by Marshall Middle
In my experience every time I sign up for something whether it be cable or a cell phone, it starts out not costing a lot, because I got a great introductory offer for being a new customer. This initial savings and great service dwindles after about 6 months to a year, and I find myself with a big fat cable bill, and a nice chunky cell phone bill as well. Why is this?
It was a lot to carry out of a childhood—all those textured layers of thwarted dreams rumbling under the fifties patina—but a lot of us did it. In those manicured lives and choreographed marriages there was an often-pronounced loneliness, an emptiness that we would try to fill with our own accomplishments. And our role, the one we would have so much trouble trying to shed later, was simply to be the best little girls in the world, the high- achieving, make-no-waves, properly behaved little kittens.
—Anne Taylor Fleming (20th century)
Good marketing. Companies are like fishermen always leading you along and advertisers are talented bait-men that can disguise any old rusty hook to look like a terrific deal. So before you bite, STOP and THINK. Read the fine print. A lot of times this is where the most important information is stored and the salesman is probably trying to seduce you with extra options, gizmos, gadgets, accessories, insurance, and service plans. Don't let them rush you. Instead take your time, you could be signing up for a whole lot more than you think (a 2 year agreement perhaps, with early termination penalties).
SO WATCH OUT! Or you might end up stuffed and posted on a plank over one of these salesmen's fireplaces as the big sucker they brag about to their friends. Don't be the stories they'll tell to their grandchildren. Marshall Middle writes for the popular personal finance blog How to Make a Million Dollars at http://howtomakeamilliondollars.blogspot.com which discusses how to create and maintain wealth.
If a girl’s a stewardess, she might as well forget it after twenty-six. They no longer have compulsory retirement, but the girls get into a rut at that age. A lot of them start showing the rough life they’ve lived.
—Beryl Simpson, U. S. employment counselor; former airline reservationist. As quoted in Working, book 2, by Studs Terkel (1973)