A depression could not be far off. Now, think about stories you have heard from people who were alive in the depression era. My grandparents are mostly dead, but I do have one grandmother who is still around to tell me stores of how she and her family survived. Also, my parents were both raised depression-era parents and were instilled with values of frugality and self sufficiency. Thank goodness they passed those values down to me.

Up north we always kept large gardens. My mother canned fruits and vegetables. I see now the value of growing as much of my own food as possible and “putting it away” for later use. I am ready to learn how to can. However, I live in Florida now and I have to re-learn how to grow a successful food crop. I know I am going to have to have good soil brought in. I will need to build a tarp to make sure my crops do not burn up in the sun. I will need to learn about planting season here and what foods do the best.

Fruit is an easy option to start. We have a large yard and although the grapefruit tree was cut down a few years back, the star fruit tree we trimmed to the ground this year will be back within two years. We have lemons and oranges in pots that are ready to go into the ground. We have apple trees of a variety that grow well in the Florida climate. I have looked online and found suppliers for Blueberry and Blackberry plants that should do well here. All of these things can be canned and will also provide a good deal of fruit to be eaten fresh.

Anyway, I am also looking at some of the smaller issues; like what items of furniture that I already own will fit one of the townhomes. What do I want to get rid of or replace or upgrade. I know that I will go ahead and buy a plasma TV that I can put on the wall with a LCD mount. I’ve put of f buying one based solely on the idea of saving money while I can. Even so, it is a “luxury” that won’t actually put me off my budget much and it will get its fair share of use. I’ll probably also replace my formal Victorian sofa with something much more kid-friendly, like a La-Z-Boy sofa. I know they are not massive purchases, but my head has just been in the kid of place where huge expenditures make me happy. I like comfort and security and lots of time with my family.

I would like to say definitively that all of the things I just talked about are solid goals for 2009. Of course, that all depends on what the school district does about salaries and new hires. It’s a tight situation with my job right now. As good as I am in my position, I can only move up if there is room for me to move up. It’s a logical process. Since it is only February, I am going to assume these are my goals for the year. If things change, then I will adapt.

AAA Auto Club South keeps tabs on gas prices in Florida, Georgia and Tennessee and says the cost per gallon of regular gasoline did indeed rise about 20 cents all around our region this past week.

Here’s the part that might make you angry. Those gas prices went up, but the closing cost for a barrel of oil actually went DOWN last week, to $5.51 less than the prior week. Oil closed on Friday at $40.83 a barrel – down about $9 from, earlier in the week.

AAA is saying that the lower oil prices might finally have an effect on gas prices this coming week.

So, I “made” $2 on the deal. Actually, it was more like $2.50, because the register spit out an extra 50 cents in Extra Bucks based on my “fall spending”. Nice bonus.

Looking back at the ad just now, it looks like the limit was not on three toothpastes, but on three EB deals. So, If I go back and buy one more toothpaste and use another $1.50 off coupon, I should get another $2 in EB. I will give it a try tomorrow.

Now days you have to search a little harder.

I went ahead and started this week. I’ll call this my first great deal of 2009.

At CVS all Nature’s Bounty vitamins and supplements are Buy One Get One Free (BOGO). On top of that, CVS will give you $3 in what they call Extra Bucks (EB) to spend on a future purchase.

I signed up at the Nature’s Bounty website for their newsletter and they gave me a printable coupon for $2. I also found an additional $2 printable coupon elsewhere.

I found bottles of Potassium Gluconate 595 Mg Caplets at my local CVS for $4.89. I picked up two bottles, used a $2 coupon for each of them and ended up paying $.89 for the two bottles, since one was free. I also received the $3EB.

Essentially, I made $3.11.

I take the Potassium when I have had to take a diuretic or am dehydrated. It also helps when I have a headache or when my high-protein diet causes a potassium shortage.

My ex lives in the house and is blessed that he can actually afford the payments. We are not caught in the trap of an ARM, thankfully. Our only headache is that we bought the house for such a high price that if we were to sell it for the going rate right now; we would not be able to cover the cost of the remained of our loan and would have to plunge into our savings accounts to pay it off. So, as much as I want that house out of the picture and loathe the idea that I still own a home with my ex, it would be unwise to sell right now.

On the other hand, those who have never owned a home and are also in a good situation to secure one of the very low interest loans are in a VERY good place when it comes to the availability of low priced homes. If I wiggle a few tings around in my personal situation, I am one of those people. I am heartily considering just signing the house over to my ex and moving along. I can pick up one of the townhomes in the community where I lived when I was first married for nearly the price we sold one for back in 2002.

Still, the overall picture is not good for our collective economy. Everything is so interlinked. More sad news about the housing market only serves as a harbinger about the jobless rate to come and issues like budget shortfalls in city and state governments. Schools are closing, businesses are shutting their doors, and the deep discounts offered by many retailers BEFORE Christmas are all sad signs of the state of our economy.

I keep thinking that I need to get my rear end in gear and put out a massive garden in the yard next year. I want to be as self-sufficient as possible.

Rebuilding of America (ROA) is an affordable investment opportunity that costs just $20 to join, plus a processing fee of $5. Your investment is out into Jumbo Certificates of Deposit, which happen to be fully insured by the FDIC. Then, ROA then “leverages the CDs to purchase, rehabilitate, modernize or finish foreclosed income producing properties all throughout the USA.”

ROA’s operates using the interest on the CD’ and then distributes the profits from their projects to the investors annually. Because the original investments are never actually used for the projects (just the interest, remember?), they are safe and are returned to the investors after the five-year term of the CD. It’s a unique investment project for those of us in the ranks of the middle class, or for those learning how to invest. Most other investment projects require a much higher minimum investment, while the idea behind ROA is that $20 is a amount that most anyone can afford – thus keeping the project attainable to a majority of people.

Jim Jameson, CEO of Rebuilding of America, says something I find very telling about the ROA project: “If Obama and McCain can raise millions of dollars at $5 per person to buy ads and run their campaigns, I figured we can use the same power of the masses to really make a change in our economy.”

The projects that ROA will tackle with the interest earned from the CDs will be reviving things like a housing project for senior citizens that was 60% complete when the construction company went bankrupt, a low-income housing project that was devastated when Hurricane Katrina hit, and other localized projects that revive communities, provide jobs, and stimulate true change for the people they benefit.

I think this is an exciting take on true grass-roots efforts and an inspiring example of everyday people working to be the ones who actually change our nation.

They surveyed 8,758 consumers on their proposed holiday shopping habits and among other findings, they found that shoppers who will use credit cards as their primary method of paying for holiday gifts will fall when compared to a similar survey taken in 2007.

Yay for the American consumer public for finally getting it through their collective heads that credit is not the way to go. This has been a long time coming, although most people only finally saw the light this year before the presidential election and during the bank bailouts.

Now, though, pretty much everyone is pinching pennies. Frugality is the new frivolity. Even with gas prices coming down at the pump, there is a collective expectation hat things are only going to get worse. I’m not the only one with a renewed love for coupons, sales, promotional pens and free trials. I’ve been brushing my teeth on the sample tubes we had saved up from dentist visits for over 6 months now. Not buying toothpaste is a small savings, but it feels good to know I’ve found even a small way to cut back on spending.

And so, as we approach Christmas and that time of year where we all seem to spend more when it comes to gift giving, meals, vacations, and winter bills, I know we are all going to be on the lookout for all things free. I know I will.

Anyway, one of the boys came up to me early this week and said, “If I become a firefighter, will I have to pay taxes?”

I told him, “Of course you will.”

He looked at me with a blank face for a moment and then he finally said, “But Obama won the election and firefighters make less than $250k a year.”

“You will STILL have to pay income taxes,” I reiterated.

I went on to explain that Obama has promised to add an additional tax deduction for working people. He has said that the tax rate for middle income families will be less than it was during the Reagan years (not difficult to do, by the way), that families making less that $250k a year will not see a tax increase, and that middle income families will receive tax relief. The key word is relief, which in and of itself is a rather ambiguous word.

Nowhere does Obama say that middle income families will no longer have to pay taxes at all. However, SO many people came out of election season believing that. MANY voters think that their boat just bought the gravy train. As sorry as I feel for those who are uninformed, I also have to say that they could have avoided ignorance by doing a little light reading on Obama’s own website.

Foolishness.