Evangalizing!

Okay there are some things that I've discovered that I'm always telling folks about. I'm kind of an evangalist for the cheap and interesting secret stuff of the world. 

Cheap Eyeglasses 

I discovered these when my daughter Lindsay had to get glasses and I couldn't bare to spend $200 on glasses for a seven year old who would likely lose or destroy them. I'm bought most of my glasses for $8 or $9 a pair -- total for prescription and frames. Most have come from Zennioptical.com but I just bought a pair for Lindsay from Eyebuydirect.com. But follow the links from fellow blogger Glassyeyes to get discounts on even cheaper glasses. When I got an updated perscription recently, the store said it would cost $240 even with insurance! I got the same glasses for $25. How can they be so cheap on-line. Slate Magazine did a great article on the subject.

Buying Used Tech

I've been a Mac person since my first computer -- a pre-Mac Apple IIe. We had Macs in my middle school classes and I leaned to program BASIC on them in 6th grade. I bought a Mac 512 after college for $25 and used it for years of writing newspaper articles and novels at home. I'm now writing on a G3 Ibook that I bought off Ebay last year for $60. It came with a wireless card and all the latest software including Microsoft Office for Mac. I bought two ibooks for my daughters for $25 each on ebay. Batteries were dead but with wireless I can still plug in anyplace in the house to surf the web, blog etc. 

I bought my Palm 650 for $50 from some guy who was upgrading to a iphone. That's the trick, people are upgrading to the latest tech all the time. I like to swoop in an take advantage of these early adopters as they get rid of their "old" tech.

I stick with brands I know -- Mac, Palm etc, and sell on-line when I want to upgrade. I think PCs age faster and have a harder time upgrading so I avoid them. LowEndMac.com is invaluable for know where to find the best deals as well as the capabilities of older machines. 

Whole Body Donation

A patient in the Emergency Room told me about this one. Instead of having your body rot in the ground with no benefit to anyone -- I've decided to donate mine to medical research. My inspiration was the great book Stiff: The Curious Life of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach -- which tells all about the things we do with bodies after we die. I was lucky enough to benefit by studying a human cadaver when I was in nursing school. I want to pass on the same benefit to future generations.  I'm signed up with MedCure whole body donation -- which donates your body to medical research projects at no cost to you or your loved ones.  I'm also an organ donor or course.