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I've had a margin account at vanguard more than a decade, but never done any margin investing. I like the idea of having the margin for quick access to lots of emergency cash. E.g. in case I total a rental car or need to bail someone out of jail. I just now learned that for a long time...

I got a letter from Vanguard saying they want to merge the mutual fund account into my brokerage account. They make it sound as if there are no downsides, and I can't think of any important ones, but just thought I'd see what others at Vangaurd are doing... are you going to accept the merge?

I wonder how much of the returns that we get from stocks and bonds are a result of the externalized costs that our companies cause to the world at large. The classic externalized cost is environmental pollution. If my company dumps toxics that will cost 10 million to clean up and then fail...

I had a neuropsych evaluation done earlier this year, prompted by relatively typical issues around memory issues as I get older, and well as lifelong anxiety and depression. In a nutshell, the result was that I'm normal, no major issues. Now I'm wondering if there is any way to get my...

After doing a lot of research on aluminum while buying some new frying pans, I learned that humans supposedly consume quite a bit of aluminum typically. 10mg/day seems like a low consensus estimate from a few sources I've seen. So I was just eating my salad and found some shavings from...

Last night driving home was the first time in my life that I ever caused a collision. Sadly, it was with a pedestrian. I was making a left hand turn from a side street stop sign, onto one of the widest and fastest surface streets in my city. I was looking right at the traffic I would merge...

I just got a notice in the mail that I am part of a settlement class due to my Anthem healthcare insurance. The settlement benefit is that I get to switch to any of the currently offered plans offered by Anthem, without needing a medical underwriting and without the possibility of being denied...

It seems that more and more sheets are being sold as sets, and it's getting less possible to buy just a fitted sheet. It's always the fitted sheet that wears first... usually after a couple of years it rips, while the pillowcases and flat sheets are fine because they haven't had body weight on...

I posted a little while about whether to report the theft of my stolen bike to insurance, but there's a new development: I had posted on craigslist about my $1400 stolen bike, and written that I will offer a generous reward for info leading to its safe return. I just got an email saying...

I just had a brand new bicycle stolen. It was my first ride on this bike, just a week after purchase. Ouch. I stupidly locked it with a cable lock in front of a store, and it was gone when I exited a half hour later. So I'm now left with the dilemna of whether to report this to Allstate, my...

I've noticed that many people, when loaning to friends or family, charge less interest than market rates, or even less than their own time cost of money. If you have made personal loans and charged less than market rates, what is the most important reason why?

After eating a restaurant meal I realized I had forgotten my wallet. With visions of hours of dishwashing in my future, I realized I did have the debit card for my HSA plan with me, so I paid the $18 for my meal with that. So now I have to figure out how to account for this weirdness of...

My Anthem individual health insurance just rose 33%. According to this article, my hike was less than average. Anthem Blue Cross raises premiums

One of our perennial topics got an article on my newspaper blog. I like the razor they mention "imposing on others' goodwill". Dollars and Sense : The fine line between frugal and inappropriate

I'm facing a dilemna around how deep I want to get into fighting my health insurance company. I received about $25k worth of medical care for an accident. Originally the insurance company denied about $12k worth of that because the hospital I was brought to was not a preferred provider. I...

I recently came across an article in my alumni magazine about how naming rights for my undergraduate university were purchased for only $5000 in 1803, which was reportedly the amount that endowed a single professorship. So I looked up inflation calculators, curious to see what ridiculous...

During the recent economic crisis I had most of my bond allocation in short term investment-grade corporate bonds (VFSUX), and learned a tough lesson about credit quality risk, as the value dropped way below treasuries and other "safe" bonds, due to investors getting worried about defaults. See...

Can anyone tell me of a good website that will allow me to overlay total returns graphs for two securities so that I can compare them. I'm looking for data on both ETFs and bond funds, but sites that do one or the other would be welcome. The major graphing sites like google and yahoo only...

I was using a 20 year old T-style bike pump to top off my car tires earlier this evening. I had been noticing the one way valve inside was getting flaky; often when I would pump I would feel the backpressure not just on the downstrokes as normal, but also on the upstroke as well. As I was...

I've been using 123greetings for sending birthday and holiday greeting cards for years now, because they seem to have the most/best cards of the free sites. but they always seem a bit on the dodgy side with a cheap looking ad-heavy site and I worry a little about whether I'm signing my...

I'm trying to decide whether to take advantage of the 0% capital gains tax rate or do a Rollover into a Roth IRA. I've been thinking about converting some or all of my approx $100k Traditional IRA into a Roth IRA, to take advantage of the down market and pay less ordinary income tax on the...

I happened across this fairly decent article with lots of ideas for frugal living: Ten Ways to Start Living the Frugal Life And it looks like we need a new category for this board because they have an article on: Homemade Dryer Sheets - How to Make Dryer Sheets Cliff Notes: soak some fabric...

I recently got six stitches in the ER to sew up a wound from a nasty fall. The stitches were removed a week or so ago, but the scar is going to be there for a while. It's about 3/4" long, and roughly follows the outside of my eyebrow. It's on an angle, as if it were connecting my third eye to...

I recently got with the times and started using a power toothbrush, the Braun Oral B Triumph 9400. I ordered some replacement flossaction toothbrushes from amazon and things are going great. I have this "can't believe I lived without this all my life" feeling, knowing my teeth get much cleaner...

Interesting idea about risk, that feels very apropos today: Original article on "quants": http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/10/science/10quant.html?pagewanted=1&hp I wonder if incorporating this idea into monte carlo simulations would improve their accuracy.