By Colleen Rothe

Anyone who lives a life surrounded by digital tools knows and likely loves Craigslist.

But it’s not the end all be all when it comes to online classifieds. Some new pioneers to the world of online classified advertising are breaking out and giving Craig a run for readership.

There are several sites available. The most notable ones are Oodle.com, Kijiji.com, ClassifiedAds.com, and WebCosmos.com.

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By Colleen Rothe

In this New Depression we’re enduring, many folks have jumped on the second-job bandwagon. In order to juggle house and family responsibilities, they are turning more and more to jobs that allow them to work from home.

Recent global resource polls suggest there’s been a 50 percent increase in the amount of people working from home, at least part time, over the last three years.

But consumer advocate groups like the Better Business Bureau, as well as law enforcement agencies like the Federal Bureau of Investigation, continue to get complaints from individuals who have fallen victim to work-at-home scams.

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By Your Consumer Curmudgeon

In my admittedly and proudly relentless curmudgeonly way, I have been pushing austerity and basic non-consumerism for the past year, as I’ve watched (and sadly, anticipated) our economy go down the drain.

I have also urged readers to do the opposite of what our recent, unlamented, departed Decider kept promoting on behalf of his corporate sponsors the past eight years, which was to abandon all reason and go shopping. To me, it has made little sense to succumb to Holiday bingeing and Super Bowl ads and rush out to spend what’s left of our hard-earned money unnecessarily on crap we never needed and won’t use beyond tomorrow. And the truth is, most shopping is unnecessary. Our ancestors and forebears were proud of their independence and self-sufficiency. If they needed something they made it themselves, or found a way to make do without it. It was what our nation was founded upon. So the whole notion of having to be dependent upon an artificial marketing-driven “need” for the latest Barbie doll, fashion accessory, fast food innovation, or designer soda pop is anathema to me (and always has been).

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By Colleen Rothe

I never realized how much peanuts are in our everyday food consumption. Everything from simple peanut butter, to brownies, cakes, pies, candy, cookies, crackers, donuts, dressings and seasonings all have peanut paste in them or potentially in them.

Yes, we’re playing the “potential” game now when it comes to the recent peanut butter paste tainting and subsequent recalls. It all started in early January with various companies who use the paste in their products and has now reached 44 states with 637 people infected by Salmonella found in said peanut butter paste produced by Peanut Corporation of America.

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By Colleen Rothe

Since moving to the West Coast, I haven’t found a large majority folks who lease their vehicles, but there’s enough. So heads up.

If you’re fortunate enough to have the kind of life that allows you to trade in a vehicle every two to three years and you live less than 12 miles from work, leasing your car might seem like a dream. It can be. As stated above, you get the freshest technology in driving (think better fuel economy and MP3 player connectors built into the stereo). Sometimes, or as the auto sellers tout, your monthly lease fee will be cheaper than a car payment were you buying it.

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By Your Consumer Curmudgeon

I think we’re all getting the message. It’s finally starting to sink in. This mess we used to call an economy is not going to get better any time soon. It’s certainly no better since last week, no thanks to Tim Geithner. Still, we were warned. We were told to expect it would get worse, and it did. You can look elsewhere for the numbers. Like your own stock or retirement portfolio, if you’re still lucky enough to have what is left of one after Madoff and Friends got finished looting the world.

For the past year I have counseled prudence. I can relate to Ben Franklin, in that regard. Here’s an investment idea: get a book of quotations of Benjamin Franklin, including those of all his amusing pseudonyms, like Silence Dogood, Harry Meanwell, Alice Addertongue, Richard Saunders (Poor Richard), and Timothy Turnstone. He was full of stuff that would be really useful nowadays, like “Necessity never made a good bargain.” Maybe this isn’t such a good time, however, for “Early to bed, early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise.” I’ve been doing all those things for years with scant results. Healthy? Maybe. Mostly. Wise? Perhaps, at times. But wealthy? Puh-leeze.

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By Your Consumer Curmudgeon

Amazing, what a week can bring you. Or take away. Once again in the interests of salvaging what any of us consumers have left, don’t throw more good money after bad. As in, very bad. As in Wall Street Bank Executive Masters of the Universe Bad.

You must know by now how the recent TARP Rescue Package rescued nobody except a few thousand Wall Street and big bank executives and their multibillion-dollar (but who’s counting?) bonus packages.

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By Colleen Rothe

I’m starting to believe that either I have a curse upon me where every microwave oven I touch is destined to die a day after its warranty has expired; or the various manufacturers have conspired to simply not make them last that long.

After a week of research, what I found was that it simply depends on how often you use your microwave, the amount of time you use it, and what quality build it is that determines its longevity.

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By Your Consumer Curmudgeon

I don’t know about you, but I for one think it’s high time the trials begin. And if not as bloody in outcome as those that took place in France in 1789, they should be no less pointed, in terms of historical importance. The notion that the CEO of Merrill Lynch, just before taking his company bankrupt, had the gall, let alone wherewithal, to spend $87,000 for a throw rug for his new office (other people’s money, of course). According to CNBC he also “needed” curtains for $28,000, two chairs for $87,000, fabric for a “Roman Shade” for $11,000, Regency chairs for $24,000, six wall sconces for $2,700, a $13,000 chandelier in the private dining room and six dining chairs for $37,000, a “custom coffee table” for $16,000, an antique commode “on legs” for $35,000, and a $1,400 “parchment waste can.”

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