Seriously, open your mail, even stuff that looks like junk mail

This one showed up, looking just like those presorted notices from one's health insurance, stating that the privacy policy has changed or whatever. But nope, it's money. The accompanying letter says it's a State and Federal Medical Loss Ratio Rebate. I googled that and don't understand entirely what it is, but it seems to be a rebate they'll send everyone because they charged too much based on what they paid out, or something.

This one also totally looked like junk mail. But was a check for a class action suit I had opted into. Apparently I got $127.14 for Uber sending me an unsolicited text message (probably when I signed up for something to get some Swagbucks). Sure, send me all the text messages you want, at those rates.

I also got a few others recently, from credit cards I had accounts with in years past, that also looked like those unsolicited offers of 30.00% APR loans or whatever, that I happened to open.

So, yeah, open your mail, even if it looks just like junk mail you receive from these companies all the time. I hope I haven't recycled any envelopes that contained checks.

POTATO, POTATO, POTATO

Have I mentioned I have a bunch of potatoes? Potato, potato, potaaaatoooo. I made potato salad with the tiny potatoes, the red potatoes, and the purple potatoes. It tasted like potato salad, except it looked red and purple. There was probably something more interesting I could have made that specifically used tiny potatoes and/or purple potatoes, but I made this, and it was good.

I also made potato tacos. I'm not sure if potato tacos are a thing, but I imagine they probably are, because root vegetables are a staple of traditional diets in the Americas. I chopped the potatoes up with onions and made basically homefries, but with more seasoning (I used jalapeño sauce, smoked red chili, and lots of cumin). I had small corn tortillas leftover from something, so I served the potatoes on those with tomato salsa, corn salsa from Trader Joe's (this stuff is seriously good; I highly recommend it), and some leftover goat cheese salad crumbles a neighbor gae me, which were the closest thing I had to cotija or similar. They turned out great, and were very popular among my family. 

Moar potatoes

I continue to make things with potatoes, because I continue to have entirely too many potatoes. Here are some homefries. I made them sliced, because they cook faster and more evenly. Nothing special, just potatoes, a little oil, Adobo, dill, smoked red chili powder or paprika. They're good alone, with breakfast foods, in breakfast burritos, or as a quick lunch with whatever vegetables you have around stir-fried and dumped on top of them.














Also I made au gratin potatoes. I used a recipe I found on Pinterest that I can't seem to find again. They were just OK. You can't really go wrong with potatoes and cheese, though I've had better.

I don't think I ever posted a photo of this whole Fair Foods haul. Wow. This one was pretty amazing. And, uh, contained a lot of potatoes.

Oh my god I have all these potatoes

I seem to have a ton of potatoes. Big, small, red, white, yellow, oh, and a bag of small blue ones and a bag of tiny weird-shaped ones. These were all acquired either through Fair Foods or through a similar food surplus program run though a religious organization. Both programs are amazing and have been so helpful to our family. And both programs give you a pre-packaged load of food without much opportunity to turn parts of it down. So there are all these potatoes.

I'm going to have to figure out different things to make with potatoes. Fortunately they keep quite a while, I mean, compared to things like bananas or leafy vegetables. But as tends to be the case with rescued produce, they're already getting up there in age. So far I've made a quasi-Indian curry. I sauteed onions and garlic, then threw it in the slow cooker with potatoes, frozen peas, and canned tomatoes that were either free in one of these food packages or a few cents via couponing. I dumped in a bunch of every spice I had that works in curries (see here for where to get inexpensive spices). Then once it was sufficiently cooked, I blended it a little to make it thicker, and served it over rice. This meal was close to free to make, and it served our family for dinner plus enough for everyone to take for lunch the next day.

Stay tuned for more potatoey goodness.

Well this was a nice surprise

This showed up in my e-mail today. I didn't recognize the name and had to google what the suit was about; Apparently XPO Logistics, which does deliveries from IKEA, had a robocall survey calling people a few days after receiving a delivery from IKEA, and there was something illegal about how it was set up. The class included anyone who had received an IKEA delivery, and I believe I only had to provide my phone number as proof of being in the class.

These class action things are often around $10-$20, or sometimes silly amounts under a dollar where sending the check cost more than the amount, but sometimes they're serious amounts of money. This is definitely something to get into if you don't already. Click the "class action suits" label on my post to find my other posts where I've explained how to find these suits and sign up. It's definitely worth it when payments like this show up.

Watermellooonnn

So I got this free watermelon. Obviously watermelon is good just to eat, but I was looking for something interesting to do with it, and wanted to incorporate it into a meal. First,
I scooped out balls of watermelon. I combined this with some quinoa (I used some one-minute quinoa that I got couponing), plus chopped cucumber a neighbor gave me, a purple onion from Fair Foods, and canned black beans from couponing. I drizzled some balsamic salad dressing over it. It was quite a hit.

I don't have a melon baller, but at some point we seemed to have acquired these kid spoons that are scooplike rather than spoon-shaped, which suck as spoons, but work great for making melon balls. Yes, my grown ass made melon balls with an alien spoon. Don't judge.

The melon balls weren't super spherical, but the watermelon was overripe, so they wouldn't have been even if I had a melon baller. +1 for the weird alien spoon.

Next, since the watermelon was super overripe, there was a lot of juice and shredded melon left in the shell. I didn't want to waste it, so I combined it with some kosher/vegan agar-based jello-type stuff I had on hand. I made the whole thing in the watermelon shell, because this looked fun.

I poured as much of the liquid/liquifying watermelon pulp into the measuring cup so I wouldn't end up with too much liquid, then made sure the water was fully boiling, and poured it into the cup. I needed two cups for the amount I made, and I made it a little under to make sure it would set up with the fruit pieces added. It turned out great, and was a big hit with both kids and adults. Someone suggested the watermelon juice would also be good for margaritas or jello shots, which seems like it would also be pretty great.

Museum of Science has a bunch of summer programs, and admission is free with EBT or WIC card

Read their e-mail here.

Lots of programs this summer that are included with admission; highlights include space and crocodiles. Membership is free with an EBT card or WIC card. No need to stand in line; just show your card to the person at the entrance to the main part of the museum. Get your hand stamped and you can visit the Discovery Center near the Planetarium as well.

Irony: The portal for letting student loans know you’re poor requires an up-to-date computer

I’m trying to do my yearly renewal where I let the student loans people know that I can't afford to pay the things. My computer is 11 years old. It only runs really old versions of browsers. Only one browser can connect to studentloans.gov (the others bring up security errors). Only one will connect to the irs.gov. They are two different browsers. The site requires you to log into the IRS page directly from the student loans page. When I copy the long IRS URL into the browser that does open IRS pages, it says I am only allowed to access that page directly from studentloans.gov. Argh!

Who needs an instacart code?

Get $10 off your first order and I get $10 off. Clickedy click. 

I got a bunch of Swagbucks from TaskRabbit without spending money

I went to the TaskRabbit website to hire a bunny to do a home repair I didn’t have the tools for. I was using my computer at the time, so the browser bar popped up to activate Swagbucks. The rabbit I selected didn’t have the right tools either and canceled the task. I selected another rabbit whose profile also listed them as doing such things, and they also canceled saying they don’t have the tools. The rest of the available bunnies were all very expensive, so I ended up buying some tools.

A few days later I see that I was awarded 1000 Swagbucks for each canceled rabbit. Um, OK! That nearly pays for my tools. 

Free $100 Postmates delivery credit for you and me

Use code 9HNYH and we both get $100 in delivery credit. Their delivery fees can be super high, especially during prime hours, so this is really useful. They deliver from cheaper places than many of the other apps too, which is nice. 

$20 off TaskRabbit, first-time users only

Use this code and get $20 off.

I've had hit-and-miss success with TaskRabbit. I wouldn't rely on it if you absolutely need something done at a particular time, as they don't provide you with a replacement if your person doesn't show. I hired someone once to do setup for an event, they didn't show, didn't respond to my messages, and all TaskRabbit would do was give me a $25 credit. Infuriating. But I've had great luck with using them for things like electrical and plumbing work that didn't need to get done at a particular time. There are a lot of tradespeople on there who aren't licensed in this state or have let their license lapse, but absolutely know what they are doing and are perfect for small jobs that don't require a license or permits. I also used it once when I needed something business-related dropped off and needed it to look a little more professional than just sending documents in a cab.

You can still get $25 for that survey on your health insurance

Ha. I just got an e-mail from JOANY saying I'm one of their top referrers for the healthcare survey. Woohoo!

If you have insurance you purchased through your state's marketplace (so, not straight Medicaid/Medicare and not through your employer), you can take this survey and get $25. They will ask you to text/email/upload a picture of your card, so you will need to have an insurance card of a type of insurance sold through the marketplace.

After you've taken it and they've paid you (it takes a few days, and they pay via PayPal), you can refer your friends and get $25 when they take the survey as well.

Amazon gift card for parents of infants

MIT wants to study the brains of infants  Looks fun, gets you an Amazon gift card. 

Swagbucks: What's worth it and what's not

So, I went back and looked at my last post on this topic, and it's actually pretty much the same still. Surveys are super hit-and-miss. I try one every time I'm bored, and if it's legit, I keep going, if not, I don't. The Reddit Swagbucks forum also is usually up to date on which things are working and which aren't. 

Definitely go to my post linked up above and check out the tips for how to run the Swagbucks TV app on your phone while you go do something else. 

If you don't have Swagbucks, go here to learn how it works and to sign up under my referral link so we both get free stuff. Then refer your friends so you get more free stuff. 

Whoa, a free $35 just showed up in my Perk.tv account

I just logged into Perk, which I hadn't done in some time, and found that I had 36,000 points, or $35 in Amazon gift cards. There isn't any recent activity showing except for my points for having logged in, but I clicked around and found "my team," which is showing me people who signed up under my referral link and are earning me points. I've posted my link here and on a couple forums that do referral trains, so, thank you, people who have signed up using my account. If you aren't using Perk, click on the "PerkTV" tag below this post, and it will show you my posts explaining how it works. Click here to sign up using my code, and we both get free stuff. Like Swagbucks, Perk is one of those things where some of the tasks are worth it, and others are a huge waste of time that only make money for the site and not for you. Check out the PerkTV forum on Reddit for tips on which things do and don't work well.

At the moment, the best one is the Perk Pop Quiz app. Download the app on a mobile device, set it to "lightning mode," so the trivia game will just run on a loop without you attending to it, and leave the device while you do other things. The game will just run and you'll get 1-2 points for every game you "play" (because the games run ads that make money for Perk, of course). There's also the PerkTV app, which runs videos in a similar fashion. It will work for a time on my devices (old iPhones and iPods), then will go through periods where all it does is crash or freeze up. You can run the videos on a computer too, though mine is too old and just overheats and freezes. The site used to run on a lot less bandwidth, and I'd leave my computer, my phone, and some old iPods running it all night.

The $35 has motivated me to get back into running Swagbucks and Perk on my devices. I'm going to get back into the hang of running Perk overnight on my phone and seeing if I have any old iPods that still work and will run the apps. Tomorrow I'll post about farming Swagbucks on a mobile device.

Updated eBay first class postage rates

Like I talked about before, eBay charges the buyer the retail first-class postage rate based on the weight of the item, and charges the seller the commercial rate when the seller purchases the shipping through eBay.

The postage rates have gone up a bit since I initially posted about that, but the same idea still applies – if you charge the lower commercial rate for shipping, your listings look much more attractive. Especially when you get above 12 ounces or so – I think amounts under $5 tend to seem trivial to people, while amounts over $5 seem more substantial. I'm much more likely to bid on something charging $4.38 for shipping versus $6.70.

Just remember: eBay charges you, the seller, 10% of what you charged for shipping AND what you charged for the product in their Final Value Fee. So either add 10% onto what you charge for shipping or make sure the additional 27-50 cents is reflected in the price of the item, along with also remembering to include the PayPal fee.

I just made $25 net selling some random worthless crap I had lying around my house – some 1970s coins I found in change, an airline toiletry kit someone gave me, some drawer pulls, some discontinued IKEA picture frames, a passport wallet, and a halloween decoration. I shipped the stuff using eBay shipping and printed it out on my printer, so I can just drop it in any mailbox or drop it off on the post office counter without standing in line. I packaged it with boxes, envelopes, and bubble wrap saved from things I've bought in stores or ordered on Amazon. All I paid for was tape, which I got from Dollar Tree. It took me under a minute to list each item and about two minutes or so to prepare each one to mail. I also listed another few items that didn't sell, but you can list hundreds of items per month for free*, so no worries.

It's a seriously easy way to make money, once you get the hang of it. And it's generally non-taxable income if you're selling your own possessions and are averaging a net loss overall (meaning if you sell mostly your own clothes and books and things, the few items you do flip for more money end up being cancelled out by all the times you sell a shirt that was $30 new and went for $5 on eBay). It's more money in your pocket though, since most of us would usually just donate all the things in our house that we're done with.

*The base amount is 50 free listings per month, but every time I list items, eBay suddenly sends me an e-mail offer giving me 100, 200, or 500 free listings during that month.

50% off kids’ clothes at Boomerangs

April 18-21 at JP and West Roxbury stores. 

So BookScouter is pretty cool

I actually found out about Bookscouter from an annoying ad that covered up most of an article I was trying to read. Hey, sometimes there's a silver lining, right? I have this collection of books of various sorts that I've been selling over time on Amazon Marketplace – both books my family and I are done with and books people have given us to get rid of because they know we do Amazon/eBay/etc.

So, the way it works is you enter books you have, and it checks several book buyback companies and tells you if they're buying it and what they're paying.

The book buyback companies all generate a pre-paid shipping label to ship the books. You just put them in a box and drop them off at the post office, UPS, FedEx, or wherever it says to. They all pay you via PayPal, within about 10-14 days of entering the books on the site and packaging them up.

SellBackYourBook.com is by far the company that is looking for the most books. They were buying about 80% of the kids' books I tried, 50% of the nonfiction/text/professional books I tried, and about 20% of the bestseller/mass-market books I tried. Their prices are really good for things like kids' books and bestsellers. They gave me 26 cents each for a whole bunch of board books, paperback early reader books with like eight pages, and mass-market paperbacks. A number of the textbook and professional books were only a bit more than that, around a dollar each or so. I also check the used prices on Amazon, and if it's going for more than $4 or so (pretty much the minimum to make a profit), I list on Amazon. SellBackYourBook also has one of the lowest minimums to meet to create a shipment – $7.50 – so it's probably the best one for regular people cleaning out shelves or freebies.

Powell's offers the best prices by far, often 50% or more of list price. Their condition guidelines are extremely strict though, and they aren't buying a lot of titles. Check there though if you have unusual books, expensive books, or books in really nice condition. I didn't end up selling anything to them.

These are the ones I ended up using. The Textbooks.com were each 2-3 books. Most were textbook-type books as one might guess (not as in the ridiculously expensive textbook-only books used in math and so forth, but as in books on education and psychology and such that are fairly pricey, but have a market outside of universities), but they also randomly took a board book copy of I Love My Hair as well, so, yeah, it can be pretty random. They accepted all of my books (in decent condition, but certainly with scuffed corners and sometimes even more wear).

Ez Book Recycle Inc. is SellBackYourBook.com. That shipment was 12 books of all sorts, ranging in value from $0.07 to $6.96. They accepted them all.

Textbook Rush was for 14 books, ranging from $0.10 (paperback short kids' books that I honestly would probably have no problem recycling if I didn't have a donation box going at the time) to $6.96 for a scholarly type book. They accepted everything.

CKY Books was for 20 books, mostly older scholarly, religious, nonfiction type books. One was rejected for having a tear on the dust jacket.

So, yeah, $65 for 51 books that I acquired for free. Honestly, I probably would have gotten only slightly more on Amazon, and it would have taken me a year or more before someone bought all of them. I didn't have to provide customer service or package them other than just shoving them in a reused Amazon box and slapping on the label. I do still have books listed on Amazon; I wasn't going to sell back books for $1-5 that are going for $10+ on Amazon. But for most of the books someone might be looking to get rid of, BookScouter is definitely a way to do it.

Fair Foods continues to be amazing

Comment with what I should make with it. 

Free Little Caesar’s Pizza today

Little Caesar’s is giving away lunch  There’s one in Roslindale if you aren’t familiar.

Dollar Tree has a blog about being cheap, and it's pretty cool

It has ideas, a lot of which use their products and several of which that don't. Much like Dollar Tree, some of the stuff is tacky AF, and other stuff is pretty great.

Speaking of Dollar Tree, they are still really the best place to buy most school/office supplies, cleaning supplies, and bins and stuff for organization.

Income-based Hubway is back and has some changes

Hubway once again has an income-based plan. It's now $5 per month instead of $5 per year, but if I'm reading this right, it's not as bad as it sounds. It looks like they only charge your card during months that you take out a bike. So for $5, you can take a bike out as many times as you want (under 60 minutes) during that month. Much cheaper than the T or rideshare, and for trips within the city, biking will usually get you places faster than other modalities.

Also, they're only letting people sign up online if they have an EBT card. Anyone using WIC, Masshealth, SSI, etc. needs to sign up in person. I'm guessing though that if that's a hardship, you can probably talk to someone about e-mailing your documentation. No mention of free helmets anymore, but Amazon has several for around $15-20 each, which is not a lot to protect your noggin.

FYI: PayPal credit doesn’t go on your credit report

The interest rates are ridiculously high if you don’t pay it within the six-month no-interest period (around 20% APR seems to be the usual), but they give just about anyone credit, and it doesn’t show up on any credit report. I’ve used it a few times recently when I’ve needed to pay folks like lawyers and contractors. To use it with people like this rather than an online store, you just have to ask them to send you a PayPal invoice, and then it will give you the option to use PayPal credit if you’ve already applied.

Second Daily Table Open in Dudley

Story from the Banner about it here

Fancy Pants is closing. 50-80% off everything.

Fancy Pants is closing! See the details on their Facebook page here.

We've been big fans of the place for many years. We've sold a lot of used kids' clothes and toys to them and have shopped there regularly. I'm quite sad to see it go, and hope they're able to reopen somewhere else at some point.

I went on Tuesday and they still had a lot of things left. I got some baby items and such to give to people. I got pretty much an entire wardrobe including a jacket and shoes for about $100 for a kid who suddenly has nothing that fits. There were also a ton of books if people need them; they generally only stock really young books -- just picture books and board books -- but the selection is good and they're at least 50% off their usual prices, which are decent to start with. 

Oh, and they have a good selection of (mostly new!) winter hats and gloves all winter, which I've always appreciated about them, since most stores stop selling winter things in about October. There was still a lot of winter stuff left on Tuesday. I got a bunch of fleece balaclavas (is that the right word? Bank-robber masks, not gross Russian desserts) for $3 each since we are crazy and bike all year round when possible. 

They're open until the 22nd, so hit em up soon. 

Check your phone number here to see if you can get $1200

If your phone number is on this list, DISH Network owes you $1200 for unscrupulous telemarketing tactics.

None of our family's numbers were on the list unfortunately, but this one is definitely worth checking out. Who doesn't want a free $1200?

Get $7 off your first Delivery.com order

And I get $7 off my next one too!

Go here: https://www.delivery.com/share?code=raf08318 

American Express compensated me for the grievous harm they caused

This was a good one. I hope a lot of y'all got in on this!

$25 via PayPal for taking this survey. Must have insurance through the connector.

I just did this survey. You must have insurance through your state's connector (not straight Masshealth/Medicaid, not insurance through an employer or school) and you must text or upload your insurance card. It took about five minutes. They send you $25 via PayPal, and I get $25. Then you refer your friends, and you get $25 each time they take it. It's pretty sweet. Their Facebook page is here if you run into any troubles and want to contact them.

EDIT: The study paid me. It's legit. They sent me an e-mail asking me to upload a screenshot of the connector page to confirm current enrollment, but after that they approved it. 

Happy 7/11

Gotta love free Slurpee day. 

Free clothing for children and adults tomorrow

 

Moar deception

Class action suits are fun.

I don't remember what they did to deceive me, but they definitely did

Got deceived again

More random free money

I went online to check the interest rates on some credit cards that don't have balances, to see which would be best to float some expenses for a few months.

Two of them, both Chase cards, gave me things saying I had some sort of points to redeem. I figured these would get me stuff like $5 off coupons, but whatever, those are useful. 

Turns out one card's points were redeemable for $30 direct deposit and one for $40. I'm not sure what the points are or how I got them, but hey, free money. 

Attention! Some class action checks don't look like checks

 

This check came today, to compensate me for having been caused severe emotional damage. Or something. 

The postcard you see on the left showed up like that, with my address on the other side. Looks like junk mail. Fortunately, it was clear who it was from, so I opened it up and got the check out. But be on the lookout for checks that don't look like checks. 

Old Navy is 30% off online only right now

Check it out. There's also a lot of stuff marked down. Like, swimsuits, because they're already out of a number of sizes and colors. In March. While it's snowing.

There are a lot of good class action suits up right now

This site and this one both have lots of good ones right now -- Method, Ecover, Seventh Generation, Quorn, several other food products that don't require proof of purchase. Head on over, and rack up some free money!

There sure are some crazy mofos on eBay

Someone bought something after business hours last week. E-mailed me the next business day stating it hadn't been shipped, asking "is there a problem???" My policies say I ship within two business days. It was still the first business day. Also, if they had used their adult words and just told me they really needed it quickly, I would have happily upgraded the shipping.

Speaking of, I've discovered that most buyers don't read the seller's policies or read the description of the item. Part of this is due to eBay hiding the description. On mobile you have to click into it, and on the computer you have to scroll all the way down. So when I'm selling anything with an open package, not in package, doesn't include accessories, scuffed, ripped, blah blah blah, I've been putting it in the title and then printing out the packing slip and enclosing it. (I don't usually include packing slips; hardly anyone seems to.) So then they get the packing slip right with the item, and they see that the item they bought is "Ralph Lauren hoodie with wear on cuffs," and they're less likely to complain.

Has anyone gotten their MA or federal tax refund yet?

Both of mine are saying they were received mid-January and are being processed. I know federal refunds with EITC or child credit can't be disbursed until after February 15 this year. Not sure what's going on with MA refunds. Last year I got state on February 2 and federal on February 10.

I'm thinking that federal will be about 15 days later than last year, since they're operating off of February 15 instead of February 1, so I'm expecting it any day now. I don't know what's going on with the MA refund. I hope this doesn't mean I got audited or some crap.

Which reminds me...I'm not sure I ever posted about that time I did get audited by the state. I can't find it through a search, and I don't seem to have a "MA DOR is a trainwreck" tag. Anyway, I got audited, sent in all the stuff. In addition to W-2 and 1099 work, I had done an odd job for someone one time, the person paid me about $1000, and I declared it and paid taxes on it. The DOR kept insisting I didn't have a record of the income, and the record of the income showing up in my bank account wasn't enough. I had to talk to several people on the phone and explain to them that if they weren't satisfied with my documentation, I could just delete that income and they could give me a bigger refund. It took probably 10 people before one finally got it. Amazing. OK, I'm making a tag for DOR just to be safe. I'll probably need it.

Good Neighbor Energy Fund, for people who make too much for fuel assistance

I just got a call from the Good Neighbor Energy Fund, asking me if I wanted to apply, since we have done so in years past. For the past few years, we've qualified for fuel assistance, but Good Neighbor is a great program if you make too much for fuel assistance. The website has the income limits listed right up front on the page, so if you didn't qualify for fuel assistance and still need help, check it out. It works basically the same way, where you bring in your documentation and they pay the utility company directly. It's administered by the Salvation Army, which, yes, I know is problematic in many ways. The people who administer the program are much much more user friendly than the people at ABCD fuel assistance.

Swagbucks has this new MyGiftCardsPlus thing that gives you free money

I just signed up for this and got 975 Swagbucks ($11.08 if you redeem in batches of 2200 SB for $25 Amazon gift card).

The deal requires you to buy a $50 gift card. They have a ton of options, though most of them are things like mid-price/high-price chain restaurants where we wouldn't generally be spending money. They do have several places where most people would spend money regardless, like Lowe's, Home Depot, clothing stores, etc. I noticed that the GAP gift card earns you a larger number of Swagbucks than Old Navy, even though you can use the gift cards at both places since they're the same owner. So I bought a $50 GAP gift card, because I typically spend that much at Old Navy a few times a year.

If you haven't checked out the huge Old Navy clearance section at South Bay mall, do it! It's the biggest one I've found so far. Women's and men's is in the back corner of the store, and kids' is in a separate section in each kids' section. Old Navy tends to sell things for a very short time before they're out of season or out of style, so there's always a lot on clearance. The stores have more than the website does, because they also seem to move things to clearance as soon as they're low on certain sizes or they want to take down the display. If something stays on clearance very long and they're down to only a few of them, they'll often mark them down to a couple dollars. The stuff is often cheaper than thrift stores, and you can get things that wear out quickly and don't usually make it to thrift stores, like tanktops and leggings. 

Also, Old Navy is one of the furthest ahead in terms of seasons; right now they mostly have swimsuits and sundresses. This means that the place is pretty useless if you suddenly need snow boots or swimsuits during the correct season, because they'll likely all be gone, but it means things go on clearance before you actually would need them. We've gotten coats and gloves at a major discount when they clear them out in October or so, and swimsuits when they clear them out in about May.

So, get yourself a $50 GAP gift card (plus $11 in Amazon money), and go check out the Old Navy clearance section. And if you don't have Swagbucks yet, click the Swagbucks label to find all my past posts, which explain how to use it and contain my referral link so we can both get extra free stuff. Thanks!

Make a lamp shade for your thrift store lamp for about $2

So, a few days ago, I was trying to figure out what to do with a broken IKEA floor lamp. Could the pieces be recycled, or could someone use it for something? The hollow threaded part that connected the bottom section of the, uh, stalk? Stem? Post? Pole? to the base (I think this part is called a nipple. Seriously.) had broken off and broken in half, and of course it was an unusual size, because IKEA. I actually had a package of these in graduated sizes, because I once fixed a ceiling fixture I got from a thrift store, so 1) I was able to try them and see that this fixture was in between two adjacent standard sizes and 2) while they were no longer in the original package, I'm pretty sure they're called nipples. Hurr hurr.

I eventually realized I could just take out two of the three sections and make a table lamp. How would I do that though, when the post sections are threaded onto the cord? Oh, easy. Unwire the whole thing, reassemble, and then rewire! Some friends on social media were placing bets as to whether it would work and whether they would need to call 911. Assholes.

It did work, and on the first try. But then I needed a lamp shade. Of course lamp shades often cost more than the lamp, when we're taking about basic stuff like this, and thrift stores never have shades because lamps last longer than the shade. I started looking around for something I could make a lampshade out of. I was thinking I could probably use poster board and reinforce it with coat hangers or something, but then I saw this wastebasket that I got for a dollar at Dollar Tree.

The lampshade was the perfect shape and size, was lightweight, and the mesh made it even easier to sew fabric to it than it would have been with a cardboard shade. So, what I did was:

1) Cut the bottom out of the wastebasket. I guess you could actually leave it on if you like, as it wouldn't be in the way and light can of course pass through it. I cut mine off because lampshades don't typically have a top, and it made it easier to attach fabric later on. I used wire cutters. Heavy-duty scissors or a utility knife would work well too.

2) Find something that has a hole in it that is slightly larger than a lightbulb base. This seems to be the most secure way to attach a lampshade to a lamp, and is what IKEA lamps use. It also allows for any type of bulb. I used a closet pole socket like this one, since I had one lying around in a drawer. Mine were cheaper, I think $1 for the pair. You could also make something similar out of a fairly sturdy piece of plastic, like a plastic lid out of the recycling. It just needs to fit around the bulb and be able to have holes drilled in it. The closet rod hardware was perfect, since it already had three holes. If I were building it from scratch, I'd probably put four so it would be easier to get it centered and taut. 

3) Attach the middle part to the basket. I used wire to do this. The wire I had is thin craft-type wire, so I twisted it and wrapped it until it was fairly rigid. If I were purchasing wire, I'd probably use something a bit heavier, but not quite as hard to bend as, say, a coat hanger. The basket made it easy to get centered and level, because I could just count how many diamonds down from the edge and count how many diamonds were around the basket and divide by three. Measuring would also work, but that would involve getting up and finding one more thing, so I didn't do it.

4) Find fabric to cover the basket with. I unfortunately didn't take measurements or photograph every step, but you'll need roughly a foot by three feet maybe of fabric. If you wrap it around the basket and it fully covers it, you're good. Any material should work. If you aren't the type to own fabric waiting to be used for projects, use a good part of a worn sheet/blanket/pillowcase, or a shirt you don't need any longer.

5) Attach the fabric to the basket. The easiest and most secure way by far is with a needle and thread. Wrap the fabric around the basket so it covers the whole thing, trim it so you have a seam that runs straight up the shade (parallel to the pole), and then sew it to the basket. This part will be hidden, so no need to stitch neatly. Then, once one end is attached, stretch the fabric all the way around until it overlaps where you just sewed. Trim it so you have a straight edge with about an inch overlap. Fold the fabric under to make a nice seam. Then stitch through all three layers of fabric and around the basket wires. I did one diagonal stitch around each diamond.

6) Next, trim the top and bottom of the fabric so it barely overlaps the basket. If your fabric has pretty much no stretch to it, overlap about half an inch. Fold the fabric over the basket. Go around the edge and stitch it so the basket is between both layers of fabric, stretching it taut as you go. A whipstitch/overcast stitch/whatever you want to call it (shown in the picture) is going to work best at holding the fabric taut and looking the best. The sewing involved here requires really no skill; it's basically the same as those wooden sewing cards my kids had when they were preschoolers. The equipment needed is just a needle and thread, found in any drugstore sewing kit. If you're really opposed to sewing though, it should be possible to do this with hot glue or duct tape or something, or ribbons covering the edges, or whatever works for you.

Have I mentioned that the cat is an asshole?

Banana French toast

This was a surprisingly easy recipe I invented. Fair Foods gave us two bunches of slightly bruised/browning bananas and a loaf of what I thought was sandwich bread when I took it, but ended up being cranberry walnut bread. None of us are particularly crazy about the nuts-and-dried-fruits category of foods, so I tried to think of things I could do with it. I figured it would be improved if it were sweet, and this led me to French toast.

I knew bananas are often used by themselves as a binder/thickener in a lot of vegan cooking, so I figured this would work. I blended the bananas using an immersion blender, then added some vanilla and pumpkin pie spice. If using fresher bananas, you'd probably need to add some liquid to get it to a thinner consistency, but this was correct since these were rescued bananas. I then soaked the slices of bread in the stuff and fried them in a nonstick pan with a little oil. The result was normal textured French toast with a bit of a banana/fruit/nut flavor. We served it with maple syrup (Amazon has the best prices usually, FYI) and everyone enjoyed it. It's probably one of the simplest things I've ever cooked. Will definitely make again.

Heads up for people who use the MA DOR free webfile for income tax

Apparently the state's own tax website is no longer active. They now are publishing a list of sites that will file your taxes for free based on income.

OLT will file them for free if you make between $13,000 and $62,000 AGI. However, if you've already filed your federal taxes elsewhere, you can't use this site; it only will file federal and state at the same time. You can pay $7.95 to file your state return alone on this site though. If you make more than $62,000 AGI, I'm not sure why you're reading my site*, but they will file it for $7.95 for state and $7.95 for federal.

1040NOW will file just the state return (or both, if you don't file federal elsewhere) for free if you make under $32,000 AGI. Be sure to use the link with "freefileMA" in it.

MA Department of Revenue doesn't list them, but Turbotax will also file for free if you are eligible to file 1040A or 1040EZ (income under $100,000, don't itemize deductions, no self-employment, no unusual credits or deductions besides the common ones like Earned Income Tax Credit and child credit.)

If you google free e-filing and your situation, you will find more companies that do free e-filing for students, people with disability income, military families, or whatever your case may be.

You can also print out the form and mail it for free. It takes longer to get your refund, but it's free. If you want to make sure you don't make any errors, most of the commercial tax websites (TaxSlayer, etc.) will let you do everything but file the return without paying. You can let it do all the calculations for the credits and everything and then transfer it to a paper form.

(*That's a joke. I realize of course that there are people with high incomes on paper who are supporting relatives, have high disability expenses, are trying to save a failing home business, and so forth.)

I got misled or defrauded or something

About that Amazon.com "Save $70 by opening a credit card" thing

I've been getting this Amazon promo every time I buy something, and have been ignoring it. First, I already have the Amazon Store Card, which I got about a few years ago. It gave me $50 off my first purchase, which is why I opened it, and no interest for six months on purchases over some amount, which I also why I purchased it. (At the time I needed car seats that would fit three-across in a compact car.)

I was assuming this offer was the same thing, and would reject me since I already had one. But then today I went to purchase something and a full-screen ad came up on the way to checkout, showing an image of an Amazon Visa Card, with an actual credit card. (The store card only works on Amazon and is a floppy membership-type card with no chip or strip, since you wouldn't be swiping it anywhere.) Hey Amazon, good advertising there. This actually got it through my thick skull that it's a different product, and I applied.

I was approved in 60 seconds, and it credited the $70 to my Amazon gift card balance without me having made the purchase yet. Even better, since this means I can just take the free stuff and throw the card in a drawer when it gets here and never use it.

For reference, if you're wondering if your credit score is sufficient, I have a lot of debt, but no negative items. I generally qualify for store cards with a low limit, but my unused Visa/Mastercard accounts also send me letters saying they're lowering my credit line due to high amount of total debt. I got the lowest interest rate they offer and a limit in the mid-four figures, so I'm thinking this card is probably a good one for people without great credit to try.

Two dollars!

Trying out this Wikibuy thing that supposedly gives you better prices than Amazon

I accidentally stumbled across this on one of those sponsored Facebook posts, and it looks worth giving a try. So far I've installed it and poked around a bit. I haven't found a price that's better than Amazon, but I haven't had it installed very long. So far it seems more legit and less gimmicky than things like the Swagbucks toolbar. I'll update once I've used it more. Does anyone else use it and have any reviews or tips?