amount of work involved. To expedite results, you can grab your rake (or shovel or lawn-mower) and just go door-to-door, offering your services directly.

2. Call a Local Contractor

Find a local contractor and see if you can hire yourself out as a day laborer. This is a particularly viable option, if you're the "handy-man" type. There are probably quite a few contractors in your area looking for day laborers to help them build and/or repair houses, decks, fences, etc.

3. Sell Some Stuff

Go through your house, attic, garage, etc. and pick out EVERYTHING that you are willing to part with. Then, depending on the weather and time of year, put signs up around the community that announce your yard sale.

If you have more time, go to eBay, register, and list the items online.

4. Offer to Distribute Stuff

Contact your local newspaper to see if they have need for a neighborhood distributor. If so, you're in luck.

Don't stop there, though. Use your phone book and/or the local Chamber of Commerce to research businesses (retail or restaurant being the best) that market to the general community. Call them up and offer to distribute flyers for them -- for a price.

BONUS TIP: See if you can combine Tactics 1 and 4 (handing out flyers for yourself AND for these businesses - at the same time).

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Banks Borrow Record Sums from Fed

nobody@vox.com(Cheapo Groovo) — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 07:09:36 -0700

Read my other banking post here

clipped from dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com

Banks borrowed a record amount of funds from the Federal Reserve in the latest week as the year-old credit crisis took a persistent toll, while the commercial paper market continued to contract, signaling tough conditions for short term borrowers.

Banks’ primary credit borrowings averaged $17.45 billion per day in the latest week, the second straight week this had hit a record and up from $16.38 billion the previous week, Fed data showed on Thursday.

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STFree Card - The Safe Sex License

nobody@vox.com(Ms Genevieve) — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 10:04:02 -0700

Safe Sex License

Pendarvis Harshaw, an Oakland-based teen, recently sparked a slew of controversy with his public radio essay which stated that in his social circle, "sex without a condom is the new engagement ring." He said that for a generation who has grown up with safe sex education and divorced parents, the real symbol of trust, love and commitment has nothing to do with walking down the aisle; the ultimate oath is letting your guard down in the face of potentially life-long consequences. You can hear it here: http://www.youthradio.org/wtnw/wtnwcondoms.shtml

Also, recently, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention acknowledged it had drastically underestimated the number of people becoming infected with AIDS in the United States. The CDC had been reporting 40,000 people get infected each year, but now the agency estimates the figure is 56,000—a 40 percent increase.

Increasingly, products and services are popping up to help young people in the dating scene protect themselves from catching an STD.

Founded in 2003 by Eli Dancy, the STFree card is the world’s first and only Safe Sex License which gives users the ability to prove to another individual that they are STD-free; STD test results are accessed by calling a toll free number and entering in the membership number on the front of the card. (The SSL requires two sets of numbers in order to access its stored information)

You can find out more at: http://stfree.com/

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Consumer Alerts - Tires and Cell Phones

nobody@vox.com(Cheapo Groovo) — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 08:49:49 -0700

Since just about everyone drives and has a cell phone, you may want to explore these.

Aged Tires - A Driving Hazard?

Frequent Mobile Phone Use Boosts Tumor Risk by 50%

Use this site to track all recalls!

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S15 Off Maggiano's Little Italy

nobody@vox.com(Cheapo Groovo) — Sun, 03 Aug 2008 07:23:32 -0700

Maggiano's restaurants take $15 off an order of $45 or more via this printable coupon. Some exclusions apply. Deal ends August 31.

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Hooked on Hopium - Hope: It Could Happen to You

nobody@vox.com(Ms Genevieve) — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 14:00:49 -0700

Hope: It Could Happen To You

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Housing Bill Passes, Draconian Provisions Not Taken Out

nobody@vox.com(Cheapo Groovo) — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 08:27:19 -0700

I warned everyone in an earlier post, so here is what actually passed and gets no coverage in mainstream press or blogs:

A provision to increase the national debt ceiling by $800 billion.
While this bill is often referred to in the news as a “$25 billion” plan, the final amount will likely be much, much higher. The Treasury’s previously limited $2.5 billion line of credit to Fannie Mae / Freddie Mac has instead been increased to unlimited. The Treasury can now buy an unlimited amount of Fannie / Freddie housing securities and stock.
In yet another example of persistent, big brother, big government, police state creep, anyone working in the mortgage industry will now be required to be fingerprinted.
Finally, buried deep within the bill, is the provision that every credit card transaction will now be reported to the IRS. How this fits in to the housing crisis is anyone’s guess.

Insulate yourself from wild economic swings, arbitrary government regulation, and corporate layoffs

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One Minute Shift - One Drum

nobody@vox.com(Ms Genevieve) — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 12:41:45 -0700

One Drum

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How to declutter files?

nobody@vox.com(Leanne Naidoo) — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 10:01:47 -0700

My favorite file folder is called TO FILE. Simply genius I thought at the time of it's birth. A place to store all the paperwork I need to file. Only the papers never got filed and this folder kept growing. I now have 3 folders labeled TO FILE.

My many TO FILE folders

A little while later and I now have this:
The Super-est most awesome-est organizi-est drawer. YAY!!!!!!

Tools: All you need is a label printer and plenty of folders and you'll be on your way.

A perfectly filed drawer

Initially I sat there for 20 minutes just feeling sorry for myself. Then I went to lunch. Stashed a slice of chocolate cake in my bag and told myself I could eat it only if I finished my filing.

I took out all the old folders, and re-purposed them for the new categories I needed. This time round I was going to have a file for everything. No more saving the rain forest by combining subjects. This also meant that I got 50 more file folders. But honestly there were days when I couldn't find a document for hours. The most embarrassing is not having something for a meeting scheduled 5 minutes.

Now when I receive a call, I can go straight to the file. Oh and I put them in alphabetical order. Initially I was of the school of 'like with like' and 'As I Need It'. What am I talking about you ask?

Like with like - related subjects like food, recipes and picnics would be together. Then also invitations and holidays seem related so they went together too. Right? It all seemed so simple at the beginning. However if I ever wanted to find something like 'moving and packing' I could never find the darn thing. It would mean me sitting and calmly thinking what is it related to and maybe it'll be in that folder? Yeah, I now call this method Stupid Idea No.1

The As I Need It method (aka Stupid Idea No.2) - is to make files as I need to file something. But I never wanted to waste time with the hassle of making files and everything got chucked into the dreaded TO FILE folder.

Alas now I have all my major categories demarcated and beautifully tabbed alphabetically on the left. I know where to find things! The lessor categories are filed within the major categories in their very own folders with tabs in middle and on the right hand side.

Beautiful, Simple and It Works.

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A Little Diddy about John Mellencamp

nobody@vox.com(Ms Genevieve) — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 14:46:48 -0700

***Crosspost from my Employee Blog (also on Vox). Please comment there. ***

Ok, I have to admit, I stole the title for this post from NPR, but it fit so perfectly with the news of the day I had to use it!!

John Mellendcamp LIFE, DEATH, LOVE, AND FREEDOM

Infor has announced the Headline Act for Inforum 2008: American Rock Artist and Farm Aid Co Founder - John Cougar Mellencamp will be performing at our conference at the Venetian Hotel on Wednesday October 15th. John has just released a new album July 15th entitled LIFE, DEATH, LOVE, AND FREEDOM, is a perfect addition to a conference that is as empowering and enterprising as he is. He will be coming to us fresh from his September 20th performance at the 23rd Annual Farm Aid concert being held at the Comcast Center in Mansfield Massachusetts.

John co-founded Farm Aid with Country Music Icon Willie Nelson in 1985 with a focused mission to help raise money for America's farmers and increase awareness of the importance of locally grown foods and have since raised over $30M. In today's economy, where rising fuel prices has also increased the prices of the food we eat, many analysts point out that the wave of future is in farming. Consumers can consciously spend their dollars supporting their local agricultural economy and That sustains the families of the consumers and of the families of our farmers on whom we depend.

Speaking of farmers, at Inforum 2008 you can find out how the folks at the Dairy Farmers of America are driving their business by migrating to Infor ERP Adage 5 and Role-based Home Pages.

You can find out more at http://www.inforum2008.com/

In the meantime, let's hear that Little Diddy about Jack and Diane :-)

John Mellencamp - Jack and Diane

BTW: An old high school buddy of mine, Joe Hernandez-Kolski, will be one of the opening acts for John Mellencamp's performance tonight , July 22nd at the Charter One Pavilion at Northerly Island in Chicago. Joe is a spoken word artist and he recently wrote a piece about John Mellencamp's influence on his work and he now has the honor to perform with him!! How cool is that?!?! If you were lucky enough to score tickets, look out for my guy Joe! If not, here's a sneak peek at what he will be performing.

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