For a while now, i've been doing occasional surveys with 2 different survey companies: 1 pays you $3 for each survey while the other requires you to accumulate points which you can then convert for $20 at a time. That company only pays the equivalent of between $1 and $3 for each survey, and it takes longer to make any money. They also take a really long time, 6 to 8 weeks, to get the check mailed, so you've got to be like me, a patient saver!

I remember reading another blogger saying she averaged $20 or $30 a month from surveys, which i found hard to believe at the time, becus half the time I'd spend 5 minutes answering endless questions only to be told i didn't qualify. Or, I'd try to begin a survey the day after I'd received it and they told me it was already closed and that they met their quota.

However, since i haven't been working, i have been doing nearly every survey that comes my way from these 2 companies and i must say, my earnings have grown. I'm already getting $20 in January and $40 in February from the 1 company and have been getting more or less regular $3 checks from the other company every week or so.

It may not seem like much, but just 1 $20 check will pay for a month's worth of cable. $40 would pay for both my phone and internet combined.

So while in the past I poo-pooed surveys as a meaningful way to spend one's time, that's changed for me now and i guess I'll have to "eat crow." (You young 'uns probably don't know what I'm talking about.)

I have 0 Christmas spirit this year. I'm not depressed, there's just not much going on. Christmas day will be the usual dinner with mother and sister and Monday i'll be headed down to see my dad and stepmother for an overnight visit.

There are no children in my family, so that makes a huge difference. Unusual, isn't it? 4 of us kids, only 1 just got married, and no one has kids of their own. I think it stems back to my parents' divorce, not to mention my first step-mother's early death, my mother's 3 failed marriages, multiple moves.... Too much instability. And i haven't been dating anyone for a while, so no big excitement over the whole gift-giving thing.

Maybe tomorrow night I'll invite my neighbor over for hot chocolate or something; i know she's estranged from her daughter, who's my age. Sorry, don't want to be a downer.

I also just heard from my old college roommate, who is passing thru my way on her way home from Boston to see family in NJ. I invited her to stop by, which she's done in the past.

I need to start thinking about baking tomorrow, so today would be a good day to make sure i have all ingredients.