Selling graduate textbooks

Published in July 29th, 2008

If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!Once upon a time I realized that limited edition graduate texts in myField might go out of print some day and I decided to establish my own “little” library by buying them before they went out of print. In [...]

Buying the best from the outset

Published in July 27th, 2008

Posted by Jacob in Philosophy, Strategy

6 Comments

When delving into a new endeavor (house owner, car, sport, computer, … ) it is often recommended to buy a “beginner” version or a “starter unit”. The idea, as it goes, is to see if one is “really” into this new activity before committing a lot of money. Now, ab initio this sounds a good [...]

Using baking soda for brushing teeth

Published in July 25th, 2008

Posted by Jacob in Health, How to

12 Comments

I have started to use baking soda to brush my teeth (again). I don’t do this to save money on toothpaste, which is cheap and often free thanks to the lunacy of coupon clipping (this is the only place where we do this). Rather, I do it to save money on the dentist, who is [...]

Living in a garbage truck

Published in July 23rd, 2008

Posted by Jacob in cost of living, household

6 Comments

Someone turned a garbage truck into a small apartment. While this looks nice and expensive in a involuntarily ironic kind of way much like a $7000 track bike turned commuter, check out the cabinets in the kitchen. Genius!
I have not made anything out of wood since that suspension bridge model in the 6th grade (always [...]

I revised my blogroll

Published in July 23rd, 2008

Posted by Jacob in announcements, blogging

3 Comments

Check it out in the lower right. I try to keep the blogroll short and relevant to this site. I also try to keep it somewhat representative of the blogs I actually read on a daily basis (hence blogroll). Several blogs have not been updated for a long time, and since I’m stupendously busy(**) several [...]

Money for nothing and the shirts for free

Published in July 22nd, 2008

Posted by Jacob in How to

4 Comments

I have noticed that there is a limited number of dominant freecyclers in my group (find your local group by going to freecycle.org) so I have started to pick up cues on who wants what. If someone offers something, then rather than just picking it up for free, I will usually make an offer to [...]

Lately I have been buying stocks like crazy…

Published in July 21st, 2008

Posted by Jacob in financial independence, investments

11 Comments

…in fact, looking over my credit card statement, where I put all my “frivolous” expenses, I can see that except for food, etc. it’s been more than two months since I bought anything but stocks. The reason is that yields are finally reasonably in the 3-5% range compared to the depressed range resulting from the [...]

Think Big, Basically and Simply.

Published in July 18th, 2008

Posted by Jacob in fitness

No Comments

I’m currently reading Thoughts of a Philosophical Fighter Pilot by Jim Stockdale (again). I’m not quite finished yet, but the book is chocked full of wisdom that is applicable to [my] life once the translation between military life and civilian life is made. In his essay on “climbing the pyramids of naval aviation” he emphasizes [...]

With record oil prices is it time to buy winter clothes?

Published in July 16th, 2008

Posted by Jacob in budgeting

5 Comments

The reason our utilities are so low is due to a) We live in CA and b) We keep the thermostat set really low or really high. Last winter, we did our first season together without any heating(*). It was my second season without any heat having gone “heating-less” for a winter in a central [...]

Who needs a college degree anyway?

Published in July 14th, 2008

Posted by Jacob in Philosophy

21 Comments

I think that in many cases a college degree is a waste of money! I do believe that university educations should only be for a select few. In particular I do not believe that sending everybody to college will make us collectively smarter. Consequently, I do not believe that college degrees will make our society [...]

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