Monthly Archives: March 2009

Cheap Ways To Extend Your Computer Life

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We’ve all had the itch for a new computer. I work with computers, so I know how quickly technology changes. With that comes the ever-present knowledge that today’s technology will become tomorrow’s obsolete dinosaur.

My computer is now four years old, and I have noticed it slowing down. Not just because it is slow compared to other computers, but because that’s what computers do over time, especially if you run Microsoft Windows.

There are some good ways to put the itch to rest for awhile. None of these will get you to where your computer compares to the latest and greatest, but they can get you noticeable improvement over what you have today.

  • Defrag - Most computers have a tool where you can defragment the drive. The operating systems are lazy and will just place data on the drive any old place it can. Over time, this leads to the data being spread out. The computer runs better when the data is on one part of the drive, and the Defrag tool can assist you with this. Note: If you haven’t run defrag in a while, you may want to run it a few times in a row to get things organized.
  • Spyware and Virus Removal - Many people have programs to check for viruses and spyware, but do you really know if they’re working? Check into them to make sure that they have the latest definition files, so that it recognizes the latest attacks. Make sure to do a full system scan if you’re not sure that it runs regularly. You’d be surprised what little buggers might be on your computer slowing them down.
  • Temporary Files - Most programs are supposed to clean themselves up but many do not. Most programs will create files in the system TEMP folder, which is normally under C:Documents and Settings%USERNAME%Local SettingsTemp. Find that through ‘My Computer’ and clean it up. I typically go after anything older than a month, which should help minimize the risk that you’ll delete anything important. Tip: Do this before you defrag.
  • Add memory - My computer shipped with 512MB of RAM. Good at the time, but not so much now. I recently added 2GB to bring it to 2.5GB total, and it’s helped. Memory is pretty cheap. It cost $20 to add that amount to my computer.
  • Start from scratch - After awhile, it might just make sense to start from scratch. You probably want to be pretty savvy or know someone that is, but most computers come with a system disk that will let you re-create it as it was ‘out of the box’. There’s a lot of work involved in getting it up to where it needs to be. You need to re-install any programs. You have to re-create your settings. You need to install all security updates that have come out since then, which can be daunting. But, this is probably worth around the three year mark. Tip: The ideal way to do this is to purchase a new hard drive and start from scratch on that one. You can still keep your old one plugged in and boot to either one. That way, it’s much easier to transport your ’stuff’ over, and it also gives you the flexibility to log into your ‘older’ system if need be.

There are a lot of other things you can do, but this is a few things that might help extend your computer life. In this day where we’re holding onto things longer (a good idea), hopefully this helps get you started.

Happy computing!

Watching TV For Free With Hulu

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I have to admit, I’ve become a pretty big fan of Hulu.com, the site where you can watch many TV programs or movies online without breaking the law. I had been watching it for various programs that were older or to see if I wanted to perhaps watch a particular show that I’d never gotten into on first run.

However, it really came in handy the past two weeks with one of my favorite shows: The Office.

I normally have my DVR record The Office, but for the last two weeks it didn’t work out. Two weeks ago, for whatever reason, the DVR didn’t think it was a ‘new’ episode. As it’s only set to record new episodes only (as to avoid it recording re-runs or syndication versions of shows, which would quickly fill up the machine), it skipped the recording.

Last week, I interrupted the recording because I was watching the NCAA tournament game (University of Michigan was playing) and it tried to record the two scheduled recordings: Grey’s Anatomy and The Office. I told it to stop recording The Office so that I could continue watching the game.

No fear, I was able to watch both shows on Hulu. Granted, my office chair isn’t as comfortable as the couch or bed that you can normally watch TV in front of, but it’s really not bad. You have to watch less than a minute of commercials on Hulu, which is less than if you watched it on TV real time, and still less time than even fast forwarding through the commercials on the DVR.

I applaud NBC and other networks for participating in Hulu. It’s nice to see companies realizing that the traditional ways of reaching people are not the only ways.

Oh, and by the way, it was worth interrupting the show. Michigan won! (Though unfortunately, they lost the next game).

Expenses For Maternity Clothes Haven’t Been Too Bad

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Danielle asked how we’ve managed with the cost of maternity clothes for my wife during her pregnancy.

The answer: Not too bad.

Quite honestly, my wife didn’t start showing until about the fifth month, and only just recently has been to the point where her regular shirts don’t fit her anymore. She’s just now entering month eight.

She is taller, so the way the midwife explained is that the baby has more room to grow ‘up and down’ where with shorter women, they have no choice but to push the belly out.

What’s been lucky for us on top of that is that my wife has a smaller waist, and she hasn’t put on a lot of weight on her hips or butt, so she was able to wear a lot of the pants. She has bought a pair of maternity jeans, and was also wearing stretchy pants, but outside of that, we have been pretty lucky. She did use the ‘Belly Band’, available at maternity stores, which basically is a piece of spandex that grips the pants and belly and holds everything in place, allowing you to leave jeans or pants unbuttoned. It’s totally not obvious, and by the design, it just looks like a t-shirt hanging down.

When we did buy clothes, my wife has been fantastic about hunting down sales. We shopped a lot at Kohl’s, and a few other stores, and rarely bought anything that wasn’t on sale or that we didn’t have a coupon for.

I don’t have an exact dollar amount on maternity clothes spent so far, but I know I had thought it would be around $500, and it has been nowhere near that, so all in all, we’ve been pleasantly surprised!

Updates on Baby Beagle

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Baby Beagle is less than two months away according to our doctor! Wow, how time has absolutely flown.

Scary and wonderful at the same time!

Anyways, some of the things we’ve done over the last few months:

  • Purchased our baby furniture – We ordered baby furniture from Buy Buy Baby, who also owns Bed, Bath & Beyond, so we were able to use 20% off coupons for all of our furniture. Added bonus: When the salesman put the order in on the computer, the prices were about 10% less than what they were labeled on the sale prices. Very pleasant surprise that saved us a little extra
  • Registered for showers – Both of our mom’s have generously offered to each throw us a shower, so we registered for all the stuff we thought we’d need, and then some!
  • Painted the nursery – We have a four bedroom house, so we had the luxury of each having an office. With the baby on the way, we knew it was time to combine offices. So, we had to move all of our stuff together, which also made us clean out and throw out a TON of stuff. That’s a good thing, and it’s amazing how much stuff you gather in just a year and a half (which is how long we’ve lived in our house). After that was done, we re-painted the room (green on three walls and green and brown stripes on the fourth wall), added some closet shelving and also added a ceiling fan (all with the help of my father-in-law).
  • Lived financially as if my wife wasn’t working – Today was my wife’s last day, actually, but we’ve been getting our financial business in order well in advance. I’ve leveled a lot of our monthly expenses so that there aren’t as many peaks and valleys, and we’ve been cutting back my wife’s paychecks to where we automatically put the money somewhere other than our bank account, so that we’re prepared once the paychecks stopped. This has involved us changing a lot of spending habits, namely eating out, buying clothes, and entertainment. We’ve spent the last two months living basically as if my wife wasn’t bringing home an income, so now that she’s not going to be, it won’t be as daunting.
  • Gone through most of the childbirth classes – Our instructor runs a class that meets once a week for three weeks. We’ve completed two weeks and will wrap up next Monday. It’s been an ‘eye-opening’ experience especially since they show you videos and all. Yikes! But, it’s taught us a lot and we’re feeling much more prepared about a lot of things.

All in all, we’re getting ready, and even if we weren’t, it’s happening regardless!

Checking Back In With A Net Worth Update

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It’s been awhile since I’ve posted and I apologize for the delay. But, I’m happy to report that the project I’ve been working on at work has gone very well. I can’t share too many details because of confidentiality agreemens, but I’ll just leave it that it’s been one of the most gratifying projects I’ve worked on in my career, and I’m proud to have been on such a great project.

Anyways, now that we’re back I’ll share the net worth update for March 2009.

As you remember, February was pretty brutal month in the stock market, and therefore the net worth update was what I had expected: Not good.

Overall, our assets dropped 2.33% in value, but on the plus side, the debt we carry dropped by 0.81%. This was thanks largely in part to an ‘early’ income tax refund that a good portion of which was applied to debt.

What happened was that after I changed my filing status from single to married, I started getting a lot more take home pay. I took that and stuck it in an earmark of our savings account titled ‘2008 Tax Refund’. Now that I’m reasonably sure that our actual tax preperation will give us a refund, I simply took that money and applied it as if we’d gotten a full check from the government.

When we get our real check, we’ll have a bit more to apply to debt as well.

But, anyways, overall our net worth fell 5.0% for the month. Not good but given the free fall that took place in the stock market, I’m not too worried and think we’re headed on the right track, especially given the fact that we’ll soon be losing my wife’s income since tomorrow is her last day!

More on that as we continue to resume regular posting!!!!!

My Wife Turned In Her Resignation Letter

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Yesterday, my wife turned in her letter of resignation. She will be working until Friday, March 20th.

After that, she will be getting ready to have our first baby, and after the baby is born, she will be staying at home to take care of the baby.

We have been preparing financially for this for quite some time, but it’s still a big and a scary step!

Here are some of the financial preparations we’ve made in the meantime:

  • Talked about it a LONG time ago – We had talked about this even before we got married, and were in agreement that once we started our family, Mrs. Beagle would stay at home. Her job is not that high paying, and this made it easier, because the cost of child care would have made the net take home pay almost nothing.
  • Talked about it again and again – After we found out we were pregnant, and then along the way with the economic downturn, we’ve talked about it again. Even though things aren’t as rosy as they were, we still feel comfortable with the decision.
  • Paid down debt – We’ve focused on paying down debt since getting married in September 2007, and even before. We paid off a car loan, and have paid over one-third of outstanding student loans in a year and a half. It would have been nice to been a little further along (the goal had been for 60% of the student loans to be gone, but we’ll be about 15% short), but we’re still in good shape.
  • Bumped up savings – I’ve leveled out some of our monthly expenses, and also bumped up some savings just so we have a good cushion and have savings for long term purchases, such as home repairs, auto repairs, and replacement automobiles.
  • Saved for baby needs – We had started putting aside money for things that we needed even before trying to get pregnant. So, when it came time for baby furniture, we had some money stashed away. Our parents are generously throwing us showers, so hopefully the cost of actually equipping the baby with everything won’t be too shocking, but I have some money allocated from our upcoming tax refund just in case

One thing I still need to spend some time on is saving for the college education of our baby. We’ve decided that we will start saving once the baby is born, and this will carry through for future babies that we might have as well. I know that we’ll be putting money aside for this purpose, but I need to get my ducks in a row as far as knowing the best 529 plan and how to get started.

Even with that, I think we’re in good shape and we’re looking forward to this next (and many upcoming) chapter.