Let's get it started! *

I have really been lagging behind on this Business.. business. I've researched adequate packaging for shipping, checked out what other people are selling, had a few ideas, made some things... But I feel I haven't really gotten stuck in yet.

I haven't actually made any products for listing, and ArtFire's 45 Day Guide suggests having at least 100 products to list. So last night, I began to make a small 100 page notebook to fill with product ideas and material requirements and probable costs. I definitely don't have 100 ideas in mind yet, but it's okay. I have a few to get started with.

It just needs some holes and some stitching together. I could have stitched it simply last night, but I want to try something experimental with a macrame spine...



* Have you seen the movie Hot Tub Time Machine? I loved it. Check this out - although I reckon it's better in the context of the actual movie! :)

Lovemoney.com

I've recently decided to check out Lovemoney's free online banking service to help me with managing my money.

Originally, I was just typing in numbers on a spreadsheet from my online bank statements to work out my net outgoings and income each year since I've had a bank account. I found out about Mint.com's service today, but then I realised it was for people living in the US. While searching for a UK version, I found out that I was too late too for the no-longer here Kablax, but there is another website called Money Dashboard, which uses the same software as both Mint and Lovemoney.

After a quick bit of browsing I found some complaints about Money Dashboard using some sort of Microsoft Silverlight software or something. Something about it eating CPU something or other. I didn't feel much motivation to get too engrossed on the details.

Having not really found any major complaints about Lovemoney, I've decided to give that one a go first. I got a little chuckle reading the terms and conditions:

"We only provide aggregate, non-identifiable information to our current and prospective advertisers and business partners. For example, we might tell advertisers that we have 120,000 registered members in Metropolis, but we won't tell them that Superman is one of them, and we won't tell them that his email address is ckent@dailyplanet.com."

Should be good, but we'll see how it goes.

Oh, and incase anyone wants to read the post that started me off today in the first place, here it is: How To Understand (and Create) A Personal Financial Statement Each Month In 5 Minutes by Brian Armstrong