It’s a time for giving thanks, and I am very grateful for all you awesome readers of this blog. Honestly, this blog has helped me keep on track and it was really fun along the way. I started blogging in December 2004, revealing our net worth of $55,750. As you can see on your top right of the screen, two years later we have doubled that! What better way to celebrate this success than to give away a bunch of stuff! 😉

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My Money Blog participated in some carnivals again this week:

• Carnival of Personal Finance #72 at It’s Just Money
• Carnival of Investing #46 at 1st Million at 33
• Festival of Frugality #46 at Lazy Man and Money

If you are interested in participating in the Carnival of Investing either by entering a submission or hosting, please see here.

If you haven’t filled out my feedback survey yet, doing it now would be simply fantastic. I’m only going to keep it up until the end of Wednesday, so let your voice be heard!

I’m tinkering with my site right now, and I managed to kill my e-mail address 🙁

Update: E-mail was down for parts of Sat/Sun/Mon. If you sent me something during this timeframe, please resend. It is back up now.

I want to know more about you and what you think of my humble site. Please take 60 seconds of your time and fill out my Feedback Survey, because it will help me make this blog better for you.

It’s only 6 multiple choice and 3 short-answer questions. I promise to read all the submissions and I’ll share the results (and any changes I implement) with you when it’s done. Thank you!

I’m tired of reviewing stuffy bank products. How about some cool urban furniture instead? I was sent both a Fiery Red Omni and Otto Chair courtesy of Andrew of SumoLounge for review, and here it is!

At first glance, it just seems like a bean bag chair. But has your beanbag chair been featured at the Sundance Film Festival, MTV’s Real World and HGTV, and at the same time able to withstand the wrath of a 100-lb Bernese Mountain Dog who likes to dig? I think not.
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JLP of AllFinancialMatters has started his Bogleheads’ October Project, in which every day in October a different person will review a chapter from the book The Bogleheads? Guide to Investing. Hey, if someone reviews every single chapter well enough, maybe you won’t even have to read the actual book! Too bad I already bought a copy (hardcover even!) months ago. 😉 I’m doing Chapter 19: Tune Out the ?Noise?, which is funny, as I’m just now writing something about doing just that.

Lest you think things across the pond are so much better than things here in the States, I read today that according to a British study young people here are worse off now than their parents at the same age. In fact, they are coined the iPod generation – “Insecure, Pressured, Overtaxed and Debt-ridden”. Sounds very ominous, doesn’t it?

Whew! London is fun… and very expensive. Everything basically costs twice as much here. Burger King Whopper? On sale for ?1.99, or $3.80. No, I didn’t eat one. 😉

I just watched A Comedy of Errors at the Shakespeare Globe Theatre. It was simply fantastic!! It’s an authentic replica of the original Globe Theatre where Shakespeare introduce most of his later plays to the public. For ?5 ($9), you can get a ‘groundling’ ticket which is basically general admission for standing room only. But they are right in front the theatre – so they are the best seats (so to speak) in the house. If you get there about an hour early, you can line up to be the first people there, so you are at the very very front. You can literally rest your elbows on the stage and be inches from the actors. By far my favorite experience so far. I’m catching a musical (much more expensive) tomorrow.

All the museums and libraries are free in London, so it’s not the cheapest thing to do, but still the best deal for me. Only two minutes left at internet cafe, gotta run!

Although it’s far from finished, the Carnival of Investing has a fresh new home at it’s own domain. As a collaborative effort between me and another avid money blog reader/friend, there will be two people to make sure it runs smoothly. There are lots of new changes in the works, so please update your bookmarks. Right now the Carnival needs new hosts!

This week?s Carnival of Investing is up at Pragmatic Finance. Thanks to Jason for hosting.

Next week’s Carnival will be held at GrowYourFunds. Host Larry has decided to do a theme for this week: Alternative Investments for Individual Investors. In his words – “I’m thinking of things like REITs, hedge funds, commodities, etc. Benefits, drawbacks, suitability, timing of each product or asset class are things we might write about.”. So please send your best post on this topic, new or old, to the Carnival!