Canadian Personal Finance Blog

Archive for December 20th, 2007

As a middle aged man (you lookin‘ at my gut? I’m workin‘ on it!), I have sore muscles most days, but after attempting to keep up with a bunch of 14 year old girls, I have real pain from some simple exercise (and I didn’t work very hard either). My house goes through Ibuprofen very quickly, due to many reasons but my lack of exercise is one of them.

Do I buy Advil or Motrin? No, I tend to buy the “No Name Generic” versions of these kind of drugs because most of the time they are much cheaper than the “Name Brand” versions of these drugs. Cheaper is fine by me, since the active part of the medication is what I care about. Generics if they work are the right choice in this area.

Canadians Using Less Energy

Is it due to global warming? Don’t think that is the only reason.

Canada’s demand for energy fell by 2.0% in 2006, thanks to declining consumption in the nation’s industrial, transportation, residential and commercial sectors.

Interesting, but we shall see whether this trend continues too.

Snow is Expensive

The City of Ottawa’s snow budget is evidently out of control with this year’s early and heavy snow falls. As usual short sighted planning has caused budget planners to assume that Ottawa wouldn’t get a lot of snow and now we are going to pay the price (as tax payers). What is worse is that all this snow is stopping the Rideau Canal from being available for skating for Christmas day as well!

Say Thanks to Volunteers (especially at this time of the year)

At Christmas time there is an over indulgence in buying presents for many people (in my opinion), however, I think now is the best time to say Thank You in some fashion to the volunteers that touch your lives. Who do I mean? In my life here are some of the amazing volunteers that touch my life and my kids’ lives:

• Coaches (I realize some hockey coaches get paid, but the coaches that touch my kids’ lives don’t get paid much (maybe expenses)).
• Church volunteers (the folks who decorate the Church at Christmas for example)

You don’t have to necessarily buy them a gift, maybe all you have to do is say Thank You to them, and tell them you appreciate their good works?