Cat and Girl is one of my favorite webcomics. It’s cynical, postmodern, and smart. I admit that not everyone finds it amusing (Kris, for example), but I do. I particularly liked yesterday’s strip, and am grateful that artist Dorothy Gambrell has granted me permission to re-post it here:

Cat and Girl often features commentary on class, money, and consumerism. Mostly it’s just delightfully strange.
Have a safe and happy Halloween.

Several people wrote to tell me about the Restaurant.com 80% off deal, but I sort of blew them off. It sounded too good to be true. I was wrong. Turns out this is very very real, but the offer ends today.

Kris and I have used Restaurant.com once, but don’t know much about it. Here’s what I can tell you:

The web site allows you to buy discounted gift certificates to restaurants. You might, for example, buy a $25 gift certificate for only $10.
Gift certificates are electronic. You print them out and take them with you.
Gift certificates are good for one year from the date of purchase.
When you sign up, you’re placed on an e-mail list through which the site sends you other offers.

Read more at the Restaurant.com FAQ.
Through today only, if you enter the code TREATS at checkout, you’ll receive an additional 80% off your order. In other words, today only, you can purchase $25 [...]

My friend Sparky called the other day. We chatted about work, we chatted about the economy, and we chatted about investing. We also chatted about our families. We talked about my mother and her health problems, and then we talked about his parents and their health problems.
“I can’t believe they haven’t updated their wills,” said Sparky.
“What?” I said. “Are you kidding me? How old are they?”
“They’re both about 65,” he said. “Maybe a little older. They haven’t updated their wills since I was five. If you go by the paperwork, when they die, I have to go live with one of my aunts. I’m almost 40.”
We both laughed. “At least it’s my favorite aunt,” said Sparky. “If somebody has to become my guardian, I’m glad it’s her!”
Though Sparky and I were making light of the situation, estate planning is serious business, and not just for those near retirement age. I don’t mention it often — [...]

In general, when I share reader questions, I try to keep them as broad as possible. I get a lot of requests for advice about specific situations, but I try to steer those to the Get Rich Slowly discussion forum. I like for the questions on the blog to be relevant to a lot of readers.
Here’s a small exception. Christine wrote for help with her specific circumstances. She’s a twenty-something student overwhelmed by her finances. Her concerns are representative of many e-mails I receive.

I am an avid reader of your blog and have been trying to follow your advice but can’t get any of it to stick to my personal situation.
I am twenty-four years old, working a full-time job earning around $33K annually and attending college part-time a couple evenings a week. I’m single, no kids or roommates. My main problem is my fixed expenses are just too high and I cannot dump [...]

A GRS reader dropped a line last weekend. “I want to invite you to the Diehard Organizational Meeting on Wednesday,” he said. “I’m new to the group but obviously we’re all believers of value of index funds and John Bogle’s investment philosophy.”
“Hope to see you there,” I replied.
I’m still new to investing, but my reading continues to point in the direction of index funds. (An index fund is a mutual fund designed to track a particular stock market index. FSMKX, for example, attempts to mimic the performance of the S&P 500 index.) Index funds were popularized by John Bogle, the founder and retired CEO of The Vanguard Group. Followers of Bogle’s investment philosophy call themselves Bogleheads or Diehards.
I’m not a Diehard (yet), but a chance to meet and learn from them was an offer I could not refuse.
The Diehards
Seven of us gathered last night at a Portland coffeehouse. We’re all at different places in [...]

From time-to-time, I like to highlight GRS-reader projects. Chett wrote to share an idea he’s trying to get off the ground. 5k5k is a fitness and financial challenge. He’s looking for people to commit to completing a 5,000-meter (3.1-mile) run and saving $5,000 (or paying off $5,000 in debt). As you know, I think personal finance and physical fitness have many parallels. If you’re working on these aspects of your life, I encourage you to visit Chett’s site.
Here are a few other miscellaneous tidbits:
The U.S. Federal Reserve cut the federal funds rate to 1% today, dropping it to a level last seen in 2004 (and before that, 1958!). Officials hope that this will lead to an increase in consumer and business spending. This makes me tense. I realize I’m not an economist, but this seems like the opposite of what they should be doing. Some people — and I’m one of them — believe [...]