Canadian Personal Finance Blog

Archive for the ‘Green’ Category

For those of you saying, “Christmas starts too early every year“, I agree, the real start to the season (if you want to call it Christmas) should be Advent, and this past Sunday was the first Sunday in Advent, so Happy Advent! For those of you who wish to call this “The Holiday Season”, then start whenever you want, since that season seems to start in September.

Random Thoughts: Tiger by the tail

Given Tigers Woods’ dalliances and driving seems to have filled the news this week, I figured that title would work as well for me. Some ask, “How can he do that, he has so much money”, maybe it’s because he has so much money that he thinks he can do that, is the answer. Rich people make just as stupid decisions as we working poor, just they have a lot more money to make those decisions with (thus they can be much more spectacular and interesting to read about).

• Michael James attempts to tackle the interesting question about Financial Advisor Self-Regulation and whether Fraud is really the problem here.
• Preet at WhereDoesAllMyMoneyGo gets into the festive Advent mood by offering a Reader Appreciation: iPod Touch Giveaway! go over and leave a comment to register.
• Canadian Capitalist points out The Institute for Financial Learning Ponzi Scheme which is just a sinister way to steal money from folks.
• Larry MacDonald points out another thing that happens during Advent, stock sell offs where you might go Bargain Hunting and Tax-loss selling are there other bargains out there?
• Gail Vaz-Oxlade points out that there is no piety in being House Poor and she gives you some hints on how not to end up that way.
• The Four Pillars discusses the interesting points of Threats as a Negotiation Strategy , which is a methodology I have used in the past, but you must be willing to follow through with your bluff/threat or you may be very unhappy with the results.
• Promod at Riscario Insider gives a useful primer on What happens during a paramedical exam for life insurance his best point is act like you are on the witness stand and do NOT yak with the person doing the exam!
• Free at 45 points out in the Green Spot: What’s Lighting Up Your Tree I put up lights in my office, hopefully I won’t get in trouble for it.

Enjoy the Advent season!

A preliminary report from the City of Ottawa garbage folks has floated the idea of removing the Garbage Collection portion of the City Taxes and turn it into a user fee. With this move City Taxes will drop by $86 which sounds like a nice idea, however, the User Fee for Garbage is slated to be $195 per household which is about a 115% increase in the cost of paying for Garbage in Ottawa.

How is this possible? Let’s look a little closer:

• $86 is our original garbage fee, so we’ll keep that
• $41 fee for the black and blue box program in place (say that 5 times fast)
• $68 for the new Green Bin program for organics and compost and such

Now that is an expensive program. If you are a rural Ottawa person you won’t have to pay for the Green Bins, since you won’t have them, but you’ll still have your garbage fee go up by around 50%.

My suspicion is that garbage collection will become more like water and sewers and will become a bi-monthly billed program, which will then spiral in price to match the cost of garbage collection.

Do I have any other options here? No, I can’t opt out, I can’t claim I don’t use the service, so I must pay, as must my neighbours.

Care to complain? November 10th is your day.  Read the briefing notes, very interesting accounting discussions there.

Happy Guy Fawkes Day

For those with any UK heritage it is, in fact, Guy Fawkes day today. Hopefully there aren’t any more gunpowder plots out there!

There is Gold in them thar Cow Plops!!!

At least that is what this National Film Board short seems to suggest, where an inventor has come up with a good way to extract methane from cow poo, which is usable with cars and such.

The description of the short does it justice:

This short film presents Mr. Bate, an inventor who discovers a substitute for gasoline in barnyard manure. Even though he fits the classic mould of single-minded know-how and practical dreamer, his discovery is tried and tested. He demonstrates how his home-made digester does turn manure into potent methane gas that powers his auto. And for good measure, he demonstrates his latest sustainable invention – a bicycle powered by the bumps on the road.

Now that is what I call a really GREEN solution to a problem, given we need cows anyhow, why not use their DUNG for fun?

Mass Transit?

That is one of the big questions I have to think about given my new appointment.

In my previous job, there really was no reason to take the bus because:

• It took 4 times the time to take the bus as it did in a car
• The Bus did not run often enough and did not cover the times I might need to come and go to work
• Parking for my car was free

Variable Changes

With my new position the financial variables have changed and it now I might again look at the transit equation again:

• Parking now costs money no matter where I put my car (varying costs but none are very cheap).
• The amount of time to get to work by car is now only 1/2 the estimated bus time
• The transit tax write off comes into the equation as well

To bus or not to bus, that will be the question, but for now I will drive.

Biking?

That is another interesting point to consider for this trip. Straight biking to work while excellent for the health can be dangerous in traffic (some of the route has bike paths but not all of it), and I am not sure whether there are showers at work (I do sweat a great deal). The electronic bike is an interesting idea I have been looking at, but whether I can recharge at work is another interesting question to think about.

Car Pooling?

I do know someone at my new job who I might be able to car pool with, which might be an excellent choice as well. I have previously car pooled which works well if the people car pooling all work the same hours, which can be tricky, but the more interesting question is how do you arrange to compensate folks for car pools? Anybody with any ideas, please feel free to post them.

So we have spent the long weekend moving, and adding furniture to our basement but are also attempting to clean out some of the clutter that has accumulated over the past 10 years.

A few things that I have learned:

• If you find a box that has not been opened ( you can tell because it has the packing tape from your move on the top ), do NOT open it if you are attempting to de-clutter. As soon as you open a box it will cause you to rationalize why you kept it and it simply will create more clutter (at a 6:1 ratio (i.e. 6 new boxes will be created from this one box)). You can peek inside to make sure it isn’t a box of gold, but if you look closely you are finished!
• There are treasures in your basement, for charitable organizations:
  • I found 3 old sets of glasses, that I will take to my church (they recycle them and someone else will get glasses cheaper or free).
  • My old TV (20 years old and allegedly didn’t get channels 2-13 any more) will go to the Salvation Army and not to the landfill site. This is supposed to be free, I will report on whether that happens.
  • A great deal of arts and crafts supplies that will go to the Salvation Army as well, hopefully they can make some money on that.
  • A large amount of baby clothing and paraphernalia that is being donated to the next generation in my wife’s family.
• Shelves can be useful for storage, as long as it is for storage and not clutter, we shall see what comes of these shelves, but they need to be attached to the wall (given my son will most likely climb them some time very soon).

The spiders that lived in my basement are very upset (they now live in the garage thanks to a vacuum blitz as well), but in the name of de-cluttering some insects must be moved.

I spoke with another person who de-cluttered, but they did so after their basement flooded, and they had to throw out a great deal of treasures because they were ruined. My advice would be to de-clutter now, and don’t let mother nature or the forces of nature force you to do it.

During Hard Times Beer Sells

That seems to be the message, given that Molson Coors profits doubled in the second quarter of ‘09. During hard times more folks tend to buy their liquor and drink it at home, this seems to prove this Financial Lemma.  Of course even cheaper folks like me search for the cheapest beer (or even better drink their friends beer).