Living Low Cost in Los Angeles

While 'project mayhem' may not be in your immediate future, you don't have to look far to start feeling a little like Tyler Durden.

As you might imagine. Living in a tent has advantages and numerous disadvantages. Its cheap, it simplify and you feel like you just dropped out of a frame of Fight Club while you glance around your office thinking, "none of these pansys live in a tent". Beyond that its just plain roughing it.

Angelenos may associate the Palos Verdes Peninsula with high price real estate, grand sea vistas, and Trump National Golf Course. Palos Verdes ('PV' or simply ‘the hill’) has been the quiet conservative refuge for the 'pony club' set since the 60s. In PV the condos go for $1000 a square foot and the peninsula grocery store is packed with $100k whips.

I’ve decided to cut the prim and proper city down to size by tenting it long term. Well, I'm not on a crusade or anything. I'm just looking to save a buck, but I don't mind putting a political bent on it. Two thing are for sure, the neighbors don't like it and feeling a little bit 'Fight Club' is intoxicating.

Living in LA can be expensive, especially if you’re surviving on your blog’s non existent income. Most of the folks at my office are paying between $900 and $1200 a month for their modest South Bay digs. And that only covers there part of the rent. All of them are sharing apartments or houses with groups of people. It’s the way things are done in Los Angeles. No one likes it, but everyone deals with it.

I’m no longer playing the game that way. Loyal ManyDigit readers may remember my visit to meet Jay Shafer, modern father of the Tiny House revolution. I really wanted to do something like that. Live simply and save my money for other things, like travel, and paying down credit card debt.

While camping in Colorado last month I had a revelation, I should just live in my tent. Most of my ideas go no where. I just talk about them with my friends once then they fade into the darkness. This time the stars seemed to be aligning correctly. The lease on my high priced LA apt. was coming to an end so I poked around to find someone who would be willing to sublease a camping space to me. Half jokingly I placed an add on craigslist.com, and in two days I had a deal worked out with a leaser in Palos Verdes. For $150.00 plus utilities a month I could have his patio/backyard and use of his bathroom and kitchen.

In a marathon effort, I got rid of nearly all of my furniture, I kept my clothes, my laptops, my camping gear and I moved in.. err out. I’ve been living the good life for 2 weeks now and I think I could do in indefinitely.

I’ll be writing some more about the new lifestyle I’ve discovered over the coming days and months, so check back. I will say this; the lady next do waters her garden every morning at 5:50am and inadvertently gives me and my positions a good watering down- a challenge that I’m learning to deal with.

You might ask what I’m doing with the grand a month I’ve been saving. The answer is “Whole Foods”. I’ve been eating like a king.

Bad Poetry - Good Times.

I'm a big fan of bad poetry. I enjoy writing poetry that deep down i know is aweful, but i don't think that should bar me from sharing or publishing it.

I find myself spending more and more time posting my really bad poems on verybadpoetry.com. It's starting to really eat into my productivity, but I don't care.

You can read random poems on the front page or you can browse through the archive and find some real gems. I joined the poet hall so you can find my aweful poems pretty easily.

Check it and publish something. It's cathartic.

HTC Touch-Flo

With the fever pitch building around the iPhone’s release in a few weeks, other manufacturers are trotting out interesting takes on the touch GUI. The LG Prada has already hit the streets and is most commonly pointed out as ripping off the iPhone, I think its closer to the Dulce and Gabana Razr. Last week videos of HTC’s touchable user interface started showing up on the net.

Instead of re-imagining how a phone should be, HTC basically combined some already available touch shortcuts and tied them to a slicker and easier to comprehend UI layout.

Since the first Palm devices started hitting the main stream you’ve been able to assign short cuts to simple motions of the stylus across the touch screen. For instance, dragging the stylus from the bottom of the screen to the top could open your calendar.

HTC has taken things further. Instead of a stylus the focus is on the finger, a hallmark of the iPhone philosophy. But that’s where the similarity seems to end. Dragging your finger from the bottom of the screen to the top appears to turn a cube below the screen and a separate set of functions is displayed.

I think it’s a good way to organize the many hats that smart phones wear. More interestingly this new GUI runs on top of a regular installation of Windows Mobile. HTC should just start distributing this as a skin for use on any Windows smart phone with a touch screen. It might bring a segment of the market that generally would avoid windows.

Excited digger already looking to trade in an iPhone

I just saw this post when i searched digg for cellphonetradins.com to see if anyone else had discovered it.

How to get an iPhone

You've got an iPod and a cell phone, trade them in for the cash to make your iPhone dreams come true.



read more | digg story

How to get an iPhone

Ok, so you want an iPhone but you’re afraid to take a risk. First of all, that's no way to live your life. If you like it, dive in. If you’re anything like me you've been reading the long awaited Apple Inc. iPhone rumors for more than two percent of what you can only hope will be the full length of your natural life.

So, that's settled. You're going to do something you want to do for once in your life. Now the only barriers are presented by the funds you have available. I'm going to let you in on a valuable secret: You have an iPod, you have a cell phone, when you get you're iphone you'll have two of each. Sure, you’re a modern money making plutocrat, but you don't really need two of each. You can sell both of them on eBay, but who wants that hassle?

I've found a place that will let you trade both of your soon to be redundant devices. Cellphonetradeins.com now allows you to trade in both at the same time! A few months back I traded in some old phones for some extra cash, I was really impressed. A check showed up in about 3 weeks. That's just enough time! If you do it today, you can pick up an iPhone and cash your check at the bank in the same errand.

Depending on what you've got to trade, you could pay the fee to break your existing contract or even buy an iPhone out-right with "free money".

I'm going to trade in my Nano today, ill let you know how it goes.

Amp'd: Where our revenue at?

The cellular MVNO geared toward "urban" users goes filed for bankruptcy protection early today. They will be restructuring and taking another crack at the bizarre marketing angle that they've been trashing away at for years.

In the interest of transparency, I should let all of my loyal readers know that I interviewed with some low level hire-ups at Amp'd to write copy for them. I was not hired. This should come as a clear warning to all of those other companies who have chosen not to hire me in the past. They sited "did not end enough sentences in prepositions" as the reason for passing me by.