Content has been demanded so I will try to oblige.
This summer has been very busy. I imagine most of you have seen Jaeger’s run down of what we’ve been doing. This month is the first since April where I’ve had several weekends in a row just to myself (though Jaeger’s currently away in OK visiting family so it feels a little strange).
Our car Lyta, is working on 230,000+ miles and I expect that she will permanently go to sleep some day soonish. I’m hoping she can last another year or two so we can save money for another car without stealing from some other budget area. This time around Jaeger wants AWD so we can navigate the unimproved mountain roads. Even though we aren’t planning to buy the car right away, I got sucked into used car research. Give me something to research and I disappear into a fog of research for days, even if it isn’t an urgent problem. My current favorite vehicle is a Subaru Forester. I was originally looking for a wagon but they don’t seem to make many with AWD. Subaru of course has it’s Outback but the Forester seems to get similar gas mileage and has more room in back. The Forester seems to have pretty good crash results but I’m a little disturbed by the mileage (though with AWD, I really can’t expect it to be terribly good). I also looked at the Toyota Matrix/Pontiac Vibe. Pre-2007 the models are available with 4wd and it had better gas mileage than the Subaru. However, from the reports I read it sounded a little slugish. I don’t know, when I’m actually ready to buy I’ll probably try to hunt down a 4wd version to check it out. I also briefly looked at the Toyota Rav4. However, I really don’t like the look. Also, Consumer Reports mentioned that it’s difficult to install car seats (no, we’re not planning on having children soon but I’m hoping our next vehicle will be around for a while).
Okay, enough on cars. in addition to obsessively researching cars, I’m also still working on figuring out what we want to do in London. My conclusion is that the trip is going to cost way too much 
. However, it doesn’t make sense to spend the money to get there and then avoid all the attractions there. Also, it’s one of those trips that is much easier before one has children. Anyway, I’m looking forward to it. However, I have a sneaking suspician that I might be enjoying the planning as much as the actual trip. I really hope that by the time we leave (mid-September) British Airways allows carry on items again. I know international flights usually have entertainment systems but I doubt they’re good enough to keep me occupied for the entire flight time. Not to mention I’ve been saving up books to read during this flight!
Speaking of reading . . . Last June I decided that I didn’t read enough non-fiction. So, my goal was to read at least 1 non-fiction book a month. My first book was The Harvard medical School guide to healthy eating during pregnancy. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m not pregnant I’m just an overplanner. I figure it’s probably a good idea to try changing my eating habits before I’m pregnant. I imagine pregnancy comes with enough issues of its own without adding diet change to the mix. It was a pretty interesting book but the author was a little down on the vegetarian diet while pregnant. Later I’ll probably want to hunt down a pregnancy nutrition book specifically for vegetarians.
July wasn’t a good month for non-fiction. I scanned through several recipe books but I suspect that doesn’t really count. I’m still a little unclear whether or not audio books should count. I listen to audio books almost every day on the way to work but somehow that feels like cheating. It doesn’t help that most non-fiction audio books are abridged. I just finished listening to The money book for the young, fabulous and broke. In general, I’m not a huge Suze Orman fan. One of her books I stopped listening to during the first CD because she kept going on and on about stupid financial decisions she had made early in life. I suppose she was trying to empathize with her audience. It wasn’t working for me. So, when this book came out I ignored it for a while. However, I was running low on audio books and so decided to give it a try. It was okay. Suze Orman reads the book herself and her intense voice can be a little trying sometimes. In general her advice seemed to make sense. I don’t think I learned anything new but it was interesting to get her persective on various situations. I was fascinated by her view on credit cards. Most personal finance authors I hear say, “credit cards are evil.” I don’t agree with this. Credit Cards are easier to abuse than other forms of money. However, if you pay your balance each month there are some distinct advantages to using credit cards. Plus, if I have cash I can spend it all without knowing where it all went but I never lose track of my credit card spending. Anyway, Suze Orman is very pro credit card. Some of her statements about them made me a tad uncomfortable. For example, she suggested that when you’re young it’s okay to use credit cards to fill in the gap in your income until you make enough money to live on. She does stress that you should use the credit card only for essential items, not wants. However, the whole thing seems like a slipperly slope.
The most recent fiction book I read was The Bride Finder by Susan Carroll. Previously I head two of her newer books The Dark Queen and The Courtesan (both were very good). It’s obvious that The Bride Finder is an earlier book. The depth of her later books is lacking. However, it was a very satisfying read. My last book that I enjoyed that much was The Marriage Spell by Mary Jo Putney. All of these books are romance with a touch of fantasy.
Oh, in a previous post I mentioned that I had started reading Crystal Soldier again but had trouble getting through it. I think the book just required a little bit more concentration than I usually have after work. During the 4th of July weekend I finish Crystal Soldier and Crystal Dragon and found both of them to be excellent books. They have a different flavor to them that is sometimes hard to digest but very interesting. This series is a prequel to several other books set in the Liaden Universe. However, these books feel different to me than the earlier books. Anyway, if you enjoy space opera and romance (in varying proportions in the different books) I highly reccomend this series.
Hm, enough content for now? I’ll try to update again sometime before next year 
You do have a valid point regarding the credit card. Especially in not allowing merchants to pass these charges on if they choose to only the credit card users.
There is a gas station in Longmont that appears to have a unique way around this (I say appear because I’ve never actually used that gas station). They give a 3 cent-gallon discount to those that pay with credit card and a 6 cent-gallon discount to those that pay with cash.
However, I’m still quite fond of my credit card.
Why are credit cards evil, even if you pay off the full balance each month? Because with every transaction, a portion of the revenue from the sale is invisibly (from the customer’s perspective) diverted to the credit card banks. This means that in order to compensate for the profit loss, the merchant is forced to increase the price of everything.
I wouldn’t have as much of a problem with this markup if it was only passed on to customers paying with credit cards. Some customers find credit cards more convenient? Fine, then charge them for it, and give customers using cash a lower price. Unfortunately, due to the draconian contractual terms imposed by credit card processing companies, businesses are prohibited from passing on the cost of credit card processing _only_ to customers using cards. Customers paying in cash to any business that accepts credit cards are, in effect, forced to subsidize all the credit card users.
There are a _few_ businesses around that have been enlightened enough to refuse credit card purchases entirely (such as Maggie’s Vegetarian Vittles here in Lincoln, and Left Hand Books in Boulder). By doing so, I’m sure they do lose a fair number of potential customers, but with the benefit of being able to educate and enlighten anyone who asks why. And of course, it also allows them to give a fair price to the customers who pay in cash, and also keeps the money circulating in the local economy, rather than being siphoned bit by bit off to Wall Street.
Anyway, despite my misgivings about the entire credit card industry, I still keep a few credit cards around, though I very rarely use them anymore except to make online purchases. For that, they are still quite useful, and often the only payment method available. Cheers!
I’m sorry, Bitscape, but you simply miss the point here.
Credit cards are not an exploitation of the merchant. Sure, the merchant has to pay between 3% and 5% fees which he can’t pass on to the customer, but it is a widely known fact that people buy more when they can put it on a credit card.
The merchants may make less profit per item, but they make it up in volume. A person may only eat at a restaurant two times a week if they had to pay cash, but maybe they’ll eat there three times a week if they can pay credit. The merchant may make less profit per item, but at the end of the week, he-she has more profit because they accept credit cards.
The effect is MUCH more pronounced for stores such as Walmart, Sears, and Best Buy. Not just are people more willing to buy more stuff using a credit card, they are more willing to make major purchases like a big screen TV, because it is much easier for them to ignore the fact that they’ll have a massive credit card bill *next* month.
Credit cards absolutely exploit people. They just don’t exploit merchants. They exploit the consumer’s lack of self discipline and make it easier for them to spend more money–both to make the credit card company more in transaction fees, and to make the credit card company more money in outrageous interest payments.
Kiesa, I’m not saying you’re being exploited. I agree with you that credit cards are fine if you manage them, use them only for things you would have purchased anyway, and pay them off every month.
Anya and I do the same thing, and I think they are just plain handy.
The people who need to watch out are the ones that spend very differently with a credit card vs. without it.
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I’ve heard it said by financial advisers that a good way to check yourself is to establish a pattern in your spending, for example, January through June, several years in a row. Average the expenditures. Then live the same period the next year, but use only cash for all your purchases if at all possible. Then total your expenses. If your expenses for the six months using cash were significantly less than the credit card, maybe you should consider not using the credit card much anymore.
Yes, I understand Yanthor :) It’s an interesting idea to have the same amount of cash as you spent in credit cards the previous year. However, that would mean I’d have to break down and get an atm card (our bank charges a fee of $7 a year for a card which I find ridiculous but I can’t convince Jaeger to change banks so I boycott getting a card — no, it doesn’t make sense, I’m just stubborn).