Although they’re now all owned by the same company (Expedia Inc.), I still prefer TripAdvisor over the others as a source for hotel reviews.

The reviews at TripAdvisor are submitted by people that have actually stayed at the hotel, so they’re a lot more relevant than some arbitrary star-based review from Hotels.com, HotWire, or Expedia.

Sure, it takes about ten years to read through all the reviews, but if you’re planning some special vacation and you really want to get it right, TripAdvisor is worth a visit.

It’s like a Personal Finance Blogger thing, giving away free books.

Dawn from Frugal for Life is giving away a free copy of “Not Buying It,” all you have to do is leave a comment. Easy as pie! More details at her site!

On another note, fellow Money Bloggers may be interested in the new forum over at the Money Blogger Network. It’s where all the cool kids hang out.

Ever said that after you visited a restaurant?

“Dang, my wife (girlfriend, sister, mom, Bob) can cook better than that!”

It sucks. You’re paying money for something that you (or someone you know) can cook better. It’s even worse if you’re saying it at a “your bill is your first born” restaurant.

See, I know for a fact, that I can make a better salmon than Sizzler.

Or, pictures of what it’s like working at Google.

It’s a bit old but I just stumbled across it over at the Digital Point forum. The pictures were loading a bit slow there, so I figure I’ll download them for your viewing pleasure (for those that haven’t seen them yet).

Click on the image above to head to the image gallery.

Pictures from the Digital Point forum.

Went to the grocery store to pick up some salmon for dinner…

Came back with extra goodies.

Couldn’t help it. They were going 3 for $4.50. It’s a steal.

Three months ago I mentioned that I no longer have health insurance. Apparently that’s a bad idea. My wacky diet of 85% Crunch Berries probably doesn’t help any.

Thanks to comments left by other bloggers, I have been hard at work finding a suitable health insurance plan. It was noted that I should get insured ASAP!

So yeah, three months later, I’ve narrowed it down to three plans. These are all high deductible plans with 0% coinsurance, purely for covering a catastrophic illness.

Who to go with?

There are some local providers that may be cheaper, but I’m choosing larger/nationwide providers so that hopefully, the expected price increase on premiums would be more reasonable (if there’s even such a thing).

The lifetime maximum for each of those plans above are similar, with Health Net and Blue Shield at $6 Million and Aetna at $5 Million.

I’ve rummage through the terms and policies of each plan carefully, and the gist of them is basically this:

If you get sick, your illness is probably not covered. Sucker.

So far I’m leaning towards the cheapest plan from Health Net. I expect to have the coverage for about a year or two, till I graduate from college and hopefully attach myself parasitically to some multi-billion dollar corporation that also can’t afford health insurance.

As with taking a peak in someone’s wallet — you can also learn a lot from what’s on a person’s computer desktop.

Besides, voyeurisms is cool.

So here’s a snapshot of my desktop. Plain black background at a resolution of 1280 x 1024. I try to keep the amount of icons on the desktop minimal. The majority of programs I access can be found through the Start menu.

Anyway let’s start with the top of the desktop.

Well this is embarrassing. Over 5 shortcuts for games:

* Battlefield 2 (borrowed)
* Steam
* Battle for Middle Earth 2 (borrowed)
* Guild Wars
* Dungeon & Dragons Online (borrowed)

The osCommerce folder is where I keep track of files related to the open source e-commerce and online store management software. The 581 folder is where I keep related files and worksheets for a project that I’m working on.The Temp folder is where temporary files are placed before I can organize them to their specific directory or throw them in the Recycle Bin.

The SBC (StopBuyingCrap) folder is the place where I keep all blog related files and pictures. If you open it up, you’ll see numerous rough drafts on post, reviews, and bunch of odd pictures that I haven’t sort out yet.

The Business folder is pretty straight forward. Business related files, media, and workbooks are stored in here.

The Anime and Downloads directory is where I keep downloaded entertainment media. They’re mostly video and music files.

Further down you’ll see the GWC folder, which is where I store all school related work. Below that you’ll see short cuts to two browsers, Firefox and Opera. I’m currently debating between which of them to use. On the right of them you’ll see a web shortcut to my online classes.

Lastly, you have my monthly budget spreadsheet and the current Accounting homework that I’m working on.

Moving on! Let’s see what’s on the bottom part!

The Bottom part of my desktop usually contains a lot of temporary files that I’m either working on or still in the process of utilizing. You’ll see a 811 PDF file I created for a project, and a test HTML page for the same project.

My “To Freaking Do List” is fairly self explainatory. The “ideas” text file is where I jot down ideas I have for the blog, projects, or anything neat that I thought I should make a note of (more on this later). The Complain document is that recent complaint letter I wrote to E-Direct. The Please Finish Me! document is a paper that I’m working on that needs to be magically completed.

The Initial document is another project I’m working on. Key.txt is a temporary text file where I keep some recent passwords or keys that I created online. NoMBA.pdf if an e-Book that I came across and will read soon. The last PDF file is an e-Book written by Seth Godin, called Flipping the Funnel; for 18 pages, it was quite an interesting read.

There are also some Quick Launch icons, Firefox for web, Outlook Express for email, mIRC for IRC networks, and ACDSee for media browsing.

Finally, here’s the last part of the slide show, a look at my ideas.txt file.

As mentioned, this is where I jot down ideas or topics that I’ll write about for the blog (and other projects). Basically, it’s a “coming up on SBC” schedule. Believe it or not, I plan some of these post. About 50% of them are planned, or rather, written previously then posted on whatever day.

I’ve blurred them out, not because I’m worried someone will steal these awesome ideas (heh), but more because many of them are unconfirmed drafts. I’d hate to say I’m going to write about something, and then end up not following up on it.

If you look at the list, you’ll see some of the stuff I’ve posted already, and some stuff that I haven’t yet. Quite a few of them are incomplete drafts in the blog’s write page. You’ll also see that I have quite a few post with the category of “Stupid Mistakes.” They’re basically about major foobars in my life that are finance related. I’m still working on them!
So uh, that’s that.

I’m not sure why, but this entire post was in some weird monotone mode. I feel like I was giving a tour in the museum of who-gives-a-damn.

Oh well. The post was a good idea when it was still in the idea.txt file!

Went in to get a haircut today, and I found out that he changed the price from $8 to $10 per haircut—since the beginning of the year. This means I haven’t been tipping him at all for the past few months, because I’ve been paying him only $10 ($8 + $2 tip).

He was pretty cool about it though.