So I’m picking up my mail, a bunch of bills and flyers when I spot, buried in the stack, a bright red sparkly bubble envelope (I didn’t even know they existed–I’m gonna re-use it and make someone else’s day!) and already, I’m excited. What was inside was even more exciting, a hot-off-the-press copy of Celebrity [...]

Reading an old Dan Kennedy book (purchased for 50 cents from my local library. Short story long? It was falling apart so I asked them to tape it. They said they’re going to chuck it when I returned it, so I gave coughed up 50 big ones (little ones), they stamped it “Discarded” and now [...]

Consider this my penance.

Years ago, I was in a European cinema commercial, me and about 12 other actresses. 3 days of shooting for 60 seconds. I was really excited. But my then 8 year old daughter felt otherwise. In fact, she left me long voice mail message reprimanding me for appearing in a cigarette [...]

This is a photo of the side of my 20 year old Inglis fridge.
The fridge is so old that when a national lifestyle magazine wanted to feature me in a “What’s in Your Fridge” series that would have given my book some great publicity, I started thinking of friends who would let me [...]

So, I’m freezing. It’s cold up here in igloo country in December. So I decide on a spot of tea, boil the water and pull out my cache of “too good to let the kids use to stain paper for history projects” tea. Instantly I know which one I’m going to choose. I’ve had a [...]

Consumer Reports sampled coffees to determine which was the best ground coffee. The winner was not any of the 3 bestsellers. Not Starbucks. Not Folgers. Not Maxwell House. Starbucks didn’t even get an honorable mention.
Cheap grocery store brand, Eight O’Clock Colombian Coffee, was crowned the winner, at just over half the cost of Starbucks. Is [...]

Forget trying to guess what people want. Forget trying to ask people what they want. They don’t know!
But we do know this, according to Gladwell and his buddy Dr. Howard Moskovitz. There is no universal answer. There is no perfect spaghetti sauce. There is no perfect Pepsi. There is no perfect pickle. Only Perfect Pepsis. [...]

Have you ever stepped into the spotlight wearing fake designer stuff? Fake Gucci? Fake Coach? I think the whole concept of fake stuff is ridiculous since the real stuff doesn’t, in my eyes, have any inherent value. But that’s another story…
Daniel Ariely, Professor of Behavioral Economics at Duke University and the author of the wildly [...]

My eldest daughter is studying Biology at University while her mama is studying Buy-ology at home.
I had already read Paco Underhill’s Why We Buy a few times, once years ago and again before my book came out. When I first caught a glimpse of Buyology , I assumed it was the latest Underhill [...]

This video is 20 minutes long, well worth it, but if you don’t have time to listen, I’ll cut to the chase below.
Price DOES matter. Not in the way you think. With everyone cutting back prices ’cause of the recession, you might want to consider doubling yours. According to author/journalist Benjamin Wallace, research shows [...]