It’s easy to think that saving money in the summer is a snap. You don’t have to drive the kids to school, you don’t need the heat in the house, and we tend to eat less when it’s hot. But expenses can creep up when you’re dazzled by the summer sun – so here are the top six ways to save money this summer.

6. Sun Dried

You’ve been waiting for that summer sun all winter. You can’t wait to get under its warm rays. Well, neither can your laundry. A great way to save on your electricity bill is to hang laundry and let the sun dry it for free. String up those wet clothes on the backyard clothesline or drape them around the apartment and your laundry will be dry in no time.

5. Garden Variety Groceries

Want to save on gas? Spend less time in line at the supermarket? Then grow your own food. This is good, wholesome fun work and nothing tastes as good as something you’ve grown yourself. Plus for the price of a packet of seeds and a watering can you can have all the good, healthy fruits and vegetables you can eat. What you can’t eat can be saved as preserves for the winter.

4. Clear The Air

Before the dog days of summer hit, you’ll be hauling out that air conditioner to help beat the heat. It’s a good idea to clean or replace those filters so that the machine will operate smoothly. Blocked or dirty machines become rabid voltage hounds that can eat up your money while not cooling your home down.

3. Water You Waiting For

It’s a good idea to water your lawn in the early morning or late at night rather than in the afternoon. High afternoon temperatures will evaporate the water and you’ll find you watering more often or having to use more to get the job done. Morning and evening watering will have the best chance of soaking in while the temperature is cooler and you’ll cut down on your water consumption.

2. As Summer Sales Away

Before you put away the beach umbrella and reach for the rake, think about what you spent your money on over the summer and try to take advantage of end of season sales to get a head start on next summer. Radical discounts usually abound, as stores are desperate to move seasonal merchandise. If it’s not perishable, then lay in a supply for next year.

1. Visit Your Own City

Every city has its attractions. Every city receives tourists eager to see the local sights and sounds and this goes for your city, too. So why not take a vacation where you live? Book a hotel, snag a travel guide and start sightseeing. You know the best restaurants already, there are no currency conversion or language problems, and you’ll save a bundle on airfare, taxis and so on. People come from all over the world to check out your hometown so maybe it’s time you did as well.

I guess you can break down into a few different subtopics, although it differs from country to country. Canada and the UK have the following types:

• Debt Consolidation Loans – Similar to debt consolidation in that it allows you to put all of your debt in one place. These loans will combine a whole bunch of in one go. It sorta allows you to pay off debt with an IVA also.

• Debt Negotiation – This process consists of a debtor making an arrangement with their creditors without the help of a debt management company. This is what happens when you go directly to a creditor and ask for a portion of your debt to be written off or if you ask them to freeze or lower your interest rate so that you can finally pay off your debt.

• Debt Consolidation - This process involves a debt management organization assisting you to get your debt under control. It will be similar as above but the company will likely have a lot more experience in contacting creditors and will have a greater chance of success with attempting to get your debt amounts reduced or at least limited through a interest freeze of some kind.

That’s all for today

All of my posts concerning Draco and Viktor are titled “The Worth Of”, but I’ve never actually talked about their monetary worth, mostly because that’s not the type of worth I was ever concerned with when writing about their importance to the Harry Potter series. But recently, I got to thinking: what is their actual monetary worth? Any Harry Potter fan can tell you that the Malfoys and Viktor are rich, but just how rich are they, and how does that wealth get translated into Muggle terms we can readily identify with?

Forbes already did part of the work for me when it comes to how much Draco’s father Lucius Malfoy is worth. In their 2005 list of “The Forbes Fictional 15″ wealthiest fictional people, Lucis was calculated as being worth $900 million(that is, when galleons are converted into dollars). That’s a lot, but how does he rank with wealthy existing people? Firstly, he’s only $ 1 million short of being a billionaire, meaning that in the scope of the top billionaires in the world, Malfoy’s like middle class. To give you a sense of how middle-of-the-pack Malfoy is, the top billionaire in the world, Mexican telecom tycoon Carlos Slim Helu is worth $53.5 billion dollars, making $18.5 billion a year. A year. In contrast, Malfoy only makes $2, 465, 753.42 a year. Also, Bill Gates, the most powerful entrepreneur in America, makes $53 billion, coming second to Helu. Malfoy’s level of wealth includes movie stars like Mel Gibson and Jennifer Aniston, and music stars like David Bowie. So, while Malfoy thinks he’s so much better than non-magical people, he’s actually really not much of a monetary force in the world of Muggles.

Meanwhile, how much does Viktor Krum have? Well, there’s no exact amount given to him like what Forbes gave Malfoy, we can estimate how rich Viktor is by how much athletes in similar sports make. Viktor’s sport, Quidditch, is like a cross between soccer (football) and basketball, since you can hold the balls with your hands. The average footballer makes, according to a 2006 story by The Independent, 676,000 pounds a year, meaning 13,000 pounds a week. In American dollars, that’s $970,640. But, at least according to the MLS Players Union, U.S. soccer players make much more than this, their lowest salary paid being around $15,ooo and David Beckham, now playing for the U.S., is one of the highest-paid soccer players, averaging between $5,500,000.08 (base salary as of last year) and $6, 500, 000.o4 (guaranteed compensation as of last year). The highest paid U.S. soccer player is Chris Albright at $176,000. The salary of the average basketball player is between $14-$24 million a year. So, considering the popularity of Quidditch in Magical Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australia and the wide range of salaries between the popularity and skill of certain football and basketball players, I would wager that Krum-being one of the top Quidditch players in Magical Europe-would take in a salary between $900,000 and $4 million a year.

If there is a lesson to take from any of this imaginary guessing, it would be that money talks, even in the land of make-believe and magic.

In Credit

By “In Credit,” we mean, if you have credit that you could still spend on a credit card account.  With a regular credit card, this does not mean that you actually have money socked away for you to use.  This is a credit account, not a savings account.

Earning Interest

When you have money sitting in a bank, you will usually earn some amount of interest from the bank.  If you put the money into savings that are less liquid, like a CD, you may be able to earn even more interest. Compound interest is what makes millionaires out of modest savers if they start soon enough and put money away regularly.

Best Reward Credit Cards

Just because you cannot earn interest with a credit card does not mean that you cannot make money with your credit card.  Some people go to great extremes to maximize their cash back rewards from credit card use.

Improving Your Credit Score

One good thing about having credit available on your credit card is that it will improve your credit score. This is because one of the factors in your credit score is you debt to available credit ratio.  Do not open up a ton of new credit cards in an attempt to increase your credit limit. This can backfire and reduce your credit score.

Paying Interest

While you do not get interest from the credit card company because you have credit available on your credit card, look at what happens when you have an outstanding balance on your credit card.  The compounding interest can keep adding to your bottom line such that it could take you years to pay off what you owe if you only stick to the minimum payments.

Getting a Debit Card

Here is a way that you can get interest when you have “credit” on your credit card.  This can work is you get a credit debit card which is tied to a checking or savings account. This way, any money you keep in your account will help you accrue interest that compounds.

Harper’s spending from last year was the reason that the country hit it’s highest deficit last year.

“Contrary to the federal government’s claims, the analysis shows that government spending and investment in infrastructure simply did not contribute to the improvement in economic growth,”

That’s what Niels Veldhuis, from the Fraser Institute had to say. Those guys talk out their a**es sometimes but maybe they’re right on this one.

Numbers from TSX composite index showed the increase at 10.4 points to 12,111.1. The Toronto Stock Market advanced over the last few days as the U.S. Federal Reserve said that interest rates will stay at historic lows. They will stay at a staggering market – very close to zero for an extended period of time said the Reserve. The Canadian dollar was slightly higher though, up 0.03 of a cent to 99.01 cents US. So i guess it’ s not all so bad. More news in the coming days.

Whoa! and if this wasn’t crazy enough, the car lot owner is asking for an additional million because of the negative press his business has been receiving!  HE SOLD HIM AN EXPLODING CAR! For pete’s sake, what a world we live in.  If you’re like me then it’s time you got off your haunches and wrote a letter. I wrote one to my MP telling him that I want that case dropped immediately or we should discontinue trade with Australia!  This is just the type of case that will set a very bad precedent and I would hate to see it happen on my watch.

Also, try boycotting anything Australian until this case is settled. I know my readers are only a few thousand, but if we all told a twenty people and they told twenty people then soon Australia would have to start listening to us and do what’s right.

The Tories have been trying to get this reworked for some time – I think about 2-3 years – but Liberals have been voting against what has been known as Canada Consumer Product Safety Act. As someone that takes Consumer Rights very seriously I think that’s shocking. Maybe the Liberals haven’t got their stuff together but it’s time to work together and get something going. Don’t let the senate do all the work on this one. Just like Andrew Salmon used to say.

I guess we’ll see how this plays out after the holiday break. My guess is that it will move extremely slowly (as it has so far) but maybe we can have something sorted out by February. Consumer Rights is all I care about and it’s near and dear to my heart!