Alright people, it is my birthday time!! And what really happens every year on my birthday,since I’ve been married is that my husband, Steve, tries to surprise me. Yes! He is adorable and I love him for that. But he just can’t pull off a surprise on me. I always manage to figure out what he is planning because he just can’t keep any secret. 
Birthdays mean shopping and partying. It also means extra expenses. Now as a grown up, I can afford a little binge every now and then but it was not always like this. Let me rewind my life a little bit and take you down memory lane. When I was a little girl, my dad would take me shopping for a birthday dress at least a month in advance. The reason why my dad used to do this was because my birthday falls on Halloween, which is incidentally on end of the month. Towards the month end, the finances would usually be a little tight around the house, so my dad would also set my birthday party budget much in advance, so that there would be no unwelcome surprises.
The funny thing is that, when you grow up, the tables get turned. It is now cheaper, if you shop on your birthday than on any other day. A lot of stores give discounts or freebies for the birthday kid.
Victoria’s Secret does that and so does the cosmetics retailer Sephora.. I’m sure that there are many more on this list. This would please a lot of people out there. The trick to happy shopping on your birthday is to know the stores that give will you goodies for free or at discounted rates.
So this time around, it turns out that you can bake your cake and have it too.
Happy Birthday to me and Happy Shopping to you!
Research is part and parcel of my new job and as I was researching in the world wide web, I stumbled upon this article on the Wall Street Journal website where there was an article on the improvement of the US economy. In that, the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta President Dennis Lockhart said that in overall, the U.S. economy is improving but still fragile. He also said that the he was confident that we (America) will return to a sustainable fiscal path but it would be unwise to be “Panglossian” or naively optimistic about the whole financial state.
In another article I found that the Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, in his prepared testimony for Congress’ Joint Economic Committee had said that among the enormous costs of the downturn is the loss of some 5 million payroll jobs over the past 15 months. However experts predict that job losses and the unemployment rates will come to a sustainable level. Obama’s government is undergoing a tough, challenging phase and they are working on this, so let us give them some credit for their planned bail-outs.
So my question to Mr. Lockart is “Why not?”
Why not we stay Panglossian?
With a slow and steady resurgence in various sectors like manufacturing, real estate and every thing else, this the time when we can actually breathe a bit easy. America is a great country with the largest economy in the world and also by PPP. To top it all, we have the second highest income per hour worked in the world. Everything is close to perfect so why are we being so frugal?
The world is not coming to an end. This is the time of economic re-birth world wide. I am beginning feel that the recession is becoming more of a mind thing than of a money thing. Let’s cut the recession drama down a bit and try and stay a bit more optimistic. Panglossian, maybe.
PS: The word Panglossian derives from Pangloss, the optimistic tutor in Voltaire’s Candide.
I’m an obsessive compulsive socializer and a party animal. During Greek days in school, I was known as Cindy the Entertainer (I love Cedric the Entertainer, by the way). In all modesty, I’ve hosted some spectacular parties that used to be the talk of the sorority (and the fraternity) for weeks. Some of my girlfriends say that my obsession with compulsive socializing is a disease and some of my aunts tell me that it is a genetic trait that I’ve inherited from my father.
Being a full time mom had me craving for some quality ‘all girl’ time. So I sent my husband and baby packing for a weekend and I threw a ‘ Sexy Lingerie Party’ for the girls that had our men begging for entry. It kept them wondering and wanting. Well, did they get it? But that is another story..
Any party is what I make it.
And I’m going to tell you how to party like a Rock Star when you are not.
Make your budget first!!
Be it $0 or $5 or $500, know your limit and stick to it. This is the most important thing that the host of the party should know. Always throw a party just about 1 week from the receipt of your paycheck because even if there are some binges on your party budget, you can still survive.
Make noise!!
Noise is good because it generates a lot of attention. And attention is damn good. It will turn a regular-Joe party into an A-List event. When you do it, make sure that you create noise like no-else has done before.. If you have an account in facebook, twitter or in myspace, create a event and invite friends to attend. If you are graphically good, then you can design and send your e-cards.
Food and drinks
Potluck affairs are always the best. You can ask some of your friends to bring in the alcohol.
You can ask some to bring the salad and the dessert, while others can bring in the main course meal. And, remember, when you cook, make sure that you cook only for half the population. Trust me on this one, there will always be excess of food on your table.
El Musica!!
This should be the last of your concerns. Download the music from the Internet to suit the theme of the party. Never waste money unnecessarily by buying the music dvd/cds. Keep the speakers to a minimum and don’t let the music wake your neighbors up. Or you could soundproof your home if you have the Benjamins and turn the bass up. 
Space!!
If your guest list is small and so is your house, keep it in. If your guest list is big and so is your house, keep it in. If your guest list is big and your house is small, have it outside. If you have a garden, make use of it. You could also take the party up to the rooftop. As I said earlier, party is what you make it.
Games!!
Arrange for a lot of games. Adult games or childish games or whatever but we all love playing games, don’t we? Playing games helps your guests to interact and get comfortable with each other.
It would be an icebreaker for many of your guests.
People!!
Have the right people at the right parties. You can’t have a square peg in a round hole, can you? Its your call.
You!!
Always be yourself. Never try to be what you are not. Never try to do what doesn’t come naturally to you. Never neglect your guests. It is your responsibility to make them comfortable. Be generous in receiving help offered for arranging such parties. Keep smiling, keep laughing and party like a Rock Star without spending like one.
It has been just 60 days since Mr.Barack Obama took charge as the new President and the nation seems already displeased with him. I don’t know if we are being restless by expecting a man to pull the country out of a financial crisis caused by years of financial mismanagement. Or did we get carried away by those ‘yes we can’, rhetoric and expected too much out of him.
The new president already seems to be dipping in popularity charts and NY Times even had a page 1 story on Mr.Obama’s increased grey hair in just 44 days of taking over as President.
Coming to the point, Mr.Obama’s Tuesday night press conference did not appear to cut much ice with the media and people waiting for a ‘change’. The NYT describes his address as “sounding like the teacher speaking in the stillness of a classroom where students are restlessly waiting for the ring of the bell.”
The outrage over the huge bonuses that AIG officials paid themselves was a moot point in the press conference. AIG is 80% owned by the government and received billions of dollars in federal bailout money, even as the executives paid themselves huge bonuses. When asked why he did not go public with his outrage on learning about the retention bonuses at AIG, the president has responded, “I like to know what I’m talking about, before I speak”.
Large business corporations made windfall gains when the economy was on a boom all these years and shared the bounty among themselves. Now when the economy is on a tailspin, they rush to the government with bailout pleas (sometimes in plush private jets).
Blogger Hazzard calls to scrap bailouts and let things fail, because “there are hundreds and hundreds of financial institutions out there that made good business decisions. It’s time that they got to reap the rewards of managing their business in a responsible way”. Now, isn’t that what free market economy is all about?
