Ryan McFarland

I’m not a huge fan of light beers. But when the Guinness runs out and a case of Bud Light is still in the fridge i’ll grab one. Or like last week when i popped by Ryan Welde’s to say hi while waiting for Cena to get out of a class she was taking about business marketing. Ryan was kind enough to hand me a Bud Light.

By March 14th you can enter to win a $300 Amazon gift certificate by doing a text message survey about light beer. I love surveys. Just send a text to 247365 with the word “beer” and you’re supposed to get 10 questions. I tried it and only received four. Cena tried and only got four.

We have an unlimited text package on each of our plans. Supposedly that is the only charge “standard message rates apply” but we’ll watch our bills. I decided to opt out after even trying the “H” for help text. If you make it any further in the survey than answering what your favorite form of communication is (?) then please leave a comment. I’d like to enter to win that gift certificate!

I do seem to love class action suits lately. The Airborne class action settlement promises $6.99 back for every package of Airborne that you have purchased from 2001 to 2007. It turns out that the clinical study mentioned on the package (i’ll admit that i have read it and was impressed) was debunked by ABC News. Airborne still contains all the vitamins they list on the package as far as we know — just the claim that it prevents colds has been removed.

[Once again, thank you Consumerist!]

A lot of people have been asking me what the Zieak Effect is.  Hundreds of online articles have been written about the benefits of the Zieak Effect and some enterprising designer produced a t-shirt memorializing the Zieak Effect.  Not really.  I was doing some Stumble Upon web browsing and came across the Advertising Slogan Generator and this is the first result it gave me when i put “zieak” in the sloganize field.  Put your name in and see what you get!

The folks at Mint want to help relieve holiday overspending by throwing $5,000 toward two lucky winners with a story to tell.  Just shoot a video or write a story “confessing your holiday excesses to the world.”  Sadly i’m ineligible because i have been a “professional” writer.  But my loss could be your gain on your loss.

[via Consumerist]

I  have been trying to send in a laptop (that i bought at Costco a number of years ago) to the Costco and Greensight electronics recycling program that i mentioned previously.  (If you want to send something in and are not a Costco member let me know - we can work something out!)  I received my quote and the confirmation email but was never emailed the UPS shipping label to mail the item in.  If you need to contact the Costco electronics recycling help line just call 866-314-2059.  That telephone number goes straight to the folks that should be able to help.  They had some glitch in my shipping label email that they said they would fix and send to me again.  That could be just short of $200 for a laptop that i would feel terrible trying to sell to anyone on eBay.  While Kevin was here we swapped out the hard drives with his laptop because the one on mine was larger.  The drive size was not a criteria used in judging the value of the return.  Hopefully i receive the shipping label email and can send the old laptop in and see what they will give me for this hot notebook.

The Barbie wreath i made a few years ago still gets a bit of traffic.  Last night Angela Owen sent me an email about her product quite similar to mine - Bodywreath.  Hers is made from generic dolls from a dollar store and the heads are removed and their bodies painted green but the idea is the same.  Nice to meet someone else with a twisted approach to crafting!  She also makes some neat shoe earrings.

If you have begun to replace your incandescent Christmas lights with LED lights then you’re already well on your way to saving money. LED lights don’t need constant replacement like incandescents do. They use up to 90% less electricity and since they are cooler there is a reduced fire hazard. The only real reason to keep your old lights is because you have them. Well, what if you knew your old ones would be recycled and you could get 10% off your purchase of new, cool, inexpensive to operate LED Christmas lights? Sounds like a deal to me (even though we didn’t put a tree up this year). So recycle your old Christmas lights and save some money in the long run. You have to have them postmarked by the end of January to get the discount.

It might be a good time to mention the Instructables LED contest with prizes of Robot t-shirts and TV-B-gone kits. I have an idea for a project that would use LEDs to light up our house number that is etched in plexiglass. Hmmm… I do have a piece of glass and some chemical glass etching that i could use to make this little project. The contest closes on the 10th of January.

I better go pack up our old Christmas lights and maybe lay out some house numbers on glass.

Klas takes some great pictures.  He’s been doing a lot with his fish-eye lens recently and judging by his angle taking this shot this picture is no exception.

Have you bought a diamond in the last 13 years? I have. Three. One on an engagement ring and two on earrings. Well, it turns out that there’s a nice little class action lawsuit against DeBeers for their inflation of the value of diamonds. Seems like it almost rains money when i really decide to buckle down! File your claim here.

[tuned in thanks to Consumerist]

Bailee and Skye were playing some sort of online Scrabble game while they were visiting.  Cena invited me to a game of it and now i’m hooked.  Well, not hooked - but always looking forward to my next turn.  This is kind of like people playing chess over long distances - “correspondence chess” where you can be notified of your turn by email and then when you have time sit down and make your play.  In real-life Scrabble you often sit waiting for your opponents to take turns.  This virtual game called Scrabulous allows you to do the dishes, sleep, or wait however long you want before playing.  No table occupied by a board.  No tiles knocked by cats.  Feel free to invite me to a game if you want - i can’t promise a quick play but i promise i won’t use any online tools to look up the best word given my tiles.