giving

Practice stealthy acts of kindness.

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At this time of year everyone wakes up to the fact that need exists in the United States. Everywhere you look are food drives, gift drives, coat drives.

Here’s a news flash: Need exists all year long, not just in the weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Don’t get me wrong: I love it when people do nice things. I just wish it weren’t so holiday-specific. Pardon my grinchiness, but I think some of these once-a-year volunteers aren’t doing it for the homeless, the seniors or the kids. They’re doing it to make themselves feel good.

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We wish you a debt-free Christmas.

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An old friend of mine – call him “Frugalbert Humperdinck” – once riffed on the song “Lonely is a man without love.” Unfamiliar with that late 1960s hit? Sit patiently through this video of Engelbert Humperdinck singing the first verse, in order to get to the chorus that’s about to be parodied:

Christmas bills are scare-ful,

 

But one can be careful.

 

Lovely is a man without loans.

 

Celebrate the season,

 

Keeping things in reason.

 

Lovely is a man without loans.

 

Go in debt, you peasants,

 

Buying toddlers presents.

 

Lovely is a man without loans.

 

Why impugn your credit

 

When they’ll soon forget it?

 

Lovely is a man without loans.

 

(Half-step up for the big finale)

 

Ere to shops I dart off,

 

First I pay the card off.

 

Lovely is a man without loans.

 

I’ll assuage my cravings

 

With January savings.

 

Lovely is a maaaan without loans.

 

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Holiday countdown: You’re probably already running late.

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The retail industry treats Christmas as one big countdown. This year has been the worst yet: Black Friday seems to have lasted the entire month of November.

But right after Thanksgiving the real fun began: “Only 26 more shopping days until Christmas.”

I think it’s because as a nation, we love to be nagged. The phone company reminds us to call home on Mother’s Day. Florists fuss at you to buy flowers for Secretary’s Day. Jewelers warn men to buy bigger and better diamonds for each year’s anniversary.

Nagging works, too: The phone system is overwhelmed on the second Sunday in May. Administrative assistants smile as they load up the vases (even if they’re inwardly wishing they’d gotten gift cards, or raises). And wives all over America decide to hang in there for another year because the big lug actually remembered.

But this is not a cynical post about the commercialization of sentiment. Not this time, anyway. It’s about why “(however many) more days until Christmas” is too vague to be of any use.

That’s because it’s not a warning — it’s a snooze alarm.

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Christmas stress: Wrap up guilt and simplify.

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thOne harried late-October evening, I rushed through a store’s costume section in a frenzy of last-minute preparations. To my horror, the reds and greens of Christmas cards and wrapping paper beckoned from a nearby aisle.

“Oh, spare me,” I said aloud. “I haven’t finished feeling guilty about Halloween yet.”

 

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To budget or not to budget?

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My monthly health insurance payment has risen by $40, starting now. The increase was anticipated, or at least announced. I’d managed to block the amount, though, so I was still surprised.

My bimonthly electric bill was $22 higher than the previous one, thanks to a Seattle City Light rate increase. An extra $11 per month won’t kill me. But it got my attention.

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What can be more essential than giving?

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thChristina at the Northern Cheapskate blog recently wrote about needing a new toaster cover. The old one doesn’t owe her a thing because it’s more than a decade old, a “well-intentioned gift” from her mother that initially left Christina embarrassed. It was an old person’s item. Women in their early 20s didn’t use toaster covers.

Eventually she appreciated the gift. Still, the idea of “needing” a new one made her laugh: “The toaster won’t feel ashamed if it sits on the counter in its natural state.”

It’s more than just a toaster cover, of course.

 

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Happy graduation! Here’s a toilet brush.

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thKnow a college senior who’s moving into his own place post-diploma? Want to give a gift even though you’re on a budget? Forget the $20 bill or the iTunes card. Instead, buy some dishtowels, a laundry basket or a johnny mop.

Your preparing-to-launch student may have saved up the first and last month’s security on an apartment. But does he have a can opener?

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