Andrea Dickson

By Andrea Dickson

I never thought I’d admit this publicly, but I have had Botox injections before. Yes, I am only 33. And no, I don’t have some kind of dysmorphic disorder, and I’m not completely obsessed with every wrinkle or line on my face. I don’t adore the process of aging, but whaddya gonna do, you know?

But I will admit to a certain amount of vanity, and the truth is, I got really upset when I noticed this rather deep line between my eyebrows. It’s not so much from aging as it is from frowning. I frown a LOT. I work at a computer all day, and when I have to concentrate, or when I’m nervous, or when I’m angry or sad, I frown. I frown when I sleep, I’ve been told. I’m a frowner.

I won’t lie; I’m not a super happy person. I’m grumpy a lot of the time, and I have been since I was very young. My family is not a miserable family, although depression does tend to run in the Slavic side. My childhood was relatively happy, but I’m not what you would call "joyful." I’m not depressed, but I definitely come from a long line of women who aren’t particularly fond of perkiness. During college, I went through a period of rather extreme depression, and while I found that medication helped at the time, it’s not a long-term solution for me. I’ve come to accept that I’ve never been, and will never be, a bright and cheery kind of person.

Also, I get angry easily. Most of my mornings start with me glaring at myself in the bathroom mirror for about five minutes. Most of the time, though, I don’t realize that I am frowning — I do it all the time, while writing, talking on the phone, watching a movie, and I don’t even realize that it’s happening until I’ve been doing it for about an hour and my forehead starts to ache.

About a year ago, the presence of that rather deep line between my brows got the better of me, and I paid a very nice nurse at a local surgeon’s office approximately $140 dollars to inject toxins into my face. Honestly, I was terrified that I would end up looking like those stretch-faced, zombie women on TV, unable to express the most basic emotion through facial muscles. My nurse assured me that she had Botox, and she looked, at age 40, really great — not frozen and zombified. I took the plunge.

Aside from the cost, my only complaint about the treatment was that I had a pretty bad headache for about a week. Once that disappeared, though, and the muscles started to relax, I was happy to see that the line between my brows pretty much disappeared. And yes, the muscles couldn’t move, so I couldn’t furrow my brow. I could still raise my eyebrows and narrow my eyes, and obviously my cheeks and mouth weren’t affected, so I could FROWN, but not furrow. I simply couldn’t activate the muscles that would draw my brows together.

Then I noticed something: I felt a lot less angry. Whenever I would find myself getting frustrated at something (usually at work), just as I could feel my face pulling into a frown, I would realize that it just couldn’t be done. I couldn’t frown. And without the ability to do that, I didn’t stay angry very long. Momentary irritation tended to fizzle, and while it’s true that my job wasn’t any easier, I just didn’t get as upset about it. I even mentioned it to a coworker, who assured me that I was (1) crazy and (2) trying to justify having spent $140 on Botox. I told my parents, both medical professionals, about the effect on my mood, and they both sighed heavily and wondered what they had ever done to raise a daughter who couldn’t love her own face.

Well, who’s having the last laugh now? That would be me (yes, I can still laugh), after finding that my experience is not only common, but that it has a scientific explanation. Facial feedback hypothesis, which has previously told us that smiling can actually make us feel happier even when we naturally aren’t, can also explain why someone who is unable to frown fully doesn’t maintain a steady state of anger. It turns out that it’s not just your moods that affect your facial expressions, but your facial expressions that affect your moods.

Thus, someone who forces themselves to smile when they feel down can significantly improve their own mood, and someone who stops frowning when upset can stem the tide of anger or depression.

I’m not going to pretend that the over-application of Botox doesn’t freak me out. Between aging Hollywood madams on TV and physicians wives elbowing me aside at the shoe department at Nordstrom, I agree that a totally Botoxified face is a terror to behold. But in small amounts, I& have to say, it really has been a godsend.

My $140 worth of Botox lasted longer than expected — approximately 6 months (I was told to expect 3). Twenty-three dollars a month for an improved mood is worth it to me.

No word yet on whether total facial paralysis limits all kinds of emotions, although I imagine limiting one’s ability to smile might make them less happy?

Permalink | Comments | Andrea Dickson's blog | Channel: Health and Beauty

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This article is from Wise Bread.

By Andrea Dickson

Like many idiots, I bought my house at the peak of the real estate bubble, locking in a 30-year fixed rate mortgage at 6.375%. With escrow and taxes going up every year, and income going down (and no sign of a seller’s market on the horizon), I decided recently that I HAD to refinance.

I looked at some online quotes and called my local credit union to see what kind of rates were being offered in general (nothing worth my time). Since I knew my combined credit and payment history put me in fairly good standing, I figured that my current mortgage holder, US Bank, would want a shot at keeping me as a customer. Besides, my local branch employees were known for their stellar service and since I already had a linked checking account set up with direct deposit and everything, staying with the same bank would save me the headache of rearranging everything with the HR department again.

I called the local branch and got the number for their mortgage rep, someone who had been highly recommended by an assistant manager. The mortgage rep, who I will call "Linda" for the sake of this story, spent two days a week at my branch and serviced other branches on other days.

I have to admit, when I first called Linda, I was impressed with her. She was efficient, calm, collected, and totally in control; she had the ultimate phone voice. She understood the bits and pieces of mortgages in a way that I will never hope to. She asked about my current rate, payments, goals, income; all of this was very standard, but her manner was so with-it that I felt like I was in good hands.

And then she asked me what my mortgage number was.

This was not an unreasonable question, and any person who is capable of reciting their own phone number without checking their address book would probably have had no problem providing this info. As for me, well, I can only remember the first three digits of my mortgage number on a good day. Scrambling, I tried to log into my online banking account to refer to the linked mortgage info, only to remember that I had managed to lock myself out of the online account the day before, entering the password incorrectly many times.

"I’m sorry, I don’t have the number on me," I stammered.

"That’s OK," said Linda, "I can look it up using your social security number. The bank database has all of your account info."

It should be noted that I have a very active imagination, so at this point, I’m picturing Linda sitting behind a large desk in her downtown office, wearing a headset, tapping my SSN into her sleek laptop, which is securely logged into the banking system via ultra-mega locked-down VPN. I also imagine that Linda is brunette. Please don’t ask me why. These are details that I literally picture in my head, for no good reason at all.

I half-whispered my social security number over the phone line, always nervous that someone bad will overhear. Linda explained that she will have to send away for a bunch of data from headquarters, but that the mortgage application is usually returned within 24 hours, and that she would call me back early in the next week to schedule an appointment to go over the various mortgage options. I felt relieved. The burden of my mortgage has really been getting to me, and I’m looking forward to the possibility of any financial relief.

Early the next week, I found myself in the bank, making some deposits, and I noticed that Linda’s usually-empty desk is occupied with someone who I assumed must be Linda herself. Having not heard back from her yet, I decided that, for once in my life, I was going to be proactive. I walked up to her desk, verified that her name tag read "Linda", and waited for her to finish doing whatever it was she was doing on her (sleekish) laptop. She tapped away, glancing at me as though my presence was not appreciated.

Linda is actually a bottle blond.

"Hi," I said, holding out my hand, "I’m Andrea Dickson, and we spoke on the phone last week about refinancing my mortgage. I was wondering if you had a chance to look at your schedule? Maybe we can set something up while I am here." I am amazed that I say the entire sentence without tripping over my words, as is my tendency.

"Oh," replied Linda, definitely looking less-than-thrilled, "I didn’t get your mortgage number from you, so I was unable to retrieve your information. You said you were going to call back, but you never did."

I felt my head tilting to the side in the confused manner used by puppies who are encountering other animals for the first time. I reached into my purse, as though my mortgage number is simply floating around in there.

"No," I said, remembering our conversation, "I gave you my social security number, and you said that you were going to look up my mortgage info."

"Oh, I did say that, that’s right." It was clear to me immediately that she hadn’t even started the process. She reached into her bag, pulling out what, in my imagination, was surely going to be a leather-bound ledger book, with carefully written data about me and what I had told her thus far about my mortgage. Navy leather, is what I figured.

Not…a lined spiral-bound notebook with…doodles?

Linda turned to the back of the notebook, past pages and pages of notes written in large, blocky letters in purple ink, and there on the last page is "my" name, "ANDREA DIXON" along with my social security number, next to a drawing of what Linda apparently thinks a starfish looks like.

It didn’t actually occur to me that Linda was going to be writing down my social security information to use at a later time. I’ll admit that there’s not really a difference security-wise, between a loose leaf notebook with very unsecured personal data and a leather-bound, professional-looking executive notebook with unsecured personal data. I suppose I should be just as weirded out if it was written in a gold-plated tablet, blessed by the Pope.

On one hand, the format isn’t the issue; it’s almost as easy to misplace files filled with typed, official bank forms as it is to set aside a doodle-and-social-security-number-filled steno book. If you are extremely careless, you can lose a laptop filled with customer data (although customer data or unsecured access to it should never reside on individual personal computers). But something about seeing my personal data in a Gregg Rule Stenobook, alongside the personal information of other customers, seemed galling.

I didn’t know what to say. While I hovered, Linda assured me that the information she was sending away for would be back within 24 hours. I contemplated making a scene, but because I am a wuss, I left the bank after pointing out that she had misspelled my name. Linda gave me a look that indicated that she didn’t care how I spelled my name. I could tell that this was the beginning of a wonderful business relationship.

Back at my desk, pondering the issue, I decided to call Linda and ask if I could have that piece of paper with my data on it.

I hate confronting people. I hate confronting people. This was my mantra as I waited for Linda to pick up her line.

Linda answered the phone and I explained to her that I felt a little weird about my data, especially my full social security number, being written out in a notebook like that. I told her that I felt that the information was unsecure, and that if I had known that she was going to be writing it down, rather than entering it into a encrypted computer database, I would have called her back with my mortgage number once I located it.

Linda’s tone was distinctly irritated. Who was I to question her methods? "I can assure you that your information is safe with me. I never leave my notebook lying around. That’s illegal."

"Well," I said, struggling to be polite, "That’s good. But I’d still feel more comfortable if you could give me that sheet of paper so I could shred it."

"I have other customer data on the page besides yours," snapped Linda, "Customer information that is as valuable and as important as yours is." This is clearly meant to comfort me; that Linda is being as irresponsible with her other customers’ data as she is with mine, that all of us are at risk.

"I honestly don’t know what to tell you to make you feel better. I’ve always kept records like this and I’ve never lost anyone’s information. My briefcase has a lock."

This is good news, because no one has EVER successfully stolen a locked briefcase. It’s a well-known fact that all locked briefcases immediately detonate upon being obtained by sinister hands.

"I carry files all over the place that have more customer data than I have for you. I have mortgage application files on me at all times." This is where Linda wants me to know that my piddling little social security number is of no great importance compared to other customers, who have handed over addresses, phone number, spouse names.

"I’m really uncomfortable with this," I say.

"Well, I can’t give you the piece of paper. I can’t give you another customer’s data. If it makes you so uncomfortable, I can always cross out your social security number with a black marker, so if I lose my notebook, no one can read it."

This is a time-tested method of securing data that has NEVER failed. Now I can rest easy, knowing that should Linda misplace the notebook, which will not happen because it hasn’t happened yet, no one will EVER be able to flip the page over and read the imprint of my social security number on the backside of the page.

The thing is, I’m sure Linda is a trustworthy employee. I doubt she runs around scrawling my SSN and name on bathroom stalls, and she is doubtlessly fairly careful with her notebook. But Linda could be a trained CIA killer who would rather die than have her personal notebook stolen and still manage to have the darn thing stolen. A briefcase full of files? Easily stolen. A steno book? Much. More. Easily. Stolen.

Wondering if perhaps I was overreacting, I called another branch of US Bank and inquired if it was common practice to write down customer’s data in a notebook. Startled, the manager told me that while it was part of a mortgage professional’s job to carry files that contained data, such data was not often stored in a notebook. My own branch’s assistant manager assured me that he uses a notepad to write down all kinds of data from customers, and that he is very careful with how that data is handled.

This doesn’t sit right with me, but I am uncertain as to what exactly it is about the situation that I find so upsetting. Is it that Linda is extremely unfriendly and I am overly sensitive? I’m not even sure if any laws are being broken by Linda as a bank employee. I imagine that if a bank teller at the same institution wrote down my social security number on a piece of paper for the purposes of helping me with something, and then took the paper home, they would be breaking more than one law. 

Truth be told, I can’t find any specific laws relating to the banking sector and personal security. HIPAA might protect our personal data as it relates to our health, but the only federal law that might pertain to such activities isn’t even a law yet, but still a bill being reviewed in the Senate. So much modern legislation deals with protecting our identities and information from digital breach, but what can we do to prevent employees from writing our social security numbers in giant purple in a notebook while running errands? I doubt Linda has a separate book with back-up notes that she can use to notify me if she DOES lose the notebook and my personal data falls into someone’s less-trustworthy hands.

Here’s the thing: I don’t really know the legal implications behind this. The way that Linda, and apparently the other employees at my bank, are treating customer data may be well within the legal confines of their profession. But it shouldn’t be. So much of the laws that are passed in this country are reactive. They deal with how to let customers know once their data has been stolen, usually electronically. I’d like to know what my bank is doing to keep my data FROM being stolen, and "we’ve never had a problem so far" is not a good method for ensuring data security.

The lesson, of course, is to never give out your social security number unless you absolutely have to, and even then, see if you can push back a bit. Because you simply never know.

What would you do in my situation? Do you think the measures undertaken here are secure enough for YOUR data?

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This article is from Wise Bread.

By Andrea Dickson

Custom framing your art is often more expensive than the art itself. How weird is that?

There are so many places nowadays to find good, cheap art, but framing said art can be one of the most expensive aspects of decorating your home. Unless you have your own equipment or some killer coupons, professional framing can easily set you back $60-$200 per 8×10 piece of art. If you’re like me, and have an eclectic collection of paintings, drawings, and collage, you probably also DON’T have the kind of dough it takes to professionally frame your whole collection.

Well, there are plenty of ways to display your art that don’t involve thumb tacks or poster putty (or pricey custom framing) that are still funky, fun, and cheap.

Framed Art

Oil paintings (and often acrylics, for that matter), aren’t typically framed behind glass. They can be, but the glass has to be set off of the painting, because if it comes into contact with the paint, even if it’s dry, the paint might stick to the glass. Oil paintings are typically made on canvas, and are stretched onto a wooden frame that gives them shape. You can add a frame to the outside or just hang a stretched canvas without a frame — my point is not to invest in a big heavy piece of glass if you don’t need it.

Similarly, posters can be mounted onto posterboard and framed with a simple poster frame that may or may not include glass — the less glass you use, the cheaper (and lighter) the end product is. Matting is always optional. The larger the matting, the more expensive the project, so for bigger pieces, you might want to avoid matting. However, pre-cut matting is fairly inexpensive and can really make a difference in the quality of a framed piece of art.

Premade frames

This isn’t the cheapest option, because even premade frames aren’t cheap, but they are easy to deal with and involve minimal effort on your behalf. Frames come in many different sizes, so you can find something to fit most any piece of art. When buying a frame, take the piece of art with you so that you can see how it will look in the frame. There are many different types of frames available these days: you can buy wooden or plastic frames, frames with or without glass or plastic covering the art, frames with or without matting, and even frames without frames (essentially a piece of glass and a piece of particle board that you stick your art between). Generally, the more ornate the frame, the more expensive it will be.

You can buy frames at stores like Target or Walmart, although selection may be limited. Better options include art supply stores or frame stores — check your local paper for coupons or ask a store associate when the next big sale is in order to find the big savings. A simple frame for an 8×10 picture may be $20 on a normal day, but a sale day will knock that down to $10, easy. Aaron Brothers and Michael’s (both stores have great selections) have amazing sales in which frames are reduced up to 75% off. Always keep your eyes peeled for coupons in your local paper or Valu-Pak. Also, in addition to the art and frames section of these stores, you may want to check out the wood projects and kids’ sections. I’ve found thick, unfinished backless frames for $1.50 each. The frames were meant for kids to decorate with glitter and sequins, but they looked amazing framing some 4×4 color prints I had purchased on Etsy.

If you are a good bargainer, it never hurts to befriend your local frame consultant to see if you can’t buy some of the cast-offs or rejects — the frames that other people order, and then decide they don’t want for whatever reason.

By far the most consistently affordable place to buy ready-made picture frames is IKEA. If you happen to have a Swedish mega-maze somewhere near you, check out the frame selection on your next day-long venture.

Damaged frames

A smooth black picture frame is just about the easiest thing in the world to scratch or scuff, so frames with dings and divots are frequently tossed in the bargain bin as soon as they are unpacked. Lots of stores have their bargain section in a back corner, so always check there to see if there is something you can use. Most minor imperfections can either be easily fixed with some nail filler and black marker, or improved upon by "distressing" the entire frame with sandpaper so that it has that shabby chic look that is so desirable these days.

Buy pre-framed art and throw away the art

Department stores have more than their fair share of hideous pre-framed art. If you find a piece of pre-framed hideous art with a good frame, there’s no need to keep the art. Just toss it out and insert your own awesome blacklight unicorn poster. Ross is particularly good for this.

Used frames featuring all kinds of horrible art can be found at thrift stores, garage sales, flea markets, and next to dumpsters all over the country. You can keep the existing art or throw it away.

Making an ugly frame look amazing doesn’t take much effort — just some acrylic paint or a rattle can in an amazing color, a well-ventilated area, and a good drop-cloth, and you’ve got yourself a snazzy, incredibly hip frame for your art. I’ve actually seen some pretty cool-looking rooms that are decorated entirely using empty picture frames that have all been painted the same awesome color, or simply matched according to a general sense of aesthetics.

Of course, if you have an entire tool shed just bursting with state-of-the-art miter saws and bevellers, you can always make your own frames.

Frameless frames

There are plenty of glass or Plexiglas "frames" that consists of a clear cover, a solid back, and small clips that allow you to protect and hang your art without a traditional "frame". I buy these in bulk at my local art supply store. Gallery-style frames are another option — a very thin plastic frame that barely shows allows you to place art inside and press a piece of glass or plastic into little grooves in the front of the frame. Gallery frames are cheap, but do significantly limit the thickness of the piece you are displaying.

Hanging Art

Hanging framed art is an art in and of itself…or is it a science? In any case, there are many different ways to get the look that you want.

If you want to hang frames in a gallery style, take some advice from the pros, like an actual curator. Or, you may find it easier and more cathartic to cluster your framed art in a more unique and devil-may-care manner that doesn’t depend on straight lines and perfect corners.

There are many different ways to hang framed art. Some people like to use eye-hooks/staples and wire across the back of the frame. The wire can be kept short, and tucked behind the picture so that the nail is hidden when the picture is hung, or long, so that the picture hangs down from a nail. I’ve seen really pretty hangings done using silk ribbon that is attached to the top back of the frame using strong staples.

Unframed Art

Of course, you can save a bundle on framing costs by simply skipping the frames altogether, There is plenty of art out there that doesn’t have to be matted and framed; in fact, almost anything that is displayed with a certain amount of flair becomes art, like a wall covered in a rainbow of paint chips from Home Depot.

For more traditional 2D art, like posters, paintings, and collages, you can either leave the art as-is, or have it mounted on a poster board to give a little more heft and to keep it from getting damaged. Posterboard is fairly inexpensive, and you can do the mounting yourself or have it done at a frame shop for a steal.

Wire and clips

This method is my favorite because it’s easy, breezy, and slightly edgy. Take a long piece of wire (thinner gauges are better), some small nails, and a hammer. Pound the nails into your walls at whatever locations you feel are appropriate, and string the wire taught between them. It helps to angle the nails AWAY from the direction that the wire will be pulling. You can create a single horizontal line, many horizontal lines, zigzag lines, vertical lines, or spider webs — it really doesn’t matter. You can hang the wire up high and string it across a room, or stick to one wall or small area. Whatever floats your boat.

Next, take a handful of clothespins (the newer kind works better than the old fashioned style) or binder clips, and attach your art wherever you like it. I like to hang concert posters high up on horizontal wires, and clip vintage postcards along vertical wires. A series of black and white photographs evokes a darkroom or photographer’s studio. You can hang letters from your grandma, childhood mementos, potholders, jewelry or even air plants, if you want. Mixing up colors, sizes, and shapes is fun, or you can choose one particular style and stick with it. Variety is the spice of life, but not everyone likes as much spice as I do (for examples of both ways of thinking, check out this apartment featured on design*sponge).

With a bit more effort, you can use clips sans wire to create a gallery-like arrangement of unframed art. This method doesn’t afford you as much flexibility with rearranging your collection, but looks clean and unencumbered.

Clothing hangers

A slightly less flexible way to show off your unframed pictures or posters is to hang wire clothing hangers from a nail in a prominent location, and then use clothes pins or binder clips to hang the art from the clothing hangers. Hangers are frequently used to make mobiles for 3D art display, so you can move the medium to the 2 dimensional for a new take on a common household item.

Clipboards

If you have lots of smaller pieces of art that you want to display, try hanging a series of clipboards on your wall. Art can be neatly pinned to the center of the clipboard, and the back of the board provides a frame in which to show off the art. A clipboard can be had for as little as $2 (I’ve seen them for $0.88 on some websites, but you have to consider shipping). Buy a couple dozen of them, and hang them in neat military lines or in a more random fashion. If the dark brown background of the clipboard doesn’t suit you, you can always paint the clipboard white, yellow, or any hue that makes you smile and offsets your art collection.

Magnets

If you enjoy rearranging your collection, but have a morbid fear of nails and the damage they cause, you can turn a huge space into a magnetic board of your own with magnetic paint. Assuming you have the ability/right to paint your walls, you can create art spaces with a roller and a can of Rustoleum brand magnetic paint (runs about $30). Add some snazzy, modern-looking magnets for about $20. While $50 isn’t a drop in the bucket, it’s cheaper than framing your entire poster collection. A whole wall (or room) becomes your personal art gallery on which you can arrange your drawings, newspaper clippings, posters, collages, or anything else you can think of. The best part is you don’t have to refill and touch up holes in the wall every time you want to rearrange your artwork.

The Art of Leaning

Whoever said that art had to be hung? One of my favorite ways to display my favorite large oil paintings is to set them on top of dressers or low bookshelves, or even rest them on the floor, leaning against the wall. The look is casual, you don’t have to mar the walls with nail holes, and you can move stuff around without having to worry about busting out the measuring tape or level.

*This advice doesn’t necessarily apply to art that you consider highly valuable or a collector’s item of some kind — for those, do consider a professional framing job to protect the artwork from light and time.*

Permalink | 6 comments | Andrea Dickson's blog | Channel: Art and Leisure

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This article is from Wise Bread.

By Andrea Dickson

You’re probably going to get swine flu, and there’s really no need to freak out. Most people are surviving it just fine. Sure, fear-mongering news reporters love nothing better than a global pandemic to boost their ratings with sensationalist coverage of school shut-downs and hospitalizations, but while swine flu is no picnic, it doesn’t look like it’s going to wipe out civilization as we know it.

Let’s go ahead and take a fatalistic approach to this virus. We’re going to get it, and we’re probably going to survive it; but those who are in high-risk catgories need to take special precautions. Wash your hands all you want; it’s a virus, and it will travel.

We need a level-headed approach to combating this illness, and with a vaccine still not available to the public, it’s important to take stock of your health and protect yourself and your loved ones before the flu season really takes off.

Know if you are at risk

You expect the flu to pick off the old and infirm, but this flu is different. You might not be happy to hear that most of the 77 swine-flu related deaths recently studied by the CDC had underlying conditions like asthma or diabetes that complicated their illness (10% of the U.S. population has diabetes; 16.4% has asthma). If you are asthmatic, your condition can be aggravated by respiratory complications associated with the flu, so have your fast-acting bronchial dilator on hand and talk to your doctor about other precautions you might want to take. Diabetics are slower to heal and more prone to infections, so discuss a proactive approach with your doctor before you get sick.

Consider a pneumonia vaccination

The swine flu vaccine itself is days or possibly weeks away, and the biggest risk of the flu isn’t really the flu virus itself, but rather the bacterial infections that strike once your immune system has been weakened by the flu. Data from the CDC suggests what most doctors probably could have guessed: up to 29% of people who have died while infected with the swine flu have also had accompanying infections like pneumonia. I didn’t even know that you could get a vaccine for pneumonia until recently, but apparently this underused treatment is fairly effective. The vaccine only needs to be given twice in a lifetime, and although it only covers a couple dozen strains of pneumonia (there are more than 80 different types), most infections are caused by the 23 strains of bacteria that are included in the vaccine. Pregnant/nursing women and children under the age of two are not generally vaccinated.

I’ve been calling around, and the price of a pneumonia vaccine seems to range between $30-55. That’s not exactly cheap, but for an asthmatic like me, it’s cheaper than a trip to the emergency room (again). Check your local pharmacy or clinic to see if they are offering pneumonia vaccines; many pharmacies are scheduling vaccination clinics that include the flu shot and pneumonia vaccinations at the same time. The vaccine isn’t always covered by insurance.

Exercise and eat well

This is obviously something everyone should be doing already, but if today is the first day that you put down the bag of Doritos and take a slow walk around the block, so be it. You don’t have to deprive yourself and go crazy with a weight-loss scheme; just add some fresh fruit and veggies (the darker, the better — think berries and kale) to your daily food intake and find ways to keep your blood pumping, even if it means long, leisurely walks around the block. Take deep breaths and try to slowly expand your lung capacity. Don’t exhaust yourself, because that can just make you more prone to illness.

Get enough Vitamin D

Many people live with vitamin D deficiency, and it can be difficult to tell that you have one without a blood test. Vitamin D may play an essential role in keeping your immune system, particularly your respiratory system, healthy. There are few ways to get enough vitamin D, but you can take supplements, drink vitamin D-fortified milk (3 glasses a day), or make a point of spending at least 15 minutes a day outside during the sun’s peak hours (11AM-1PM).

Get plenty of sleep

The flu hits those who are most vulnerable, and that includes not just the old and sick, but also the physically exhausted. Most people don’t get nearly enough sleep on a daily basis, so if it means that you have to skip your favorite TV shows for a few weeks to get some more shut-eye, so be it. Remember, unless you are one of those rare genetic mutants who only needs 6 hours of sleep per night, you should be striving for somewhere around 8.5 hours of quality sleep.

If you get sick…

If you’ve managed to catch the swine flu, you can still take steps to avoid the worst aspects of the disease. The usual advice still applies: get plenty of rest, stay home if you can, remain hydrated, and allow people to tell you how good chicken soup is for you. For most people, this should be enough.

For those with immuno-suppressive disorders or anyone considered "high-risk," you might want to take an anti-viral medication within the first 24 hours of the onset of flu symptoms. Pneumonias develop when mucus and fluids in the lungs become infected with bacteria, which happens when the mucus is allowed to hang out and fester. To prevent pooling of mucus:

1. Assuming you don’t have any other conditions that would prevent this (like fresh stitches from an appendectomy), cough. Force yourself to cough; this moves the phlegm around in your chest and disrupts bacterial growth.
    
2. When not sleeping, try to rest in an upright position.
    
3. Try to move around when you are sleeping. Don’t just stay flat on your back for many hours at a time.
    
4. If you develop a cough that isn’t bringing up much phlegm, and you have your doctor’s go-ahead, get your hands on a good expectorant that contains Guaifenesin, like Mucinex. Expectorants help to thin the mucus out, so that you can bring it up when you cough. Breaking up this nastiness and coughing it out is crucial to preventing infection.
    
5. If you are asthmatic, be vigilant and keep in touch with your doctor as necessary. At the first instance of respiratory distress, get thee to a medical facility.

**I am not a doctor, and nothing in this article should be construed as me giving medical advice. However, most of the tips given here do come from the Center for Disease Control or other reputable sources, so I promise that I am not just making stuff up. Please consult your physician before undertaking any new medical treatments.**

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By Andrea Dickson

Boy howdy, was this ever a hot, muggy week. I tried to be brave, walking around naked with lots of running fans and buckets of ice, but my coworkers complained too much. Something about seared retinas? Anyway, while I wait patiently for my Hai’er brand air conditioner to arrive from Costco, here are some great personal finance blog posts from around the country, and maybe one from the Great White North.

Squawkfox lists ways to stay cool without air conditioning. Interesting enough, one of them involves mooching off of people who DO have air conditioning. I highly recommend mooching.

Soon, your kids will be going back to school and you won’t have to listen to them whine about how you don’t have air conditioning. Frugal Dad has back to school shopping tips galore.

20 Something Finance gets all metaphorical with a comparison of personal finance to the Tour de France… or is that a simile? Interestingly, neither the Tour de France or personal finance necessarily involves air conditioning.

Dumb Little Man has tips for not becoming a complete whale while living the life of a cubicle monkey. Also no mention of air conditioning. COINCIDENCE?!?!

Saving Advice asks if crafting is a good way to make money. I don’t know, can you knit a functioning air conditioner?

The Wisdom Journal offers some methods for turning your supposed "needs" into mere "wants." Like, I thought I needed a diamond necklace, but it turns out that I was simply delusional from the heat, so I bought an air conditioner, which I actually needed.

The Greenest Dollar teaches you how to quit your job, which we all know you won’t do, since that’s 8 hours of AC-cooled existence every weekday.

You know how you like to start up the grill with a pile of $20 bills? Me, too. That’s the surest way to attract a frugal mate, reports Weakonomics, so get to it if you want to marry Thrifty McSavingspants.

For Canadians traveling to the U.S., you should buy your American dinero before arriving, according to Get Money Energy. However, just as an FYI, we are already all sold out of "les aire condtiounieres", so you might want to try Mexico.

Permalink | 7 comments | Andrea Dickson's blog | Channel: Personal Finance

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This article is from Wise Bread.