A quick stop at the grocery store for some OJ?  A run to the mall to buy a new pair of jeans?  Away on vacation and wanting buy some local wares?  Having some cash on hand is always for when you remember you need milk on the way home from work, need to tip your server at a restaurant, or are making a purchase from a street vender.    I mean, it’s not every hot dog cart in town that allows you to swipe plastic for your chili cheese dog.

Often, a quick trip to the ATM is no big deal.  Need twenty bucks?  Boom, in your hands in 10 seconds.  College students in particular are aware of the convenience of the closest ATM.  It’s not often your roommate will accept your credit card when your repaying him for his desk lamp/microwave/TV that you broke.  Plus, for those who are 21 and up, the bar scene at some joints is easier played with green in hand. 

No doubt, ATMs are convenient cash sources.  However, what many students fail to take into account are the not-dreaded-enough transaction costs.  Okay, so paying 2 dollars for cash from an ATM owned by a bank you don’t belong to seems like no big deal, but is that really the case?  Rewind back 4 years ago, when I was unfortunately oblivious to the surcharges that can be applied by ATMs.  Yea, I paid 2 dollars per transaction, which doesn’t seem to be much.  Problem was, I made 20 some transactions that semester.  Now, I was pulling out a grand per transaction either (try more like $20 or $40), so that 2 bucks per transaction came out to 5 or 10 percent of the money I withdrew.  Bummer.

The interest on many student loans falls between 5 and 10 percent, meaning I was paying just as much to use money I already earned as people typically pay on loaned money for education.  What a mistake.  Now, I can’t fault someone who is out on the town and really needs money fast, but if you know that you’re going to need cash in the future, it might be best to do 1 of 2 things (or both):  make sure to withdraw money from an ATM where you will not be charged a surcharge fee, or take out a large enough sum of money so that you won’t be running to the ATM tomorrow.  If you take out 200 dollars, then a $5 surcharge is like being taxed 2.5 percent on your own money.  If you take out 20 dollars, a $5 surcharge amounts to a 25 percent loss on your hard earned cash. 

So while ATM surcharges may appear to be a minor deal, they definitely can add up to some mean dollars.  The principle is similar to how not buying a coffee every morning can save you enough money to buy a new flat screen TV by the end of the year.  While surcharge fees may not add up to the same amount as foregoing the AM java, they may propel you from a 42 inch to a 52 inch.  Just a thought.

Sleigh bells are ringing and children are singing…or rather, phones are ringing and pundits are singing (and quite poorly).  No, Thanksgiving has not yet passed, so the white-haired man in your house is more likely  Keith Olberman or John McCain (Olberman gets double duty for politics and Sunday Night Football) than Santa Claus.  As if having millions of Americans stress about their financial future wasn’t enough, it’s now time to try and decide who will be Ben Bernanke’s first mate on the USS Economy.

Voting may appear to be a waste of time (and it very well may be if your CHAD is left only pregnant), but this year’s election will affect your financial future.  Electoral votes appear to be in a toss-up in a number of states, so each vote will count (remember, press extra hard so that you don’t leave any hanging CHADs).  But more importantly, vote because you’d prefer to have a say in who leads the environment in which you’ll be shaping your financial future over the next four years.

John McCain and Barack Obama have different ideas as to how the economy should be handled.  Fortunately, you can have a say in who handles the economy.  Do not think that I am straying away from financial advice in this blog because I am getting down and dirty with some politics.  No, politics can greatly affect your personal finances.  With issues including Social Security, unemployment, healthcare, and taxes, the next President is going to affect your personal bank balance in some way.

Who will I vote for?  Tsk tsk.  Shame on you if you thought I would answer that.  But know that I will be voting because my financial future is important to me.  So in a way, this is a wonderful time of the year (or of every 4 years).  It takes only a few minutes to make your preferred course of economic policy be heard.  Plus, voting is way easier (and exciting) than balancing your checkbook.

Given the current state of the economy and the stock market roller coaster ride, it may seem like a person has as good of a chance at making money on a game show as he or she does in the real world.  But before we ditch our day jobs for a date with Drew Carey, maybe we should take a look at current expectations for the job market.  No, I’m not talking about what Ben Bernanke and the Econ Gang say, but rather about what teenagers say.

It’s bad enough that many adults are less than fantastic with their finances.  However, this could stem from income expectations as a teenager.   According to the Charles Schwab Teens & Money 2007 Survey Findings, 73 percent of teens expect to make “plenty of money.”  Granted, “plenty of money” is a vague amount, but I’m sure it’s not single digits per hour.

With less than 5 percent of Americans pulling in 100 G’s per year and only 1 in 6 houses (combined incomes) raking in 100k, teen expectations might be a bit bloated.  According to MSN.com, teen guys expect to average $174,000 per year, with girls expecting $114,200 per year.  That’s quite a ways from the actual averages of $45,113 and $35,102, respectively.

Unfortunately, 6-figure student loan debts outpace the number of 6-figure incomes hitting the job market.  No wonder debt is so prevalent in our society: too many people spending money they expect to make in the future.  Tryin’ to live a 6-digit lifestyle on a teacher’s salary can put a person in a hole faster than I can say my ABCs.  While it may be nice to pretend that your first job will set you up with a Beemer and a hilltop house, reality will catch you eventually.

Now, don’t curl up in the corner and cry just yet.  Because while there is an obvious difference in happiness levels of people who try to live off of 4,000 dollars a year versus 40,000 dollars a year, surveys indicate that changes in happiness between 50,000 and 500,000 dollars are minimal.  I won’t lie, I’d rather have half a mil than 50 grand, but I think I’d be able to survive either way.

We all know a kid or two who goes well out of his way to buy what he (or she) thinks to be the sweetest Halloween costume of all time.  This person drops one, or maybe even two, hundred dollars on a costume from a fancy Halloween store thinking he’ll (okay, it’s normally a guy) be the greatest thing since sliced bread on Halloween weekend.  Unfortunately for said expensive costume buyer, he is usually trumped by a few creative homemade (and invariably less expensive) digs that steal the show.

Venture back to the days of high school, when Halloween was in that awkward stage between trick-or-treating and college costume parties.  If you’re looking for a costume to make on the cheap, thinking back to high school Halloween dances is a great place to start.  One of my favorites was the group of kids who went out as the fruit of Fruit of the Loom.  This plays off of a simple principle of homemade costume success:  group costumes have added effect, so even crappy ideas can seem fun.

Two recent successes that I’ve seen on the group level were a group of guys who were able to get a hold of old (like 70s old) basketball jerseys from a local high school and a group who went as The Ninja Turtles.  You may contend that going as the Ninja Turtles is not that original.  However, when it is a group of throwers from an NCAA Division I in children’s Ninja Turtle outfits from Wal-Mart, the creativity is added (fat guy in a little coat principle).  I concede that those costumes weren’t homemade, but they were inexpensive as they were children’s costumes from Wal-Mart.

I’ve also seen my fair share of quality individual outfits.  The 80s businessman (suspenders, white powder under nose) is classic.  Costumes that work especially well are outfits that play off of current events or people known at your school.  For example, get a uniform from your dining hall and dress as a particular employee.  Or, if you can, get the real jersey from one of the more fun, more well-known athletes.  Additionally, if you’re at a small school, inside joke costumes can work well.  John Basedow (www.fitnessmadesimple.com) became a Chuck Norrisesque figure because of the prevalence of his commercials.  It was one of the greatest costumes of all-time because it was cheap, fun, and mostly because it was my idea.  This year’s concept will be difficult to make, but has huge potential.  It hits on both the group and throwback principle.  Comprised of blue and red boxes and blue and red boxing gloves, the costume promises to be inexpensive and plays off of the cult classic appeal.  Referred to as, “Raving Bonkers” in the UK, the thing from which this costume is based may literally knock your block off.