The May '09 issue of Esquire is all about "being a man." It's enjoyably chauvinistic, as only Equire can be.

One of the articles is simply a list of 31 things every man should own. Oddly, at least half of these items I've never even considered owning, but found myself wanting them. Badly. So that I can be a man, too. I guess they are doing right by their sponsors.

I went to Kohl's today because I realized I did not have a shirt for the suit I'm wearing to church tomorrow for Easter Sunday. I have come to like Kohl's quite a bit, because they always have stuff on clearance sales of 60-80% off and there's almost always a coupon or other %-off deal that you can take advantage of to make the clothes even less expensive.

Mighty Bargain Hunter is wondering what to do with a state quarter collection that he and his wife recently finished assembling. Not having been one to collect state quarters, all of his suggestions seem valid (I would probably choose a combination of 1 and 3), except for selling it which likely would be more of a hassle than it's worth.

I came across a Reuter's article today that explains what deflation is and why people fear it. Like most popular journalism, it's a little scant on some of the details (there's no single agreed-upon definition or indicator of deflation), and it beefs up the FUD.

I was catching up on some of my personal finance blog reading when I came across a post by Meg at All Financial Matters about whether and when spending money is good or bad (which itself is a reaction to this post at Living Almost Large). Meg's conclusion is basically that, of course spending itself is not wrong, but spending excessively is definitely wrong. In her words:

So, I'm going to be in my good friend Speedo's wedding this weekend, and my wife and I haven't yet gotten a wedding gift for the lucky couple. While looking over the registry, I asked my wife how much she thought we should spend.

I was a mediocre fan of the band Live back when they were popular in the mid-90s, enough so that I have a couple of their songs on my iPod. One song in particular happened to play today ("Waitress"), and one line from it reminded of the importance of small-change transactions. It got me thinking about how small change has made a difference in my finances over the past year. Not all of them are positive.