November 2008 Archives

Despite new safety standards, toys with choking hazards and high levels of toxic chemicals, such as lead, remain on store shelves this holiday season.

While federal legislation passed in August gives the Consumer Product Safety Commission more tools to regulate chemicals in toys, the law won't take effect until February.

The commission recently said manufacturers can sell toys containing some chemicals until the inventory runs out.

Given that, "We may need to watch out for years to come," said David Kosmos, a consumer advocate for the nonprofit Washington Public Interest Research Group.

Check on the toys you're bringing home at www.toysafety.net.

You can also get information on recalls and sign up for e-mail notifications about recalls at the CPSC's Web site.

Only 22 percent of readers who took our online poll said they were planning to shop on Friday. If you're one of them, here's a list of mall hours and links to coupons and deals that will help you plan a strategy.

Del Amo Fashion Center deals
5 a.m. to 10 p.m.

Manhattan Village deals
9 a.m. to 9 p.m., but Macy's is open from 5 a.m. to 10 p.m.

Promenade on the Peninsula deals
9 a.m. to 9 p.m.

South Bay Galleria deals
5 a.m. to 9 p.m.

SouthBay Pavilion in Carson deals
8 a.m. to 9 p.m., but several stores will be opening early, including Old Navy at 5 a.m.

If you're planning to go farther afield, here's a list from the Daily News' Bargain Hunter blog about malls in the Valley.

It's a bummer to get the kids all spiffed up for Santa, then get to the mall and find out he's on his lunch break. Waiting around does not make for good pictures. So here's our annual guide to Santa's office hours in the South Bay:

Del Amo Fashion Center
310-542-8525

Santa will be at the mall during business hours through Dec. 24.
Those hours are:
Mon to Fri: 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Breaks from 1 to 2 p.m. and 5:15 to 6 p.m.
Sat: 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Breaks from 1 to 2 p.m. and 5:15 to 6 p.m.
Sun: 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Breaks from 2 to 3 p.m.

Galleria at South Bay
310-371-7546

Santa will be there through Dec. 24.
Now to Dec. 14:
Mon to Sat: 10 or 11 a.m. to 7 or 8 p.m.
Sun: noon to 6 p.m. or 7 p.m.

Dec. 15 to Dec. 23: 10 a.m. to 9 p.m.
Dec. 24: 8 a.m. to 7 p.m.
See the Web site schedule because there are many minor variations on the hours and break times.
The Web site also has a detailed list of photo packages and prices.

Manhattan Village Mall
310-426-9899

Santa arrives Nov. 28 and stays until Dec. 24.
Mon to Sat: 11a.m. to 8 p.m., breaks at 1-2 p.m. and 4:15-4:45 p.m.
The Web site has a list of packages and prices.

Promenade on the Peninsula
310-541-0688

Pictures with Santa, on three Saturdays only: Nov. 29, Dec. 6 and Dec. 20, 1-4 p.m. each day.

Plaza El Segundo
310 647-3431

Santa has parked his sleigh next to Toy Jungle. For every photo with a border you buy, Toy Jungle and Vision Trust will donate $4 to buy toys for at-risk children.
Dec 11 to 13: 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Dec. 14: Noon to 6 p.m.
Dec 18 to 20: 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Dec. 21: 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Dec 22 to 23: 10 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Dec. 24: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

South Bay Pavilion at Carson
310-366-6636

Santa arrives on Nov. 28 and will hang around until Dec. 24. He'll be there from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. There may be slight variations in the hours but he will be there all day most days.

Check by phone or on the Web site where information on photo prices will be available in a few days.

How does Erin Pettingill, a wife and mother, handle her new-found fame as a maven of scrimping and saving?

Find out through her blog, I Am Frugal. Pettingill, of Provo, Utah, is now a national name thanks to a recent story by The Associated Press.

On I Am Frugal, Pettingill tips off her readers about coupon deals, sales and specials at supermarkets and drugstores, and other assorted freebies and promotions.

If these baleful economic times — or the passion to procure people-pleasing presents — have you pinching pennies and wringing dollars for all their worth, consult I Am Frugal's frequently asked questions page as a primer to find possible savings.

Dr Pepper is making good on its promise of free soda now that the release of Guns N' Roses' "Chinese Democracy" is a reality.

The soft-drink maker said in March that it would give a free soda to everyone in America if the album dropped in 2008. "Chinese Democracy," infamously delayed since recording began in 1994, goes on sale Sunday.

"We never thought this day would come," Tony Jacobs, Dr Pepper's vice president of marketing, said in a statement. "But now that it's here, all we can say is: The Dr Pepper's on us."

Beginning Sunday at 12:01 a.m., coupons for a free 20-ounce soda will be available for 24 hours. They'll be honored until Feb. 28.

It was only a matter of time before people could use the Internet to visit a museum. If you're looking for cultured fun on the cheap, visit Rembrandt in Southern California. This virtual exhibition shows and explains 14 paintings by Dutch painter Rembrandt van Rijn that are also on view in five Southern California museums, including the J. Paul Getty Museum, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the Hammer Museum. Our region happens to boast the third-largest collection of Rembrandt paintings in the nation, surpassed only by New York City and Washington, D.C.

Rembrandt in Southern California is a great guide for those who aren't so familiar with analyzing artwork. Study up on the paintings before seeing the real works of art, or tour the pieces at your own pace. You can even print out an exhibition guide for packing along if you decide to visit the paintings. The site offers a unique guide to exploring these significant works, pointing out the minutiae in Rembrandt's brush strokes and texture work. An audio tour rounds out the whole museum experience, providing a personal docent in the form of directors and curators. Admission to the Rembrandt in Southern California exhibit is free and its doors are open 24 hours, seven days a week.

If you aren't sure which books to give that avid reader on your gift list this holiday season, how about considering every title she could name?

BookSwim, an online book rental and delivery service, offers gift subscriptions that can help expand the amount of reading you can give, without running up a big tab or cluttering up someone's home with another stack of books.

The Web site, www.BookSwim.com, lets readers order books and have them delivered right to their door for a set fee each month. Modeled on the online movie rental company Netflix, the subscription service sends between three and 11 books at a time to its customers, who can keep them for as long as they like with no late fees. When finished with at least two books, the reader sends them back in a pre-paid return bag that's included with every shipment.

BookSwim offers four different membership levels, with prices ranging from $19.98 per month for their "light reader" three-at-a-time plan to $39.94 per month for the "voracious reader" 11-at-a-time plan. Their most popular plan, which allows users to have up to 7 books at a time, costs $29.96 per month, with a $1.50 per month discount for a full year paid in advance.

The Newark, N.J.-based company, was launched in May 2007 and shipped its 100,000th book in early October, said marketing director Eric Ginsberg.

BooksSwim has customers from New York City to Alaska, and Ginsberg said it appeals to city dwellers who like the convenience of having the books delivered and to rural residents with little access to public libraries or major bookstores. "We thought when we started the service we would get a lot more rural than urban, but what we got was a good mix," Ginsberg said. "People want conveniences; they want things to come to them."

Readers who decide they can't part with a book also have the opportunity to buy it from BookSwim, with the price calculated based on the age of the book and the number of times it has been lent out, Ginsberg said.

The company doesn't offer a one-book rental plan, because it's more cost-effective to ship multiple books.

Anyone using Google's Street View map feature to scan one downtown Pittsburgh street is bound to do a double-take. Two 17th century swordsmen doing battle? An escape from a building using knotted sheets?

Google really did capture those scenes when it sent a car equipped with cameras down Pittsburgh's Sampsonia Way to take photographs for its online maps. But these images and most of the other scenes caught on Sampsonia were staged by artists Ben Kinsley and Robin Hewlett.

The project was Kinsley's master of fine arts thesis project at Carnegie Mellon University.Kinsley and Hewlett found themselves exploring surveillance, virtual reality and Street View through art. "We were interested in ... playing with -- and subtly questioning -- the notion of reality in something that we perceive as a factual representation of our world," said Kinsley.

You don't have to know someone in the military to treat a soldier from your home state to a holiday feast with all the trimmings and a phone call home. You can send a package complete with a phone card through online care package provider Treats for Troops.

The slumping economy has taken its toll on troop support programs. The number of packages being sent to the troops has fallen to an all-time low, says Treats for Troops founder Deborah Crane, and thousands of men and women on active duty are registered with Treats for Troops' Foster-A-Soldier Program.

You can choose the soldier who will receive your package by home state, branch of service, gender or area of deployment. A quick check of the soldier's online profile tells you what kinds of foods, snacks and supplies they need and want, why they chose to serve their country and what they miss most about home.

You will also have the opportunity to create a personal message to go with your package, and get a personal thank you from the soldier.

Heading to D.C. for Obama's inauguration?

Good luck.

A four-night stay at a fancy hotel is going for as much as $40,000, and even those spaces are filling up fast.

If you're planning to go -- or think you might want to try to go -- here are some tips and resources for finding a room, a ride and a ticket.

Hotels
Most downtown hotels are already filled, but there are still some rooms available in outlying areas of the city and the suburbs. Many hotels are requiring three- and four-night minimums. Travelers can check Web sites such as Expedia and Orbitz for deals as well as www.washington.org. "You really want to get at it right now," advises William Hanbury with Destination DC, the city's tourism bureau. Groups requiring 10 or more rooms can call Destination DC at 800-422-8644.

Other lodging options
Hanbury says people are coming up with innovative approaches such as sleeping in church basements, school cafeterias or on friends' couches. Some D.C. residents have posted ads on Web sites such as Craigslist offering to rent out their homes.

Transportation
Many streets downtown and around the National Mall will be closed on Inauguration Day, so plan to use public transportation whenever possible. Your best options include Metrorail and Metrobus and the DC Circulator bus. You can avoid waiting in line in Metro stations by pre-purchasing all-day Metro passes online. Be aware that security is heightened. For example, your bags might be checked on Metro and Amtrak trains.

Tickets
Tickets to the inauguration ceremony are free -- but sure to be scarce -- and will be distributed through members of Congress in January. Contact your senator or representative to request a ticket. Here are the Web sites of House members who represent the South Bay:
Dana Rohrabacher (R-Huntington Beach)
Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles)
Jane Harman (D-El Segundo)
Laura Richardson (D-Carson)

Congressional offices will get the tickets about a week before the Jan. 20 swearing-in ceremony; in-person pickup is required. Be wary of any Web site or broker claiming to sell tickets; Congress is the only way to go.

Did your bank statement contain an error and you are unsure of the rules for getting it corrected? Did your credit card interest rate change unexpectedly? Does it seem like your bank is charging excessive fees?

If you have a question about your banking and financial life, from the appropriate steps to take to cancel automatic charges on an account to the rules regarding check cashing, you can most likely find the answer at www.helpwithmybank.gov, which provides answers to a wide range of frequently asked questions about national banks.

The site is operated by the federal Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, which charters, regulates and supervises all national banks, and supervises foreign banks that operate in the U.S. The Web site provides a list of all of the banks and subsidiaries under the OCC's supervision.

Elsewhere on the site, you can find instructions on how to go about obtaining one free credit report each year, and how to correct any mistakes that you find. Also, you can find a list of tips to help fight identity theft, including information on how to contact the fraud departments of major credit bureaus, how to file a police report and how to file a complaint with the FTC.

If you have questions about other topics, check their list of most frequently asked questions. If you're not able to find the answer to your question, or even if you have a complaint about your bank, you can send a message to the comptroller's office via the site.

There's even a dictionary of banking terms and phrases. If all the changes in the financial services industry are making you a bit anxious, you can sign up to have consumer advisories sent to your e-mail account.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Do you have a confession to make about a purchase you shouldn't have made?

Whether it's the $600 treadmill you bought on a credit card, then used as a really expensive clothes hanger, or that collection of pricey handbags you just had to have, Spendster.org is the place to bare your frivolous soul.

A new site from the National Endowment for Financial Education, a nonprofit that aims to help people learn about handling money, Spendster.org is intended to give people a place where they can admit poor spending habits as a way to develop better ones.

Posted videos range from walks with a shaky handheld camera through an apartment loaded with unused appliances and sporting equipment to a slickly produced visit with a woman whose penchant for buying new shoes threatens her dream trip to Italy.

It's subtitled, "The sad tale of a girl who traded what she wanted most for what she wanted at the moment."

The videos have many similar punchlines. "Everything was on sale," says one woman at the end of a film of her shopping her heart out. "I went over my budget, but it was all on sale."

Another features a woman who admits her habit of buying large cups of Diet Coke each day at a convenience store, which she calculates equals about $90 a month, or $1,080 per year, or $10,800 over 10 years. "Gee, that's a lot of money down the drain," she concludes.

Beyond the entertainment of sharing in other people's spending mistakes, the site offers users a chance to calculate how much they spent on things they didn't need. It also shows them how much it would have cost if they put it on a credit card, versus how much they could have earned if the money was invested or put in a savings account. There's a page that offers advice for shoppers before they head out to the store and a space to enter comments about personal revelations regarding wasteful spending.

As the site's advice page, "More Stuff," notes, "Sometimes, after you've thought about it more, you realize you really don't want to spend that money."

Newsstands from Seattle to New York quickly sold out of Wednesday's papers declaring Barack Obama the nation's first black president as jubilant customers picked up two, three or even 30 copies as keepsakes.

The New York Times and the Chicago Tribune were among papers that restarted their printing presses to produce hundreds of thousands of additional copies across the country.

Entrepreneurs were seeking as much as $200 for The New York Times on eBay.com on Wednesday.

John Penley, a white man who recalled drinking out of the "wrong" water fountain as a child in North Carolina, searched New York's Lower East Side on Wednesday for papers to mark an event he never dreamed possible in his lifetime.

"There was one copy left at the bodega around the corner, and people were actually fighting for it," said Penley, a retired photojournalist. "I can't find a copy of any paper anywhere."

In Miami's diverse South Beach neighborhood, Books & Books manager Vivienne Evans said customers lined up even before the store opened.

"People were breaking down the door," she said.

In the South Bay, the Daily Breeze sold out, and -- together with its sister paper the Long Beach Press-Telegram -- sold an extra 25,000 copies Wednesday.

Say what you want about the Internet replacing printed newspapers, but saving a copy of a Web page on a disk isn't the same.

"What it really shows is there's a unique value to print," said Steve Hills, The Washington Post's president and general manager. "It's the ability to look at the whole thing and have a piece of history in your hands."

If you didn't make it to a newsstand in time to get your piece of history, it's not too late. The Breeze is one of many papers across the country selling reprints of its Wednesday front page.

When you order your copy, you can also buy T-shirts and coffee mugs decorated with the historic coverage.

Twitter, which dared to ask the world "What are you doing?", is now asking the multitudes to give on-the-ground reports of today's votes.

Twitter Vote Report, http://twittervotereport.com, gives up-to-the-minute reports of the 2008 election at the voting precincts.

Specifically, it asks users to submit information about how ballot locations are running.

Cell-phone-wielding Tweeters can text in reports of how long lines are and whether there are problems with machines or registration rolls.

To see how to enter information to the report, the codes and instruction videos are available at http://twittervotereport.com/how-to-help/.

If worse comes to worst, instructions on how to get help from the Election Protection Coalition are available at www.866ourvote.org.

The nonpartisan group gathers and provides information on voting irregularities and has election rules on its Web site.

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As if the privilege of participating in a democratic government wasn't reward enough, some of your favorite sweets dealers are giving folks incentives to vote today.

Show off your "I Voted" sticker at a Krispy Kreme shop Tuesday and you'll get a free star-shaped doughnut -- with red, white and blue sprinkles! The South Bay's doughnut hole is at 1199 W. Artesia Blvd. in Gardena.

Ben & Jerry's shops will hand out a free ice cream scoop to customers Tuesday from 5 to 8 p.m. The South Bay's cremery is at 350 N. Sepulveda Blvd. in Manhattan Beach. And to cash in on that sweet deal, you don't even have to vote. Just show up! But if you're out getting ice cream anyway, why not stop by the polls while you're at it?

And if you need a little caffeine to get you a long night of watching the returns, head over to Starbucks, which is giving away free 12 oz. cups of brewed coffee.

California's Elections Code has rules against rewarding people for voting or not voting, but a Starbucks spokesperson said that the coffee giveaway is being framed "more in the tradition of democracy and celebrating it." She said the firm was not violating the law because "we are using the honor system and not asking for any proof that anyone voted."

Burn some calories, have fun with the family, get a cool T-shirt and promote a good cause, all before lunchtime on Thanksgiving Day.

A Torrance tradition, the 29th annual Harry Sutter Memorial Thanksgiving Day 3-mile Fun Run will take off again, at 8 a.m. Thursday, Nov. 27, at Sam's Club, 2601 Skypark Dr., Torrance.

A food drive will be held during the race, with collected canned food items distributed to South Bay needy. This year's race will also feature a separate contingent for families with dogs at the rear of the race.

For inspiration, check out a local family's fun 2007 run at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipxq6fA9Ycw.

To qualify for the $20 early registration entry rate and a guaranteed T-shirt, entrants must complete an online registration form or complete a mailed entry form postmarked by Nov 7. Registration forms are available online at http://www.ci.torrance.ca.us/Parks/7654.htm. The entry fee for later registration will be $25 through Nov. 24.

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After dozens of best-selling novels, Danielle Steel still has words to spare: She's starting a blog.

"It's like a letter to a friend, and fun to be able share something and say, 'Gee I did this,' " says Steel, 61, whose run of hits includes three this year alone: "Honor Thyself," "Rogue" and "A Good Woman."

"I've remained very remote and very private, partly because of all my kids (nine). They're bigger now and I would like to communicate with my readers in a more informal way, not just through the list of my accomplishments on my publisher's Web site.

In a recent interview from her home in San Francisco, Steel launched her blog Wednesday. She expects to post entries once a week, or more often "if I get excited about something."

An acknowledged technophobe who writes on a 1946 typewriter, Steel says her children dragged her into the computer age, inspiring her to take a closer look at what is written on the Internet.

She is not always impressed. "Some are very interesting, but some are so inane -- unknown people telling you what they do every day, which is even more boring than what I do every day."

But she will play nice on her blog.

"I want it to be friendly and positive," she says. "I have seen some of the blogs being highly critical about people and highly nasty. I don't like that in life; it's just not necessary. Life is hard enough without being sour on top of it."

And so far she's true to her word. On Friday she blogged about her "extremely silly sense of humor," which she says her children inherited:

April Fool('s Day) is a nightmare at our house. Every year, at least two of the unmarried ones call to tell me that they're pregnant, and three to say they're in jail. And I always fall for the first three calls until I realize what day it is.