Welcome readers to "Every Penny Counts"

By The Standard Staff - 05/14/2007

Welcome readers to “Every Penny Counts” This special advertising section is chock-full of good advice on planning for retirement, financing your college education, ways to stay on top of your mortgage payments and how to save money in the ever-escalating world of costs. This section will be in The Montana Standard on Mondays, and online at www.mtstandard.com under special reports.

We hope you find it useful.

o o o Great wedding, money-saving tips Getting married? Here’s some advice on saving money from the book ‘‘Where to Seat Aunt Edna and 500 Other Great Wedding Tips’’ (Hundreds of Heads Books, www.hundredsofheads.com, $13.95), straight from people who’ve done it: ‘‘To save money on your dress, look for a line by a designer that has been discontinued. I saved about $600 on my dress that way.’’

— Kristina, San Antonio, Texas; Number of wedding guests: 60 o o o ‘‘Want to really save money on your wedding? Don’t invite anyone else! My wife and I went to Disney World — just the two of us — to get married. Then we hosted a family picnic when we got home.’’

— M.R., Hellertown, Pa.; Number of wedding guests: 0 o o o ‘‘One way to save money is to trade services. One bride I know traded her services as a Web site designer for a photographer’s services at her wedding. The important thing to remember is to do this only with professionals. Aunt Sally who bakes cakes for the church bake sale may not be qualified to make your 200+ person wedding cake.’’

— Ann Saavedra, Walnut Creek, Calif.

o o o ‘‘We had no photographer, no caterer, no band and no florist, and our wedding was great. Our friends and family took pictures, we made all the food. My husband made a wedding file of music on his MP3 player, — L.D., Greenville, N.C.; Number of wedding guests: 170 we bought some bulk roses from Costco, and my mother mixed those with wildflowers she picked and arranged them in her collection of antique pitchers.’’

——— ‘‘The invitations were one area where we figured we could really save some cash. All you are really doing is trying to find out who the heck is coming so you can plan accordingly. It shouldn’t cost an arm and a leg. We just bought postcards on the Internet with pictures of Aruba, our honeymoon destination, and sent them, telling people to either call or e-mail by a certain date if they could come. I’ll bet we saved $400 by doing it that way.’’

— Aric Mechlin, Watts Flats, N.Y.; Number of wedding guests: 100 ——— Hundreds of Heads Books’ survival guides offer the wisdom of the masses by assembling the experiences and advice of hundreds of people who have gone through life’s biggest challenges and have insight to share. Visit www.hundredsofheads.com to share your advice or get more information.

——— (c) 2007, Hundreds of Heads Books, Inc.

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

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Gas prices still a better deal than carpooling Paying $3 a gallon for gas does get you thinking about carpooling to work.

Carpooling makes sense for a lot of reasons: It saves you money, it cuts down on traffic and it helps the environment.

That said, I’d rather walk than carpool.

I guess the major problem I have with carpooling is that, for it to work, you have to be in a car with other people.

Maybe it’s just me, but being in a car with the same people every day is like one rung above a hostage situation.

Here are a few of my other concerns about carpooling: Grooming: People do a lot of icky personal maintenance in their cars. Without getting into specifics, let’s just say that if all the digging and scratching and picking were to be done in the presence of other individuals, it would not be uncommon to see people bailing out of moving vehicles on the interstates.

Air quality and emissions: Enough said.

Conversation: I don’t know about anyone else, but I talk to myself a lot in the car. I like this arrangement, because I get to talk all the time and never have to stop talking to pretend I’m listening when someone else is talking.

Mood: I am not always what you would call Mary Sunshine in the morning. On the other hand, some people are unfailingly perky and chipper. I don’t think it is a stretch to suggest that this could be a source of conflict.

Outbursts: I have this habit of muttering really, really horrible things about other drivers. My fear is that if other people overheard some of the things I say, I could find myself surrounded by a SWAT team.

Minivan: Here’s a disturbing thought. What if some guy in the carpool drives a minivan. I would gladly pay $10 — no, $20 a gallon — for gas rather than voluntarily ride in one of these five-door rolling monuments to emasculation.

Cell phones: Here is what I see happening. I politely ask my fellow riders to refrain from using their cell phones in the car. They refuse. I show up the next day with a bullhorn.

Radio: There absolutely could be no compromising here. I do not do talk, easy listening, moldy oldies or wacky morning DJs. And under no circumstances will I listen to AM for a nanosecond longer than it takes to get the traffic report.

Seating: Unless it was my turn to drive, I would have to be guaranteed shotgun. I could never ride in the back, particularly if the vehicle had those childproof door locks. If there was some type of rotating schedule for riding shotgun, I would only be able to join the carpool on the days it was my turn to ride shotgun.

Anyway, if anyone has an opening in their carpool, drop me a line.

Distributed by the Los Angeles Times-Washington Post News Service