Monthly Archives: July 2014

Learning To Coupon (or Trying To Save Since I’m Not Earning Much Now)

Posted on July 3, 2014 | 2 comments

First of all, a little update on the job situation. I was not let go from my assistant job yesterday. However my boss said he really only wants to give it another week. If I can’t get the results that he wants, then the job will end. As much as I want to be optimistic about being able to get the right results, what he needs is about 3 times what I’ve ever been able to get. So it’s not looking so good for me. But at least I will have a job through next week.

While I’m not making much money right now, I’m trying to save wherever I can. Since I’m being sponsored by OrangeTheory for workouts right now, I’m not going to SoulCycle. I just can’t afford it. I’ll totally go back eventually, but for the next 2 months, it’s not in the budget (nor could my body probably handle more workouts in a week).

I’ve also been selling back old DVDs that I don’t watch anymore to Amazon. I’m sure I could get more money if I sold each online on EBay or something, but selling back to Amazon has been easy and for the condition that my DVDs are in, I think I’m getting a pretty fair price.

And the biggest change I’ve been trying to make is using coupons. I’ve never really been a coupon person before. I’ve tried to, but it just never works out. Either I forget to bring the coupons with me to the store or I forget to go get the paper on Sundays. And when you are only saving a few pennies here and there, the hassle doesn’t seem worth it.

Plus, I’m pretty much only grocery shopping at Trader Joes if I can. There are still a few items that I have to go to Albertsons for, but pretty much everything I need is at Trader Joes. And I find that I spend less money there than at other stores. But Trader Joes doesn’t take coupons.

So I’ve been focusing my coupon energy on CVS. It seemed like a pretty great idea from the start. Every other week or so I get a coupon either in my email or in the mail that’s good for 20 or 25% off all my items in one trip at CVS. That’s a pretty impressive savings to begin with.

Then, you always get like 100 coupons on your receipt at CVS. I used to be annoyed by that, but I’ve been starting to pay attention. There’s also a machine inside of CVS that gives you bonus coupons.

And finally, I’m going online and printing coupons from the internet instead of buying newspapers. That way I’m not spending money on coupons (which seems like a silly idea to begin with).

I know on those extreme couponing shows they show people making huge plans for shopping trips and seeing what coupons could match with what sale. I really don’t have the energy to do that all the time. Plus, there are times that I just need to buy an item.

So my focus is on what coupons (and Extra Bucks) I get from CVS and what coupons I can find online to match them with. It doesn’t take me that long because I’m not buying a lot of items. It’s mainly paper goods and beauty stuff. And I’m not going to use a different brand because there is a coupon, I’m pretty brand loyal. So if I see a coupon for something I use, I print it and try to wait until I have a 20 or 25% off everything coupon to match it with.

I’ve done pretty well so far with saving a lot of money on things I would have bought anyway.

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52% savings is pretty awesome. As my dad puts it, you can’t get that sort of return on money in the stock market that quickly.

The other day, I had some Extra Bucks that I needed to use and I got an email that there were more Extra Bucks waiting for me at CVS. I needed to buy some toilet paper, so I decided to go and use my Extra Bucks on that. I figured the Extra Bucks would save me over 50%.

I got to the store only to realize that toilet paper was on sale and was actually less than the value of my Extra Bucks! If I was a super organized couponer (which I might try to be), then I would have already known this! I didn’t want to lose the extra Extra Bucks money and the toilet paper was about $2 less than my coupons, so I grabbed 2 individual bags of peanuts that were $1 each. I always try to keep emergency snacks in my car (so I’m not tempted to get fast food) and peanuts are a good snack to have.

I went up to pay for my 3 items and had an epic savings!

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Yup, 100% savings! Technically, I still had to pay a few pennies in tax, but that’s nothing compared to spending almost $15!

I’m totally aware that I probably sound crazy, but this is exciting to me. Any extra money in my bank account is money that can go toward my debt. And sadly, that’s not going down that much due to my lack of income. So $15 is a lot to me!

If you are a couponer and have some advice to a couponing newbie, I’d love to hear it. I’m shocked that I got such a great savings so quickly, but I know that it was dumb luck this time. I want to make sure that I am able to figure out how to do this again.

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Posted in Fun Stuff, Saving, Shopping

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6 Jobs Not Enough? (or How Can It Be That I’m Still Underemployed?)

Posted on July 2, 2014 | 7 comments

I mentioned a week or so ago about an interview that I had coming up to do some survey coding work for the movie screening company I tried working with earlier this year. The interview went great for that job and I was hired on the spot. I think perhaps my history with the company worked in my favor. It’s going to be between 10-30 hours of work a week once things get going, but the issue will be when that will be. I first have to train, which will involve 2 or so months of working graveyard shifts.

The sooner I can work those graveyard shifts (and the more I can do each week), the faster I’ll be trained and able to work the daytime hours. I just got my first request for my availability, so hopefully I’ll have my first training session soon.

In the meantime, I’m unsure how stable my future will be with my assistant headhunter job. My boss has always had issues with getting people on the phone (as in they aren’t answering) so that’s one reason he brought me on. But I’m running into the exact same problem that he has had. He’s talked about whether or not this job is working out and yesterday he emailed me to say that he’s considering stopping the phone calls for a while. Pretty much while you are reading this (assuming you are reading this the morning it gets posted) I will be on the phone with my boss to discuss the future.

I don’t want to lose this job, but I understand the frustration. I’m frustrated too. I want to always improve on my work and do the best that I can do, but the problems are things that are out of my control. I can’t force potential people to answer their phone. I’ve tried calling at various times of the day and tried blocking my number to see if that would help, but it doesn’t. I’m lucky if I talk to 5 people over the course of my shift, which is 4 hours long.

So I’m back in the place where I’m looking for another job to add to my job collection. I currently have 6 day jobs (assistant headhunter, substitute teacher, box office staff, babysitting, dog sitting, and survey coder) and that’s not counting my acting career or blogging (which I know I should really try to monetize to help with bills).

I never thought I’d miss my 6 days a week telesales job, but I do. That was steady work that I could count on and it was flexible enough for me to do what I needed to do. I really need to find something else like it, but that’s so difficult.

There are a lot of jobs in Los Angeles that in the job ad will say “NO ACTORS”. And yes, they tend to put that in all capital letters. They assume that actors are flaky, and I agree that many are. But I’m not that way. Yes I might have to take a long lunch or work a weird shift so I can go to my audition, but I always finish my work. If only I could convince an employer of that.

So even though I just got hired for another new part-time job, I’m looking for work again. I can’t trust that my headhunter job will be long-term (even though I want it to be) and I have no idea how many or few hours I will get for the survey coder job.

So I’m asking for help again on here. If anyone knows of any flexible work, I’m looking. I’m happy to send anyone my resume, but to summarize it I have assistant, data entry, sales, coordinating, and writing skills. Plus I’d be interested in any babysitting and dog sitting work. If any of you could help me out, I’d be so incredibly grateful.

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Posted in Acting, Tough Stuff, Work

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Honest Company (or Going To Target And Seeing Celebrities)

Posted on July 1, 2014 | 2 comments

On one of the blogger groups I belong to on Facebook, one blogger mentioned that there was an event coming up at Target to celebrate the Honest Company having their products for sale there. I gave the blogger my information and hoped that I would be picked to attend this event, and somehow I was lucky enough to be chosen!

The event took place at a City Target in Westwood. City Targets are smaller than the usual ones, but they are in places that really need a Target and don’t have a space for a huge store (Westwood is right by UCLA so you know those students could use a Target).

I’ve been familiar with the Honest Company for a while. I absolutely love their hand sanitizer gel (I always have one in my purse) and I use their lotion at nighttime (I try to use lotion with sunscreen during the day and their lotion doesn’t have SPF in it).

And I have another reason to love Honest. They did a contest for babies to appear on their marketing, and my friend Heather’s son James won the contest and is now featured on their diaper boxes!

So I was pretty darn excited to go to this event already, but I got even more hyped up when I walked in and was handed a press pass.

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I don’t know why having a press pass is so exciting for me, but it is! I also got a really great swag bag when I walked in!

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We had some time to kill before the blogger event started, so I walked around to see if I could find Heather’s son on a diaper box. It took a few minutes of looking, but I found it!

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I texted that picture to Heather to let her know I found James on a box, and she texted back that she was on her way to the event! Again, I got super excited (I swear it was like I was on a sugar high). I got to see Heather and her kids before heading in to the blogger event and already people were noticing that the baby from the diaper box was there.

Eventually, I left Heather and her family to go to a private blogger roundtable with the founders of the Honest Company (Jessica Alba and Christopher Gavigan) as well as a representative from Target (whose name I sadly have forgotten).

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I noticed that behind Christopher Gavigan there was another diaper box with James on it and I mentioned something to the blogger I was sitting next to. Christopher heard me say that, and he looked at me with shock and said, “Is that baby really here?”. I let him know yes and he insisted on getting to meet James. So not only was I in a room with a celebrity (Jessica Alba), my friend’s baby who I hung out with earlier was a celebrity to the founders of the company!

The blogger roundtable was pretty cool. Basically everyone in there was a mom, so a lot of the conversation was about baby stuff. But I did get to ask my question (I want the Honest Company to make travel sizes of their products) so that was pretty amazing.

After the roundtable, of course I had to get a picture with Jessica Alba.

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I wanted one with Christopher Gavigan as well, but he was very busy talking to some other people. But as I was leaving, he made me promise to introduce him to James.

I headed back out to the store where the next part of the event was happening and found Heather and her family. I let them know that James was turning out to be the big celebrity of the night. I also said how the founders were so excited to meet James. And once Jessical Alba and Christopher Gavigan came out to the next part of the event, they saw James and made a pretty big deal out of him being there.

After the event, it was time for me to head home (I don’t need to be tempted to spend money in Target!). This was such an amazing event and I really felt honored to be invited to it. I still consider myself a newbie blogger so getting to go to something that Target was doing was amazing.

If you haven’t checked out the Honest Company before, I highly recommend it. Most of their products are now in Target stores so they are super easy to find!

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Posted in Beauty, Fun Stuff, Shopping

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