Money!

Exchange rate Feb 20, 2013

I think we've all seen enough of American money in the movies to recognise it when we see it, but I thought some of you might enjoy a quick comparison to Australian money, and also to learn a little bit about money here in the U.S.

To start I thought I would address a few quirks about Australian money, for those readers who aren't from Australia so you know exactly where I "came from".

Australian Coins

First, in Australia we have done away with 1c and 2c coins. This was many moons ago while I was still a kid. The smallest coin in Australia is now the 5c coin BUT you can still sometimes see prices as, say, $1.88. Now we don't do the 1c or 2c so we can't give coin up to 88c but neither can the cashier give 2c change. If you pay with card (EFTPOS in Australia) you will be charged exactly $1.88 BUT if you pay with cash, you will pay $1.90. It gets rounded down or up depending on whether it's closer to the next 10, the previous 10 or 5. At first people were worried they would be cheated out of money with the rounding up but really it most likely evens out, plus, you can just use card (which is VERY prevalent) instead of cash, problem solved :D

Australian Notes

Australian notes are made of a polymer so it feels very plastic. You can cut it with scissors but getting it wet doesn't damage it. A bad thing is though that when wet it's possible for them to stick together, and sometimes even if dry by static, so you could accidentally give someone more money than you intended! The notes also have a few safety features, mostly watermark type things, so you can tell if it's real or fake.

The best thing about Australian notes, in my opinion, is that they're colour coded. So when you look in your wallet you can tell by looking at the colours how much money you have in your wallet! A lot of people call Aussie money (and UK money) "monopoly money" because it's so multi-coloured and to them, looks fake.

American Notes

American money is basically paper (though a special kind) and very easy to tear and if it gets wet it can destroy it (however it's not uncommon to see notes taped back together!). Occasionally you will hear someone refer to American notes as "greenbacks" and this is of course because they're green, or rather they used to be. Like Australian money, American money is starting to become coloured, just not quite as BRIGHT as Australian notes! I still find it hard to identify how much I have in my wallet though, and I'm sure I'm not the only person to open it up to see a few notes and think I'm rich, only to find out they're $1 notes :P

American Coins

Similar to Australia, America has coins that are being used less often to the point you may never see them (unlike Australian 1c and 2c which are now totally obsolete), these are the 50c (half dollar), $1 coin. They also have the $2 note which you won't see too often either. You can still find some of these, but they're not common.

Both Australia and America have slang terms for particular notes. Not everyone uses the slang (me for example :P) but you might hear certain things from time to time like "redder" for a $20 note in Australia (because it's red) or "Benjamins" for $100 notes in America (because Benjamin Franklin is on the note). This wiki link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slang_terms_for_money has more examples (though I'll admit some of them must be old because I've never heard some of them! Like I said, personally I don't use the slang terms, not when "10" is so easy to say but doesn't mean you won't hear them some time!

Both countries have security marks/features in their of course, BUT here in American there is a special marker/texta! The first time I saw someone take out a marker and scribble on a note I was confused when nothing came up. I wondered why they were testing if a marker worked, on money! That's when I asked and found out about the "counterfeit detector pen". Here's a "How Stuff Works" link to explain: http://www.howstuffworks.com/question212.htm  Basically if the money is fake, the marker will show, if it's real, nothing happens :)

It did take a while for me to get used to the differences. It's still weird to me to have so many ones ($1) in my wallet but I know other people that find it odd to have "big money" (anything with "dollar" after it being "big") as a coin, especially as they're not light! A lot of American men carry the "change" in their pocket as well and someone I know went over to the UK and ended up carrying a fair bit of money in their pocket not realising they had $1 and $2 coins in there! It's also still weird to me that the American 5c piece is the size of an Australian10c piece, and the 10c piece is the size of an Australian 5c (roughly)... not to mention all the pennies!

** I'm sorry this one took so long to get out! I'm actually working on a few at the moment, and the Health Care one specifically is difficult to make sure I make sense (when sometimes the healthcare here doesn't make sense!). So stay tuned! I'm going to try and get some of the "easier" ones out first and continue working on the Health Care one :)

Seasons - Weather & Shopping

01/21/12 - Temp in F

01/21/12 - Temp in C

This is a post I've been thinking about for a while because it was of course one of the first things I noticed, the difference in weather!

In my area of Australia (I'm just gunna say "Australia" for this post to save time but yes, I know it's hotter in QLD, NT and WA than in Vic :-P) it was basically HOT (Summer), warm (Autumn & Spring), and cold (Winter)...  Cold was anything under 20C (and I don't remember anything under 0C) and sometimes at night it would get down as low as 1C and that was just the world ending! But most of the time it basically felt like we only had two seasons... either warm, or kinda cold.

Foliage wise too, nothing really changed. I didn't noticed the plants really obviously dying off then "springing" back to life like I do here in the US. I noticed Autumn of course but we must just have a lot of evergreens near my house because I never noticed an extremely large amount of leaves. Everything basically stayed green all year round until it went brown in the heat of summer.

In a lot of towns here there's a "dumping" area for plants, lawn clippings etc so this past Autumn (okay it's called "Fall" more often in the US) we scooped them up and dumped them there. SO many leaves, about 4 truck-bed's full and it was a lot of work and I definitely felt it the next day!

Here in Iowa we definitely have all four seasons. Summer is HOT, Autumn is warm with the occasional cool breeze (and the leaves falling etc), Winter is FREEZING with snow, and Spring is warm but wet with all the snow melting then all the grass comes back green, and flowers bloom.

Summer gets ridiculously hot here in Iowa, but a humid hot which I personally think is worse in some ways and better in others. The dry heat in Australia is good in that you can often stand in the shade and not feel as hot, but this also means the risk of bushfires is greater. Here in Iowa there's no hiding, it's hot EVERYWHERE. The good thing about that though is window unit air conditioning units are really reasonably priced and actually really efficient. We have central air-conditioning as well (very spoilt) so our house is basically climate controlled which is wonderful :-) My husband once told me that it gets so humid because of all the crops (corn and soy) that boosts the moisture in the air.

It was only after my first full (and proper winter) when I finally realised what "Spring Cleaning" was and why it was necessary. Over Winter the house is all shut up of course and sealed with the heater running (in our case central heating with a humidifier running because the dry air from the heater makes me so itchy!), that's a lot of recycled air. When Spring hits you open all the windows and let the air circulate. You clean EVERYTHING to get rid of that "sealed up" and stale feeling and you throw out stuff you'd just been storing because you really don't want to go out for longer than you have to!

With the weather came another realisation, I don't own enough clothes! Well.. okay I didn't own enough variation of clothes, not to contend with the weather anyway :-P

I have to admit back in Australia I basically wore the same thing year round (only adding a jumper when cold) because the temperature didn't really alter all that much... pants (jeans) and a t-shirt... so I didn't really understand in movies how they would "pack away" clothes or buy clothes in seasons ("this is my winter wardrobe"). Why would you pack them away? Why would you buy multiple seasons of clothes? Seems a little pointless and expensive... WELL, now it all makes sense! I store my heavy winter coat, snow boots, beanies, winter gloves, long sleeved undershirt and all that because you only need it for 3 months of the year. As it starts to get cold you get those clothes out of storage, move your colder weather clothes to the front of the wardrobe and the summer clothes to the back.

That of course leads to SHOPPING for seasonal shopping. My jeans broke last summer and I went to go buy a new pair from a store I like to shop in and all I could find were capris or shorts or skirts but not a good range of full-length jeans. I had to wait until they came "back in season" before I could get proper new ones. I had to get cheap jeans that I hate but at least did the job.

I broke my sunnies last week and found out that those are seasonal as well, and found out my favourite shopping store (Kohls) is a seasonal shop so NO sunnies :-( Ended up located my sunnies (same as my broken ones) at Wal-mart. Thank goodness for Wal-mart hey!

They talk about times of the year in terms of seasons too. "I'm going to college in the Fall", movies are "out this summer"... I have to admit it takes me a second or two to calculate that :-P

Pop Can & Bottle Recycling... For Money!

Okay so I found it hard to find a heading that didn't just make it sounds like I'm talking about typical bottle and can recycling that we do in Australia, so hopefully you guys were attracted by the word money as something interesting/different and read this post! It's only going to be a short one (you all probably have realised by now that "short" is a relative term!) but seeing it's something I did today I thought I should get it out there before I forgot! As a heads up I'm probably going to use the term "can" a lot but assume I'm talking about bottles as well :D.

Today I took 240 cans to the "can center" and in return I was paid $12. Now you'd be forgiven for thinking I actually got paid to recycle, but that's not actually the case... not entirely anyway. I'm not profiting, I'm actually breaking even.

How's that you ask? Well, I can't remember whether it's the same in Australia, but cans and bottles here have this weird looking writing on them that usually includes a monetary amount like 5c or 10c. It's actually state codes with how much of a deposit you pay for the bottle or can. See pics below (p.s. the can one was a really hard photo to get clear!):

Soda Bottles Deposit/
Recycling codes

Codes on the cans

Receipt Showing Deposit Paid

So you can probably see that there are only a couple of states that are listed (CT, IA, HI, MA, ME, NY, OR, VT for 5c, MI for 10c and CA says CRV explained here http://www.calrecycle.ca.gov/bevcontainer/ ). This means that if you buy a bottle or can in those particular states, you will PAY a "deposit" when purchasing the beverage (see my receipt above).

In order to get that deposit back you need to take the bottle or can to a redeeming center. Apparently legally the place you bought it from is supposed to accept the can back, but not all places are equipped to deal with it so will only take a 12 pack or a small amount, if they take any at all. That's why they have the "redemption centers".

Rules for Redeeming

There are rules for redeeming cans and bottles as well. The place I went to today gave me a list of rules (to the left). Every place probably has different rules. The place I used to go to (that has since closed down) would take 240 cans or 300 cans. You were paid 5c per can. Now here's the thing. They never actually counted the cans while you were there (that would take too long because it's by hand) so instead some places will go by the "height" of the bag (because the can bags are pretty standard in size/width and yes we usually pay for them, 75c at this new place). I actually found at the old place they didn't pay me for the 300 cans but I didn't know that at the time, it wasn't until I got home that I was told I should have been paid more ($15 as opposed to $12) which isn't a lot but can add up over the years!

At the new place they don't count them either but the lady told me they will only take 240 cans (or rather only pay for 240 cans but you can give them more, just won't be paid more) because people were cheating them and saying there was 300 when there was less. They trust you to have the right number of cans in the bag until you prove to be untrustworthy. She also told me that the companies who make the pop are the ones that pay them for the cans. They are paid 6c per can, they pay us 5c per can so their profit is 1c per can. Apparently since the old place closed they've been EXTREMELY busy handling the cans and have needed to hire on someone new to help (she told me that earlier that week in one day they had well over 70 people come in so $138 profit assuming all the bags were exactly 240 cans and not including bottles etc).

Processing the cans at the can center consists of people opening all the bags and sorting them into bags for their respective manufacturer to collect (and people don't tend to wash them so it's really sticky) . When I dropped off my bag there were 2 people sorting cans and there were a LOT of bags to sort. It'd be pretty good repetitive arm exercise though... I know because I had to sort through my cans into bags of 240. Fun fun!

On doing some research for this topic I actually came across some posts that talk about "can counting machines" that you empty your bag of cans into and it spits out a receipt that you take to the cashier who will give you the money for however many cans are on the receipt... of course I also read that homeless people camp out near some of those places and beg people for their receipt (but homeless people is actually a whole other post for another day)... so maybe counting the cans myself is better than dealing with the guilt (misplaced or not).

A friend asked me where I stored the cans. We have a breezeway and in that breezeway we have a cardboard barrel from my husbands father that a can bag fits into perfectly... other people have other methods of course). It's taking up a bit of the breezeway now only because I sorted the cans into separate bags but when those are gone it doesn't impede movement at all.

So there you go. Not everyone collects the cans and instead just throws them out (whether they don't have the storage space or they're above it). Some people actually collect the cans from other locations (bars, outside apartment complexes, if they're cleaners at businesses or schools) and actually add to their income in that way. Given I have collected 720 cans (or $36) in the last year+ (yes I was lazy redeeming them) that's actually, over time, a fair bit of money you're throwing in the trash. I know it drives my husband nuts but hey, I have $12 right now that I didn't have yesterday, and when I take the other 2 bags I sorted that'll be another $24. PLUS it saves space in the regular trash can :D

Anyway, hope you enjoyed this little post. Now I'm off to spend my $12... nah it's bedtime, but thanks for reading :)

P.S. Here's a wiki page explaining the reason behind it for some states and countries if you're interested: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Container_deposit_legislation.

Winter - How it affects normal life

Storm - 19 December, 2012

Well we finally got snow and it came in the form of a pretty decent storm, called Winter Storm Draco. It started with rain, then turned to sleet (horizontal at that) and then turn to snow. Combine all that with the high winds 25-35mph the roads were awful.

Thursday was when I first heard the storm was coming and I admit I didn't really think much of it. I didn't realise the impact it would have. I didn't really want to drive in it, but wasn't too worried at the same time either because, I thought, I'd just pull over, or drive slow. I totally forgot that my truck needs weight in the bed (goodbye traction without it!) and the size of my tyres make for good aquaplaning.

Storm Draco Begins 20 Dec, 2012

It was first supposed to hit at 6am (around the time I get up to get ready for work) but as it turns out it didn't hit till 11am and it continued through the day and I couldn't tell you when the wind really died down. I can tell you I left work at 3-3.30pm and didn't get home till 5.30pm-ish. It took 2-2 1/2 hours to drive 30 miles (which normally takes me 45-60 minutes).

I knew what was going to happen, but that doesn't help when it's actually happening. A few times I lost traction enough to fish-tail my truck. Once up onto a median strip (narrowly missing the pole because I jerked the wheel in time.. which incidentally is usually a big no-no in this weather... smooth fluid movements, nothing sudden.. no sudden acceleration or braking or turning), another time into the opposite lane of traffic (where thankfully the guy was at a stop sign and just laughed at me as I said "SORRY!!!"), and the final time I "ditched my truck". I lost it on the interstate and was headed for a ditch. It wasn't a small one either so I was forced to alter my trajectory as best I could and fling my steering wheel the opposite way. I still got stuck, but this time sideways and not a nose-plant into a big ditch. Thankfully a good samaritan (Ryan) drove past, saw I was still in my truck, and turned around (risking his own safety I will mention) and asked if I was okay. He called my husband for me (my phone battery was dead), and then asked me if I had anything like a chain and he'd pull me out. Luckily I still had some ratchet straps and though it ended up sacrificing itself, he got me out and I drove the rest of the way, very gingerly home. When I got home my husband and our neighbour were digging out our driveway. My back and neck were sore (from sitting so tensely) but I was oh so glad to be home, thankful I didn't roll my truck, thankful Ryan stopped to help and that his truck was strong enough to pull mine out, thankful I didn't ditch on the way home (and it was BAD... I couldn't see the roads at times but you can't pull over or you'll never get out so I just followed the tail lights ahead of me), thankful I've driven that path enough that I could guesstimate where the road was, and thankful it wasn't bad enough to incapacitate my truck.

ANYWAY before all this happened, I was talking a friend one morning (around midnight Aussie time but more like 7am central time in the US) and I had to run outside to start my truck. While out there (and still on the phone) I noticed my windscreen had iced over as well so I had to scrape it (it hadn't snowed yet but we'd still get ice on the windscreen). While telling my friend this (and a few other winter issues) I realised I hadn't addressed this on here yet and it might be interesting to some of you to read what winter can sometimes mean for daily life (outside of freezing our bits off!).

Winter in my area of the US means snow. I'd never really seen snow before I moved to Iowa, once for about 5 minutes as I drove through some random snow fall on the way to Melbourne, but that's about it. I thought in places where snow was common, it snowed daily/regularly during winter and I had no concept of what it really meant to have a white winter!

I thought (in my innocence) that when it snowed it pretty much snowed constantly. A few breaks here and there but mostly constant, how else does it stay on the ground? Well, that's because it's FREEZING! You might see on the weather report it's 35F but then it'll say "feels like 20F" because with the windchill it feels much colder. It can be sunny out with the nice hot sun feeling great when you're inside, but as soon as you step out the windchill.. brrr!

It doesn't snow all the time. It's like rain, only instead of rain it's snow. So think of how much it rains and imagine that being snow instead. That's what it is.
There's a few things to address so I'll do them in numerical point form to make life easier (hopefully) in case anyone wants to specify a particular number to ask questions or comment:

1. Getting Up Earlier -You're never quite sure if you're up "early enough" or "too early" but if you have somewhere to be, you better make sure you give yourself at least an extra 1/2 hour (depending how bad the weather was the day before) both to be able to leave the driveway, and also to get to work/wherever you're going on time. The next few points will explain why...


2. Start Your Vehicle Early - You will need to start your vehicle early to give it time to warm up. Not just inside the vehicle but also the engine itself. Driving on a cold engine isn't good at the best of times, but worse if it's frozen... but lets be honest, mostly it's about making sure that heater is working before you head out!


3. Digging Your Vehicle Out - You need to make a path out of your driveway so that you don't run over too much snow, compacting it into a slick surface (makes getting out harder and sometimes dangerous and almost impossible to shovel later). Just about everyone owns a snow shovel, but some really lucky people have snow blowers (makes it SO much quicker to dig out!). You will need to dig around your vehicle, as well as making sure your license plates and lights are visible (don't forget the brake lights including the "top one" if you have one).


4. Scraping Your Windscreen - Whether it's snowed a lot or not, almost every day you will have to scrape your windscreen, whether you're going somewhere or not. The reason for this is if it gets to the point where it melts then refreezes you could end up with a hard shell on your windows etc that you can't scrap off easily and you CANNOT use water (no matter the temperature) because cold will freeze, and too warm may crack (it's that cold) so scraping is your only option (eventually salt may work too...)


5. Wiper Fluid - It's funny how used to using wipers you get without realising it. You cannot use them in winter unless you have a special fluid in them that doesn't freeze otherwise, you guessed it, it could freeze on your windscreen and make a huge mess. You can buy special fluid (make sure you check what temp it freezes at, it'll usually say on the bottle) that will only freeze at really low temps (we just got some that'll be fine to -27F) and can even sometimes help melt the snow.


6. Digging Out Paths - Some towns will have rules about whether you MUST dig out your footpath/sidewalk or not. Failure to do so in those areas can result in a fine. However I know that some towns while this might be a "suggestion" there is also a law where if you've dug out and someone slips and hurts themselves it's your fault whereas leaving it alone it's "natures" fault. so you need to make sure you know so you don't end up regretting it! 





#7 Roads Being Plowed

7. Snow Plows - Governments, and even some people, have snow plows. The city workers will plow the main roads after a snow fall (sometimes during depends on how long it's been going on) to keep the roads clear and safe. The regularity of plowing depends and the time as well, so some mornings you might be "snowed in" because you can't drive your vehicle on the roads until they're plowed, and sometimes even the plow can cover your vehicle making it hard to get out, so be careful where you park! Some people own attachments for their trucks as well either to earn money by digging out people's driveways for them, or for personal use because they live on a road that doesn't get plowed by city workers.


8. Salt - Something totally new to me... salt melts snow! There are different kinds of salt too. Some are gentler than others (for example I was warned to avoid walking my dogs because some salt is so harsh it can burn the pads of their feet... so snow shoes for pets seems to have a practical purpose as well as being cute!). Just today I saw some coloured salt on the ground (not entirely sure why it's coloured.. maybe so you know it's there?). There are also big tanker type trucks that carry a salt water solution to salt down the freeways and highways. It doesn't work too well when the road has iced over and while it helps with the roads.. it leads to the next point...


9. Rusting Vehicles - The salt they put on the road, like when you live in a town near the sea, ends up rusting your vehicle. So while rust is a bad thing of course, I don't know of anyone that wouldn't buy a vehicle for everyday use simply because it has some rust (of course the amount matters), because it's going to keep rusting. My husband has a vehicle, a camaro, that he doesn't drive in winter for this very reason.


10. Warm Clothes - Something that perplexed me was, what do you do with all the winter clothes you're wearing to get from A to B and entering a warm building, like say, Walmart? Your tolerance may vary but I wear snow boots, gloves, a beanie, scarf (or facemask), and a big heavy coat... when you enter a building with heating that gets HOT and while the snow boots can stay on, what about the rest? I thought I'd see people carrying backpacks so they could stuff their winter gear into it... I haven't yet though 'cause most people just shove the gloves into the pockets of the coat or hold the gloves and beanie in one hand with the coat slung over their arm and the scarf loosened.


11. Cheaper Winter Clothes - One bonus of it being winter here 3 months out of the year, winter clothes are MUCH cheaper here than in Australia. I bought a coat that I can wear 4 different ways (there's a reversible inner coat that I can wear by itself or with the outer coat). It was only $60 when something comparable in Australia would be hundreds of dollars!


12. Shoe Spikes - I fell only once last year but one of the dangers of snow is black ice. Sometimes just a surface that doesn't look slippery but is. You can buy they spikes for your shoes that you slip over the sole of your shoe to make walking less dangerous. I don't personally use them because often there's not enough snow and you'd need to keep taking them on and off to walk on spots where there's no snow. Also out of interest, nearly fell on my butt the other day because i didn't see the submerged cement corner :S


13. Emergency Pack - The morning after the storm hit, I put my dolphin torch in my truck (http://www.powerhousemuseum.com/collection/database/?irn=12292 - I love it!). I already had an emergency blanket (you know the silver ones) and also an airplane blanket I appropriated from my last United flight. It's also best to make sure you carry food and water but of course water freezes in the cold so you need to take it out and put it back in again. You should also put a chain or tow rope in just in case and, unlike me, make sure your phone is charged or have an emergency phone that can at least dial 911 or 112.





#14 Going Into a Ditch

14. Going into a ditch/Getting Stuck - There are government vehicles that drive around during storms (or after) checking vehicles for people. This is usually on the more main roads so try and drive on the main roads unless you're comfortable with the idea of waiting hours before someone drives past to rescue you.


15. Filling Your Vehicle With Fuel - This is probably the weirdest part... you don't shut your vehicle off when filling up. I remember all the signs at the petrol stations in Aus with their "do not use a mobile", "make sure your vehicle is completely off" signs and here there is no such thing. You leave it on to keep it warm.


16. Parking - There are some places where you're not allowed to park when it's snowing, and some places you shouldn't because vehicles can get plowed in (i.e. when plowing the roads the snow covers your vehicle and good luck getting it out!


17. Snow mobiles - Just like some people have four-wheelers, some people have snow mobiles at well. The interesting part is there are actually specific snow mobile routes and signs for them. I think it sounds like fun but it's also dangerous because you can't see what's under the snow, that's the main reason for the routes, so you can be more sure it's not dangerous.

Out of interest, snow isn't always "pretty" either. The salt from the road causes the snow to go from pretty white to grey/brown sludge.

Social Security Numbers & Credit Score

Click here to get the SSN explained

You've probably heard in movies people talking about their "social", or "SSN", or "so-sh" or "social security number" and wondered what exactly that is. Well, it's similar to a Tax File Number in that you need it to file taxes, but there's so much more to it! 

The Social Security number, also known as an SSN, is one of the most valuable numbers to have in America. It consists of 9 numbers and is usually written as 123-45-6789 and outside of the first time when disclose your full "social" to a company, you will normally identify yourself with your "last 4", being the last four digits. Your social is used to file taxes, to work, to identify "you" as well as tracking your credit score and credit history. The Social Security Administration (SSA) issues SSN’s depending on your legal status in the United States, so not everyone has one (students for example who have no need to be working or anything like that).

When I first arrived in the US I arrived on a K1 fiancee visa. People on K1 visas are eligible to get SSN's, but only if you get it within the first 76 days of being in the U.S. I'm wasn't allowed to work so when I got my SSN it said "valid only with DHS authorization" (which means a work permit or greencard) on it. Only when I got my greencard was that wording removed.

The SSN is linked to credit history and credit score, and companies report to the credit bureaus (four major ones) that you have applied for a loan or card (approved or not), that you’ve defaulted (or not), how many credit cards and accounts you have and many other things. If you have a low credit score it can really start to negatively affect your life here in the US.

The credit score ranges from 300 – 850

• Between 300 and 499 – Bad credit score.
• Between 500 and 579 – Poor credit score.
• Between 580 and 619 – Low credit score.
• Between 620 and 679 – Average or OK score.
• Between 680 and 699 – Good credit score.
• Between 700 and 850 – Very good or excellent credit score.

As a new immigrant to the US, when I first arrived I had no credit score and no credit history, and there was no way to bring my history from Australia. It was important to start building my credit score and credit history as soon as possible and the most popular ways to do that are:

• Have an American spouse or parent put you on their credit card (referred to as “piggy-backing”) bearing in mind you get their good AND their bad;
• Get a secured credit card (Capital One has a good one); and
• Get a store card (some stores are really strict so this may take some time)

Credit score determines things like getting a car or home loan with a lower interest rate, being eligible for store cards and credit cards, whether you need to pay a larger security deposit (bond) for an apartment, how much your car insurance premium will be, even as far as whether the electricity company will let you get connected without a deposit first. It has been reported that some employers will even checking your credit history to see what sort of person you are and determine whether they want to hire you.

There are companies out there who claim they can monitor your credit score however many often erroneously report to the credit bureaus that you are a victim of identity theft and put a “fraud alert” on your account which in itself can damage your history. In fact, being a victim of identity theft, even after you clean all the stuff up to show that it wasn't you, you will still have a lower score because of your failure to properly protect your number.

Links:
Checking your score: www.creditkarma.com (free)
Checking history: https://www.annualcreditreport.com (free once a year)

So getting a SSN was actually a pretty big event for me. Suddenly I was "on the map", and now, over the years, I've started building my score to get into the excellent range :) The only bad thing about this is the junk mail asking you to get this or that credit card starts pouring in... but I admit I was pleased the first time I got some... but only the first time :P

Hindsight... A visit home

An epiphany!

There are a few question I get asked pretty often (by family/friends and yes even strangers)... Whether in Australia or the US I'm asked if "Do you like living here/in America?" and  "Do you miss Australia?". They're questions that don't have a simple yes/no answer and often I'm worried of offending one party or the other (from experience this happens :S).

When back in Australia in September 2012 I was asked "Is the US home now or is Australia?" and I couldn't bring myself to say the US was home and neither could I say "Australia is still home"... to be honest, I felt like I was betraying either country no matter what answer I gave.

It wasn't until I returned to the US and went back to work (the very next day) that I had my epiphany (or mood swing.. who knows :P). It was a gorgeous sunny day. I went and got lunch at my "local" food haunt. I  was walking back to work and I realised that I felt comfortable. I like my job, I like where I live (most of the time), I like our house and of course my husband and our furry children (2 dogs).

Other immigrants will understand how welcome that feeling is. A lot of the time immigrants (I'm generalising here but I read this a lot on my immigration site) feel out of place about the strangest things. Someone once said she walked out of her house one day and realised she had no idea how to send a letter... and that's so true! You don't know where anything is, you don't know the processes. It's bizarre!

So that's where my ephiphany comes in, I realised that where I am is home. It's not the US, it's not Australia... it's where I am that's home. I finally feel comfortable enough here that I can say "I'm home"... but I still call Australia my "home country". Technicalities I suppose but where I am is my niche in life, not a country, and right now where I am is in small town Iowa, USA. This isn't meant as an insult to Australia, I simply mean, I'm finally at a place in my adjustment here where I'm comfortable enough to feel home and not like the alien I am :P

On a funnier note, being back in Australia was definitely weird, after two years (almost to the day actually) being back there was very different and I definitely noticed some things I hadn't noticed before.

On the observation front though (bear in mind I live in small town Iowa, and in Australia I lived in the Grampians so a lot of these things are related to where I'm from and where I am now):

1. Driving down the highway in Iowa (not the backroads, the highways) the trees are off in the fields and farther from the road. Driving down the Western Highway in Aus I was lucky to see the fields BEHIND the trees. Lots and lots of trees, and eucalpyts to boot, right up almost butting up to the road;
2. Hills versus flat lands. You can't see for a very long distance in my area of Aus because of the hills, but in Iowa it's just land and corn and soy beans as far as the eye can see;
3. Speaking of corn and soy beans, we grow canola in my area of Aus;
4. I saw NO shingled roofs... which is all there is here (that I've noticed). In Aus there was either tiled or tin;
5. Houses in Aus are made of brick or wood, but in the US they also have aluminum siding, which is what our house is;
6. Out shopping there was a sale on the Creamy Soda I love (Kirks), 4 for $10. In the US this can mean that they're $2.50 each so you can get 6 or 2 or 1 or whatever and you get the saving (usually). In Aus however you must buy the amount listed to get the saving, otherwise it's the original price;
7. Cable TV... oh how I love thee! I know that in Aus you can get pay-TV but it's so insanely expensive when here in the US everyone has cable or satellite. There are different sized cable/satellite plans, the more you pay the more channels you have, but going back to Aus most TV's only have 6 channels on regular TV;
8. When mum was here visiting she noticed that the toilets here tend to fill up more before then flushing down. She had a minor panic the first couple of times worrying the toilet was going to overflow;
9. When I first landed in Aus it was really glarey out. I was shocked to see so few people wearing sunnies... here in the states almost everyone wears them... could be because they're so cheap here;
10. While shopping in a more major town than my mum lives in, I saw a restaurant called "chequers"... yep that's right Americans, the restaurant "Checkers" spelt with a Q. I thought it was weird because it's a shop name so why change it? I likened it to calling "Subway", "Train Station" :-P; and
11. One thing that I noticed as soon as I was back on US soil is that I love my phone (and US cellular plans). I love having unlimited data, a good signal most of the time, unlimited texting, a smart phone and enough minutes that I never have to worry about over-paying (unless I call Aus that is). I think Australia is getting better at this but when I was last living there (2009) these smart phones weren't as prevalent (iPhone or blackberry were your choices), data plans sucked and calls cost a small fortune. I use my phone (an HTC Incredible 2) pretty much all the time now and love it (well not recently.. I'm having battery problems :P)!

And finally, I tried to check out this theory on the coreolis effect... but I only thought about it right as I was leaving so sorry, nothing to report :P

Thanksgiving 2012 (inc Black Friday & Cyber Monday)

TURKEY DAY! Well... not "Turkey Day" for us because neither my husband nor myself are big fans of turkey... I don't mind eating it covered in gravy and ketchup, but I hate cooking it... smells SO bad raw! So Thanksgiving this year was Ham for us. Specifically brown sugar double-glazed spiral ham :) If it's not ham, it's chicken, and this year my husband picked ham.

The sides each family has depends... it can change family to family and area to area, but in my experience it tends to be:

• green bean casserole (made with mushroom soup, milk, green beans and dry fried onions)
• candied sweet potato (made with sweet potato topped with marshmallows and baked in the oven)
• cranberry sauce (most eat the kind that comes from a can)
• dinner rolls (sweeter than we have in Aus)
• pumpkin pie (dessert)

That isn't to say that's what WE have :P I don't like green bean casserole, and the candied sweet potato is WAY too sweet. The cranberry sauce isn't a favourite and the dinner rolls taste like American bread.. not good... So we have roasted vegies (potato, sweet potato and carrots with rosemary) and sometimes peas and corn and gravy. My husband, the American, likes the green bean casserole so I make that for him, and he likes stuffing so I make that separately too. We were too full to eat pumpkin pie this year but we did have chocolate pudding (mousse). Yum! We're still eating left-overs and it's still good!

Cornucopia

I'm sure most of us, all over the world, have seen or read stories about the meaning behind Thanksgiving, the pilgrims sitting down to dinner with the Natives (I have to admit my knowledge comes from the Addams Family movie with Wednesday at camp :P)... but here's a Wiki article for those that want to read more: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thanksgiving Thanksgiving is also celebrated in Canada, though in October instead of November and has different roots, despite being called the same thing. The image on the left, the cornucopia, is a common image you'll find connected to Thanksgiving. It is supposed to symbolize the harvest bounty.

My favourite part of Thanksgiving is the idea of sitting around the table and letting everyone know what you're thankful for, or even taking the time to think about it yourself. This year I saw people changing their Facebook status each day with something they're thankful for. I thought that was pretty neat. I actually learnt some new things about people that I didn't know and that's rarely bad :D

Another cool thing about Thanksgiving is the shopping!! Like Boxing Day sales for Australia (though that's after Christmas), here in the US you have Black Friday (day after Thanksgiving) and Cyber Monday (Monday following Thanksgiving). This year a lot of the sales actually happened all weekend, not waiting for Monday and the Black Friday sales actually started Thursday night.

Here's the Wiki page on Black Friday -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Friday_(shopping) but you should probably do some searches for news articles about Black Friday as well... look at some photos... some people can be CRAZY! Here's the wiki for Cyber Monday -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyber_Monday

The catalogues and adverts come out a week or two before the actual time for the sales, and the deals that are the best are called "doorbuster deals". These are the deals that they think will have people "busting in the doors"... and the sales tend to start around 4am, or 6am, and this year some started at midnight. People will line up outside DAYS before the sales start. This year in my area people started lining up outside Best Buy (electronics store) on SUNDAY... that's right, almost 5 days before the sale. It got to about 0C the night before the sales too... sorry, I couldn't do that! Apparently there were tents this year too!

I have never actually attended to stand in line early, I admit I'm probably a little scared. People have actually been killed, trampled to death when the doors open. This year someone pulled a gun on a line-jumper in Texas.

Cyber Monday is exactly how it sounds, sales that are online only. I haven't had a look at many of the sales this year but I did buy 2 new games (Bop It and Yahtzee). One of these days maybe I'll be a pro, know where to go and when, know what really is a good deal, but I admit Thanksgiving kinda snuck up on me this year :P Maybe next time :) At least it reminds me Christmas isn't too far away either!!

I hope those of you that celebrated Thanksgiving had a good one, and those of you who didn't, I hope you understand "our" cooky traditions a bit more :)