Due to the confluence of a holiday and an internet access snafu, as unlikely as it may seem, this is the first Friday post of the month. That means it’s time to round up the best frugal tips from the frugalosphere from December.
Needless to say, December is dominated by what is politely referred to as "the holidays" but which we all know to be that most un-frugal of occasions, Christmas. This annual orgy of unnecessary expenditure comes ’round each year and hypnotizes otherwise savvy people into parting with their precious cash.
Can there really be such a thing as a frugal Christmas? I’m not entirely convinced, but many bloggers gave it a try. Many of the tips were, like the seasonal music piped into all public spaces starting on November 1, familiar and repetitive. Give dad a book of "coupons" for hugs, wrap presents in newspaper, shop for decorations after the 25th, etc.
My Super-Charged Life did share the revelation that there are 7 Free Toys Your Kids Will Love More Than Expensive Gifts. They are a cardboard box, a cape made of an old pillow case or towel, a balloon, two sticks, a fort made of sheets or blankets, empty paper towel tubes, and a paper airplane. Click on the link for details. It’s probably too late to swap that bicycle you got your son for a pair of sticks, but now you know better for next year.
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Free Money Finance had a "Help A Reader" post the other day with an email from a woman asking if folks thought it was a good idea to take money out of her mutual funds to pay off $24K in credit card debt.
The broad consensus from commenters on the post was yes, cash out the mutual funds and pay off the cards, 
provided those funds are not inside an IRA or something similar. Okay, fine.
A few commenters obliquely approached the core craziness here by asking if the reader would have borrowed money on her credit cards to invest in the mutual funds. Of course that sounds like a really loopy idea, and of course that is what she (effectively) did.
Not paying off a credit card or other high-interest consumer debt so you can save or invest is, or at least should be, an intuitively bad move. The returns on the investments are unlikely even to approach the cost of borrowing the money.
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As most of you know, 2010 is a special year for taxes. It is the last year covered by the Bush tax cuts which, as you may remember, were engineered as a package of temporary adjustments and deals rather than permanent 
changes. Most of it goes poof on December 31st of this year.
In the meantime, 2010 is a special year for converting traditional IRAs into Roths. When the Bush cuts were being constructed there was a need to find more government revenue, particularly at the end of the period covered by the law, i.e. 2010. IRA conversions fit the bill because, in the short run, they generate additional income tax revenue. (In the long run they do not, since conversions reduce income taxes paid in the future.)
So as of a few days ago, the income limitation on conversion to a Roth is gone. And just to get things started with a bang, for 2010 only, you have the option to defer the income tax bill on the conversion to 2011 and 2012. (That is, it is split between those two tax years.)
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Back on the web now. My apologies to everybody who missed me. Living without broadband for two days was quite an experience. It would make a good reality show, maybe for PBS: 1980s House.
Speaking of being wired up and of decades past, when I sat down to catch 
up on what I had missed I came across a wonderful item. The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission announced the voluntary recall of nine books on home improvement. Printed in China with lead-based ink? Not exactly.
The books contain errors in the technical diagrams and wiring instructions that could lead consumers to incorrectly install or repair electrical wiring, posing an electrical shock or fire hazard to consumers.
Several aspects of this story amuse and/or fascinate me. And there are implications for that other great and dangerous DIY area, personal finance.
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The Internet connection at the Curmudgeon household is down, and I am way too old to blog from Starbucks. Please stay tuned.
Frugal Friday | Frank Curmudgeon | 
January 15, 2010 12:59 pm | 
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