College Scholarships

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Not too long ago, Jennifer Rotman from College Scholarships.org contacted me with some helpful information for College Scholarships. If you are a college student or bound for college, and you are looking for scholarship information or help, this site can be helpful to you. If you or someone you know are in the position of looking for financial help for college, College Scholarships.org may be able to provide you with the information you need.

The website is full of information on Scholarships, grants and student loans - along with many related resources. From what I have seen so far, it is very thorough and a great resource. Here's what Jennifer had to say:

We've completed a unique and succinct graphical time line of what U.S. college students really go through financially when securing education loans.

Just like your blog, we put a tremendous effort into raising awareness to students. Many, unfortunately, often make financial decisions they later regret. If you feel the time line is beneficial to your audience and serves a positive social purpose, please feel free to share it with them.

As someone who went through undergrad working while attending school full time, I can appreciate the helpful information this site brings.  Having additional financial aid can make a big difference in your college and future career decisions.

I hope you have found this post and information helpful.  What other resources do you recommend for college scholarship and related information?  Leave us your thoughts in the comments.

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Sign The Petition To Save Our Libraries!

This past weekend I was at the Flushing branch of the Queens Public Library. It is one of the main branch libraries and also the first Queens Library branch, as mentioned on this post. Upon entering the Library I noticed a table occupied by two ladies with petition forms. After reading a sign next to them, I decided I wanted to do what I can to help the cause.

The petition is to prevent a proposed $14 million cut in the Queens Library's funding from occuring. If the cut goes through, it will mean fewer books and cuts in the hours of operation. In particular, the Flushing Library will no longer open on Saturday and Sundays any longer. Other branch libraries will also cut back in days and hours of operation.

Regular readers of my blog know that I am an advocate of libraries. I believe libraries are the doorway to a level playing field for those who are less privileged. As the saying goes, knowledge is power, and libraries have provided knowledge to those less privileged but are determined to advance their lives.

I hope all my readers and bloggers will help this cause by spreading the word out on this petition. Those in Queens NYC, I hope you will head to your local libraries and sign the petition to keep the budgets from being cut. Perhaps you can do even more than sign the petition. If you have the time and inclination to do so, volunteer and help the libraries in various ways. I will be contacting Jimmy Van Bramer, Government and Community Relations, Queens Library, to find out more information and to find out what we can do to help. You can call him at 718-990-8585 if you would like to call him as well.

If you know of other resources to help the Queens Library, please feel free to contact me or leave a comment. Pass this message on to all your friends and family, especially those who use the library on a regular basis, since they will be affected directly.

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Logo from QueensLibrary.org

Free Games That Children Play

If you enjoyed my post 7 Super Duper Games For Free and you have young children, you'll love this post!

I have seen many children in the Queens Public Library's Flushing branch play many of these games. Each time I visit the library, I see a new game being played by young children. The waiting list for computer use, mostly for these games, can be a long time. In order to play your children must sign up with their own Queens Public Library card, you can apply for it for free if you are a NYC resident.

Below are a list of sites that contain children's games I have found thus far. So instead of waiting to play them in the library, which many kids opt to do, for the company, you can let them play in the comfort of your own home. I will update this post when I come across new sites or if you add comments to this post with them.

• Nick Jr. Games - You’ll find games with characters such as Dora The Explorer, Go Diego Go, Blues Clues, Wonder Pets, Miss Spider, Ni Hao Kai Lan and many other Nick Jr. Characters.
• PBS kids games - You’ll find games featuring famous characters like Big Bird, Clifford, Curious George and many others.
• Qubo games - Qubo is a 24/7 Children's television network. You can find it on channel 31-2 on DTV. On this site, you will find characters such as Vegetales, 3-2-1 Penguins, Babar, The Zula-Patrol and others.
• Sesame Street Games - You’ll find games for some of your favorite Sesame street Characters such as Elmo, Zoe, Big Bird, Cookie Monster, Bert and many others.

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Screenshot from Nick Jr. website

Should You Pursue An MBA In 2009?

Photo courtesy of lumaxart

Pursuing an MBA may be what most people do not want to do right now.  If you are a contrarian, then you know it's the best time to do so!  When everyone is running from something, a contrarian will take the opportunity and use it to their advantage.   It's pretty tough for the average MBA graduate these days.  Those who are still pursuing an MBA degree must feel a good degree of pressure.  With the number of jobs shrinking and debt rising, anyone in the situation could feel like atlas, with the burden of the world on their shoulders.

Why am I writing about this today?  It's the end of 2008 and many people are making long term decisions and resolutions for the New Year!  I think many people may be heading back to school due to the employment climate.  If you can afford to head back to school, it's probably a great opportunity to do so.  Once you receive your degree, the employment opportunity should be better than it is today.  This decision, in my opinion, is both frugal and wise - for long term planning.  Am I thinking about pursuing this?  What do you think?

Before you do pursue an MBA or any other post graduate degree, you may want to ask youself some questions and figure out why you want to do this.  Knowing why you are doing something is the most important step in any long term decision that will affect you and your family.

Asking yourself why you want to pursue an MBA degree before you begin, and finding "Your Right Answer" should be the first step before you start.  Whatever the reason is, whether you want to earn more money, you want to become an entrepreneur, to meet like minded people or any other personal reasons; knowing the answer to why you want to do something is the most important step you need to take.

There are no guarantees in life, that just makes life that much more exciting.  I want to wish everyone good luck and great success in 2009!  Thanks for your continued readership!  I would love to hear your thoughts on this, especially those pursuing an MBA and those who already do.  Follow me on Twitter for additional links to Frugal tips and tricks. If you would like to contribute to Frugal NYC in any way, articles, ideas, posts, interesting links, advice, financial assistance, or anything else, feel free to contact me via email. Click here to add this to your RSS reader.

Symptoms Of Cold and Flu Season

Photo courtesy of pacdog

So here I sit, on the verge of a cold or possibly the flu, hopefully just a cold. It's that unfortunate time of the year again, when we hear our friends, family and colleagues sniffing and sneezing. It's cold and flu season in the Northeast and other parts of the US. The rest of the world cannot get away from these bugs either. The cold and flu virus spreads faster in the colder seasons because people crowd together indoors. These are ideal environments for the cold and flu viruses. Your body also becomes more susceptible since it has to cope with the additional energy of keeping your body warm during the cold seasons. I'm sure most of you are familiar with cold and flu symptoms, they are listed here.

Symptoms of a cold

1. Runny nose
2. Cough
3. Slight fever
4. Sore throat
5. Fatigue - feeling tired and unwell
6. Stuffy nose
7. Sneezing
8. Clear mucus, after the first 3-5 days you may get dark mucus. This does not mean you have an infection, just that your body is fighting off the cold virus.

Symptoms of a flu

Flu symptoms are much like cold symptoms, but last much longer and are more severe.

1. Fever (usually high)
2. Headache
3. Muscle aches
4. Chills
5. Extreme tiredness
6. Dry cough
7. Runny nose may also occur but is more common in children than adults
8. Stomach symptoms, such as nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea, may also occur but are more common in children than adults

My Home remedies - they may or may not work for you, but they have worked for me at one point or another.

• Chicken soup - the warm soup helps your body rehydrate and keeps it warm from the inside, not to mention if done right, it tastes really good!
  
• Jell-O - helps soothe sore throat. The water you get from Jell-O is a big plus, and children love Jell-O.
  
• Coca-cola boiled with minced Ginger. Drink this concoction and you may feel better faster. This helps clear sinus, I learned this one from my dad years ago.
  
• Cough drops also help soothe a sore throat, as long as it's not infected.
  
• Drink lots of water, as I wrote about in my previous "Water" post , this can help a healthy person recover much faster.
• Eat Congee/Porridge - this is another way of replenishing the fluid loss during a cold/flu. The plus, you can put just about any ingredient along with it. Sweat and sour porridge anyone?
• Herbal Tea/Medicine - The great thing about herbal remedies is they are taken in mostly liquid form. This helps replenish your water loss, though you may have to get used to some of the tastes. I purchase pre-packaged herbal drinks from Asian supermarkets.
  

Many over the counter medicines exist, below is a list I put together for Symptoms and relief.

• Flu-like symptoms including aches, pains & fever: Tylenol Cold, Nyquil/DayQuil, Theraflu
• Nasal & Sinus congestion & pressure: Advil cold & sinus, Sudafed 24 hour, Mucinex nasal spray, Afrin
• Sore and/or scratchy throat: cough drops, sore throat spray
• Cough: Mucinex expectorant, Dimetapp cold and cough DM elixir, NyQuil, Robitussin Cough and cold, Delsym cough suppresant

8 Tips To Treat a Cold

1. Blow Your Nose Often -- and the Right Way, which is one nostril at a time!
   
2. Stay Rested - Sleep, you will need it more than usual.
   
3. Gargle - with some salt in your water to help clear your throat.
   
4. Drink Hot Liquids - they help soothes your body and replenish water.
   
5. Take a Steamy Shower - this helps moisturize your nasal passages and helps clear them
   
6. Use a Salve Under Your Nose - Help soothe your skin. Menthol, eucalyptus and camphor all have mild numbing ingredients which help relieve the pain of a nose rubbed raw.
7. Apply Hot or Cold Packs Around Your Congested Sinuses
8. Sleep With an Extra Pillow Under Your Head - this helps drain your nasal passages.
   

Know The Facts

People may have different reactions to the flu. Most healthy people recover from the flu, and become immune to that specific strain of virus. Healthy adults may be able to infect others 1 day before getting symptoms and up to 5 days after getting sick. So it is possible to give someone the flu before you know you are sick as well as while you are sick. The best protection against the flu is vaccination, this is especially important in young children, older adults and those with asthma, diabetes, or heart disease. A good resource to see how severe the flu is spreading is Google's FluTrends. This gives you a map of the US and how severe it may be in your State, the data is based on the number of searches for the flu on Google. So as more people search for flu info in your State, you know the flu is spreading more rapidly. For those outside the US, sorry I have not found such resource for you yet.

When To See A Doctor

If you are unsure if you should see a doctor or are worried, it's probably a good idea to see a doctor. You can click on the above link for a great chart describing symptoms and what to do.
Above all, get lots of rest and drink lots of liquids. If you want to get a flu shot, you can see your doctor or visit your local pharmacy. You can call CVS for locations at 888.Flu shot Or visit cvs.com if they are near your residence.

Hope you have found this helpful. What are some of your suggestions? Let us know in the comments! Thanks for visiting, follow me on Twitter for additional links to tips and tricks. If you would like to contribute to Frugal NYC in any way, articles, ideas, posts, interesting links, advice, financial assistance, or anything else, feel free to contact me via email. Click here to add this to your RSS reader.