I need to study more

I don't know how much harder I could have studied for my macro-econ exam. I studied the weekend before for several hours and I studied two days before for a couple hours each time. I still didn't do as well as I would have like to on the exam. I passed and that's the most important thing but I thought my grade would have been much higher.

I'm pretty bummed about this. I wish I wouldn't have looked at the grade.

Gold gold and more gold

The economy is crazy so I'm looking to invest in other instruments. For instance, gold bars are a great alternative to invest in. Gold is a great way to preserve my purchasing power, while protecting my wealth and diversifying my investments. I can buy bars, bullion, coins or ingots.

Personally I'm looking to invest in gold coins. They're small and portable. If I would need to sell them, I can easily transport them myself. I can have a company like Monex hold onto the products for me in their depository. Or I can spend them. After all, gold coins are legal tender in the U.S.

I really need to watch my spending

I overspent like crazy these past 2 weeks. I'm only supposed to spend $125 dollars but I've probably spent closer to $250 which is double. I can only account for $50 of that extra $125. I owed my mom some money and I had to pay for my football pool. I don't know what the heck I did with the rest of that money.

I definitely need to tighten my belt and stop wasting money.

I'm not looking forward to dealing with car dealers

I've been looking for a car. I haven't decided whether to buy a used car for cash or finance a 2 year old car. I probably won't decide for sure until just before I go out to actually buy a car.

Anyway, I've been looking at car at a certain dealer. The price keeps fluctuating like crazy. The price has changed by $2000 in about a month. The price first came down $2k. Then went up a grand. So it's now $1k lower than the original asking price. According to car guides, the $2k price is about what they should be asking for. Which means I'll have to negotiate like crazy.

Yuck!

I'm getting new stuff for my apartment

It's about time. The maintenance man stopped by today to tell me that I was approved for new carpet and new appliances. My carpet is old and cleaning it just won't do. The new carpet will only be in the living room. I'm also getting new appliances for the kitchen including a Frigidaire Ranges. I always talk about going online and buying stuff so my management company went to a website and compared prices and features on appliances.

After they got a quote online, the got it price matched at a local store. So I got a credit on my rent for a couple of months since I helped save them money. They would have never thought to go online looking for major appliances if I had not talked about it.

I just wish I could find another way to get more rent credits.

Making mistakes and new posts

Whenever I make a mistake in my post, or realize that I left a thought off, I write a new post. I know a lot of people go back and just edit their own posts. I only go back and correct spelling mistakes or glaring gramatical errors. Other than that, it's a totally new post.

Do you edit old posts or write new ones to explain your point more clearly?

Part time job part 2

The reason I might get the part time job is because I want to graduate in 2009. Some of my classes won't get reimbursed so I'll have to pay out of pocket. Well I sure as heck can't afford that.

That's why I'm considering the part time job. Believe me, it's not something I'm happy about.

I might get a part time job

It would be working at a company that works as lists brokers. Basically, people call in and ask questions about products and decide whether or not they want to be contacted again. If so, they're added to the list to be called again, if not we don't call anymore.

I say we and I don't even work there yet. I never thought I would even consider working at a direct marketing firm but after talking to the people there, it's not what I thought it would be. No cold-calling, no harassing people that don't want to be bothered.

I haven't worked two jobs in a while so I'm a little nervous.

More money for school

My job has increased out tuition reimbursement allotment from $5k to $5250. The $250 is not even enough to pay for 1 credit (tuition is $525 per credit), but every little bit helps. I can take 10 credits next year and get all of the money back. I have a 4 credit math class plus 2 regular 3 credit courses and there's my 10 credits.

I hope to be able to take an additional class that I won't be reimbursed for.

It's time to register for spring classes

I don't know what to take. There are only 2 or 3 classes available to me. I'm not even remotely interested in one class. I could take that pre calculus class but it was so hard this semester that I don't know if I'm ready to try it again. Even my Innovative Tutor couldn't help me. The class was only 1 day a week and it was 14 weeks instead of 16. I think we covered too much material in the time allotted.

Add to that the fact that I don't think my teacher was very good and it was a recipe for disaster. I won't ever take a math class as an accelerated class again. I would like to take a literature class, but the one I need is only offered as a day class.

I better get in touch with my advisor soon since I don't have a lot of classes to choose from.

I'm looking for a new job

My 6 months are finally over! I've been looking in the job bank for the past 2 or 3 weeks but I haven't seen anything worth applying for. Most of the jobs that I have seen are lateral moves. I don't want a lateral move because it's usually no more money but the same level of responsibility.

I would like to advance by 2 job grades at least. However if I see a job that's only 1 grade higher but has the potential for advancement, I'll go for it.

Down with Google! Up with Yahoo!

Or even Ask.com. I hate hate hate Google right now. A lot of bloggers do. They've decided that they wanted to update page ranks and a lot of people got hit hard. I lost page rank on all of my blogs except 1. That blog didn't have a page rank to begin with!

So why am I so mad at Google? I'm a paid blogger and my assignments are generally based on page rank which Google supplies. Since people are losing page rank, we'll probably lose money as well.

This sucks because I use that money to help pay for school.

I have to help my friend move

I hate moving. At least this time it's not me that's moving though. I just have to go and help my friend move. She has to deal with all of the packing and sorting of stuff. I'm just providing some extra labor.

We're using her boyfriends truck to move her stuff. He has a truck bed liner in the back of his pickup so we don't have to worry about her stuff sliding around on the truck. All we need is some blankets to cover everything since we're not sure if it will rain this weekend or not.

I'm not looking forward to lifting all of that stuff, but I am looking forward to the pizza party that we're having afterward. Oh, and the wine. We're gonna break in her new place in style.

Sometimes I really miss overtime

I never thought I would miss overtime pay. I knew that I was tired of working overtime and I was glad that my current job didn't offer it. We were short-staffed at work for about a month. For 2 weeks during that month we were so swamped that we had overtime offered.

I worked a couple of hours and didn't think anymore about it. When I got my check I was surprised that I actually saw the extra money in there. That made me realize that I miss getting overtime pay.

But I hope we don't have anymore overtime for a while.

CRM software has been updated

Business owners hate training new employees. It's a necessary evil but make no mistake about it, they hate it. Why, it's time consuming. Most employees learn better by actually doing the job, not reading about it in a book. Well there is a product out there that will let you spend more time increasing sales. At the same time, your employees spend less time learning software. What is this wonder product? It's AIMpromote. Superior to traditional CRM it has a lower cost of implementation and total cost of ownership. And now the software has been updated.

Have your sales force focused on making those sales not sitting in a room learning software. Check out the company press release for more details:

Traverse City, MI October 19th 2007 -- AIMpromote, provider of lead management and customer relationship management software, has launched a significant upgrade to their CRM offering. The newly added white-label CRM software feature enhances the value that lead aggregators can offer to their lead purchasing customers. The enhanced reselling functionality provides an intuitive interface to completely manage the selling of a privately labeled CRM as their own.

Lead aggregators operate in the highly competitive B2B space, and need ways to add value to their offerings. Michael Myles, President and CEO of AIMpromote said "The significant added value provided by the AIMpromote white-label customer relationship software gives lead aggregators a way to differentiate themselves in what has become a highly commoditized market." He went on to say that "this product also provides an easy way to leverage existing client bases to more rapidly increase sales."

The close tie-in between the selling of leads and the powerful sales management functionality of the AIMpromote customer relationship software enables the end-users of the system to easily purchase leads that are then available to be worked directly in the system. There is no importing necessary. Billing is also consolidated, providing an easy way for the end-user to manage their funds and billing profile. The system has been designed from the ground-up to offer high levels of customizability and advanced functionality for everyone involved, while requiring little investment in time.

The CRM reselling and lead sales functions functionality includes the ability for lead aggregators and CRM software resellers to completely customize pricing, including setup fees, discounts, and free trials. This flexibility empowers the resellers of the system to enhance their profit margins as they see fit. The CRM reselling system allows lead aggregators and consultants the ability to brand their system with their own logo and contact information. Integrated Authorize.Net payment processing gives an interface to take credit cards automatically, and have the funds deposited directly into their bank accounts. The advanced accounting and reporting pages in the AIMpromote system give a top-down view of the business as a whole, as well as for each individual account.

The tiered approach that AIMpromote has taken to the reselling of their powerful customer relationship management software gives even the end-user clients the ability to also resell the system. The billing and accounting system automatically takes care of everything for them, even automatically setting up accounts. "The ease of use and flexibility of the AIMpromote CRM for those providing business-to-business consultation services and those selling leads has created an opportunity to significantly improve the bottom line, with very little time or expense," said Matt Wolfe, Vice President of Operations for AIMpromote. Wolfe added, "The service and functionality of the system is unique in that customers are supported through an integrated support ticket system by their parent account. The end-users of the system will never know that the service they are using is being resold, or that the company from which they are licensing the software are not the actual manufacturers of the software. To them, it won't be AIMpromote at all, it will be 'ABC Software Company CRM', or whatever name the company reselling the software chooses."


About AIMpromote
AIMpromote leads the market in growth and technology for on-demand lead management and CRM reselling solutions. AIMpromotes enterprise lead management software empowers companies in any industry to more effectively generate, delegate, and report on leads and the teams that manage them. AIMpromote is the only solution that integrates detailed web analytics with sales and marketing analytics to provide a complete closed-loop view of the sales process. The AIMpromote lead management software offers a completely customized solution that can be tailored to fit any organization's customer acquisition workflow. The unique combination of having the most functionality, and the lowest total cost of ownership, AIMpromote is the most cost effective solution for improving close rates and marketing efficiency.

Reading other blogs

I like reading other blogs especially finance blogs. It gives you an idea of what other peoples investing styles. Sometimes I agree with their style but sometimes I don't. I just find it interesting to see what they think and what motivates them.

I don't really write about my money too much on this blog, I do that on my other blog. What about you, do you write about your money on your blog?

Nothing but junk mail

I was looking forward to getting the mail today. I'm expecting a check to come in and instead I get all of this junk mail. There were several credit card offers in there. I have bad credit right now that I'm working on improving.

Having bad credit is a pain because you can't get things like home loans or auto loans. If you do get someone to give you a loan, you will get outrageous rates. For instance a car loan. Most places will give you a car loan but you might pay over 40% during the life of the loan in interest.

That's why it's always in your best interest to compare rates. Even if you have bad credit, there is someone out there who is willing to compete for your business. All you have to do is show them that you're responsible and you've moved past whatever caused you to get the bad credit in the first place.

Speaking of texting

Do you have a seperate texting plan or do you just pay as you go? I pay $.10 or $.15 per text message that I send. I don't send a lot so I don't see the need to have a plan. One of my friends texts all the time so she has a plan where she pays $5.00 per month. Maybe it's just me but it seems that the need to text message decreases with people over a 24. Just seems to be an observation.

What about you? How often do you use text messaging.

Bills by text

I just got a text message while I was at work. I was all happy because I thought it was a friend of mine. Instead it was one of my credit cards letting me know that my bill was due. I'm happy for the reminder but I just wish it was something better than a bill.

I'm considering switching credit card companies because I've found some better deals out there. The new company offers bills, statements and payments by text. But they also have a 0% on balance transfers for 13 months. I could use that money to pay for school, and use tuition reimbursement to pay it off.

Hmm, then I could take the money I would have used for school and spend it on something else.

I hate my job

I hate it more and more each day. Recently, they decided to give everyone in my department the same job title. Some of us were at the old level and some already at the new one. Out of all of the people in my department, I'm the only one that hasn't been upgraded yet. And I was told that I might have to wait until next year. Ummm, I don't think so. I was already thinking about posting to a new department, now I'm ready to take just about anything that comes along.

I need to make better investments

I read a lot of money magazines and articles looking for investment information. I've made some good investment with some of the stock that I've chosen but I could do better. Speculation for the most part is not a good thing, but sometimes you just know something is going to take off.

Take for instance the price of oil. Once the price per barrel starting soaring, you knew that oil companies would be a good play. But did I get in then? Noooo. I feel like I had good investment information and that I should have acted on it. It's not too late, but the prices have soared since my original inquiries.

I need to start listening to my gut more. I could have made some serious cash.

It's registration time already

I can't believe it's already time to register for the spring semester. I've looked through the schedule of classes and nothing is really jumping out at me. I only need 6 or 7 classes so I kinda have to wait for specific classes to become available.

Do you earn interest with Paypal?

I have a Paypal account. I basically just use it as a clearinghouse. People pay me for posts, Ebay stuff or whatever and then I transfer the money into my regular checking account. Then I break down the money into whatever categories including savings.

One of my friends told me that Paypal pays interest. I didn't know that. Does anyone else get interest off of their Paypal account?

It's never too late to make a change

Sometimes I wonder where my life is going. I'm back in school studying economics and sociology while still working at a bank. I've worked in banking forever. My last job was at a bank. It's been almost 14 years in one industry. I think that I can't make a change then I read about Kevin Koss who is now a San Francisco Real Estate Agents. But that's not where he started.

Kevin starting working at a restaurant in high school. This lead him to the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park NY. He graduated and worked in nationally recognized restaurants in a variety of cities finally settling in San Francisco. Then after tiring of working opposite schedules as his partner, he went in a new direction - real estate. Now how do you go from food to real estate? He had interests in both his whole life. If you read his bio you can understand his journey better.

Reading that just made me see that if I have the drive and determination, I can branch out into another field and be successful. I just have to graduate school first.

When free isn't free

I saw an ad to get a free bathroom cleaning product. I was excited because it looks like something that would work well. I went to the site to order it and after I hit submit it asked for cc info for shipping. The product is $9.99 and shipping is $4.99. I shop online all the time, for a product of that size, the shipping should have been less than $3.00.

I went back to the ad and looked and it said you had to pay for shipping in teeny tiny print, but it was there. I unsubscribed from those emails. I wouldn't have minded paying shipping if it had been blatant that it was expected. Don't hide it in the fine print and spring it on me after I place my order.

Build instead of buy?

Would you rather build a house or buy an existing home? I'm not in the market right now, but I am leaning towards building my own. First of all, I can get exactly what I want. If I want 3 bedrooms and 6 bathrooms, I can get that. Ok, that's a bit extreme with but you get the idea.

Sometimes you're constricted in the amenities available unless you design the home yourself. From cabinetry to carpentry, all of the decisions are yours. Do you want wood or laminate flooring? How about glass or ceramic tile? It can be mind boggling with all of the choices that are out there. There are places online like Floorzbuzz that can help with your decisions. Because they sell products wholesale, you'll save a ton of money and you have a variety of products to choose from.

That's one of the main reasons why I'm trying to save all of the money that I can. I know that building a home will be expensive and the last thing I want to do is cut corners. Save money and keep prices low, yes. Be a cheapskate and buy cheap materials? Definitely not.

I broke one of my piggy banks!

I just wrote a post yesterday about my piggy banks. 2 are ceramic and 2 are plastic. I broke the tiny ceramic pig from Toronto. That was really my favorite of the 4. It had my birthstone as a accent on the front plus it said Toronto. Who knows when I'll get back there to get another pig.

I doubt if I'll be able to buy that exact same bank. I just wanna cry.

Backing up your computer

Do you back up your site? I backup all of my sites weekly. It can be a pain because I have to transfer the information off of my computer to a neutral site. I figure if my computer goes down, it won't help to have the backup info on that computer. I'm looking into something like Anytime@Anywhere online backup that will make it easier and more convenient for me to save my data.

My computer and all of it's info is important to me because it contains a lot of financial info as well as my means for making extra income. I have to protect my investments.

Piggy banks to become extinct

Oh no. I love my piggy banks. I read an article where they predict the top 10 things that will be extinct in 10 years. Piggy banks were number 8.

I have 4. 2 are really tiny souvenirs banks from Canada, 1 from Niagara Falls and 1 from Toronto. The other is a small bank from my job. The last bank is a big blue plastic pig that I got from a dollar store.

Only 2 are full. One of the tiny banks and the small bank from my job. The biggest pig is about 3/4 full. I can't wait until they're all full.

I just hope I can continue to find them. I love piggy banks.

My first economics exam wasn't bad

I was scared to take the test. I've spent so much time studying for that stupid math class that I really never studied for my economics class. I ended up doing all of my studying at the last minute. But I feel good about my grade.

There were some tricky questions but only 2 that I was totally unsure about. I guess I'll find out how I did next week.

I can not afford to get sick

Ugh, I don't feel well again. I'm run down and stressed out. I was coughing, hacking and sneezing all day at work today. I also had to get a warm cup of cocoa because I was so cold. I just got over the flu back in September.

I can not afford this. I don't have any sick days left so if I miss a day of work, I don't get paid. I'll be there hacking all over everybody. I know that's bad but I can't afford to lose the pay.

Stupid I-Phone Commercial

I don't like this newest commercial. It tries to make the I-Phone seem like the best thing since sliced bread. I know it's a cool phone, but it's not the end all to end all.

First the guy is talking about how he needed a ipod, phone, camera and texting device but the I-Phone is everything. Umm, you can get a camera phone with texting abilities so you would only need a seperate ipod.

I don't even use the music player on my phone because it drains the battery. I don't want an important call to have to get cut short because my battery dies. I know Apple needs to make their product seem like the best on the block but it really isn't. Especially when you need to pay a mint for all of the features of the phone to actually work.

How am I going to pay for school?

I don't know where the money is going to come from. I dropped my math class so I won't get that money back. I was planning on using that money to help offset the next semester. I would take a student loan but the first time I went to school I took more money than I was allowed to.

How does that even happen? If I took too much, the school should have denied me the additional funds. I could go to my bank to get a private loan but I may not get that either. I may take advantage of a student loan consolidation loan and then try to get a private loan.

I have 3 months to figure something out.

Tracking your net worth

Do you track your net worth? Do you post it on the internet? I do on my other blog. I actually messed up this quarter. I added the amount I paid my loan for the quarter instead of subtracting it. It was almost a $500 dollar difference. Right now my net worth is pretty low, but I'm working on it.

What about you? Are you happy with where your net worth stands right now?

Would you ever take a payday loan?

I know several people that have. They can really help you out in an emergency. All payday loan companies are not the same. There are some really bad ones. There are some that aren't that bad.

You can even get a payday loan over the internet now. I believe that each individual should do what's right for them and their situation. But if you look at the website offering the loan, all of the information that you need is right there to make an informed decision.

I'm dropping my math class

Well I'm actually withdrawing from the class. I don't even remotely understand it. When I get home and study, I think I understand what's going on. Then I get to the next class and see the exam. He takes the hardest questions from the homework and uses them as exam questions.

I don't expect him to use the easiest questions. But damn, not the hardest ones either. We practice working out the problems but they're not similar to what shows up on the exam.

I'm not mad that I'm withdrawing. I'm more mad that I'm totally losing the money that I paid for the class. It's past the time where you could get a partial refund and since I won't get a grade, there won't be any tuition reimbursement either. I could have done a lot with money too.

Online gaming

I love online gaming. I win frequently too. Much more than in regular casinos. Once I started with less than $25 and won over $500 playing slot machines. I didn't play card games or roulette even though I would like to.

I think it's a shame that you have a hard time playing at a online casino anymore. But you can go to onlinecasinobluebook.com and find casinos that still accept U.S. customers. You can find regular casinos, bingo halls, pokers rooms or my personal favorite, sports books.

The best part about online casino bluebook is that they have a list of the top 10 online casinos with 8 out of the 10 having a online review available. You can find a list of casinos with any promotions that are available. And you can read stats of certain games. The stats include odds, tips and strategy.

If you like online gaming, you should definitely check the site out.

Use due diligence when using online auctions

Research the items you plan on buying online before you buy. There are stories out there about some of the sellers on online auctions selling old, out-dated and expired merchandise. They are also selling items that have been recalled by the manufacturer.

Read the fine print before you buy. Some of those sellers are shady and some just don't know any better.

I found cargo pants!

Yes! This is a major coup for me. I'm average height but I have long legs. Most women's inseams are 30" to 32". I need at least a 34". I found them at MetroStyle catalog online. I always shop online because it's cheaper and I get the clothes delivered right to my house. Plus, I found some great coupon codes that will save me a lot of money.

For Christmas I'm telling my mom to buy me clothes or stuff for my house. I need new sheets and towels. She can shop at Overstock.com because they sell really nice sheet sets. You can find sales there and get really good deals. I saw a set of satin sheets for less than $20 one time.

I hate shopping for the holidays but I love getting presents. I'm giving my mom my list early.

I need to study for my exam

Blah. I have 6 exams in my math class. Yeah, 6 exams in 14 weeks. It's an exam every two weeks. It's always on 1 chapter but some of the chapters are a lot shorter than others. For example, my last exam was on 6 topics. This exam is on 3 topics.

Hopefully I'll do better on this exam than I did on the last exam. I got a horrible grade. I need to pass this class with at least a "C" in order to move on to the next class. If I don't get this, I surely won't understand the next class which will be much harder.

Did I mention how much I hate school?