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Browsing category: Uncategorized

  • April 24, 2012

    I’m all over the interwebs today

    Today I’m over at Cordelia Calls It Quits, with a guest post on blogging jealousies and dealing to the green-eyed monster – getting back in touch with what I love about blogging and saying fuck it to the endless game of numbers.

    I’m ALSO featured at Girl with the Red Hair, where Amber interviewed me about what I do for a living.

    These are two of my favourite blogs, so be sure to head on over and have a peek round.

    To new readers, greetings! Hope you’ll stick around for a while.

    By way of introduction, I’m a 2o-something from New Zealand. As an introvert in the creative industries, a blog was a natural outlet (seeing as I’ve been messing around on the internet for over a decade and writing for publication for a little less than that) occasionally (okay, once) sharing cool things I’ve worked on elsewhere.

    I blog about money, careers, relationships, travel and all the other spices of 20-something life (with frequent forays into recipes I’ve tried or books I’ve read) and you can check out some of my top posts here. While I have a particular passion for personal finance, money isn’t everything; I’m trying to live for today while saving for tomorrow, finding some balance while still getting ahead. Right now, I’m dabbling in a spot of wedding planning, but my eye is on the bigger prize – travel and eventually buying a house.

    Enjoy!

  • April 23, 2012

    Carnival of Personal Finance #358: Anzac edition

    Roll up, roll up. Welcome one and all to this week’s carnival of personal finance!

    This week’s a short one for me – it’s cleaved neatly in half by Anzac Day.

    For those not familiar with Anzac Day, it’s a national holiday commemorating our soldiers who fought at Gallipoli during WWI.

    They fought for a mission, a cause larger than any single one of them.

    While most of us will never be part of something on that level, we are united in a common journey – that’s what this carnival is all about! We’re all on a quest to achieve financial savvy, stability and independence. And as always, here are the links to the best of this week’s writing to prove it.

    Editor’s Picks

    Should kids have to take a minimum wage job when they’re teens? Nicole, Maggie, and the grumpy readership weigh in on whether grunt work is worth it. (My general feeling is that unless they’re genuinely tied up with other things – Olympic training, practising for a performance at Carnegie Hall, prepping for early entry to uni or other pursuits at that level, why not?)

    Want to pick up your blogging game? Here are 12 tactics to build up a money-making blog, via The Financial Blogger. (I have a post tomorrow on why I’m doing the exact opposite.)

    Eric from Narrow Bridge Finance explains why he hates bad tippers. (We pay our hospo staff a living minimum wage. I’m very glad tipping is not part of our culture, though most places now have tip jars – and the higher-end places usually offer an option to add on a tip when you pay by Eftpos.)

    Some fees just can’t be avoided. Boomer & Echo presents 10 Fees that are actually worth it. (Sometimes it pays to pay for a privilege.)

    According to the Weakonomist there are only six kinds of employees. (I’m fortunate to work with great people – that’s such an important element when it comes to a satisfying work environment.)

    Career

    MISSION: Rock the search, the work and the exit.

    There’s been a lot of brouhaha over employers asking for Facebook passwords. Obviously these are a very select few. Still, Glen Craig from Free From Broke presents Should You Give Human Resources Access to Your Facebook Profile?

    Some jobs are downright awful. Everyone’s heard stories about people who stuck it to their employer and stormed out of the office. Jeremy from Modest Money presents Avoid Burning Your Bridges, and reminds us why that should always be a lst resort.

    Credit

    MISSION: Minimise charges, maximise rewards

    Apparently there’s a new credit card fee making a resurrection. Beware!, Matt Schulz from InvestingAnswers.com says.

    And on a similar note, Liana from Card Hub presents Get Ready For More Credit Card Fees – watch out for offers that require you to pay a fee before your account is even open.

    What do you really know about credit cards? John from Wallet Blog presents 6 Fun Facts about Credit Cards.

    We’ve all heard the typical advice for a healthy credit score: Pay your bills on time. Don’t max out your credit cards. Don’t close your oldest accounts. But the problem is, this advice is just that: typical. Bethy from Credit Karma Blog presents 4 Ways to Get a Better Credit Score Now.

    Debt

    MISSION: Kill it

    Ryan Yates from Deliver Away Debt presents The Fine Line of Debt Refinancing – Rescue vs. Ruin, and says, “Talking with a bank is a lot like being on a first date; if you don’t shave your financial legs, you won’t let them get too far the first time you meet.”

    Danesh Parhar from The Financial Rebellion says there’s more to worry about debt than just the amount of debt you have – consider the monthly payment.

    In Debt Consolidation Programs, Ben from ReadyForZero Blog explains the different types of debt consolidation available.

    Finance

    MISSION: Forewarned is forearmed

    The Pareto principle states that, for many events, roughly 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes (or effort). FMF from Free Money Finance suggests you should 80-20 Your Finances, too.

    Since the GFC, the US government has increased the insurance limits on deposits. Jim from Bargaineering elaborates further in FDIC Limits.

    Frugality

    MISSION: Do more with less

    Hosting people can be expensive (and exhausting). Amanda from My Dollar Plan presents How to Host Out-of-Town Guests Without Breaking the Bank.

    Babies are a blessing, but they are also a target for materialism. Don’t get sucked in, warns Everything Finance! Here are some Baby Essential Costs You Can Skip.

    What’s a good car to own in your 20s? Green Panda from Green Panda Treehouse presents Best Cars for College Graduates to Drive.

    Don’t be foiled by food labels. Sandy from Yes, I am Cheap presents Food Labels And Terms That Fool You.

    In Buy Current Technology, Not State of the Art, Ryan at yourlifeforless says it’s important to focus on your needs, and avoid buying state of the art technology just for the sake of it.

    Jason from Live Real, Now reminds us in Be Happy with What You Have that it’s not possible to buy happiness, either directly or indirectly, through the accumulation of “stuff”.

    Once upon a time, the two-income household was virtually unheard of. Justin from The Family Finances asks, Is It Still Possible To Raise A Family On One Income?

    Money Thinker from Money Thinking presents Sifting through Needs and Wants, with a few handy questions to ask yourself before whipping out your wallet.

    Investing

    MISSION: Work smarter, not harder

    Acronym alert! Is SIPC like being FDIC insured? Not so, says Evan from My Journey to Millions, in What Is SIPC? Recent Sanford Case Should Lead to Interesting Results.

    James from Short Road To Retirement presents How To Invest Your 401k Plan, with a link to a calculator that will tell you how to allocate your assets based on your age and risk tolerance.

    Bonds have a place in many an investment strategy. SB from One Cent At A Time reckons Bonds are Paramount in your Portfolio; Even with Room for Volatility.

    Over time, tax treatment can make more difference than net returns or expense ratios. Dan from ETF Base explains What Makes an ETF Tax Efficient.

    How much do different investments really return? Drew from Objective Wealth presents Investment Asset Classes, Start Your Engines! with a car racing twist.

    In Sprint in $300 Million Tax Fraud Lawsuit, Flexo from Consumerism Commentary says, “Sprint says it was just “looking out for the consumer” when it failed to collect and pay $100 million in taxes.”

    Thinking of joining the IRA bandwagon? Mike Piper from Oblivious Investor presents Where Should I Open an IRA?, and says, “With all the new commission-free offerings in the last couple years, the answers to this common question have changed.”

    Money Management

    MISSION: Keep the ship running smoothly

    Gender roles often influence the division of household tasks. Ray from Tie the Money Knot asks, Who is the Financial Driver? in your relationship.

    Mike from Do Not Wait explains Why Simplicity is Key For Retirement – as it is in many aspects of life.

    Laura @ Frugal Follies on what a 1940 census taught her about saving. Digging into your ancestry can be uber-revealing!

    Robert from The College Investor shares his Top Apps for Finance, Investing and News.

    Would You Rather Live a Little More Now? Or Have a Pile of Cash Later?  Smart on Money wonders if we have to sacrifice everything right now to save up for the future.

    Other

    MISSION: Educate yourself

    Learning to handle your time wisely must be one of the hardest things about adulthood. Miss T. from Prairie Eco Thrifter lists 7 Time Management Tips that Will Help You Work Efficiently.

    Is ProvisionRX a Scammy Pyramid Scheme? Lazy Man and Money says ProvisionRX looks like the most basic of scams.

    In Shopping for Health Care, Money Walks offers some tips for buying health insurance.

    Real Estate

    MISSION: Learn from the property gurus

    In Home Mortgage Pre-Approval Letter Received, PT Money Personal Finance reaches a new chapter in the journey to buy a new home and become a landlord.

    Family Money Values presents Real Estate Investing – Get Better Cash Flow from your Rental Properties, and says, “Here are some suggestions on how to evaluate your properties to make sure that you are keeping a taut ship.”

    PK from Don’t Quit Your Day Job asks Who Decided 417:1 Leverage is a Good Idea?, and wonders if another federal bailout is imminent.

    Taxes

    MISSION: Crunch those numbers

    Those deductions can really add up when you run your own company. Teacher Man from My University Money presents Claiming a Business Loss – Losing Money Never Felt So Good.

    Left your taxes to the last minute AND made a boo-boo in the rush? Peter from Bible Money Matters has 8 Tips for Amending Your Tax Return When You Make a Mistake.

    Darwin’s Money explains Obama’s proposed ‘Buffett’ rule and why it’s a horrible idea for America in Senate Rejects Buffett Rule – Fighting Stupidity with Logic.

    Believe it or not, the IRS offers installment plans. Rob from Dough Roller presents Can’t Pay Your Taxes? Read This.

    Thanks all for taking part! Be sure to get your submissions in to next week’s Carnival when it is hosted by My Personal Finance Journey.

  • April 22, 2012

    Link love (Powered by chives and fortuitous occurrences)

    You know the great thing about conferences these days?

    If you can’t afford to make it, there, these days you can soak up most of the talks for free afterward. Lately, I’ve been catching up on SxSW podcasts and Webstock presentations.

    At one of the events I was at recently, David Lawee, a VP at Google, talked a bit about the early days of the internet industry. That took me right back to my early days of running a website, submitting it to Lycos, Altavista, and all the others for indexing – meta tagging, and other primitive SEO.

    Yep, back when Google just had a funny name and it seemed the search game was overcrowded. So when exactly did it all consolidate and how did Google overtake all the others? I don’t personally recall – I just know that at some point, Google became the default for me and everyone else I knew. (Anybody remember this period more clearly?) Those guys really had a clear dream – that information is everything, and that organising it could do great things for humanity.  Another speaker, Dev Paitnaik, recounted a great anecdote in which Sergey Brin told the story of a person who managed to save his father’s life (the dude had a heart attack) by quickly Googling CPR and clicking I’m Feeling Lucky. What a powerful, persuasive argument.

    But as corporations do, it seems Google is losing its way, and Gizmodo had a great piece on why this is.

    You know what else occurred to me?

    At these kinds of seminars, you hear about the power of storytelling – that we forget how to tell stories and have to relearn it as adults. I’m fortunate that I get to do that every day. And you hear all about how to be a better leader, inspire a workforce, etc. Conscious capitalism. Social responsibility. Ethical business. All the buzzwords, and more.

    But really. Is it so hard to act decently? So hard to be human? Do we so quickly forget? Corporate douchebaggery, as I alluded to the other day, is pervasive. Surely it seems obvious to any sane person that we treat others how we want to be treated. Business shouldn’t be any different.

    That said, I’m optimistic. Companies as old as IBM are getting into social innovation. Gen Y is entrepreneurial and effecting change from the ground up. Eventually, the old guard will fade out – and, hopefully, responsible, ethical, sustainable business will be the norm, not the exception.

    To the links!

    Thanks to Money Q&A for featuring my post on finding meaning in your work in the latest Yakezie Carnival.

    How many financial ‘ladders’ do you have? Via Bucksome Boomer.

    Aloysa at My Broken Coin reckons Pinterest could help you save money.

    Miss T offers up some down to earth advice on networking.

    How freelancers can keep in touch with professional contacts, from Dollars and Deadlines.

    At Ms Career Girl, three tips for figuring out when it’s time to quit the ‘dream’ job.

    And Zen Habits has a ‘do what you love’ guide.

    Thinking of entering a helping profession? A guest post at So Over Debt explains what you need to know.

    Brazen Careerist has four mistakes we often make in changing jobs.

    Yes and Yes features a financial dominatrix (something I’d never heard of before) and also explains how to get a job with a liberal arts degree.

    Ever feel overwhelmed by all the good things happening to you? Jess at Makeunder My Life does.

    Suba at Wealth Informatics explains how to use a Not-To-Do list to get more done.

    Excellent advice for sensitive types at Smart, Pretty Awkward (and if you have any tips on learning not to sweat the small stuff, please let me know!)

  • April 21, 2012

    Places I have lived: A rundown of my renting history

    As I mentioned in this post, the housing market in NZ is rather unique. Crappy stock, sky-high prices.

    I thought it might be fun (in what sense of the word, I’m not quite sure, actually) to recount all the places I’ve lived in since leaving home.

    Student life is, of course, meant for building up horror stories about bootstrapping. Two-minute noodles. Walls of beer bottles. Bongs and one-night stands and other awful flatmate escapades.

    The boarding house

    My first place was .. an experience. Along with one of my best friends, we set out to find somewhere we could both live. Nobody would rent to 17-year-olds, and no flats were advertising two empty rooms at once. Eventually though, we found a special situation: a six-bedroom townhouse/boarding house where each tenant paid the landlord individually. And he didn’t mind if we weren’t 18. (He actually also proposed us living in the basement apartment of his own house, with cheap rent in exchange for help with chores and cooking. That was a bit too weird, though.)

    The first night my cell phone was stolen off the coffee table. Everybody locked their rooms when they weren’t home. Flatmates came and went, including the P-addict who used my soap and shampoo, the crazy old lady who threw dishes into the bin if they weren’t washed immediately, the girl who slept with the middle-aged body builder who lived next door, the guy just out of jail, and more.

    The family townhouse

    Next was another terraced house, with my friend and her grandad. Nothing much to report there. It didn’t last long; her mother came back to the country and I got the boot so she could live there instead.

    The quiet suburban house

    This is the furthest I’ve ever lived from public transport – a good 20 minute walk at least. Very inconvenient. Again, only lasted a few months.

    The old bungalow

    This was the oldest house I’d ever lived in, but it did have mixer taps (this is a requirement for me in any house). Flatmate had a few dope plants growing in the cupboard, but otherwise was sweet to live with. My first experience living on a main artery road, in which I learned to factor in road-crossing time in my walk to the bus stop, T had a major car accident just outside, and I vowed I would never buy a house on a busy road.

    The suburban apartment

    Apartments are rare outside of the CBD, but this was one of the notorious blocks. We were here for about a year. You pretty much couldn’t make any noise; the big communal rubbish bins were always overflowing and the pool was usually kinda grotty. Our dishwasher was home to cockroaches and for some reason half our mail never made it to our letterboxes, which were inside the lobby (I was a student then so had plenty of correspondence from Studylink to deal to … or I should have had, anyway).

    The ghetto house

    Nobody would rent to students. So we ended up in the ghetto. Our street was nice at one end, but at the other end was a state housing enclave – and that’s the end we lived at. Our room was a converted garage. There was mould in the closet, on the ceiling, and I could see my breath in front of me in the winter. Our landlord lost his job and when the hot water cylinder went, he took over a month to fix it. That was coming into winter, too. He also then tried to pin a bunch of things on us when we left, like the roof caving in. Oh, and we got burgled… three times?

    Other fun things: nightmare flatmate still owes me nearly a grand from this. He was a terrible drunk and broke a couple of panes in our door while on the piss. Similarly, the boys used to wrestle all the time and managed to break a couple of windows doing so. I got half decent at painting/puttying. Nightmare flatmate also got his car rear window smashed several times, mostly by the shits down the road who also burgled us, and once by his girlfriend.

    The thoroughfare house

    Weed got sold. People came and went. One of the flatties literally had a walk in closet for a room. Another had a bit of casual polygamy going on. Lots of Naruto was watched.

    The bottom floor studio

    A really nice small place, albeit a tiny kitchen with old cupboards. But brand new bathroom, gorgeous built in cupboards and drawers and a cute little patio-type thing. It was a quiet, affluent neighbourhood handy to everything – and really cheap.

    The bad: the yard was always in the shade so I hardly ever used the patio and our clothes took forever to dry on the line; it got a little too small for our liking (even the apartment we lived in had a living room); the landlord’s kids upstairs were often loud and the floor was thin; it was always dark because we were on the bottom floor and surrounded by fence/trees; T’s first bike got stolen, after which he hated the place; and it was just that little bit too far away from the west, where everyone he knows lives.

    Current house

    Also on a main road, but not at the same level as the other bungalow. We have a garage, a deck, lots of sun, a 20-minute walk to work for me and a spare room for junk, among other things. After moving in, we also found the previous occupants had been growing cannabis in the space between the roof and the house, hacking a power point to run electricity up into that space, and apparently using the hall cupboard (now my wardrobe) for drying.

    The house itself isn’t all that nice, I’ll be honest – it needs work and it’s very much a rental (but all the cosmetic things, like the carpets and walls, are pretty well hidden once you move in with all your stuff). It’s at the low end of my standards, but it does well enough.

    The house itself is split into two dwellings; the back one is a one-bedroom, and the tenant is a lovely older lady who’s rarely home. In fact, we haven’t seen since Christmas and just found out she’s down south caring for her sick mother. Hope she can continue to pay rent and keep her place – quiet neighbours are great!

    So, that’s my woeful housing history from 2005-2012. What does yours look like?

  • April 20, 2012

    On sweating the small stuff

    Lately, I’ve been letting tiny little niggly things get to me.

    The kind of things that I know the other party doesn’t give a second thought to.

    I love the Eleanor Roosevelt quote: “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.”

    And likewise, the small stuff is only bugging me because I let it. I let it through and I let it stick around and fester.

    You know what, small stuff? You’re overstaying your welcome.

    It’s true. Some people are douchebags. Nothing I can do about that. Letting that get to me is fruitless. And we don’t want the douchebags to win.

    Sometimes something or somebody is a priority for you, but not vice versa. That’s the way of the world. There’s only so much you can do, and beyond that it’s out of your control. Nothing to be done there.

    Sometimes shit just happens.

    And thus, I will quote another fantastic saying, the serenity prayer:

    “Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
    Courage to change the things I can,
    And wisdom to know the difference.”

    Words to (try to) live by.

    Are you a sensitive type like me ? Or do you let things roll off your back? How?

  • April 19, 2012

    Review: Don’t Breathe a Word

    Don’t Breathe a Word – Jennifer McMahon

    This was my first brush with McMahon; I picked this book up off the library’s ‘recently returned’ shelf on a whim.

    The cover is creepy – one bug-eyed child with the edges of her face blurred – and let me assure you, the text is equally creepy.

    The story is based on a simple and not particularly original premise: that of a lost little girl. Little Lisa went missing in the woods, possibly into the world of fairies, and her family has never quite been the same since. Fast forward to today, and Phoebe is dating Sam, Lisa’s younger brother, when mysterious overtures are made to them from someone claiming to be Lisa returned to the human world.

    The narrative is linear, but divided between two timelines – that of the present, in which Phoebe and Sam race to uncover just what the hell is going on – and that of the summer leading up to Lisa’s disappearance. Both storylines gallop along. McMahon’s pacing is perfect and masterful. I dare you to try and put this book down. In the past, secrets are hinted at, as we learn that Sam and Lisa’s apparently lovely rural childhood was perhaps not so serene as it appeared to outsiders. In the current, Sam and Phoebe are tormented by somebody playing games with them – could it really be Teilo, the king of the fairies? Or is there a more reasonable, sane explanation for the mindf***s that are happening…the mysterious characters showing up, the break-ins, the notes?

    A particularly interesting aspect, I thought, was the fact protagonist Phoebe was in a relationship with a dude 10 years younger, from a different social and intellectual class. I kind of thought that was going somewhere, and it could – but McMahon, despite making more than a few references to this, chose not to explore that path any further.

    Toward the third section of the book, it starts to unravel a little. Not just in terms of the mystery, but in terms of McMahon’s writing. It’s a little rushed (thankfully, it wasn’t quite The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake) and while the ending itself, I think, was a more than valid way to go, it certainly felt that the author ran out of steam and bashed out the final chapters without much thought.

    Nonetheless, a full four stars from me. Don’t Breathe a Word is truly haunting, and best of all, while it deals with the fantastic it’s very much grounded in reality.

  • April 18, 2012

    Of employment and independence

    I greatly enjoy reading Passive Panda. Huge respect for James; if I recall rightly, I first heard about him when he personally reached out to me via email when he was first building up the website and it’s since seen some phenomenal growth.

    Recently, he put out the question: are you doing yourself a disservice by working for someone else?

    Much like the lifestyle design set (which goes hand in hand with the entrepreneurial set) the self-employed seem to be more and more the norm online. Too often, you’re looked down on if employed by the man.

    So not surprisingly, that post pulled in a stupendous number of comments, a couple of which I’ll highlight here (the more nuanced, insightful ones):

    Gregory: Working for someone else comes with the benefits of LEARNING from someone else in some instances, that would be my main counterpoint.

    Illiya: It all depends on if you’re happy with your job / career or not. If you’re not, go change that. You only get ‘one’ life.

    Ben: The thing is, you can work for your self and still settle for mediocrity. Just after high school, I worked in a mom-&-pop computer repair store for almost 5 years. The owners could have been very free and prosperous, but settled for being mediocre and thinking of it as “just a job”. They did themselves – and their customers – a disservice in that.

    Faith: Everyone can’t work for themselves, because if we did there would be no employees.

    As some astute readers of mine pointed out in an earlier post, the nature of work  is that you’re always serving somebody else.

    Maybe you don’t have a boss lording it over you. But you will have clients. Those customers are paying you; and you have to deliver the goods.

    Maybe you’re not a wage slave to a single company. But you are directly beholden to multiple parties, a responsibility of an entirely different kind and scale.

    And some occupations just are not conducive to self employment. Teacher, economist, policy wonk.

    I think it’s pretty obvious that you’re only doing yourself a disservice as an employee if you feel that you are.

    But what I’ve come to realise is that we all rely on others to get by. To produce the food we eat, the clothes we wear, the houses we live in. We create our own value and we exchange that for the things we need. In the post I linked to above, I originally asked if true independence is possible as an employee. But in fact, bona fide self-sufficiency is darn near impossible.

     

  • April 17, 2012

    How to reclaim your work mojo

    Sometimes we fall into a bit of a work rut. Get up, head to the office, put in a day’s graft, head home. Rinse and repeat. Maybe there’s a never ending stream of tasks, or perhaps there isn’t enough to fill the hours. The days go too quickly, or too slowly – either way, you find yourself wondering where the weeks are disappearing to.

    I think I recently sunk into one of these, and didn’t quite realise it until one day I simply woke up eager to get to work and get stuck in. Seriously.

    What did it take? Some positive feedback that reinvigorated my enthusiasm, and some fresh success that really proved motivating. When your efforts are paying off, that’s a HUGE shot of re-energisement. Sometimes that’s all you need.

    So if that’s you, how can you find your mojo again?

    I think it all boils down to one simple thing.

    Figure out what it means to you.

    Remember why you got into the job. To save money for a round the world trip? To keep going while you build an empire on the side? Get experience and build your resume? To make a difference?

    Whatever it is, tap into the factor/s that drive you. Rediscover that lightning bolt and turn it into renewed vigour.

    (And if your job sucks, plain and simple, then take action.)

    Any other tips of your own to share?

  • April 16, 2012

    I may never win an Oscar or Grammy, but…

    via GIPHY

    I sure would win a prize for purveyor of unattractive baked goods

    I find baking cathartic and the end result both surprising and delicious. But pretty? Food presentation is not my forte. And given how fast it disappears in our household of two … meh. Hence why recipe posts here are sporadic.

    I sure would win a prize for planning

    Okay. Sometimes I view life like a chess game. In probability trees. Almost infinite paths of ‘what if’. Forewarned is forearmed, I say.

    I sure would win a prize for failing at remembering what I spend

    Hence why I spend a few minutes every couple of days, when I log on to internet banking, to check and categorise our latest transactions. Even that sometimes is a struggle. And that’s why I don’t use cash.

    I sure would win a prize for parking fails

    I have parallel parked once in my life. During my test. (I am still the only person I’ve heard of EVER to have been asked to parallel park during their driving test). I hate parking. Almost more so than lane changing (I’m with Marge Simpson. Changing lanes is for rally drivers, she sez.)

    I sure would win a prize for least put together female in the western world

    I check my reflection before I leave the house. After that I do not look closely in mirrors during the course of the day. I don’t quite know why; it’s a weird kind of phobia. It started back in high school, when I simply refused to ever look at myself in the bathroom mirrors. Suffice to say I had some body image issues, and today I think that persists a bit even though my skin has cleared up. I am friends with my home mirror, and that’s about it.

    That said, I do check myself out in car windows. The picture is much more forgiving. And something about the curve shortens my long, rectangular face.

    What useless things would you win at?

  • April 15, 2012

    Link love (Powered by dumb phones and gruyere cheese)

    This is the first 9-5 job I’ve had where the office shuts on holidays, and because of something some of my American Twitter buddies said last week, I thought we only had a three-day weekend. Then a Kiwi Twitter friend tweeted about Monday being the real sloth day, which then prompted me to actually Google and discover that yes, Easter = four days off! Two short weeks in a row!

    And what’s more, the weather turned it up. It was like the summer we never had.

    But we didn’t do ANYTHING for it. This frustrated me. T spent a bunch of time mucking around doing stuff for some friends, who then became our (unwanted) house guests for most of the weekend. Normal people hang out with friends and go home at the end of the day. These peeps hang out here for days on end and sleep on the couch because their home lives suck. (Let’s not even get into addressing that or even the idea of fixing it.)

    In short, it took a PMS-y me having a mini breakdown over my broken phone/not doing anything and making most of the beautiful weather/interlopers to get through to him. Did I mention my  iPhone stopped charging? I was phoneless from Saturday night through to Thursday night, when I finally picked up a $39 cheapie to get me through. This week, hopefully, will be the week to get it fixed. I mostly miss being able to catch up on the day’s news in bed in the morning/check social media and email on the go/be able to jot down blog and work ideas while walking home/use my awesome supermarket shopping checklist app. Analogue life is quaint indeed.

    A short roundup this week:

    The Totally Money blog carnival at Stupid Cents included my post, Life planning on crack.

    Bridget lays out how to live on no money after graduation.

    Meg meets someone with a very different perspective on money and an aversion to wealth despite enjoying its trappings.

    Some sane advice for wannabe travel writers. Heck, any writers at all. Writing makes for a better hobby than career. So you better darn well love it.

    Untemplater lists the pros and cons of train travel.

    Here’s Cate on making time for reading (something I never have trouble with, except for my university days when I barely had enough time even to sleep and eat).

    And finally, a post on blending culture and customs when it comes to marriage and weddings. I was stoked to see this. Another Chinese chick from Malaysia! There are plenty of us around, but none I’ve found in the bloggy world.

    Anyway, this post really got my wheels turning. But I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that race and culture are not major elements in our relationship. (Part of that comes down to the fact that while my parents were more tiger than Western, they’re definitely not as strait-laced as many Chinese parents are. And I am pretty much a walking banana.)

    More than anything, class differences are what stand out to me. In my world, prison, tattoos, drugs and drinking problems are foreign. Babies are special, planned for, cherished; not popped out without a second thought. Houses are bought, not rented and trashed.

    At our engagement party, one corner engaged in an animated discussion reminiscing about visiting incarcerated family members. The rest of us looked on and listened awkwardly. I can’t relate to discussions about cousins in rehab or being investigated for welfare fraud or taking off with the kids for the umpteenth time after another argument with their partner.

    What are your thoughts on culture or class colliding in relationships?

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