Monday, July 27, 2009

The Library

So, I realized I have been spending way too much money on books. I don't desire to keep many books after I read them, but I do enjoy passing them onto my friends. I always like to have a good book to read onhand, especially with how much time I sit waiting on trains to pass. I have not invested in a Kindle or any other kindof book reader yet, so I am still reading traditional books. I do believe I would use a Kindle if I had one, but not exclusively by any means. Until last week, I have probably been to a public library a handful of times since high school and that was probably for emergency Internet access or something, not to check out books. (Of course in college I had to use the college library but that was a requirement!)

So, last week I got myself a library card. Libraries are so much more user friendly than what I was used to growing up. You can pick out the books you want online and have them sent to the library that you prefer to pick them up at. You can also put limitless books on hold and they will come to the library of your liking. The Live Oak Library System where I live covers libraries in 3 counties - Liberty, Effingham, and Chatham County where I live and work. I have already exceeded the number of books I can check out for my first 3 weeks, so I am also using Brandon's library card. The books are all in surprisingly fantastic condition! Out of the last five books, I would not think any of them had been previously read. Two of them were books that were going to be expensive to buy because they are not printed in the U.S. The books were by a British author, Madeline Wickham, who is known for the stuff she has written and published in the United States under the name Sophie Kinsella. Sophie Kinsella wrote the "Shopaholic" series, which one of the books was recently made into a movie. The biggest inconvenience is that libraries have had to cut back on their hours due to lack of funding. The libraries have hours that vary per day and are not even open every day. Luckily, I have a library near my work which I can go to 4 days per week after lunchtime, so I do this on my lunch break. There are not too many places to go around here, so this is kindof exciting for now.

If anybody has read a good book lately, please let me know!

Friday, July 24, 2009

Discover Card

This is directed to people who have a Discover card, or are interested in getting one and like to shop!

You can even get different pictures on your Discover card and I have an adorable beagle on mine that I get compliments on weekly when I use my credit card for purchases.

I definitely like to shop, but at the same time I can be quite frugal because I have to save money in some aspects of my life so I can afford the luxuries that I enjoy.

ShopDiscover is a great opportunity for anybody who has a Discover card. It is a way for cardholders to save money when making purchases from a variety of retailers. You can receive anywhere from 5 – 20% cashback on the purchases you make from these sites.
I have used this in the past to get an extra percentage cash back. Then, I have used this money to turnaround and use it towards a cashback gift card, so I can do more shopping.

Websites that are linked to Shop Discover that offer additional discounts include a variety of retail shops from Ulta, Gap, magazines.com, Fossil, and Banana Republic to name a few.

Discover even offers exciting contests like this! For me blogging about this opportunity, I am in the running for a free $50 gift card. I don’t know about you, but I certainly like the idea of free money on occasion.

Thursday, July 23, 2009

New To Blogging

Everybody else seems to be blogging these days, so why not give this a try? Most people seem to think little things (or big things) that happen to me are interesting, sometimes at my expense unfortunately. So, why not share with others what is going on in different aspects of my life from day to day.

Sorry if my life bores you and if it does feel free to share with me any ideas you have to make my life more interesting because I am always willing to try something new.

I even finished a book last night which was written about blogging about cooking, "Julie and Julia: My Year of Cooking Dangerously" By: Julie Powell. A movie is about to be released August 7, 2009 based upon this book. It might be a good movie because there are many things in the book that would be quite funny to see. I read this book for my original book club in Savannah that I have been a member of for about a year and a half or more now. Time certainly flies!

Speaking of new things, I joined a new book club recently. It is summertime and I always have managed to read more in the summer than any other time of year since I spend time at the pool and the beach and various other outdoor activities. Also, I have discovered that if you read while you are stuck behind a train it makes the time pass quickly and you can get much more reading done regularly. Especially since I have been known to get stuck behind 3 trains within the past week during one lunch break! I have book club meeting tonight to discuss a book. It is called "Leave it to Cleavage" By: Wendy Wax. This book club decided to pick books that were either about Georgia or the local area of Savannah or else writers that were from the area. No matter what you think this book is about by the title, I bet it is much different than you imagine.