Interesting Government Visitor to Pants in a Can

So I was looking at my Google Analytics reports early this morning and noticed a new network location listed under the “Visitors” tab.

It’s labeled “Information Systems – U.S. House of Representatives”.

Interesting.

Now I’m sure some out there think I’m going to say something about how I’m horrified that some government employee is wasting our tax dollars surfing websites like Pants in a Can on the clock, you know, using government time and equipment for, well, less than official things but I’m not going there…

Government waste, oddly enough, doesn’t bother me too much.

Looking into it further, their landing page on the site was my post from July 15 titled, “FTC Bait? My Own Mortgage Crisis…”

That had me thinking, hey, cool, maybe the whole PMI/Countrywide dilemma I find myself in is getting a little attention in Washington! Sweet! This could be a good thing…

But then I went another step further and looked up the search terms they used to stumble across my site…

“definition of mortgage insurance, ftc”

Ouch.

I dunno, maybe it’s just me, but you think they’d have access internally to, um, more official sources of reference…

But I can’t say that I’m not flattered that they clicked through to my site.

And I also feel the need to say that I’m thrilled that someone in Washington DC is looking this type of thing up.

Though the media would have you think otherwise of late, mortgage company disputes don’t begin and end with foreclosures…

I’m not looking for a bailout; I just don’t want to be ripped off (any more)…

Posted on September 24th, 2008 at 8:35 pm by Brainy Smurf
Blogging?, PMI - Mortgage Insurance | No Comments »

Personal Finance can get…BOOORRRIIINNNGGG…

Back when I stared writing on this thing that I call “Pants in a Can”, I didn’t so much think that I’d make it exclusively a personal finance blog. Main reason was that I didn’t think I’d have enough to write about.

And, let’s be honest, it’d be boring.

I mean, how exciting is it to read about how I just paid my VISA bill this morning or how the DJIA just reached some essentially meaningless number?

It’s not.

It’d kinda be like reading the Wall Street Journal.

Sure, there’s probably some decent info in there, but would it kill them to add a few more pictures or fluff pieces? I’m not saying they’d have to go all “USA Today” or anything, but find a happy medium.

At the start, I ranted and raved about annoying school buses, drivers from Virginia, and those PC vs. Mac commercials that drive me up a wall more than I complained of various finance charges and terrible customer service at Countrywide.

And you know what?

Going back and reading about my personal issues with those school buses and Virgina drivers, and that Mac guy, well, some of my posts used to be kinda funny. Mean-spirited, but funny. It’s a shame few read them. (hint, hint)

So, while I’ve tried to broaden the theme and shake things up a bit with my recent “Photo of the Week” posts (yeah, I know, they’re pretty dull), I thought I’d go back to occasionally ranting and raving about the stuff that I see all the time that annoys me to no end.

Like the latest PC vs. Mac commercial.

Yes, I’d opt for the free pizza.

The Mac guy could deliver it for me.

Posted on September 13th, 2008 at 11:19 am by Brainy Smurf
Blogging?, Rants | No Comments »

Larks’ tongues! Otters’ noses! Ocelot spleens! RSS Readers!

Last month, Sean from Financial Ramblings ranked the busiest, the longest lasting, and the most popular PF-Blogs in his reader.

While that might not be a real credible sampling, it’s still a pretty impressive list that must’ve taken a long time to put together — but for dorks like me that love charts and numbers, it held my interest a lot longer than most entries about blogging do. This entry included.

On his chart of the busiest PF-Blogs, PIAC came in 26th place out of 150 with 36 posts for the month. That was pleasantly surprising.

Of course, quantity doesn’t necessary relate to quality.

One popular blog on there has multiple posts per day… everyday. I used to read it, but then I began to realize that it was a repetitive, I dunno, “how many job interviews can I go to without actually ever getting a job” fest.

If it wasn’t a about a half-hearted job search, it was just talk about a new crush, what she’s having for dinner, or what overpriced outfit she planned on wearing Friday night or something. Yawn.

On the other hand, there are some sites that post maybe once or twice a week that are just great reads every single time. They ranked really low on the busy chart. Often times, quality outweighs quantity.

The next chart Sean put together was a longevity chart. PIAC started back in April 2007 which ranked 69th. Not old, but not new either.

But it was this chart, combined with the popularity chart that really tweaked my interest.

On the popularity listing, my Feedburner count wasn’t even listed. Not sure why, but it doesn’t really matter — I would have fallen at the back of the list. Way at the back.

Post frequency aside, among other sites that are the about the same age, my number of readers is very, very low — usually between 50 and 60 readers. It’s been stagnant for, well, pretty much all of 2008 while my traffic has continued to grow and grow with each passing month…

Why is that?

Well, one thing I’ve noticed is that a lot of blogs out there have big graphics in their side bar begging people to sign up for their feed. Many even make entries stating just that: Click here to subscribe to my feed! No other content, just sign up please.

I haven’t done that before… until NOW!

So, if you wouldn’t mind, and you semi-regularly read this site, please consider signing up for my RSS Feed, you know, if only to boost my ego. ;0)

No worries, I won’t bother with telling you what I’m having for dinner, what I’m wearing on Friday, or what kind of soap I used this morning.

Posted on August 25th, 2008 at 9:24 am by Brainy Smurf
Blogging? | No Comments »

Value Dropping Every Minute

I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned it in the past before on PIAC, but since I quit my photographer position last November, I’ve had around $30k worth of camera equipment essentially collecting dust in the corner of my, ahem, jersey room.

While the lenses and the lighting equipment hold their value, the actual camera bodies certainly do not — and they make up for at least half of that $30k total. Definitely a depreciating asset…

So, having noticed a blog that my wife frequents regularly has a “daily photo” section and that I’ve got tons and tons of expensive camera equipment doing a whole lot of nothing, well, I thought I’d start doing “picture of the day” posts here too!

It probably won’t be popular.

It probably won’t be nice to look at.

And it probably won’t generate any comments either but I can’t fathom selling the equipment off and it hurts to watch it go un-used.

Maybe I’ll even use January 2007′s “Dumbest Purchase”.

Not sure when I’ll start…or even if I’ll start.

It’s just an idea at this point.

Posted on August 10th, 2008 at 7:49 am by Brainy Smurf
Blogging?, Motivation, Photo | 4 Comments »

Simplifying Things Around Here

Beginning this Friday, I’ve decided to simplify my monthly net worth chart.

Who really cares about the numbers at the start of the year? And are all the percentages really necessary?

I don’t think so.

So starting August 1, the chart will only display the past month’s progress. Really, that’s all that matters anyway.

Maybe at the end of the year, I’ll do a full year recap with a big confusing chart where I’m the only person who can make sense of it, but maybe not.

The past few months, a number of PF bloggers have stopped reporting their net worth all together. Most recently, Lazy Man comes to mind.

The greats, like JD from Get Rich Slowly or Trent from The Simple Dollar have never really done monthly updates at all — and they’re still great!

But there’s something to be said for sites like Consumerism Commentary where Flexo has illustrated how he’s taken his net worth from as low as $13k in December of 2003 all the up to nearly $156k just last month — month-by-month.

It gives his words, stories, and advice, I don’t know, some credibility, I guess.

It gives you that, “Hey look what this person did… I can do that too!” feeling.

Some might find the monthly updates to be boring posts, but for me, the real numbers people use on their own sites are most inspiring in a “keeping up with the Joneses” sort of way…

Maybe it’s just me…

Posted on July 29th, 2008 at 3:33 pm by Brainy Smurf
Blogging?, Net Worth Updates | No Comments »

Re: Carnival of Debt Reduction

My ‘Red Zone Finances‘ article just made the cut for this week’s “Carnival of Debt Reduction” hosted over at DebtFREE-Revolution.

Among the other selected submissions, there are some great strategies listed for paying down debt — creatively and in a hurry.

Check ‘em out!

Posted on July 28th, 2008 at 3:12 pm by Brainy Smurf
Blogging? | No Comments »

Blogging on Vacation… Not so much…

Yeah, so my idea of doing updates (like a net worth update today!) while on the road isn’t happening…

I put together a pretty ambitious vacation itinerary (we’re exhausted) so just finding the time is difficult enough but the biggest hurdle, by far, has been the internet connection at each hotel…

High speed? Please… I feel like I’m on a 9600 dial-up connection.

So it’s not happening… I’ll be back on the 5th with a full recap.

Happy Canada Day!

Posted on July 1st, 2008 at 7:06 am by Brainy Smurf
Blogging? | No Comments »

Low Productivity Lately

I didn’t get much done this weekend. Motivation isn’t quite at an all time low, but it’s not far off either.

I’d had plans to spend some quality time updating the blog, but it never happened.

I ended up playing an NHL video game instead — for hours. I’m a little embarrassed to admit it, but according to the computer, the last time I played was back in October which makes me not feel so bad.

Jumping on the bandwagon, even though they’ve been eliminated from the real life playoffs, I played as the Washington Capitals.

Sometimes I wonder how I found the time to even play video games in the past… By past, I mean like over 10 years ago. Seems I never have that time anymore and I have no idea what I’ve filled it with.

I’d also planned on cleaning up the curbside on the far end of the property.

See, we live on a corner, so there’s twice as much ‘street’ to clear which entails picking up all of the leaves, sticks and plain old debris that lines the curb. Basically, you want to get as much up yourself so that when the street sweeper (eventually) comes by to pick up all of the sand that’s been spread on to the road over the winter, it leaves the pavement bare for the entire summer.

Yesterday, my wife and I did manage to get out there and get the job done.

Apparently the teenagers across the street from our open lot prefer Taco Bell and Marlboro smokes. Shocking, huh?

How do we know this? Well, our curbside is apparently their late night trash can. It’s also their overnight parking space for some reason even though the family paved their entire front yard (yeah, it looks, um, ghetto) and has plenty of room for all of their run-down vehicles.

In hindsight, I should have put the pieces of their broken glass water pipe on the hood of their mother’s car, but I just threw it out. She strikes me as the type of woman who’d pat her kids on the back for that sort of thing.

Really, who paves their entire front yard??? It’s a single family home with a parking lot for a front yard?!

I hope they move.

Soon.

We’d also planned on getting the basement, um, well, decontaminated. The issue we have down there hasn’t exactly gotten worse, but it hasn’t gotten better either.

Thursday night we went out and purchase some kitty litter — and I can I just say, that stuff is a bargain! Really. I’ve never had the pleasure of spending so little money at Walmart for something so heavy that I had to struggle on the way out to my car.

The plan was to use the litter to soak up the pooling water — something we’d planned to do this past weekend — but it didn’t happen.

Friday, my wife, she does all the talking, called a local plumbing company to have them come out and take a look at our sludge problem. They’ll be stopping by tomorrow (Tuesday).

The good news from the call is that they confirmed that it was apparently pretty common for the kitchen plumbing not to be connected to the city sewer line in favor of a dry well.

That explains the plumbing that I see in the basement. It also explains the hole I covered with a big rock in the back yard — that’s the dry well and thankfully not some sort of outdated “little house on the prairie” septic tank of some sort like I’d originally worried.

The bad news is that the plumber also told her that, to him, kitchen wastewater is more foul than toilet wastewater. My take is that it was a warning shot meaning that this is going to cost us more than if we had a “real” sewage problem.

I don’t know why, but for some reason, I don’t consider the kitchen sink water to be sewage, but holy crap, it freakin’ stinks…

Posted on April 28th, 2008 at 9:48 am by Brainy Smurf
Bargains, Blogging?, Home Improvements, Motivation | No Comments »

Pants in a Can: 1 Year and Counting…

Well, I’m one year into this now…

Has it paid off?

I like to think so.

I was well into my journey when I started the site last year (on tax day — total coincidence), but I was still carrying over $20k in non-mortgage debt — much of it at a high rate.

In July, I then went out and used credit cards to finance over $20k in home renovations, which sounds crazy, but in the end, it worked out nicely.

Today, I’m only lugging around $6300, or so, and it’s at a low rate of 5.35%.

The site has definitely forced me to hold myself more accountable in regards to spending.

There’s just something “extra” about wanting the net worth numbers to go up each month and just that little tiny additional incentive makes a huge difference.

Let’s be honest… It isn’t much fun to broadcast down numbers, so it’s become a habit to avoid having to.

The site has also also forced me to keep better track of where my money is going.

I’d done that routinely in the past, a couple of times per week, but never like I do now. I’m a lot more detailed now — I can tell you to the penny how much I’ve sent to Citgo, Mobil, or Sunoco this past year.

Apparently Shell is my gas station of choice…  Interesting.  Or not.

Weekly tranfers into savings? No way I would have considered doing that a year ago. No way.

I’m starting to think that, by April 15 next year, it’s a given that I will easily be 100% non-mortgage debt free and I’ll have a nice savings cushion to fall back on.

That is unless I finance another huge home improvement project between now and then — which is a definite possibilty…

Stay tuned…

Posted on April 15th, 2008 at 6:24 am by Brainy Smurf
Blogging?, Success | 2 Comments »

Festival Inclusion and Pants Update

My Find IT on eBay posting was recently featured in the Festival of Frugality hosted by A Penny Saved.

They even complimented this site’s name! How cool is that?

Anyway, perhaps I spoke to soon when I said the jeans on eBay were a great deal — they *still* haven’t arrived. I’m not anywhere near chalking it up as a loss quite yet, but man, could they ship any slower?

I won the auction on March 19. Their listing loudly stated that “Payment it is a must in 7 business days” which, of course, I complied with…

I wonder when they plan to ship? One would hope it’s “a must in 7 business days”.

Sigh…

Posted on April 8th, 2008 at 6:32 am by Brainy Smurf
Blogging? | 2 Comments »

PIAC Site Stats for March 2008

Who doesn’t like to talk numbers? Sure, I’d much rather go over financial numbers this morning, but over the past few days, I feel I’ve beaten them to death. There isn’t much left to go over there until my next paycheck comes in.

So for the first time ever, and like many other sites on a slow day, I’m going to go over my monthly stats for PIAC (Pants in a Can).

March was the first month since I started that I managed to compile 31 posts — effectively making PIAC a blog that’s updated daily. It took a lot of work on some days, but others, well, I was able to write two or three posts in one sitting so I could relax for a few days.

The more rigorous scheduled turned out to be very beneficial for the site as I nearly doubled my previous highs for unique visitors and visits.

For the month, the site had 3366 unique visitors and 5261 visits — far and away the most traffic the site has seen. I also topped out at 40 FeedBurner readers part way through the month.

This was due largely to participating in my first carnival, a mention in Laura Moran’s “Today On MainStreet: Personal Finance” article on TheStreet.com, another mention (of the same post) on Tricia’s Blogging Away Debt site, and the top listing (for a few hours) on Google for my “Vatican adds Accumulation of Wealth to 7 Deadly Sins” posting.

Often times the posts that I think are my best aren’t the most popular. Funny how it always seems to work out that way, and this month was no different. The most popular posts in March were:

1. $28k+ Credit Card Debt Eliminated – Nice accomplishment, but hardly a great post.
2. Vatican adds Accumulation of Wealth to 7 Deadly Sins – A quoted article post.
3. Moment of Clarity: When I Figured Out How to Fix my Finances – My favorite
4. A Life Where ‘or Plastic’ isn’t an Option – Eh, mostly a quoted article.
5. Live like Most Won’t to Live like Most Can’t – Another good one.

The top blog referrers were:

1. Blogging Away Debt
2. Million Dollar Journey
3. Windy City Blues
4. Consumerism Commentary
5. Corner Office Blog
6. How to Make 7 Million in 7 Years
7. Debt Kid
8. Five Cent Nickel
9. The Happy Rock
10. Dedicated to Financial Freedom

Many of them were due to the frequency of my posting this month, which led to the site being listed on the popular pfblogs.org blogroll pretty regularly.

Right now, I’m not really optimistic about April going as well as March did, but many of the posts over the past week or so have garnered some comments and I’m pretty happy about that.

I like to think that my financial situation fills a small void among the various PF blogs. I’m not poor and I’m not paycheck-to-paycheck but I’m also not contemplating quitting my day job to blog fulltime either. But hopefully more folks in my situation find their way here and follow my lead!

Posted on April 2nd, 2008 at 8:46 am by Brainy Smurf
Blogging? | No Comments »

Re: Carnival of Personal Finance #145

So I participated in my very first “Carnival of Personal Finance” this week and I have to admit that for the past few months, I’ve been avoiding all of the carnivals as they’ve always seemed a little goofy and essentially nothing more than, well, link farms…

But I must say, it’s brought me some new traffic and best of all, it’s also opened my eyes to a ton of blogs that I hadn’t ever read before.

I think it’s safe to say, I’ll be back…

Posted on March 24th, 2008 at 6:38 pm by Brainy Smurf
Blogging? | 1 Comment »