Yesterday I need send a couple of greeting cards. For one of the cards, I need to get a Starbucks gift card, so at lunch time I went to Starbucks and the Post Office in Lexington, Massachusetts.

The Starbucks in Lexington, MA wasn't that crowded at lunch time. I was able to get right to the counter when I walked in and get the gift card with no problems. Pretty simple task.

The Post Office trip was a little strange:

When I went to the post office to drop off the cards, I decided to get some The Simpson stamps. Very cool idea to have The Simpsons as postage stamps!

I gave the clerk the two greeting cards to be mailed, which both had the 'Forever' stamp. She took the one that had a gift card in it and started to bend it.

"This one won't make it through our machines," she said. "It will have to go through Parcel Post."

"Ah, ok." was my reply.

"Its going to cost an extra .60 to mail this letter," she said.

I was a little surprise at that. It cost .60 more to mail an envelope with a gift card in it? Just because it can't fit through a sorting machine? That seems very weird. Instead of arguing, I took some stamps that I had with me and use that to increase the postage.

I'll have to test this out to see if this is really true. Is the Post Office charging more money to send gift cards when you hand it to the clerk?

I have a feeling that it would have gotten to the final destination just fine had I just put it in the mail slot.

Robert Reich has it right with the next big finance battle, its going to be with the Credit Card companies.

What's happening to credit card lending is a smaller replay of what happened to mortgage lending. For years, banks used every gimmick possible to get the public to use their cards -- regardless of the credit worthiness of the customer.

Read his Blog titled, The Great Credit Card Battle To Come and see if you agree that some changes will have to occur to the Credit Card companies to end some of the big banks taking advantage of their customers.

Apple Inc. reports fiscal second-quarter earnings Wednesday after the closing bell today. Analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters expect Apple to earn $1.08 per share on $7.9 billion in sales. In 1999, Steve Jobs said the the second-quarter was the toughest quarter for the company.

I project that Apple will beat the projected earnings and lower third quarter earnings due to the tight computer market. Sales of iPod and iPhones have certainly help Apple over the past years. This will be a key call to listen to see how they view the current market situation and probably an update on Steve Jobs.

There's a lot of speculation among Apple users that a new product will be announce soon. Some people think that Apple is working on a product that would just bigger than iPhone and smaller than a laptop. Will this be the return of the Apple Newton?

In case you haven't notices, the Economy is on the rebound. Lots of good business a head! Hang on tight!

Keep your hands inside the vehicle at all times!!!

This happened back in December, does this mean that the market will start to go back up on March 10?

Demand for safety sends 3-month Treasury rates below zero
Tue Dec 9, 2008 5:14pm EST
By Ellen Freilich

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Three-month U.S. Treasury rates dipped below zero on Tuesday amid intense demand for safe U.S. government debt and bets that the Federal Reserve will keep cutting interest rates to avert a deep, sustained recession.

U.S. Treasuries prices, which move inversely to yields, rose across the board and allowed the Treasury to sell $30 billion of four-week bills at an unprecedented high rate of 0.000 percent.