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Just grab the cheapest levers at your local bike shop. They're not really a tool that you need to min/max. I have some yellow plastic ones that have cool spoke clips in the handles, I think they were $3.
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Mar 24, 2014 15:44
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My buddy has a small website business that he runs on the side. I think he's pulling in $5,000-$15,000 a year. Is it worth it for him to form an LLC or should he continue to run as a sole proprietorship? I think he's making around $50,000-$60,000 from his regular job and he lives in California.
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Mar 24, 2014 15:47
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dreesemonkey posted:I don't want to derail too much, but I'm eating around 1600 calories a day. I'm not claiming counting calories is that great dietary wise, but it's simple and effective for me. I think society has conditioned some bizarre diet myths into the popular consciousness. People hear about these diets and their primary criticism is "thats not enough!" I'm not aware that science allows for you to have a net reduction fat unless you expend more calories than you take in. It's just physics. Realistically not many people can spend the time it takes to burn an excess 1000 calories a day, so reducing food intake is the most effective way to do it. I think lifetime has shown one too many anorexia specials. W&W goons feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. Relevant chat: business trip, free lunch and dinner today and tomorrow.
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Mar 24, 2014 16:53
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Losing any more than 1-2 pounds a week, after accounting for like, daily fluctuations because you eat and drink poo poo, is unsustainable.
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Mar 24, 2014 17:10
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100 HOGS AGREE posted:Losing any more than 1-2 pounds a week, after accounting for like, daily fluctuations because you eat and drink poo poo, is unsustainable. Unless you're very fat.
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Mar 24, 2014 17:38
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100 HOGS AGREE posted:Losing any more than 1-2 pounds a week, after accounting for like, daily fluctuations because you eat and drink poo poo, is unsustainable. Well yea. I didn't claim it to be sustainable, it was literally "On monday morning I started counting calories and doing my best not to exceed 1600 unless I did significant exercise" vs eating whatever whenever. It was the very first week, I think typically people respond very quickly to a big change like that then it slows down. I can probably expect about 1 lb/week if I keep up with it (I've dug myself this hole before)  I didn't track but would be interested to see how much I was eating before, probably 2500-3000 calories on "normal" days.tuyop posted:Just grab the cheapest levers at your local bike shop. They're not really a tool that you need to min/max. I have some yellow plastic ones that have cool spoke clips in the handles, I think they were $3. Thanks, probably have to order from amazon, my LBS is 20 miles out of the way.
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Mar 24, 2014 19:28
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dreesemonkey posted:Well yea. I didn't claim it to be sustainable, it was literally "On monday morning I started counting calories and doing my best not to exceed 1600 unless I did significant exercise" vs eating whatever whenever. It was the very first week, I think typically people respond very quickly to a big change like that then it slows down. To help with your expectations, I've found a half-pound a week (~250 cal/day deficit) cut to be perfectly sustainable if you don't mind your performance stagnating.
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Mar 24, 2014 19:47
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If you have a mortgage, does paying extra each month to bring down the principal faster lower your 'minimum' monthly payment?
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Mar 24, 2014 19:59
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Cicero posted:If you have a mortgage, does paying extra each month to bring down the principal faster lower your 'minimum' monthly payment? Nope, you will just end up making less payments overall.
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Mar 24, 2014 20:05
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Hey, I'm not sure if this should go in BFC or over in the Hardware/Software Crap forums so please excuse me if it would be better elsewhere. My company is in the process of redoing our whole ecommerce website and I'm advising on what changes would make my life easier. We currently ship about 50 packages a day and don't use any special shipping software or management. We use Paypal as our online credit processor, and their multi-order shipping tool to ship. This works decently but leaves a fair amount to be desired. There seem to be an endless sea of options for online shipping managers, but I was hoping to get a goon recommendation. The must have features are automatically emailing the customer a shipping notification with the tracking number and giving us a nice central place to track missing packages, but they all seem to do that. Our website has been built with our own shopping cart, and our own web-based order tracking - which all works pretty well. We'd really love it if the shipping management software we used could also act as a shipping calculator during checkout - pulling the customers zip and returning various levels of shipping from USPS and UPS. Stamps.com doesn't do this, which is why I crossed them off the list for the time being. We have much greater development resources than most other businesses our size due to our owner being married to a coder. Anyone have some shipping advice? Should I take this somewhere else?
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Mar 24, 2014 21:33
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I also have a question for the BFC daily chatters: I have a company provided cell phone that they cover 100%. I'm allowed to use it for both company and personal business. It's great, except when I'm on vacation and coworkers/customers who have that number are able to call and if I'm not paying attention I'll answer. So the question is: Do I get a cheap (read T-mobiles $30/month or $2/per day) plan specifically for personal use allowing myself to be unchained while I'm on vacation and off hours? My financial situation stands at all debts paid off (minus fiancée's student loans), currently have saved $3,800 of our $20,000 emergency fund and $4,200 of our $10,000 wedding fund. I've been mulling over the idea for a few years now but I'm warming up to the idea more and more now that we've lost one of our team members and the number of customers I'm servicing has increased significantly. BFC Daily Chatters, what say you?
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Mar 24, 2014 22:21
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TouchyMcFeely posted:I also have a question for the BFC daily chatters: I say leave the phone at home if you don't want to be bothered by unnecessary communication. The solution here is not to compartmentalize different types of communication but to learn to let go and enjoy life without that possibility of instant contact.
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Mar 24, 2014 22:27
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TouchyMcFeely posted:I also have a question for the BFC daily chatters: I'm a huge fan of Republic Wireless and Ting for cheap mobile plans. You have to pay the cost of the phone upfront (at least for Republic, since they use special phones) but the plans are super cheap. They're based off the Sprint network, if that's a problem. I'm planning on switching to one of them (probably Ting) as soon as I can, so I can't really comment on how good the service is. I'd guess that other goons can tell you more. The T-mobile plan you mention ($30/month) might not be too bad, otherwise.
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Mar 24, 2014 22:33
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TouchyMcFeely posted:I also have a question for the BFC daily chatters: I wouldn't get a new phone.
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Mar 24, 2014 22:34
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I vote not getting a new phone and just set your voicemail on your cell and don't answer. If you accidentally answer just say you are on vacation and give them a number to call.
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Mar 24, 2014 22:41
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I'd also not get a new phone, another device to carry around and give people your number, not to mention something else to pay for. Maybe there is a app for your phone that could put certain numbers straight to voice-mail or something.
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Mar 24, 2014 22:58
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I love you guys  In this case I have an old T-Mobile Galaxy S2 (old work phone) that I could use so no upfront cost there. I already have an office number that I give out that forwards to my cell but people are sneaky and frequently grab my cell number when I call them. And as for not having my phone with me at all times, planted squarely in my rear end...What the hell is wrong with you? Did you realize that without a cell phone you might miss a call, or get lost or not be able to update facebook or any number of other unspeakable things? People DIED before the invention of the cell phone. And worse, they had nothing to do when they pooped! But I'm with everyone here. I've thought about it off and on for a number of years and just couldn't justify it. Still can't and the internet agrees with me so there we are. Cell phone free it is. Thanks BFC. You're the best!
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Mar 24, 2014 23:43
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TouchyMcFeely posted:I love you guys This post makes me very happy. 
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Mar 25, 2014 00:03
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I cannot fathom not having my phone with me even on vacations. It's my map, my camera, my internet, my notes, my to-do list. It's how I get in touch with people I'm visiting to catch up and grab a beer with them and so on. You guys are crazy.
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Mar 25, 2014 00:34
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You could like, plan ahead.
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Mar 25, 2014 00:56
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The main reason why I haven't jumped onto smart phones is because I'm on computers all day at work and at home, not to mention I want to avoid paying for a data plan when I don't need one. So right now I have a prepaid phone in my car for emergencies and rare car calls I usually make out of boredom. I use my work phone and google voice for everything else. I use a dedicated map device in our family car for my wife and for trips. So right now our yearly phone bill is about $220 for the cost of the 2 phones and plans. Anyway, I didn't have anything at work so I drove down to family dollar and got a gallon of 2% milk (I know I shouldn't drink calories but milk fills me up) and some eggs. Sephiroth_IRA fucked around with this message at 01:46 on Mar 25, 2014 |
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Mar 25, 2014 01:43
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Boris Galerkin posted:I cannot fathom not having my phone with me even on vacations. It's my map, my camera, my internet, my notes, my to-do list. It's how I get in touch with people I'm visiting to catch up and grab a beer with them and so on. You guys are crazy. I usually go to a country after learning a bit of the language and hitchhike to a place that sounds interesting. That's how I travel without my phone.
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Mar 25, 2014 01:59
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Harry posted:You could like, plan ahead. Don't be completely ridiculous. Being cheap is fine and all but having things that improve your life is fine too. When we travel it is great for last minute things to do and meeting up with people that you know in the area (they may have regular life to do while you are there). On the vacation front Vegas turned out great. The clubs there are completely awesome, can't wait to get back. Budget wise it was pretty good to me. Took $500 as my target and ended up spending $507 (the one bet I made would have net me $144 if Harvard didn't make that garbage basket with 3 seconds left). Good thing I don't drink heavily and like to be sober at the club, vodka redbulls $20 a pop. My phone came in very handy also.
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Mar 25, 2014 03:48
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Harry posted:You could like, plan ahead. It's not a 'kids these days can't live without instant communication at any time or place!' thing - it's about simple practicality. I want a camera on this trip, do I lug along a camera or the phone? I also want maps on the trip, do I bring along bulky traditional maps, spend time printing out google maps, or bring the phone? Do I take up space in my apartment with an alarm clock, or do I use my phone? Repeat for all the things the phone makes redundant. I'm 100% serious when I say that talk, text, and web are the things I do least on my phone. (the lack of web is only partially because Sprint's data network is poo poo & you can't rely on having it when you're bored in a waiting room, I swear) On that note, I'm going to seriously look at Ting. I'm using nowhere near enough data to justify paying what I am for Sprint's unlimited data, and this way I could keep my phone! $15-$24/mo(based on my historical usage rates) is a pretty sweet deal. I know I bitched about Sprint's data network(which Ting uses), but it doesn't bug me that much.  It might take some of the sting out of moving in May, since I'm almost certainly going to see a rent increase.  My current apartment is on the low end of rent for the area, but it's clearly that way for a reason.
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Mar 25, 2014 04:42
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Haifisch posted:And bring 15 more things with you because you want to make a moral point about phones. I'm not saying "kids these days" at all, just that all those things (phone and it's substitutes) are totally unnecessary and most people would do well to travel without them despite what they think they want or need. It's an amazing experience to be able to live indefinitely in the world with nothing but some clothes, money, a bit of Spanish or Turkish or whatever and the kindness of strangers.
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Mar 25, 2014 04:59
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It's pretty awesome but not really a reality for most people.
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Mar 25, 2014 05:02
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I was able to travel without a phone for a week or two, but it wasn't as fun as the next time I went to the same place and brought a smartphone. Being able to access maps, restaurant reviews, and figuring out whether or not places were open or closed and how to get to them was valuable, and definitely worth the $100 or so I paid for an int'l data plan. Getting unnecessary calls from back in the states while traveling ("Hello! I'm calling from Walgreens to remind you that you can refill your prescription!" "AGH HELL THIS JUST COST ME $2.50") was super annoying, though. Even letting the calls go to voicemail would have cost $$, too. It was ridiculous.
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Mar 25, 2014 06:59
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pancaek posted:I was able to travel without a phone for a week or two, but it wasn't as fun as the next time I went to the same place and brought a smartphone. Being able to access maps, restaurant reviews, and figuring out whether or not places were open or closed and how to get to them was valuable, and definitely worth the $100 or so I paid for an int'l data plan. BFC tip: Upon arriving in an international destination pop out your Sim card and go to a place that sells prepaid ones. I went to Ireland this summer and bought a $15 O2 Sim and 2 weeks worth of data and voice didn't use up the whole initial $15. You need an international unlocked phone, but I had a Nexus 4 and that worked.
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Mar 25, 2014 11:11
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Haifisch posted:On that note, I'm going to seriously look at Ting. I'm using nowhere near enough data to justify paying what I am for Sprint's unlimited data, and this way I could keep my phone! $15-$24/mo(based on my historical usage rates) is a pretty sweet deal. I know I bitched about Sprint's data network(which Ting uses), but it doesn't bug me that much. I'll get a $50 credit so clearly this is only out of the good of my heart. As actual content, I bought some cheap paintings on SA Mart that I liked, decided to actually use some of that money I budgeted for home furnishings, instead of just letting it sit there unused forever. 100 HOGS AGREE fucked around with this message at 12:25 on Mar 25, 2014 |
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Mar 25, 2014 12:23
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Bloody Queef posted:I saw this on extreme cheapskates, but doing a week where you spend no money at all would be a neat challenge. It'd also help clean out your freezer and pantry. We are kinda doing this atm. I am pretty much only cooking what we have in the freezer or the pantry saved up. My husband is taking eggs that we get from our chickens for his lunches, so that helps a lot. I'm only getting things from the store that are perishable, ie, milk/veg/fruit/juice. So far so good...in a month I have already shaved $200 off our grocery bill, and our eating out/work lunches has dropped as well. I just got tired of seeing all that stuff in the freezer/pantry and realizing that we are just not utilizing it.
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Mar 25, 2014 15:32
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Disco Salmon posted:So far so good...in a month I have already shaved $200 off our grocery bill, and our eating out/work lunches has dropped as well. I just got tired of seeing all that stuff in the freezer/pantry and realizing that we are just not utilizing it. We're terrible with this. We have so much crap in our pantry I don't even know where to start. If it wasn't such a hassle of tracking the stuff in there I'd build a database or something to keep track of what we have. But scanning everything that goes in/out doesn't seem like a great time to me
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Mar 25, 2014 16:42
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My wife spent 4 days on the opposite coast for work, and I basically ate all the old stuff in the freezer and pantry. It felt wonderful.
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Mar 25, 2014 16:48
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I only keep the pantry stocked for 2-3 days worth of meals at a time. Makes me more conscious of spending (by shopping for food more often), and I refrain from buying anything that will be wasted.
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Mar 25, 2014 16:49
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I made soup out of a discount supermarket chicken the other day. It was really weird - normally if I boil a chicken for an hour or so, lots of fat bubbles to the surface and the meat falls off the bone. Hardly any fat came off of this chicken, and it was still really stiff after like 2 hours in the pot. Also it was flavorless. I only eat meat once or twice a week for financial and environmental reasons. I'd rather drop my consumption even lower than eat a gross chicken like that again.
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Mar 25, 2014 17:15
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Bugamol posted:My buddy has a small website business that he runs on the side. I think he's pulling in $5,000-$15,000 a year. Is it worth it for him to form an LLC or should he continue to run as a sole proprietorship? I think he's making around $50,000-$60,000 from his regular job and he lives in California. He can make a solo 401k for himself to shelter some of the income, but he doesn't need to be an LLC to do that. Tax-wise, an LLC doesn't change much of what you can do for tax shelters, so it doesn't really make that much sense.
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Mar 25, 2014 17:34
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Bubbacub posted:Also it was flavorless. This is because you boiled it.
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Mar 25, 2014 18:10
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Forgive me BFC for I ate burger king yesterday. The worst part is; eating burger king is it's own punishment. I felt like rear end the rest of the day. Today I brought beans and rice into work. Small victories.
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Mar 25, 2014 19:04
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dreesemonkey posted:We're terrible with this. We have so much crap in our pantry I don't even know where to start. If it wasn't such a hassle of tracking the stuff in there I'd build a database or something to keep track of what we have. But scanning everything that goes in/out doesn't seem like a great time to me I went through our entire pantry and tossed the bad and out of date stuff...it made me sick to see the waste, both of food and of money. I am really making an effort for the two of us to not buy it cause "we like it and its on sale" cause it just ends up sitting there. Cleaned out the freezer, and threw out anything nasty, overly old or too badly freezer burned (made stock out of the freezer burned chicken parts and beef parts etc if possible). Now I am making strides in cooking what is in there and in the pantry. Seriously tho, I didn't realize how much poo poo we had bought and stacked away that we ended up having to toss. Once we empty out both the freezer and the pantry a bit more, I will be making a spreadsheet/list thing of some sort to keep track, and NOT get into this habit of "It's on sale, lets stock up" again. (Unless of course its for a food drive or something but its not going in my pantry!!!)
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Mar 25, 2014 19:51
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Frozen brussel sprouts. King of cheap foods.
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Mar 25, 2014 20:31
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Is there a general rule of thumb for when it's a good idea to get the insurance involved over car matters? My wife bumped into a concrete pole and messed up the front right end of the car pretty bad. My gut feeling is to get an estimate on things first and then contact the insurance. I've never been involved in a wreck that was my fault so that's why I'm hesitant. Anyway, I forgot to bring stuff today so I ended up going to the only grocery store in walking distance…. Whole Foods. I ended up just spending $3.00 on two egg biscuits and walking back because buying groceries would have been a waste. I'm going to stop at Aldi on the way home and buy a ton of eggs and other stuff to eat at work.
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Mar 25, 2014 21:43
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