Well I'm kind of nervously writing this because later I'm getting dental work done, but I've forgotten what I'm getting done and how much it will cost. I guess I'll find out in less than an hour. I know I'll have the money to pay but I just hate paying out that much at one time.

I did my taxes last night. It took a long time to get my stuff together so I finished at about 11pm. Took about an hour overall. I'm really excited because I was praying I wouldn't have to pay anything but as it turns out I'm getting a little less than $500 back. I don't know what to do with the money though! Pay towards debt or save it to help me move out later this year. Before I move out I want the car note completely gone, so maybe car debt?

Speaking of car debt there is 2300 on it. I still have to pay March's note so that will bring it to around 2000, maybe a little less! I just remember thinking how long it would take to bring that sucker down and now it's almost here!

Student loans are there too. They are about at a little under 13,000.

I called a company that I sent my resume to today, and left a message on HR's voicemail. They haven't gotten back to me yet if they ever do. I so wish my school had a better system of finding graduates jobs. I know it's not their problem but it would have been nice.

Anyway, birthday weekend is coming up. I have decided that I would like to go to the zoo with my family and a few friends. After that I'll probably go out to some bars and hang out with friends. Hope everyone had a great weekend!

Ok so a couple of projects I've learned about on Savings Advice. I'll tell you about the worst one first because I would like to warn people about it.

The first is the infamous Nielson Shopping Scanner (or whatever you call it.) AVOID it like plague. It's not that it doesn't work well. Oh, it works alright. So you take EVERY SINGLE THING YOU BUY and scan it. Well, actually first you have to select the person in the house who bought it. Then you scan the item. Then you tell it if there was a deal involved. Then you tell it if you used a coupon. Then you tell it how much it was. Repeat ad nauseum per item until you get to the end and put in how much the total was. I know what you're thinking: "Well, if it were me I would just lie." Actually I do lie. A lot. I lie so hard to that thing.

You might be wondering why I would ever order such a thing, not to mention wait months to be accepted into the program. Well, I'm a huge sucker for free things. Supposedly you get rewards for transmitting the results every week, then you get bonuses for surveys and for being a good shopper and transmitting on time. At least the transmitting part is not a problem. It sits in it's charger and self transmits. If you have enough points you can actually get some decent stuff like ipods and electronics. But believe me you'll be scanning things for about a decade before you'll get something decent. Also supposedly you can win some weekly and monthly prizes. But I don't care. I'll be sending it back in a week or so. I guess I'm just lazy but why do all this for so long to maybe get 1 or 2 semi-nice things?

On to thing #2. It is called Amazon Mechanical Turk and it is run by Amazon.com. I learned about it from Ceejay a while back. You basically do really tiny tasks for a very small amount of money, and I do mean small. I try to do the ones from .20 to 2.00. Now a lot of people don't like it because of the small amounts of money that you get from doing work, but sometimes the work is ridiculously easy and can be done quickly.

Some of the "hits" as they are called range from writing stories about your vacation (I received a dollar recently for doing this), reviewing a recent movie, doing surveys about your opinions, as well as occasional games that you play. The amount that you get varies. Also since I've been doing this I've gotten emails from some of the employers asking me to do other similar hits to the ones I've already done for them and gotten bonus money. Critics have complained about the low amount that one receives from mturk. But I don't do it as a job. If I didn't have a full time job I would be better off taking a part time job than doing mturk all the time. However, I enjoy the tasks, as well as doing it whenever I want. When I get bored and have a free minute or while watching tv, whatever. Then when I get some money built up (Amazon has no minimum in order to transfer btw) I can either convert the money into an Amazon gift card or transfer it into my bank account. It's super easy.

Anyway I've spent way to long on this post. I'll give everyone a more personal update soon especially on debt levels.

Hey everybody, been wanting to write for a while but haven't come up with much. Well today I'm having a sick day. I feel very bad for calling in (today would have been a very very bad day to call in) but I am legitimately sick, and am going to the doctor later, so I'll have an excuse. Sure I'll be out of some money maybe, but I'm thinking I'll ask for today to be a vacation day so I'll get paid for it. Btw, I have 23 vacation days! I'll never use all of them but I'll see!

I found out today that I'm getting a refund of $57. This is what I paid at the doctor at the beginning of February though I had insurance. The nurse who billed me simply said that I have a $1000 deductable, however I also have a HRA with several hundred in it that should have been billed. So I called my insurance and they said that I need the doctor to refund my money! I'm so glad I called. The whole time I was thinking that maybe the doctor was out of network or something. Later today I will ask them about that and make sure they don't charge another $57!

Another refund I hope to be getting is one for $135 for work expenses, and I should definetely get $100 of it. The other 35 is for the notary that kind of screwed me over.

I was also thinking about a bunch of ya'll's money challenges. I never really understood the $20 challenge or anything, but I think what I will do is challenge myself to earning an extra $1000 this year. No time limit or anything. It should be interesting.

Today, since I can stay home, I'll pay the car note. That will bring down the debt to around the 2300 mark.

Love the change blogging from everyone. I love finding change and look for it often (I'm encouraged by everyone here) but I won't bore you with the details. Hope everyone has a great March! My birthday is coming up on the 27th so I love March myself!