OK, OK; today's the day for a big scare, right? Well, I got stories that should scare the living daylights out of you, baby. Scary money stories. Attack of the Crazy Credit Card Company stories. Forget witches and ghosts and vampires ... they ain't got nothin' on these yahoos who messed up and made life miserable for some joes and jills.

The stories may be scary or funny to you, but one thing about money should terrify you ... having none. For some people, their worst nightmare is when they have too much month left at the end of the cash. That's why you need a plan, jack. Dave Ramsey has the money plan to end all. Create a budget and save money, then you won't have to worry about it and leave the scares to the kids. Happy Halloween, sucker.

I may not be leaving much behind when I go six feet under, but my job is to make sure everybody else does, bub. Too many joes and jills nowadays are dying and leave nothing but consumer debt, no life insurance and no dough for their families. Is that what you want your legacy to be? I didn't think so. Even if your family isn't responsible for the debt, they'll still have collectors and other lowlifes hounding them day in and day out to settle it.

Don't do that to your family. Even if you give them a good life, give 'em a good death to go with it. Get on Dave Ramsey's plan and pay off debt. Then you can build up so much cash that when you check out, the people you love will be set up for life, baby. And that, my friend, is something to be remembered for.

We all see the big houses on the hill at the pricey end of town and think "if only I could have enough money to live there." Well, let me clue you in, jack ... the upkeep on one of those $20 million mansions will cost you a pretty penny. Even if you have the dough, you don't just buy it and live happily ever after.

Digs like those usually come with six-figure property taxes, enough rooms to keep an army of (paid) maids busy, sky-high heating and air conditioning costs, and so much landscape that you'll need to pay your gardeners a lot of green just so they can maintain all the green.

Big houses are nice, but not all they're cracked up to be. Don't buy more than you need. Just like Dave Ramsey says, save money and buy a nice place, but not so much that upkeep takes you under, baby.

Bill Cosby was always one of my favorites when I was growing up in Chi-town. He's funny, but hits the nail right on the head when he speaks the facts. He's not being funny when he talks about parents getting involved in the lives of their kids, but he's dead-on right, babe. Too many joes and jills nowadays are more concerned with who gets thrown off the island then they are about how their kids are doing in school. Crying shame; that's what it is.

I've worked with enough hard-luck kids to know that involved parents make all the difference in the world. The more time you spend with the young ones, the less time and desire they'll have to get mixed up in dangerous things like running with the wrong crowd or getting themselves in debt. Don't give me or Dave Ramsey any bunk about how "my kid would never do that." They won't do it, if you teach them right from wrong. Do it, jack.

Me; I love football. But there's a line that gets crossed when some yahoo pulls a gun on the coach of his kid's pee wee football team. Seems the dad didn't think junior was getting enough playing time, so he decided to do his talking Al Capone-style ... with a kind word and a gun. Not smart.

Get a clue, buddy! What kind of example is this bonehead setting for his kid, or all the other little ones, by threatening a coach with a piece? It's one thing (and the right thing) to be supportive of your kids in whatever they do, but threatening to pump lead into a man in order to get your boy on the football field is something that should land this moron on "America's Dumbest Criminals."

If you're gonna set an example for your boy or girl, do it right. Teach them how to save money and give it away. Teach them to work hard and work honest. Dave Ramsey talks about it all the time, and it's grade-A advice, baby.

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Here's the smart money talking. According to the Census Bureau boys, the average gap in earnings between adults with a college degree and ones with high school diplomas is about $23,000 and change per year. That's a pretty good chunk of dough, if you ask me, baby.

But take it with a grain of salt. Getting a degree is good, but it's not worth the paper it's printed on if you don't work hard and stay on the up-and-up. If you pick out what you want to do with your life, then fill your head with as much knowledge as you can about it (without getting a student loan). But thinking that the sheepskin automatically buys you a one-way ticket to Easy Street is fooling yourself.

Just like Dave Ramsey says; working hard, being honest and saving money is what really wins. How do you like them apples, jack?

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Check out the Seth Godin blog on saving, jack. It'll get you to shake your head and lose your lunch at the same time. We all know that joes and jills in this country have trouble saving the dough, but check out what immigrants are doing. Seth points out that some people who come to the U.S.A. and work to earn money are among the worst paid, but still find a way to save money to send home to their families.

Do I have a problem with this? You betcha! People who work and save for their families deserve all the credit in the world, baby, and I have nothing but respect for anyone who does it. But if someone who makes $5 an hour can still find a way to live small-time and support his or her family, then everyone should be able to. Quit whining about how you "need" a new car or a bigger house. You don't "need" it, you want it. Dave Ramsey would say the same thing; odds are that you make plenty of dough, so save some. Make it happen, bub.

Here's the scoop. Forbes just came out with their Top Earning Dead Celebrities list. I don't know about you, but I think it's a little weird when people who are six feet under are earning more than the rest of us who are still sucking air. But you know how they made the big-time? They did something they loved and excelled at it; the dough followed.

Here's the fact, jack. You don't have to be dead to be rich. Do the Dave Ramsey thing. Get into a career that really lights your fire and start working hard. Live on a budget, save your dough and invest like crazy. That'll lead to tons of wealth. And not only will you have a lot of money at that point, but you'll have a ball getting there. Can you think of a better way to spend life? I can't.

Some things just aren't a good idea, jack. Like tugging on Superman's cape. Or taking on a bunch of consumer debt. The worst light-bulb-over-the-head episode might belong to good ol' 7-Eleven, though. They stocked their shelves with a high-caffeine brew called "Cocaine" and it's causing a ruckus with parents who don't want their teens drinking the stuff. So much so that they're pulling the juice out of all their stores.

Look, I'm all about getting a sweet drink every now and then. But there are plenty of A-OK names for soda that don't suggest a bullet-proof limo or a remote jungle landing strip. It's bad for business, baby. Kids are going to break enough rules growing up, so adults who try to feed off that by turning a drug name into a marketing ploy isn't the way to go.

Along the same lines, make sure to teach your kids about saving money. Never heard a parent complain about how their kid was too smart with the dough. Dave Ramsey teaches his kids how to do it, so teach yours, too.

I'll tell you what ... my good friend My Big Dummy knocked this one out of the park. Check out his opinion on why we're so concerned with celebrities in this crazy world. Seems we pull over to the side of the road and cry when we hear about Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie saying they ain't gonna tie the knot, but we pay a bunch of dough on a high credit card rate each month instead of saving for college and nobody bats an eye.

Who gives a flip about the ladies and germs in Hollywood? People don't need to worry about Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes; they need to turn off the TV and work on creating a budget. I'll tell you what; if you don't do like Dave Ramsey says and start paying attention to the money situation, then 30 years from now you won't be saying "Remember that time Nick and Jessica broke up?" They'll be saying "We've got no money and tons of bills. What are we going to do?!" Think about it, jack.

Here's one more reason to not have a car loan, jack. Bo Stefan Eriksson, who used to run a video game business before it went bankrupt, was arrested in California and charged with car theft and embezzlement. The prosecutors say he was driving $4 million in stolen cars. So what's this yahoo's defense? His lawyers are saying the cars weren't stolen; he was just three months behind on the car payments.

Here's the scoop. Even though this guy's business went belly-up, he could still have done the smart money thing and paid cash for some other car. As it stands now, he may be headed straight to the big house because he's a thief, and his only defense is that he was late on the payments.

What would Dave Ramsey say about this? He'd say live on less than you make and pay cash for everything. Sounds like good advice, baby ... so do it.

Some things, you want to last forever. A good Hitchcock movie, dinner with a cute dame, the Cubs baseball game. Other things, you want to ditch as soon as possible, like your credit card debt. Making minimum payments on the plastic will keep you in the debt doghouse for a long time and cost you big-time, baby.

Need proof? Then here's some pudding. If you have 5,000 bucks on a credit card at 18 percent interest, then minimum payments would be about $200 a month. The only problem is that you'd end up paying $2,900 in interest and it would take you 12.5 years to pay the rotten thing off. You'd do less time than that in the cooler for stealing a set of wheels.

That's why Dave Ramsey wants you to deep-six your credit card debt as soon as you can; with gazelle-intensity, baby. The longer you string out the payments, the more dough it costs you. Not just that, but it's also more months that you spend making payments instead of keeping the moolah with you-la. Bad math, jack. Get out of debt and get on with your life.

This time of year, you got slasher flicks coming to a theater near you by the bushel. But another type of slashing is already going on ... Wal-Mart is slashing prices on a bunch of their toys, getting a jump start on the holiday shopping season. It's already in full swing, baby, and we haven't even gotten past pumpkin time yet.

If they're selling, watch how you buy. Here's some good Dave Ramsey advice for you, jack ... save money a few weeks or months before Christmas instead of turning to credit cards to save your neck. Make a "Christmas gifts" category in your budget and put aside cash out of each paycheck between now and shopping time. It doesn't matter if you have two people to buy for or 22, save up the dough and pay for gifts with cash, so your New Year's resolution isn't "I promise I'm going to pay off my credit card balance this year."

All you joes and jills have heard me rant and rave about how doing things on the up-and-up is right, and people who do wrong should take it right on the chin. How's this to shake you up? Former Enron CEO Jeffrey Skilling could face up to 20 years in the cooler for his role in the Scandal Heard 'Round the World.

Say that again ... 20 years? If you ask me, I think they left off a zero or two. The next time this yahoo tastes fresh oxygen, he should be about 614 years old. With the dough he costs his investors, and the fact that he tied their trust in him to the railroad tracks, he should spend a couple of CENTURIES making license plates.

Don't let Enron happen to you. Dave Ramsey says diversify your investments and be smart when saving money. Don't put all your eggs in one basket and you won't have to worry about losing your shirt if one of your investments goes belly-up. Words to live by, baby.

With all the letters that health insurance companies toss around, you'd think they're selling alphabet soup. All the PPO, FSA, MD, HSA and HMO can make your head spin, baby, but you better have your plans in place. You may think you don't have time to get all your health insurance ducks in a row, but you'll wish you did if you wrap your car around a tree and take a one-way trip to Brokeville after you can't make the payments on your doc bills. But don't just buy some policy; find out what's right for you. That's where Dave Ramsey's Endorsed Local Providers come in.

Take it from me; the place where you can get some serious help in this department is with Dave Ramsey's ELPs (more alphabet soup). They can give you all you need to know about what to have, when and where, jack. Dave Ramsey has tons of ELPs all over the country who can give you the lowdown on what you need before you fork over the dough. It's all part of a good plan to create a budget, so get going. You can thank me later.

Why buy name-brand, baby? You're just paying extra for the name, not the product. Wal-Mart has caught onto that philosophy and is expanding its generic drug program for old folks to 14 different states, selling the non-name brand stuff for $4 a pop. How's that for saving money? Dave Ramsey talks about saving dough all the time, and this program is living proof that if you buy small, you keep more of your cash.

Buying less-expensive stuff extends to a bunch of your other life areas. It can be part of your food budget, travel budget, and a bunch of others. You gonna sit there and tell me that you can taste the difference between Honey Nut Cheerios and Honey Oat cereal? Even if you can, it ain't worth forking over an extra 2 bucks a box for breakfast food. The less you spend, the more money you have in the budget that can be used to deep-six your debt and save, big-time.

Movin' on up, baby. That's where the stock market is headed. Good old Dow Jones shot past 12,000 for the first time ever on Wednesday, just seven years after dot-com busts, recession and one of the worst days in American history put the economy on its heels.

Just another reminder, jack, that people who invest long-term will ride the waves up and down, but will come out ahead in the end because they're patient. The market has averaged 12 percent growth for the past 70 years and change, and there's no reason to think that it'll stop anytime soon. Take advantage of that growth and invest as part of your Baby Step plan, man.

That's why Dave Ramsey stresses staying calm when things go haywire in your money plan. Life happens, so don't let panic happen to you when things look to be shaky. Keep a level head and be in it for the long haul.

Taxes. The word sends shivers down your spine, baby. And with good reason, if you try to get tricky with the KGB (I mean the IRS). You gotta be careful what you claim on those W-2s, see? Otherwise you'll end up like Wesley Snipes. The law is after him for trying to cheat Uncle Sam to the tune of 12 million bucks in false refund claims and returns that he supposedly didn't file.

Some people may say that the government takes more than its share of the pie, and they may be right. But in the meantime, we live in the greatest country in the world; so if it takes 10 to 38 percent of your green to operate the Red, White and Blue, then so be it. It's just all the more reason to create a budget and make sure you pay just the right amount of taxes so the audit monster doesn't come knockin' at your door, jack. Just like Dave Ramsey says, be honest and on the up-and-up.

I don't know about you, but I give up about as often as I use credit cards. When you don't call it quits, it pays off big-time, baby. Take a look at my hometown team ... the Chicago Bears. In the first half of Monday's NFL game, they were sputtering like the Debt-no-bile on a cold morning. But a good half-time speech and a fired-up defense put them on the fast track to a big win.

If you're doing the right thing, be it in life or saving money, work hard and stick with it. The road may get rough, but you'll come out ahead in the long run. Look at Dave Ramsey. He was bankrupt and built his business off a card table without using one penny of debt. Financial Peace University will preach to 200,000 families this year. I'd say that's a pretty good number. Use the same philosophy in your life and you'll succeed, jack. Don't. Give. Up.

Talk about a milestone! The good old U.S. of A. hit 300 million bodies and counting this week. It's enough to get you to shake your head when you think about how much America is growing. When I see that number, I see opportunity, baby. I see a bunch of people who can either fall into the credit card rate trap or people who can learn to live debt-free.

I wish that all the joes and jills out there would understand ... if you have no debt, life is a lot simpler and a lot sweeter. You don't have scumwads (sorry, credit card collectors) calling you 20 times a day bugging you for dough. You don't buy a couch for $1,000 but end up paying 1,300 bucks because of a 30 percent interest credit card rate. You learn how to be happy with what you have and have financial peace. And if that ain't enough, consider this ... the more people there are, the less the government will care about you in your golden years. So you'll need to save the cash for retirement like Dave Ramsey says. How about them apples, jack?

Football is tops in my book, baby. Fighting is at the bottom. So imagine my shock when I turn on the tube Saturday night and see the boys from Miami, FL and Florida International University playing foot-brawl on the turf in the Sunshine State during the third quarter of their game. Funny how a little push here and a little taunting there can clear the benches faster than bullets out of a Tommy gun.

Playing nice never got anyone in trouble. If you keep your nose clean, your reputation usually follows suit. Not just in games, but in life, jack. Being good to the joes and jills around you and not trying to rip people off or start a fight means you're making this crazy world a better place. Instead of kicking tail and taking names, try saving dough and giving it away, just like Dave Ramsey talks about. When you save money with plans to do good with it, it's something else, baby. Make it happen.

According to USA Today, many joes and jills in America are losing faith in the U.S. healthcare system. One of the chief complaints is rising healthcare costs. The ballpark figure this year is that people will spend $2.2 trillion on doc bills. That breaks down to 7,129 bucks a person, baby.

This is why it's important to save money. Tons of people are scared about being able to afford their pills when they get older, but not scared enough to start preparing for it. That's bad. So be smart. This reminds me of Dave Ramsey and his advice. If you invest $100 from age 25 to 65 in a mutual fund paying 12 percent, you'll have $1,176,000 in the bank, generating over $120K a year without touching the nest egg. Think you can afford good healthcare when your dough is making 120 thousand a year? I thought so.

Don't wait 30 more years to save and then find out the hard way that you should have started saving 30 years ago. Start ... saving ... NOW, jack!

Friday, October 13. A lot of hoopla surrounds today, baby. This is the day for bad luck, full moons and late-night slasher flicks on some low-rent cable channel. Some joes and jills go so far as to have Paraskevidekatriaphobia (the fear of Friday, the 13th). It really is sad that a day and a number can make someone panic, but I'll tell you something to really be afraid of ... not saving money.

Don't laugh. Spend more than you make and you'll run yourself into a debt hole with a tough climb to get out. If you don't believe me, talk to some 70-year-old with $30,000 in credit card debt whose living off of $1,200 a month in Social Security and ask them if they're scared.

Dave Ramsey has been drilling this point home from the get-go; if you don't save, you don't have money. Forget about whatever-phobia ... you need to be scared of retiring broke, jack. Don't let it happen. Start saving now.

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It's a sad day when someone gets so hooked on a habit of theirs that it costs them big-time. An addiction could cost them time, money or, worst of all, their family and life. Even if something like smoking doesn't wreck your life, it will put a hurtin' on your wallet, baby.

Check this out. Judith Miller, a dollface who writes about this stuff, said the typical person she meets spends about $15,000 a year on their "soft addiction", which is either smoking, drinking, gambling, drug abuse or overeating. Fifteen grand. Invest that over 30 years and you got yourself almost 2 million smackaroos. Hope you like the cigarettes, jack.

Don't do this to yourself. If something is taking away from your time, money or life, get some help for it. But be smart with money like Dave Ramsey talks about and use that dough to eliminate debt instead.

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Time to bring up the dreaded B-word, and I don't mean budget, jack. I mean bankruptcy. The number of joes and jills declaring bankruptcy last year equaled the entire total from the 1960s. Granted, some of those people did it because of medical bills and other unfortunates, but let's face it; using credit was a big-time reason for other people to file.

Dave Ramsey talks about what a gut-wrenching experience it is to file, and life after bankruptcy ain't exactly a day at the beach, baby. Cleaning up a bankruptcy mess is hard but doable. The biggest thing to do is know how to tackle the situation. Using credit got you into trouble the first time out, so DON'T USE CREDIT EVER AGAIN! Create a budget, work extra hours, maybe deliver some pizzas or cut some grass, and the dough will start rolling in and stay in.

You've gotta change the way you look at money. If you have it, use it. If you don't have it, don't use it. Simple, simon.

They're calling it the must-have; the one-of-a-kind; the greatest thing since sliced bread; the best thing since the PlayStation 2. The PlayStation 3 will roll out on November 17 and some stores are already taking deposits. It's hot stuff, baby, and it BETTER be; at $500-$600 a pop. But no matter how hot the toy, it ain't worth buying it before you can afford it.

The system is being launched in time for the Christmas holidays, a time when people go nuts on the overspending. Don't let it happen, jack. Be patient when you're saving for new toys and don't buy them if you can't afford them. Sony will be rolling out PS3 systems by the bushel, so don't think that if you miss out now, another chance won't be coming in the next few weeks.

What does Dave Ramsey say is the secret to saving for some big-ticket item? Surprise, surprise ... create a budget and saving money. Know where your dough goes, baby.

Ever pay your dues at a job and feel like a million bucks afterwards? Nothing like it; to pay a price, deliver the goods and get the reward. Believe it or not, that's how most CEOs and presidents get started. Most people look at the big man or lady in charge and think they've always been there, but it ain't so, joe. You haven't seen the long hours and extra effort that goes with that kind of success. If you want to be that successful, you've got to give it your all, baby.

Same goes with the dough. If you want to live the good life (not being broke and being able to spend and give), you gotta put in the effort. Dave Ramsey says make a budget, live on less than you make, deep-six your debt and invest like crazy. Don't think it stops there, either. If you want a great marriage, work at it. Well-behaved kids? Work at it. Peace in your life ... you get the picture, jack.

News flash, ladies and germs: The ballpark figure is that Americans will spend $4.96 billion on Halloween this year, everything from costumes to candy. No biggie, you may think. I say, let me give you something besides candy to chew on; a big bit of that money is being spent by young adults wanting to decorate their yard, throw a party or some other overboard broo-ha. Hopefully, they won't be going into debt to do it.

Don't go so nuts over spending on a holiday (even Christmas) that you mess up your budget. Parties come and go, but the bills will be there a month later if you don't plan wisely for them. Don't throw the biggest Halloween party on the block if you've got the smallest bank account. Get on Dave Ramsey's plan and stick with it. Then, when you're debt-free, you really will have a reason to throw a party.

Ain't it great when some bottom-feeding trash lender charges some soldier 700 percent interest on a payday loan? If you said no way, then you hit the nail on the head, baby. That's just what my buddy Dave Ramsey was talking about on Your World with Neil Cavuto on Fox News. It's one thing to pick on some poor joe or jill who's having some bad luck with money; but when you start picking on people who are in the desert, laying it all on the line for the Stars and Stripes, that's crossing the line, jack.

People may go to the cash advance stores because things are rough and they need some cash. Let me tell you right now; these yahoos ain't the ones to fix your problems. That's up to you, and you can do it if you hustle. If it means extra hours or a second job, then do it. It'll be hard, but it will be short, and it will get you ahead. Make a budget and stick to it, and you'll never have to worry about 700 percent interest again.

Looking for a job ain't fun, baby. It's almost a full-time job in itself; you got calls to make, follow-ups to do, interviews to go on ... the whole shebang. You may go for weeks or months before you get an offer or even a callback. But when those hard times hit, remember what Winston Churchill said. "Never, never, never, never quit."

Quitting may be easy, but it won't get you anywhere, jack. If it's life, career or money, quitting only leaves you with nothing to do and all the time in the world to think about it. When you're in debt, like Dave Ramsey was, you may have a mountain to climb to get out of it, but not climbing will just leave you at the bottom, baby. Don't let it happen. If you make the climb once, you won't have to do it again if you learn your lesson on the way up. Don't use debt. And don't give up. Ever.

How's this for setting a world record, baby? Some snake charmer in Thailand aimed to make the record books by kissing 19 king cobras in a row. It may not be the smartest thing he's ever done, but it took guts, baby. He made sure to tell everyone there to not try this at home. Sounds a lot like a Dave Ramsey pre-caution ... play with snakes and you'll get bit.

It may not be cobras ... it may be credit cards or loans. But tons of companies out there are after your dough, jack. Trying to beat them at their game by way of free money, zero-percent interest, 90 days same-as-cash and all that other bull out there just ain't gonna cut it; it's playing with snakes. You may not lose your skin, but you will lose your shirt. Stay away from credit and pay for stuff with cash.

Ever notice how, if you work hard and long enough at something, you pick up steam, start doing well and things just start falling into place? It's called momentum, baby, and it's key to winning at anything, especially with cash. You work hard, make smart decisions and get ahead. Need proof? Then here's the pudding, jack. My hometown Chicago Bears are 5-0 for the first time since the Super Bowl Shuffle days (1986) and any team that goes up against them ends up sleeping with the football fishes. Why is that? It's because of their hard work, teamwork and how they know they're gonna win when those pads and cleats go on.

Money works the same way. Dave Ramsey says you work hard, work smart and keep working, and you'll give debt the beatdown. By following that formula, da Bears blew the Bills out of the water this weekend. Do the same with your bills, baby. Get on a budget, work hard, get on the same page with your spouse and get momentum going for you!

Robert Kiyosaki (the author of Rich Dad Poor Dad) teamed up with Donald Trump (the author of Borrowed Too Much and Bad Hair) to write a book about ways (and why) to get rich and it's due to hit bookstores any day now. The book talks about borrowing to invest in real estate and small businesses. Generate enough income from doing that and you can retire to Easy Street. If only it were that simple, simon.

Dave Ramsey and I will scream this until the cows come home and leave the next morning ... you don't get rich by borrowing! When you borrow, any one of a million things could go wrong and leave you belly-up. Lose your job? Lose your shirt. Market freeze? So will your bank account. There are better ways to make money and you don't have to walk the plank to do it. Live on less than you make and invest with a purpose, and you'll get ahead with the moolah, jack.

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Here's a new thing; if you don't want to borrow from the bank, you can go to companies that set up person-to-person borrowing, get a good interest rate and do a win-win for everybody. Simple, right? Wrong as a gong, jack.

It has nothing to do with who you borrow from; it's all about the fact that you're borrowing. Borrowing to get something is the way to end up last in the money race. Whenever you borrow from anyone, from National Number One Bank to next-door neighbor Bob, you take on big-time risk. And when life smacks you upside the head (and it will), you want to have as little risk in your life as you can. Who says so? Dave Ramsey, and he knows enough stuff to know his stuff.

There's always a better way to get what you need; the debt-free way. Will it be harder? Sure. Will it be worth it? Even more sure. Get on a budget and save your dough, baby. Don't worry about thanking me ... you can do it later, after you hit a home run with your cash.

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Want to rake in some cash this fall, baby? My Total Money Makeover is running a special deal (and I know deals) that gives you over 40 bucks in free Dave Ramsey stuff if you sign up for a yearly membership by October 31. Jump on it and save, baby. It's a steal of a deal.

When records get set, it's hot stuff, baby. When DiMaggio hit in 56 straight games or Phantom of the Opera hit 7,486 performances and counting on Broadway, it was big-time news. Well, call Guinness if you want, because the good old Dow Jones set a new mark for the second straight day, climbing to 11,850.53. Just goes to show that the stock market is keeping with it's 70-year plus pattern of growing like a bootlegger's bankroll during Prohibition.

It's stuff like this that serves as a good reminder ... you invest long-term and you win. The market may go up and down, but over time it goes up and stays that way. That being said, don't invest in something and then high-tail it as soon as the stock takes a dip, because that's the recipe for losing cash, and most people ain't in that business, jack. Dave Ramsey recommends good growth-stock mutual funds for putting your dough, and he's the smart money talking. Of course, you gotta be debt-free first, so pay off your bills and save money. Do that and you'll set money records big enough to change your family tree, baby.

It's a cryin' shame that some people don't do things on the up-and-up and look for ways to cheat the honest folks out of a hard-earned buck. But don't make it easier for these yahoos to jip you by exposing yourself to online fraud, baby. Think when you're using the Net and don't do stupid stuff like give out personal info to some jack that you don't know, or respond to phishing e-mails that tell you to give your checking account info before they do bad and nasty things to you. It's a fraud and a shakedown, jack ... so don't fall for it.

One other thing that can hit you online is overspending. It may not be a scam, but if you don't watch out, you're bank account will get hit just the same, bub. Be careful when you're buying stuff on the Internet and don't let your spending get away from you. Do the Dave Ramsey thing and make a written money plan, then stick to it.

Ever wonder what a $100 million house looks like? Just thinking about it can knock your socks off, baby. You can buy a heck of a lot of home with that kind of moolah. The problem is, most joes and jills who buy digs like that are using their dough for a lot of show. They don't need a house that big, just something to stroke their egos when they brag to friends.

Sure, it may be nice to have a pad that size, but just like Dave Ramsey says about rich stuff ... if you eat enough lobster, it starts tasting like soap. Having stuff just for the sake of having stuff is the road to ruin, especially if you're making payments on it. Having a bunch of toys, a house the size of Wrigley Field, the "good life"; isn't the only thing you should do with your dough. Helping people who need it; now that's the real deal, baby.

Forget about houses that cost $100 million and vacations that cost an arm and a leg, 'cause doing good things with your cash is priceless. Save your money and give others a hand ... splurge on the side.

Convenience can be good and bad, baby. Take these new contactless payment cards that credit card companies are putting out. Now you don't even need to swipe your plastic when you buy something. Just hold it an inch away from the scanner and ... boom! You're paid up and on your way. Sound good, right? Quick and easy. But there's a side to it that can get you into trouble if you're not careful, jack.

Dave Ramsey says it best ... when you spend cash, you spend less, because it hurts. When people started paying with checks, they bought more stuff. Then credit cards. Now, you don't even need to swipe to spend. If you don't watch your Ps and Qs, you'll spend a lot of dough before you know it, and get yourself into money trouble and debt.

In this crazy techno-world we live in, cash is still the best way to pay. Make a budget, stick to it, and get ahead in life and with money. How's that for a convenient plan, baby?

Every joe and jill has a lapse in good judgment now and then, but there's a line that doesn't need to be crossed, baby. Pro football player Albert Haynesworth stepped over that line when he stepped on the helmet-less face of Dallas Cowboys' center Andre Gurode during their game on Sunday, earning him a record five-game suspension. If that wasn't bad enough, cornerback Pacman Jones said he doesn't have a problem with Haynesworth's cleat job ... said the team needs more "thugs" anyway. Let me clue these boys in ... there's no room for that around here, jack.

Football is a contact sport, but there's playing tough and there's playing dirty. Imagine taking your shoe off after a long day at the office and finding an eyeball stuck on the bottom next to that piece of gum from the sidewalk. Haynesworth said he's sorry, and part of me believes him. But whatever he gets, he deserves. To boot, his "misstep" cost him 190 grand in salary. Hope he listens to Dave Ramsey and has his emergency fund in place.

We all know that crime doesn't pay. And that stupid money decisions can cost you big-time. But here's a front-pager from The Moron Times that hits both those points, baby. Seems a burglar broke into the house of some dame, ordered a pizza and did some laundry while she was away. He stayed until she got home, tried to rob her, then stayed in the house and looked through her purse while her neighbor called the cops, who picked him up later. How many bowls of stupid did this yahoo have for breakfast that morning?

It may be in the "odd news" section, but it ain't funny when someone tries to rip off someone else. It could be your home, your business or your checking account, but take this as a clue to keep a close eye on your money and know what's going on with it. Take Dave Ramsey's advice and be vigilant, and stay on top of your dough, jack.