Car equals freedom


When you live in a city it does
not make sense to own a car unless you have money and can afford to pay the outrageous
monthly garage fees or parking tickets you are likely to get.

Thanks to my cousin, I joined Zipcar because I have been tired of taking Metro North transit. My friend lives in Nyack, which is 45 minutes outside of the city and I wanted to visit her without the hassle and stress of relying on public transportation, especially with a toddler.

Despite having been lost for an hour I still made it to Nyack with enough time to have a sit down lunch and also go to BJ's Warehouse where I indulged in economy sized things you cannot get in the city.

The picture above is of Malcolm (left) and Noah on our adventure in BJ's.


Some great perks with Zipcar:

- You are given a nifty card that only you can use to access the car,
- They cover gas up to 180 miles FREE,
- Every car has an EZ pass and if you go through a toll it is billed to your credit card,
- You can rent cars from $8-$18/hour,
- They offer different levels of membership if you require a car often or once a month,
- There are a variety of cars and if you want to go luxury rent a bmw, mini or suv,

Concerns:

- Make sure you call the garage in advance to ensure your car does not have any problems i.e. flat tire,
- Do a test run of the car you requested,
- Report any issues of the car to Zipcar,
- If you need a car during the weekend reserve a week or two in advance.

May the force be with you!

I hardly remember what age I was when I first watched Star Wars: Return of the Jedi but I know I was pretty young. My brother's had a collection of figurines from Star Wars that I was not too interested in but do recall playing with them once or twice along with my barbies. I know my mom still has one of the space ships in the attic.

For whatever reason we decided to dress Noah up as Yoda. I figured it was too easy to find one of the cute baby costumes so who was better than the wise one? I originally wanted to dress him up as a turtle but the holiday crept up so quickly we did not find it in time. Since there was a shortage of women from the movie, by default I was Princess Leah. John of course wanted to be Obi Wan Kenobi so the family theme was in full affect.

I went to the Halloween Bazaar in Union Square and even a week before the store was a mob scene. There was a section dedicated to Star Wars characters. I was appalled when I saw the price for the Princess Leah costume, $74 while John's costume was 1/3 of it. I ended up buying the wig of two braided buns and sewed a similar dress together from a white bed sheet. With little time to plan I did not have a chance to fix some minor details but I did save $50 and dabbled in some sewing - a dream of mine.

Halloween has become a multi million business. It was reported that in 2006 an estimated 2.5B was spent on costumes and this year roughly 5B nationally. In the suburbs vacant business warehouses become Halloween Headquarters. Everyone is getting in on the fun - dressing up, carving pumpkins, handing out candy and especially decorations.

We have 365 days to think of what we will dress up as next year!