Author: Bill

Frugal Librarian#24: Solar clothes dryer

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Behold, an extensively tested method of laundry technologies, honed over centuries!  Anyone will tell you that line-drying your clothes is a serious saver. It certainly is less convenient than transferring into the dryer, and not appropriate for all lifestyles, however.

Pros: Free, there are discrete indoor methods, easier on your garments, saves tons of C02 from the atmosphere, dries faster, larger clothing amounts

Cons: Not all city aesthetic ordinances support outdoor drying, time spent wrangling those pins

The consensus seems to be, depending on the number of loads you clean and kids living at home, line drying will save you around $150 per year.
The outdoor season begins in a month or so.  After hanging up a couple of baskets in late July, the beginning of the line may already be nearly dry.

An even more green/cost-effective solution is not doing your laundry at all, but there also may be sanctions in your household against that measure as well.

Frugal Librarian #23: Vampire Appliances

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If someone just handed you a couple hundred bucks around Christmas time, you’d be cool with that, right?

That, apparently, is what you will get if you can work into your routine a daily flip of a common power strip before you go out the door, effectively cutting the energy draw to devices that aren’t in use.  Vampire energy (though obviously a lower amount than when the item is in full-tilt operation) still accumulates, some would say unnecessarily.  That energy goes to keeping the clock illuminated, and having the device in a general state of almost-readiness for you to come use it.  If you’re never going to come use it for a week, then there’s no sense in that, is there?

According to the United States Department of Energy, 75 percent of home electricity for appliances and electronics is consumed while they are turned off.

Use that VCR very much?  If it is plugged in, that’ll run you close to seven dollars this year.  Plasma Televisions, Satellite A/V receivers, are apparently pigs as well.

A device that is getting a lot of press is the Kill-A-Watt, which tells you the draw of individual devices and predicts your bills.

There also are smart power strips which will sense when an appliances are in vampire mode and “stop the bleeding” so to speak.

Frugal Librarian #22: Rising cost of mortar boards

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One final tip from the latest book, New Frugality.  If you can, buy college in advance.

Between 1982 and 2007 the cost of fees and tuition rose 439 percent.  Even when adjusting for inflation, the increasing cost of college education is greatly outpacing the purchasing power of the dollar.

So, if it is a foregone conclusion that screeching diaper-clad sleep thief will end up in a dorm someday,  you can purchase it down in advance.  Sometimes, you can even lock in today’s price and future proof yourself.

There are 529 plans, which offer tax-free withdrawal on earnings in the account, since the profit is earmarked for a future college education.  Some states also offer prepaid college tuition accounts, where you can lock in semesters today even though they will surely cost ridiculous amounts tomorrow..

On a side note, did you know that Augustana costs around $47,000 a year?

All the Live Long Day

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With the last years’ worth of talk about passenger rail between here and Chicago, there is a vivid battle on our local papers’ comment pages between the “that would be nice” faction and the “they’re just trying to get re-elected, where will the money come from?” team.

Before taking a side, one might wish to peruse this fresh book by James McCommons, Waiting on a Train: The Embattled Future of Passenger Rail Service.

This one isn’t gathering dust on our shelf.  People are using it no doubt to bolster their arguments.  That being said, how cool would it be for Cubs fans and the 75% of the University of Iowa students from Chicagoland? Or, nationally, anyone spending two hours riding the bus in Los Angeles for lack of infrastructure?

Frugal Librarian #21: YOU: Power broker

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Another financial tip the new book, New Frugality.   You’re smarter than a wall-street money manager.

Index funds duplicate the performance of a particular stock market index.  The most famous equity index fund is the S&P 500.  It is made up of stocks of the 500 largest publicly traded U.S. companies.  They’re on that list because they are the 500 BEST COMPANIES!

“Indexing is commonly referred to as passive investing.  No professional money manager is trying to beat the market, rapidly buying and selling stocks. Yet index funds routinely outperform most actively managed funds.  Why?  A big advantage is their low cost.  The annual fee for investing in the S&P 500 is some 0.10 percent versus an average of almost 1.5 percent for actively managed funds.  Index funds have no research analyst costs or multimillion dollar money manager salaries to pay.

Mark Kritzman of Windham Capital Management simulated an imaginary investor using index funds, mutual funds, and hedge funds.  Index funds had the highest rate of return at 8.27 percent, since the actively managed mutual fund’s costs are 3 times higher, and the hedge fund six times higher.

According to millionaire philanthropist Robert Wilson, “I’d say as a general rule put it in index funds.  I don’t see why small investors should horse around with money managers.”

Agony of Defeat

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The triumph of the human spirit…pfft.  More like triteness of the human spirit.   I can relate more to putting in a modest amount of effort and then not just coming up short, but failing…catastrophically…in front of a sizable audience.  I think most of us, therefore, are “Agony of Defeat” people.

ABC Wide World of Sports interposed various other symbolic clips and stills of the show’s intro over the course of decades, but they left the footage of “agony of defeat” static because the portrayal was so spot-on.  So, the initial humiliation had interest compounded for a small lifetime, week after week, until the wretched soul epitomized epic failure.

His name is Vinko Bogataj.  He was competing for Yugoslavia in the Ski-flying World Championships in Oberstdorf, West Germany (now Germany) on March 21, 1970 when his third run’s adjustment for excessive speed turned him into a self destructing cyclone of limbs and personal dignity.  He only received a concussion that day, but retired from competition.  According to various Internet sources, he transitioned into coaching, painting, and driving a forklift.

A rare blessing from the Cold War is he was unable to endure a televised lifetime of shame from across the Iron Curtain.  Imagine his surprise in 1991 during the Wide World of Sports’ 30th anniversary show when he was mobbed by such luminaries as Muhammad Ali who wanted HIS autograph.

Vinko Bogataj, we salute you.

Hellraisers

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Robert Sellers’ Hellraisers: The life and inebriated times of Richard Burton, Richard Harris, Peter O’Toole, and Oliver Reed is a well-written new book chronicling the Bacchanalian excesses of this UK theatre version of the Rat Pack from the cradle to the early grave (except for O’Toole).

However, believe you me, there is no way Frank, Dino, or Sammy could have kept up with these guys.  They must have a different kind of craftsmanship of men across the pond…the kind of guy that can ingest literally 4-5 BOTTLES of high octane spirits per day and still memorize lines and stagger to their stage marks.

To be honest, I may not finish because I can only marvel at their cast iron guts for 50-100 pages.  I’m also starting to get a bit queasy.

Frugal Librarian #20: Frozen Credit

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Another tip from the new book by NPR personality Chris Farrell, New Frugality… freeze your credit card.  No, not do a security freeze to prevent people from accessing your credit file, another great idea.

He means take the card out of your wallet or purse and put it in a container full of water.  Then give it the ol’ Han Solo treatment in your Frigidaire.

“Put the credit card away when you’re eliminating debt.  One technique is to store the card in the freezer.  That’s right, place the credit card in a container of water and stick it in the freezer.  You have to wait for it to thaw before you can use it again.  It gives you the time to think whether you really want to use it.  Yes, the card will work once it’s thawed.”

Liberace Likes It.

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Hey, if its the kind of swill this rugged devil slugs back after a hard day at the ol’ salt mine, it must be good enough brew for a roughneck like myself.  Just discovered this neat link, Vintage Ad Browser.  Naturally I gravitated to an old favorite.

However, if you’d like to peer into the marketing of over the last 100 years (some of which quite politically incorrect) in a number of industries (food, clothing, automotive) give it a l00k.  It will make you smile.

I really should watch that show Mad Men everyone is talking about (seasons 1 and 2 available at the library!)

Frugal Librarian #19: Tips from “Bud”

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The next few Frugal Librarian blog posts are ideas gathered from Chris Farrell’s new book, The New Frugality.  Farrell  is the host of the public radio program Marketplace Money.

Bud Hebeler is a retired aerospace engineer from Boeing that founded the conservative financial advice website analyzenow.com. Below are some of his top savings tips:

-Arrange for automatic savings deposits from your paychecks
-Sell things you don’t really need on the Net or elsewhere
-Downsize your home or rent. Renting provides mobility to get jobs elsewhere in the country
-Grow your own vegetables
-Buy items with cash
-Rule out cars, cell phones, or iPods for children—or even for yourselves
-Make do with old computers, and software. Use no downloads requiring payments
-Try to get lower-cost TV, Internet, and telephone services
-Turn down the thermostat and wear sweaters