I work in the city on Thursdays, so I went back to the used bookstore at lunch. I found 6 more books I can sell on ebookdrop for $17.44-$6.51 I need to pay for them equals $10.93 profit. The good news is that this is my 4th round of doing this, and I seem to be pretty consistent netting $10-$12 each time, which is great. The downside is that, in order to find those 6 books, I had to look through about 200! Oh well, not bad for an hour when I wouldn't have done anything else anyway...I'm going to keep doing the used bookstore thing as part of my 2006 challenge. I'm also going to check out some local libraries. Two have booksales once a month. I can go to the sale, write the ISBNs, use the library's internet to check ebookdrop, then buy any ones I can sell. It'll be hit or miss, I'm sure.

Thanks, Baselle, for reminding me about the $.02 stamp increase (effective January 8, I think). I'll change my goal of not buying stamps to buying just enough $.02 stamps to match the number of $.37 stamps I have, then not buy anymore. I don't think that $.39 is an unreasonable amount to pay to get a letter anywhere I want within a day or two, but Post Office expenses are just one example of what shows up in the "Miscellaneous" category of my budget. Every month it ends up being well over $100, and it's piddling amounts like these (and ATM fees, library fines, etc.) that cause a lot of it. Frustrating...

Watched the 40-Year-Old Virgin with hubby last night and thought it was great (though a tad long). I laughed out loud so many times, which I don't usually do at movies. Onto some other 2006 goals...

Internet: $40/month ($0 in 2004, $18 in 2005). I promised hubby we could move from dial-up, which he hates, to cable internet. Unfortunately, I have directtv, so I can't take advantage of the bundled options the cable company gives out, so I think I'm going to be pretty much paying full price. (We can't even self-install, because we don't have the cable wires in the house). I'm ok with the increase, though, because I feel like I get so much out of the internet access.

DirectTv: $105/mo ($89 in 04, $103 in 05). I was able to call up and get them to give me a discount for being a valued customer ($15 for 3 months, $10 for 3 months after that), so I'll get the 3 $10 bonuses in 2006. I think I'm still committed to them for most of the year, due to the Tivo service we set up a few months back, plus hubby really likes it and has no desire to switch to cable, (or reduce services), so the bill is what it is. This is one I'm going to just have to suck up...

Pool: $90/mo ($109 in 04, $77 in 05). The envelope system will really come in handy here, because we normally get socked twice a year when we open and close the pool. Setting aside money monthly will help cushion the blow. I'm also going to go on Ebay and see if I can get some discounted gift cards to Leslie's pool supply. They're not the most popular for sure, but at least if I look now I may get lucky. Also, there are a ton of mail order places I can check out for chemicals and the like, to see if I can get them cheaper there.

That's it for now...have a great day!