Dear NJ Transit: You get an F in Math

I’m a little bit pissed – no, a lot pissed – at NJ Transit for their recent fare hikes. As if it wasn’t bad enough that they increased their standard peak adult fares by 25%, they eliminated the off-peak fares entirely. My $20 ticket RT ticket to visit my mother on the weekend has now leapt to $30. That’s fifty-freaking-percent! And I’m talking about commuter routes, not intercity Amtrak-type stuff, which prices itself to balance between bus fares and airfares.

Let me tell you how this has affected me personally… My mother’s 60th birthday is next week, and I suggested a slumber party for 6 at my place as a Plan B if the Hershey Park idea (hers, not ours!) doesn’t pan out for whatever reason. She said, “that’s $150 in train fares for us to come in, that seems kind of stupid.” She’s totally right.

If NJ Transit was looking for a justification for cutting off-peak services, then this was a really smart move – the natural atrophy of their customer base. However, if they were thinking “if they pay $20, they’ll pay $30″, well, I doubt my little family unit is the only one changing their mass transit habits.

Tell me if I’m wrong … I always thought of public transportation as being economical, efficient, ecological, and really damn practical. In fact, I enjoy learning my way around the systems in other countries, even ones with alphabets I don’t know. It’s supposed to cost less and take less time than driving. Now, to drive round-trip from where my mom is in NJ ($14 gas), pay for the tunnel ($8 toll), and cough up for 8-12 hours in a parking garage ($22)… that’s $34. To take the train and the subway is… $34. That math also applies to commuters. A zero sum game like that is going to completely defeat the purpose of having a mass transit system.

So, NJ Transit, you fail some pretty basic math. And you also fail in serving the purpose for your existence.

Rant over.

Big Professional Step + Karmic Justice

Hey, remember last year, when I was exiled from that massage school in NJ that ran an approved-but-not-prestigious course in Rolf Structural Integration? Quick recap: I wanted to take a weekend intro course in Rolfing and then the full program, but no one answered my weekly emails/voicemails, which around #4 became exasperated and mildly snarky. In the last one, I said something like “No one returns my calls, does this school even exist??”  They changed the entrance requirements so they could reject me, and then the instructor (my Rolfer) brought me as his demo model and she screamed at him for 20 minutes behind closed doors, telling him to get rid of me. Because I was rude to her… well, to the answering machine that does a really bad job playing receptionist, but she felt personally affronted, and she’s the Big Cheese.

I expressed disdain for her business practices, both in terms of inadequate admin and her inability to see me as a viable, lucrative customer. Well, surprise surprise, the school is out of business.

I’ve finally got a few spare bucks in my wallet, and I went to get Rolfed last night to head off a monster pain problem (could feel it building). In fact, I’ve got enough “spare” cash to go to the Rolf Institute! My Secret Job is bringing in a consistent, decent income that will only get better as I become more established. But even if it doesn’t, I can live anywhere but the most expensive cities in the country and not have a problem meeting my expenses, obligations AND tuition … which is about $17K, divided into six payments over the course of a year. So I’m assembling the application materials and hope to be part of their January intake. As much as I’d love to start in October, and that course is actually very well-timed for my lease and my other Colorado obligations (school is in Boulder, sister’s wedding is 10 days before that in Aspen, and lease is up 4 days before the course starts), I just don’t think I’ll have the funds to pull that off because of that whole life policy premium due in August.

Know what’s really sweet? I’ve had so many offers to be a temporary roommate from my cyber-coworkers (whom I’ve met, so it’s not that weird) and my BFF who’s local here in NY. Also, both the admissions counselor and my Rolfer said it’s not uncommon to get moved along more quickly than the official “must wait a minimum of 3 months between segments”, because they’d rather fill the next class completely if at all possible. And he’s pretty sure it’ll be possible.

Next post will be about all of the changes looming in 7 months…

A Family-Financed Wedding for Littlest Sister

So my littlest sister, Starfish, is getting married this September on a pretty strict budget. She just got her first ever credit card – at age 30! – with that elusive 0% interest for a year in order to “finance” it. I think she’s capable of adhering to that plan, but those are untested waters with her. She was a teenager under the same roof as my parents and grandmother through the worst of their spending habits, and I’m not sure what she learned.

She’s planning for about 65 guests, outdoor ceremony in a small outdoor amphitheater in the Rockies. The reception will be a few miles away (but definitely taxi distance, so no provision of transportation necessary) and will feature gourmet pizza, wine & beer, karaoke, iPod music, and a cash bar. She’s wonderfully creative and will make things very attractive and unusual, but it sounds kinda cheesy -sensible for her budget, but the prospect of no hors d’oeuvres and a cash bar isn’t sitting too well with us.

I stepped up with a $500 pre-wedding gift immediately – now that I’ve got two jobs on the go and am doing rather well at the new one, I can do that fairly painlessly. My mother said she’s hoping to put in $1000, but I don’t think that’ll happen because she just got a crapload of dental work. I let my brother know what I was doing because he likes to do the right thing, it’s just a matter of knowing what the right thing is.

The part I find awkward is that, with my dad gone, my mom is planning to approach her godfather (his youngest brother) for a contribution to the wedding costs. To be fair, he sort of offered with the other sister last year, but my mom said they were fine and didn’t need it. However, Starfish and her wonderful fiance (really decent, big-hearted guy who loves our entire family) could really use the help. Starfish has no real problem accepting big gifts and is very gracious about it, and I know my future brother-in-law will be floored.

So tell me, what few readers I have left after not blogging for 5 weeks…

Do you have any first- or second-hand experience of a “family financed” wedding? How did you (or the couple) feel about it?

I hate auto-renewals

I got notification a few weeks ago that my Norton Anti-Virus software was being auto-renewed, and a charge for $48 would appear on my card. I’m generally not a fan of auto-renewals and would have considered this an important exception to that rule of thumb, but…$48? I paid $30 the previous year.

I headed over to Amazon.com to check out their price: $23. I contacted Norton’s customer service to ask about the huge discrepancy, and after warning me against the possibility of a disreputable dealer, offered me preferential pricing of $40, a refund, or to make up the difference with an extension of the anti-virus subscription. I asked for the extension, which would amount to an additional 10-11 months, and they declined. I requested the refund and just this morning downloaded via the Amazon software & games downloader the shiny new McAfee Norton Anti-Virus 2010 version -

For $14.49 + tax, making it worth waiting until the last possible moment, though that was not deliberate.

Paid for with my Amazon gift card balance earned through Swagbucks (yes, that’s my referral link – it would make my day for someone to sign up through it!)

Now let’s hope my feeling of financial smugness doesn’t backfire on me with a virus attack!

Experiment: Travelling without my MasterCard

Earlier this week, I took a short trip to visit a friend near Orlando and decided that, since it was only 3 days and I’d be staying at her place, it would be a good opportunity to see how it felt leaving my credit card behind. I’ve done many trips without using my credit card – heck, if I’m out of the country, I go out of my way not to use it. But it was always in my pocket feeling a bit like a financial security blanket.

However, I decided that with all of this so-called credit card reform, this could soon turn into a rather expensive security blanket. So I packed 50% more cash than I thought I’d need and headed for the airport. I had a short connection through Charlotte, and didn’t mind that my ongoing flight was delayed an hour. I needed to recover from the worst turbulence I’ve ever experienced – it lasted 30-40 mins and my seat neighbor and I struck up a conversation (wow, a pro-choice Texan!) to distract ourselves: her from fear of dying, me from fear of hurling. I had my clammy head against the seat in front of me, barf bag open, convinced I was about to do something that would humble my image of myself as a savvy world traveller. Heck, I even told her about the sideline I won’t tell you all about. I was the last, very green-around-the-gills person off the plane.

Long story short, my onward flight was cancelled due to weather after a string of 30-minute postponements. Not really surprising, but airlines don’t comp hotel rooms when it’s weather-related (fair enough, really – I have no problem with this policy). Oh dear. Suddenly that extra 50% was required to pay for a $69 room that magically, through the power of tourist taxes and “booking fees”, cost $90.  Next morning, the breakfast room was abuzz with the news that we had been grounded because of a tornado – which hit the area less than 10 minutes after we touched down. I refused at that point to feel ticked off that my 2.5-day visit with my friend was cut to 1.5 days.

Now, when I boarded the first flight, I was one of the last 15 people on the plane and my carry-on wheelie had been taken from me on the ramp and checked. Guess what? No access to luggage. Great, no cell/laptop chargers, fresh undies, toothbrush. The phone was a huge concern, too. When I emailed my friend about what my new arrangements are, she made a BRILLIANT suggestion – ask at hotel reception to poke around the lost-and-found box and see if there was one for my phone to borrow. Well, the housekeeper tracked one down that was about to hit the give-away bin and now I have an extra phone charger. Yay!

When I arrived in Orlando, which wasn’t the original destination airport, despite assurances that my bag would be routed there, it instead ended up at the other airport. I didn’t trust them to deliver the bag that night, so I toddled off to Walmart for the ugliest pair of undies I could find, socks, t-shirt and toothbrush. I got a call from the luggage delivery folks while in Walmart, and decided not to buy the toothbrush but to go ahead with the other things just in case. SMART MOVE. When the bag was delivered, the back part of it had clearly been sitting in a puddle and I had no wearable socks, undies, t-shirts or pyjamas. I ended up borrowing the biggest t-shirt I have ever seen in my life (4XL) to sleep in and figured that $11 for a t-shirt, ugly canary yellow hipsters with blue plaid ribbon bits, and 5pr athletic ankle socks was very tolerable. Still, it made me nervous because I had to drop so much of my cash almost immediately.

It turned out that the gathering at my friend’s house was going to be at the house for all meals while I was there, so I didn’t spend anything else the whole trip. I had plenty of cash in my pocket when I got home. However, I was really nervous the whole time that we’d be doing expensive things and I’d have to bow out because I didn’t have the cash.

What I learned:

• There are other ways to obtain a free phone charger than shoplifting
• Fast food bbq pulled pork in Charlotte airport is AWESOME and fairly priced
• 4XL t-shirts make me feel petite
• Don’t think for one minute that Walmart is a good choice for sexy lingerie
• Oh, and bring your damn credit card!

So thanks, US Airways, for getting me there safely. Thanks, Wingate Hotel, for feeding me and supplying me with spare cords. Thanks, friend of friend, for handling my airport transfers and lending me the huge t-shirt. And thanks, friend, for inviting me down and introducing me to a whole lot of cool, smart people.

Will Healthcare “Reform” Go the Same Route as Credit Card “Reform”?

It bugs the hell out of me that a law was just passed that won’t take effect for years. The government just gave private corporations a four-year window to do whatever they can get away with. When they gave credit card companies a 1-2 year warning, look what they did to us – limits are halved, interest rates have been doubled, some folks had their monthly balance repayment % increase by 150% with 30 days’ notice, new fees are being created out of thin air, annual fees for responsible cardholders are set to make a return, fixed rate cards have been unilaterally turned into variable rate ones which will allow CC companies to continue some of their mercenary antics, and I’m sure there’s plenty of other sneaky-bastard manoeuvring that I’ve missed.

So I’m wondering, what can health insurance companies do to us over the next four years? I can think of the obvious (increasing rates, limiting coverage, etc), but hey, those credit card companies got diabolically inventive. You know that insurance companies are even more capable of – and unapologetic about – an inhuman yet somehow legal lack of ethics and fairness.

Care to share any predictions?

Would you do a job you were too embarrassed to admit to?

No, I’m not going to admit what my new sideline is, but since it affects my income, I can’t really brush over the fact that I have one. After all, this is me being financially proactive before I need to get reactive – there’s no other way I’m going to make my whole life policy premium in August without a few changes.

I make my own hours, which can be anywhere on the clock…can be 2 hours a week or 102 hours a week, or anywhere in between. It’s 100% legal and has nothing to do with massage, and my flair for the written word is my greatest marketing tool. Actually, it’s partially because of that flair that I was able to slot right in at the top of the food chain. Anyway, because of all the writing I need to do to get this fully up and running, my blog posts will be fairly brief over the next two weeks – brief, but hopefully entertaining.

So, have you ever done a job that you were too embarrassed to admit to? I would love to hear about it – and the best part is, you can just mark yourself as anonymous when leaving a comment. So far, thanks to Twitter, I’ve found someone who…

- designed a BDSM website
- made lunch trays for a prison catering service that was likely running drugs
- stocked sex mag/toy vending machines (in Tokyo)

Care to add to the list…?

ABC TV – Your Greed Is Showing

I watch a fair bit of lunchtime programming on ABC (Channel 7 in NYC), and all week they’ve been doing these heartfelt ads about how Cablevision has refused to make a reasonable $ offer for their programming. The ads beseech Cablevision customers to let their feelings be known to customer service, and also suggesting that they change cable providers asap if they don’t want to risk missing the Oscars this Sunday night.

Cablevision is not my provider, so it’s easy to say that I’m on their side because I’ll still get my daily dose of The View (the only thing I would miss on ABC). Um, if I didn’t have cable TV, I would get ABC – along with CBS, NBC, Fox, CW, PBS and MyNine – for free. So why should the cable company, and ultimately their customers, pay for content that is otherwise FREE? And really, you’d think ABC was being financially crippled by the current status quo. With 20 minutes of ads cluttering up every hour of viewing, I find their appeal less than genuine. In fact, I find it just plain GREEDY.

A Week of Retail Returns

I hate returning things. I always feel bad because it’s rarely the fault of the item – it was some form of mistake on my part (wrong size, wrong color, turns out I didn’t need it, etc), and here I am creating extra work for people. But then I found out about my aunt’s psychotic abuse of return policies and decided that my return needs were perfectly reasonable. I mean, this woman will buy 10 things and return 9 of them. At all stores where she shops, and every time she shops. The back of her SUV is filled with her rejects. I really don’t get it, because returning things is not my idea of a pleasant way to spend an afternoon.

Well, it started off badly – not Overstock‘s fault, but more my brother’s and mine. I got some curtains for Christmas to replace the ones that I left on the train and never recovered, but by the time Christmas came, I’d changed my color scheme plans. We celebrated the holidays at my brother’s place in Baltimore, and I left him in charge of the return so I wouldn’t have to lug them back to NYC on public transportation (which temporarily lost my luggage too!). I forgot to chase him up, but I don’t think it mattered – those curtains were deeply clearanced so a return wasn’t really an option. I figure he hasn’t decorated a couple of the rooms in his house yet, so they’ll be put to use.

In happier news, I discovered 2 weeks ago that Home Depot changed their return policy so that you can take an item bought online to a retail location and get the refund. I almost failed to return it in time though – I did it on the last possible day (Monday) of their 90-day return window because the city was too slushy for the 5 days before that. So I paid $2.25 for the subway – only one-way because I live just a 15-minute walk away – instead of $20 in return shipping.

This evening, I received an email from Sierra Trading Post informing me that they had received my return item and, since more than 6 months had passed since the purchase, the full $23.50 was issued as store credit/gift card. It took me a moment to figure out what this was…ohmygod, it was a present I had given my post office-averse newlywed sister for Christmas 2008. As in 15 months ago. This sister has randomly finds a sealed, addressed card she meant to send at some point in the past and mails it with a little note on the back of the envelope that she has no idea what’s inside. Usually, it’s a birthday card from 2-5 birthdays ago. With supplemental stamps on it because the rate had changed once or twice since.

Of course, the issue of curtains and rugs has yet to be addressed.  I’m just afraid of making more mistakes. Like that orange paint. That was a $40 mistake. Ouch.

Penny Experiment 2: $204 for $23

I visited my mother in New Jersey this weekend to check out her new TV, get bangs cut to hide my healing scar, increase her freezer space by 1 filet mignon steak, and indulge in coupon insanity on behalf of The Penny Experiment. Saving are based on full shelf price v. net cost after sale price, coupons and other deals ($Shelf/$Sale).

Transaction 1 – $78.94 for $8.91

$15.54/$11.94  -  6 boxes of Quaker Chewy Granola bars
$ 4.00 /$ 4.00  -  2 bottles of G2 Gatorade
$ 3.30 /$ 2.40  -  6 cans of Contadina tomato sauce
$ 4.38 /$ 3.58  -  2 tubs of Betty Crocker icing
$10.74/$5.28  -  6 Hamburger Helper
$ 9.57 /$5.00  -  3 boxes of Maypo oatmeal
$ 3.69 / $2.47  -  Pepperidge Farm Cinnamon Raisin Bread

- $2 Quaker granola bars (2 x $1/2)
- $2 Gatorade G2 (2 x .50/1 doubled)
- $2.20  Contadina (2 x .75/3 partially doubled…weird)
- $2 Betty Crocker icng (2 x .50/1 doubled)
- $3 Hamburger Helper (2 x .75/3 doubled)
- $3.30 Maypo oatmeal (3 x .55/1 doubled)
- $1.10 Pepperidge Farm bread (.55/1 doubled)
——————————————————————–
Full shelf price: $60.22 
Sale price: $34.67
After coupons:  $19.07
Register rebate:  $10 off your next order (Quaker/Gatorade deal)
Net cost:  $9.07
Savings:  85%

$ 9.96 / $ 4.96  -  4 Right Guard deodorant
$ 3.78 / $ 1.92  -  2 Halls cough drops
$ 4.98 / $ 1.96  -  2 Aquafresh toothpaste
————————————————————–
$18.72 / $8.84
- $4 Right Guard (2 x $2/2)
- $2 Halls (2 x .50/1 doubled)
- $3 Aquafresh (2 x .75/1 doubled

Full shelf price: $18.72
Sale price: $8.84
Coupons:  $9
Savings:  100%

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Transaction 2:  $32.09 for $3.39

$17.34 / $8.00  -  6 jars Ragu sauce
$  4.79 / $2.99  -  1 Hellmann’s mayonnaise
$  9.96 / $5.00  -  4 bottles of Pompeian vinegar & cooking wine

- $3.60 Ragu (3 x .60/2 doubled)
- $1.00 Hellmann’s
——————————————————————————–
Full price:  $32.09
Sale price:  $15.99
After coupons:  $11.39
Register rebates:  $5 off next order (Pompeian) & $3 off next order (Unilever)
Net cost:  $3.39
Saved:  89.5%

==========================================================

Transaction 3:  $22.32 for $2.16

$9.16 / $8.00  -  4 Skippy Peanut Butter
$13.16 / $7.96  -  4 Wishbone salad dressing

- $4.80 Skippy PB (4 x .60/1 doubled)
- $6.00 Wishbone (4 x .75/1 doubled)
——————————————————
Full price: $22.32
Sale price:  $15.96
After coupons:  $5.16
Register rebates:  $3 off your next order
Net cost:  $2.16
Saved:  91.4%

===========================================================

Transaction 4:  $21.33 for $3.66

$ 3.99 / $ 2.49  -  Lipton 100ct tea bags
$17.34 / $8.00 – 6 jars of Ragu

- $1.20 Lipton (.60/1 doubled)
- $3.60 Ragu (.60/2 doubled)
—————————————————-
Full price: $21.33
Sale price: $10.46
After coupons: $6.66
Register rebate: $3
Net cost:  $3.66
Saved:  83%

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Transactions 5 & 6 combined: $20.03 for $1.62

$ 5.18 / $3.00  -  2 Krusteaz pancake mix
$ 4.98 / $2.48  -  2 pints of Coffee-Mate creamer
$ 9.87 / $5.64  -  3 x 1-lb packs Butterball 93% lean ground turkey

- $2 Krusteaz (2 x .50/1 doubled)
- $3 Coffee-Mate (2 x .75/1 doubled)
- $4.50  Butterball ground turkey (3 x .75/1)
————————————————————
Full price:  $20.03
Sale price:  $11.12
After coupons:  $1.62
Saved:  92%

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Transaction 7 (Target):  $29.90 for $3.30

$29.90 / $15.30  -  10 x $1.53 Keebler cookies
- $2.00 ($1/3 x 2, Target website)
———————————————————–
Full price:  $29.90
Sale price after coupons:  $13.30
Rewards earned:  $10 Target gift cards
Net cost:  $3.30
Saved:  89%

GRAND TOTAL:  $204.57 for $23.04