You can save so much money by simply being brave enough to ask for it ... back. The trend seems near epidemic ... billing errors are so common on my personal bills, I have to wonder if it hasn't become a form of legal robbery. If I question errors or negotiate interest rates, I'm nearly always granted what I request. But I have to ask, and so many don't or won't ... or can't.

Just in the past month, I reversed a charge for a hotel room I had cancelled weeks in advance and got a refund from Paypal for a product never delivered from Ebay for a total of $120. I got a refund of money overpaid when I paid a balance on a credit card. Within the past few months, the cell carrier suddenly forgot I had free nights and weekends and billed me the overage. Interest rates on credit cards jump unexpectedly and with subdued "notice" and doctors offices forget to post the payment that has already cleared your bank.

We have to READ every single bill that comes through our household. Scrutinize it. To some, that would seem common sense but to some of us in a time crunch, we'd have to admit we've written a quick check or just let the automatic bill-pay do its thing.

I'm willing to bet that at some point, the practice will be discovered as having been a willful and insidious act with great rewards from the majority of us who abdicate our financial power. Finances are emotionally intimidating to most of us. Even when you have enough, just paying bills and balancing the checking account is like walking a plank somehow.

But the best way to reclaim your financial power is to know what you have and how it's being spent. And after you find the first error and get it corrected or reversed, you're going to have your mojo back. Keep a tab of how much you reclaim in a year and then do something really special for yourself with the money.

Love lots,
Sophie

Today, I am struck by the embarrassing concert put on by Steve Winwood this morning on one of the morning news shows. It was painful to watch. And he did "Higher Love" which never was really one of his gems, I think. But the good thing is that watching this performance made me remember how much I loved the album Arc of the Diver back in the early 80s.

This cover is a classic icon of the time. We used to go dancing 3 or 4 times a week at a few places in a fairly remote part of the country. One was at this disco in a warehouse on a country 4-lane. I think it was called the 'Crash Landing' and it was packed on the weekends. Big hair glistening in the strobe lights. And often, we went to a hotel bar with a house band who loved to play Steve Winwood songs, among other covers.

But those were in a day when dance clubs and drive-in movies were everywhere.

There was also this place called Chester's that was a totally different scene. We lived in a dry county and had to drive into South Carolina proper to have (or buy) alcohol. Chester's was a ritual for us year-round. On Wednesday nights, Jim (the owner---who always explained that Chester ran off with the barmaid) would throw a free pig-pickin' party on the roof. It was flat and had tables and chairs and speakers from the jukebox, which was just dripping with classic Willie and Waylon, Johnny Cash and Patsy Cline. Jim, who rarely spoke a word otherwise, would come sneaking up on me and hand me a cupful of quarters and whisper, "Play something pretty for me." The roof parties were for warm weather, though. We'd sit out in the summer time and shoot fireworks off the roof that we bought from the establishment across the highway, which had pool tables and fireworks. Beer and food at Jim's and fireworks and pool tables at his son's place across the highway. And those were the only two things in the flattest horizon you ever saw other than flowing tobacco fields, which nearly glistened at a certain moment in dusk.

So the roof was an excellent view of the skyline and when the fireworks were going off, it's like the sky bowed down to us. In the winter, we'd hole up in Jim's bar and eat free chili that he made on those same Wednesday nights. He liked to take care of us. We brought endless entertainment and could be coaxed to put on spectacular fireworks displays. I've never lost my love for that type of jukebox and those songs. I haven't been back to Chester's and the closest sort of jukebox that I've found is at the Waffle House. It's not nearly the same, but if I close my eyes ...

Happy Spring!

Love, love, love,
Sophie