Here’s an updated history of our bills since moving into the house:

May 2009 – 62.62
Aug 2009 – 64.49
Nov 2009 – 64.69
Feb 2010 – 68.79
May 2010 – 69.86
Aug 2010 – 69.36
Nov 2010 – 74.58
Feb 2011 – 75.51
May 2011 – 78.15

In two years the price of garbage removal has gone up 25%. Unbelieveable.

I worked at a carpet store 15 or 20 years ago and the manager wanted to do something similar with the price-per-yard of common items like towels and ties and other fabric items to put it into perspective for customers who came in and wonked about the cost of carpet.

Anyway, our Meijer has a junk aisle. Well, I call it the junk aisle. It’s one aisle between the outdoor stuff and the toys that just has junk. It’s tons of outdated, oddball, damaged and discountinued items marked way down hoping to pawn the crap off on the masses. Some things you’ll find in the junk aisle include CO2 cartridges (whippets!), tons of blank VHS-C tapes, a damaged box of vaginal itch cream (the tube inside is intact though), random hair products of various ages and conditions, open box coffee makers, a set of cookware that is clearly a return because no one has bothered to remove all the wrapping paper from one side of the box where it was taped on – things like that.

We always take a look in the junk aisle and tonight was no exception.

Tonight I scored. There was a pile of children’s valentines boxes. Not a bunch, but more than a handful – maybe 20 or 25 boxes. A bunch of Pirates of the Carribean, a few High School Musical, even a Power Rangers or two in the mix. I was just sorting through them looking for a winner and I joked that we needed to buy a box and send valentines to everyone in July. Next thing I knew, I had found it. I had to buy them – the only ones in the whole bunch:

Homies valentines! For 12 cents!! How could I not buy them? What the fuck are homies and who would buy this crap? Valentines featuring generic pseudo-urban characters? For 12 cents!? Sign me up.

Now I’m not sure whether to keep them forever boxed – my 12 cent treasure or to send them to people. Because, face it, receiving a Homies valentine in mid-July would be pretty awesome.

I have them sitting here on my desk staring at me. We’ll be up surfing the net tonight, just me and my homies.

Well, since then I’ve been looking into the million-and-one things involved in creating a ‘magical’ Disney experience…

…you know what?

It’s fucking expensive!

So we’ve joined the ranks of the masses in digging up info and discounts and deals and tips and tricks and came up with our own that I hadn’t seen posted anywhere – and with good reason, it’s a tad involved, but things happened to work out just right for us.

So what’s our trick?

Become a Florida Resident and score all the sweet Florida Resident deals that Disney offers on tickets and rooms and stuff.

So how easy is it to become a Florida resident?

Turns out that it’s ridiculously easy if you happen to be in Florida.

You see, I also mentioned in passing a few posts back that Jamie had to go to Florida for a conference.

So with some of her free time on the last day, she hit up the Florida DMV. Turns out that for 3 dollars, a valid out-of-state license, a valid social security card and the ability to spout off a valid Florida address (doesn’t even have to be local to the DMV location – in this case she used her mother’s address – 450 miles away) and you can get a Florida ID card.

The very same state-issued ID card you have to show to take advantage of the Florida Resident discounts at Walt Disney World.

The beauty of it is that her shiny new Florida ID will cover her and the kids. I’m still stuck with poor tourist pricing on my tickets, but she can also book a room on property and lots of other neat things.

But that’s not all. Now she can also score the Florida Resident Seasonal Pass for herself and the kids. The pass has blackout dates during peak times (when we won’t be visiting), but for less than regular tickets with park hopper, we also open ourselves up to passholder discount opportunities both inside and outside the parks.

It might sound like a long way to go, but she was there anyway and it took little more than an hour of her time to get the ID and already it looks like it could save us 4 digits in total.