My latest roundup of interesting reading from around the Interweb. As always, no particular science to it, just a few articles I enjoyed or found useful.
In “How I Balance My Love Of Gadgets Between My Concern For The Environment And My Wallet”, david from My Two Dollars talks about a subject similar to my post about Health, Wealth and Social Responsibility. He makes some good points about the desire to continually upgrade to the newest electronic gadget. I am feeling this pull these days as I look sadly at my two-year old cell phone while everyone around me has Blackberries and iPhones. I have, however, resisted the urge to upgrade from my 128Mb MP3 player for years.
Danny at Money Socket makes some good points in “Stay Healthy and Get Rich In The Long Run.” I think a critical point often missed in retirement discussions is that you’re still going to be a lot better off as a healthy 65 year old with $500,000 in the bank than you would be if you were an unhealthy 65 year old with $2 million in the bank. If you’re in your 60s, obese, a smoker, diabetic, etc. that money isn’t going to buy you much happiness. You can’t ever waste money on your health.
Ben at Money Smart Life covers a subject near and not-so-dear to my heart: “Money Mistakes To Avoid – Loss Aversion.” I suffer from a bad case of loss aversion. My investing, my lifestyle and even in some senses my personal relationships are riddled with a focus on loss aversion. Sometimes I have to really kick myself to take a few more risks here and there and not always play it safe.
Over at the Brazen Careerist, Penelope has “New research reveals some new ways to buy happiness, sort of.” Living fairly far away from most “old” friends and family I worry about the effect on Bubelah and Little Buddy and myself. We have “new” friends in our little starter neighborhood that we enjoy, but the physical distance from our “old” friends and our families is something to be concerned about.
And finally I had to laugh about “Olive Oil Attitude” over at Money, Matter, and More Musings. It’s a well-written look at the debate between people who use “cheap” canola oil and “expensive” olive oil. I fall on the olive oil side. We use olive oil for all of our cooking for a few reasons: it makes everything taste better, I find that volume-wise you can use less olive oil and it just seems more natural. I know if I buy an olive and press it, oil comes out. If I get a corn kernel and press it, oil doesn’t come out, so there’s some extra processing happening. But it is just a personal preference, and I don’t have any particular dislike of canola, I just prefer the rich taste of olive oil.
Today’s post was paid for by the Olive Oil Producers of America (I wish!)
By the way, I’ll announce the winner of the book contest soon – waiting to hear from the winner!
