An hour of my Sundays are reserved for comings and goings of money; the weekly ritual includes a scouring of online banking, credit card, and investment websites, plus a review of my expenditures for the week. Besides the occasional curse at the bear market draining my retirement funds, the process is tedious and about as interesting as this sentence.
Imagine the wildest adventure possible with a copy of Microsoft Money, a directory of Firefox bookmarks, and a handful of receipts, bank statements, and bills. Tone down the explosions a bit and you’ve got my manual transaction machine of an evening.
I’ve been slowly moving my finances online, though, with pleasant results once I got past the fear of entrusting an unknown entity with my numbers. Research and due diligence helps alleviate some of those fears; my experience with these sites has been surreal and I’d recommend anyone looking to clarify or define their financial landscape to check out some of the free tools available online.
It’s been awhile since I impulsively bought an iPod touch and subsequently exchanged it for an iPhone. After carrying it around in my pocket for two months, I feel like I can finally give an honest assessment on its usefulness and value. ()
A few months ago, I decided to shed the pounds put on whilst enjoying Factset’s free lunches; my hefty progress resembled that of my freshmen 15 (), and it took a long hard look in the mirror to convince myself my “holiday weight” was neither temporary or holiday-related.
I reasoned I didn’t need to go on a formal diet when perhaps a few minutes of exercise a day coupled with a reduction in food intake would be sufficient. That said, most fad diets offer a way to rid the junk with immediate results while maintaining minimal effort and allowing for desirable foods, but I’ve noticed while it seems to work initially (the dieter is in a focused, weight-shedding mental state), results tampered off and the dieter goes through periods of rapid weight loss and gain (). Plus, those crazy numbers advertised in diets only applied to the morbidly obese anyway.