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How to Survive Suburbia

Holiday Gift Guide for the Wine Lover

Oh, we Americans love our wines. We have friends that take their wines very seriously. We have friends that buy their bottles at Target. No matter what type of wine lover you are shopping for, these gifts will please them all.

Cheers and Happy Holidays!

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Gift Guide for the Wine Lover

1. Electric Wine Opener

I’ve gotten so accustomed to using fancy wine openers that when I’m handed an old-school opener, I struggle to open the bottle. This affordable stainless steel electric wine opener effortlessly removes the cork from a wine bottle. It glows a cool blue when charging.

And now that you’ve opened your bottle, let’s continue with the rest of this list . . .

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We Got Rid of Cable and My Kids Survived: Part 2

C’mon, I know you’ve thought about getting rid of cable at least once. Do you really need all those channels? What could you do with more than $1600 this year? Even if you bought ten series on iTunes, you still come out ahead. What do you have to lose? Cut the cord! Cut the cord!

For more on watching your favorite shows without cable, click here to read my previous blog post.

If you decide to go ahead with ditching cable, you will need: [Read more…]

We Got Rid of Cable and my Kids Survived: Part 1

Cord-cutter: that’s who I am. Two months and proud. My kids haven’t complained yet.

You may think that my sizable cable bill motivated this decision, however, the real reason was that I simply could not justify paying one more month for my home phone. With the exception of telemarketers who dialed me incessantly (despite my placement on the no-call list), my home phone sat silently accumulating dust until I finally unplugged it. FIOS informed me that if I chose to keep internet and cable TV but dropped my home line, my bill would actually increase. (I had the Triple Play package).

Frustrated, I shopped around online and discovered CableVision’s Cord-Cutter package. For $50 per month including taxes, I could receive high-speed internet, a router, and digital antenna. My FIOS bill cost me close to $200 per month. Do the math. At the end of the year, I would have an extra $1600 in my pocket.

Sure, cable makes channel-surfing convenient, but I can honestly say I do not miss it. I still manage to watch all my favorite [Read more…]