The Chronic Consumer

I have a good friend who decided to relocate to London a couple years ago to teach in the public school system over there. She doesn’t regret her decision at all, but there are definitely some things that she misses from home — especially football. Of course when you mention football to a Londoner, they automatically think of soccer, so you can bet it’s nearly impossible to find NFL games to watch over there.

Thankfully, Yahoo Sports stepped up last year and started offering something called NFL GamePass, a program that allows subscribers to watch NFL games during the regular season. This service is only available outside North America and U.S. territories; within those regions, we have to pony up for DirecTV in order to watch non-local games.

Anyway, with GamePass you can watch any matchup via streaming video online. You can watch the games live as they air, or you can access archived games for up to 48 hours after the games end.

The service is extremely pricey, which could be an obstacle for a few people, but I’m sure any true football fan wouldn’t blink at the cost. Heck, I spent the entire 2002 season in another country without satellite TV and I gladly would have paid $500 or more to be able to watch the my favorite team every week. Football withdrawal is tough!!

GamePass costs a whopping $279.99 for all 17 weeks of the regular season. This full membership gives you access to every game that’s played, as well as the archives (for 48hrs) and a few special “Inside the NFL”- type programs. If you sign up before September 1, you can get an Early Bird price of $239.99, which is a nice $40 savings.

Other options include the Follow Your Team Pass, which allows you to view one game per week during the regular season (your choice), and the Weekly Pass, which allows you to purchase single-week access. The Follow Your Team Pass costs $199.99 and the Weekly Pass costs $19.99. Clearly, the full membership is the best deal, especially if you get in for the Early Bird special.

I really wish something like this had been available back when I needed it! If you know someone who’s going to be stuck out of the country for the football season, be sure to tell them about Yahoo’s new NFL GamePass!

My husband and I both love watching DVDs on our new LCD flat-panel television. We rent at least 3-4 new movies every single week, so there’s rarely a night that we’re not kicked back in front of the TV checking out the latest flicks.

Since we spend so much time watching movies, we’re slowly trying to buy equipment and accessories that will enhance our viewing experience. For example, we’ve got a nice set of surround-sound speakers on order, and we’re working on getting a nicer entertainment center to house our TV, DVR, video games, and so forth. Further down the road, we’d also like to get some home theater seating (or at the very least, some regular recliners) for the room. Once everything is set up, we’ll probably never leave the house!

I order a lot of things from Amazon.com and I always end up getting special coupon offers in my packages. When my last box arrived, I opened it up to find an offer for a bunch of free samples from VistaPrint.com. These products include rubber stamps (1 free), business cards (250 free), sticky notes (1 pad free), return address labels (140 free), magnets (25 free), and standard postcards (100 free).

There’s a catch, of course: you have to pay for shipping and processing fees, as well as for any customization beyond the basics. So for example, if you want to add a color logo to the business cards, you’d have to pay extra for it.

Still, if you don’t mind going for the bare-bones products, you can come out ahead here. For example, you can get a rubber stamp with three lines of text on it (like your return address) and pay just a couple bucks for shipping.

Anyway, visit the following page to check out all the free offers:

www.vistaprint.com/amazon323

As you can tell from my previous posts on this blog, I mostly talk about buying small-ticket items that offer little in the way of “real” value to my life — aside from any entertainment value or emotional satisfaction they bring. But just because my focus here is on small purchases, that doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten all about significant purchases such as houses, cars, and real estate. These types of investments have their place in my life as well, but since the transactions happen so infrequently, there’s usually not a whole lot to talk about.

Nevertheless, I do want to remind you that sometimes it’s really in your best interest to save up all your pennies, stop buying all the fun stuff, and instead shell out for something that will appreciate in value the longer you hold onto it. For example, can you imagine if you had invested in Branson real estate back in the mid-1980′s, right before that city became one of the top tourist destinations in the country? You’d be sitting on a gold mine today for sure! Those are the kinds of investments you have to look out for, and you have to make sure you have enough money to jump on any good deals that arise.

So while I’m always quick to advocate having fun with your money, there are times when you need to make more serious purchases as well. Just a word to the wise!

My husband and I travel a lot, so it’s not surprising that we have a lot of travel accessories around the house. I don’t mean just the essentials, like luggage, laptop cases, and toiletry kits here. No, I’m a total sucker for travel-related gadgets, like fold-up alarm clocks, mini water purifiers, portable book lights, etc., and can’t resist buying those kinds of items. I even have a whole assortment of These products may sound a bit hokey to you, but as long as I use them when I go on vacation, I don’t feel guilty about buying them.

My favorite gadget of all has to be my electronic translator that gives me useful phrases in seven different languages and has a currency conversion tool that I’ve come to rely on immensely.

Do you have a favorite travel accessory? If so, let me know what it is. I’ll probably end up buying it!!

I was alerted today of two different discounts over at BunchesofBooks.com, which is a site where you can find cheap college textbooks. I thought these would fit in well with the last post I wrote about how to save money on school books. Both of these coupon codes are valid only until August 31, 2007, so you’ll have to order within the next two weeks to use them.

The first one is for 10% off on orders of $50 or more, and the code is TAKE10, which you enter at checkout.

The second is for free standard shipping on orders of $25 or more, and the code is SHIPFREE. Again, enter that at checkout and the discount will be applied.

I’m not sure if both codes can be used on the same order, so you’ll have to check that out on your own.

Happy shopping!!

Any college student out there will tell you that buying textbooks for the new semester is one of the worst things about school life. Texts these days often cost more than $100 each, which means you could easily spend more than $500 per semester if you’re taking a full class load. Everyone wants to save money on books, but that’s often easier said than done, especially if you don’t know where to look for texts. Here are some tips:

• Avoid buying texts from the campus bookstore at all costs! Instead, just go there to verify the titles, editions, ISBNs, and cover art of the books you’re going to need for the semester. This info will come in handy later on.
• Next, start searching online for your books. In addition to Amazon.com and BN.com, be sure to check discount textbook sites like CheapestTextbooks.com as well.
• Don’t forget about swap sites like Craigslist or even auction sites like eBay. Just remember that when dealing with individuals, you might get burned on the transaction, so make sure you perform due diligence before sending money.
• Don’t buy anything that you can get for free. If you’re taking a literature course, chances are you can find almost every title on your syllabus at the school library. Failing that, you can download out-of-copyright works for free from Bartleby.com or Project Gutenberg.

You’ll obviously never be able to eliminate all college textbook expenses, but you can get them under control by following a few simple tips!

My kitchen is an embarrassment in so many different ways, from the old appliances to the mismatched dinnerware to the unsightly linoleum flooring. The worst part of all has to be my cookware, which mostly consists of pieces I took from my mom when I first moved out of her house 12 years ago. The stuff wasn’t new then, and now it’s just barely even usable. That’s why I have to put new cookware on my Wish List.

My husband and I have a hard time buying household items that we actually need, so I’m not sure how long it will take us to get some cookware. When we finally do, I think it would be best to buy a full set of berndes cookware or another top brand so we can be sure that the pots, pans, and skillets will last a good, long time.