First off, let us state the obvious. BE RESPONSIBLE WITH YOUR CREDIT CARDS!!

Often, I hear many people warn others about the financial dangers of using credit cards. Yes, that is true. If you fall behind on credit cards, you will quickly be paying huge amounts of INTEREST every month as you try to catch up on your ever-growing balances.

PAY OFF YOUR CREDIT CARDS RIGHT AWAY
But what if you are somebody that ALWAYS pays off your credit card balance immediately after making a new purchase? What if you put yourself in a position where your credit cards are always paid off and you never pay anything in interest? If this is you, you likely realize the great benefits of using a credit card for as many purchases as possible to gain cashback.

For the past several years, I have used credit cards on everything that I can. I will say that I don’t use a credit card when I pay my monthly mortgage, but that’s only because the bank doesn’t allow it! The only other time I refrain from using a credit card is when I pay for a service that adds a 3%-5% surcharge to the total invoice for credit card users. In these instances, I will simply send a check.
We should always take every opportunity that we can to optimize our money when the opportunities are there. If you are always keeping it “old school” by paying cash or check for every single bill and expense, then you are likely missing out on at least $1,000 in cashback every year.

CREDIT CARD CASHBACK IS AWESOMENESS!!!
Not utilizing cashback on credit cards is like putting all your savings into an account that only pays out $0.001% in interest every month. You’re selling yourself short! If you are the type of person that is able to pay off your entire balance promptly after all purchases, then you should seriously explore all of your credit card options. 

There are many options out there. There are likely some that I do not even know about, but I am going to share my most valuable credit cards that I use on a continual basis throughout the year. I will list the credit cards along with the cashback percentage that I receive on each one for specific items/services. Here they are:

-PenFed Platinum Visa Card: 5% on Gas Purchases

-Chase Freedom Visa Card: 5% on Grocery Store Purchases (Rotational Category)

-Discover it Cashback Card: 5% on Dining/Restaurant & Walgreens Purchases (Rotational Category)

-USBank CASH+ Visa Card: 5% Cashback on Cell Phone Charges

-BMO Harris Bank Cash Back Mastercard: 5% Cashback on Internet Services Purchases

-Target REDcard: 5% off Purchases at Target

-Synchrony Bank Amazon Store Card: 5% Cashback on Amazon.com Purchases

-Marriott Bonvoy Visa Bold Card: 5% CashbackPoints on Hotel/Motel Transactions

-Bank of America Customized Cash Rewards Card: 3% Cashback on all Online Purchases

-Citi Double Cash Mastercard: 2% Cashback on ALL Purchases






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Take note that two of the above-mentioned credit cards utilize “Rotational Categories.” My Discover card and Chase Freedom Visa card both rotate 5% categories every quarter of the year. The categories are usually Groceries, Dining, Gas, Amazon, Walgreens, PayPal, Streaming Services, and Walmart. You just need to make sure that you activate the new upcoming categories as the existing one is about to expire.

As you can see, the categories mentioned above cover a large chunk of our daily expenses! If by chance I have a transaction that does not fall in any of the above categories, I use my Citi Double Cash Mastercard as a default. With this Citi card, I always get 2% cashback no matter what the item or service is. I get 1% during the time of the transaction and the other 1% after the balance is paid off. You will NEVER catch me using a credit card that is only garnering just 1% cashback totals on a transaction!

Keep in mind that cashback credit cards sometimes have above-average annual percentage rates (APRs) or annual fees, so it is ESSENTIAL that you make sure that you keep paying off your balances in a timely manner!

CHEAT SHEET!

How do I keep track of all the different credit cards and categories, you ask? Simple answer! I use a “cheat sheet” that I ALWAYS have in my wallet! I never leave home without it! It looks like chicken scratch, but it does the job! Honestly, though, after about a week or so, you will have most of them memorized, but keep this card in your wallet just to be safe or if your memory has a brain fart.
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TOO MANY CREDIT CARDS HURTS YOUR CREDIT SCORE??

Oh, one other thing regarding this strategy of using multiple credit cards. I often hear people state that having too many active credit cards will damage your credit score. All I can say in response to that is that for the past 10+ years, I have held at least 12-15 active credit cards on any given day. And guess what? My credit score is ALWAYS among the top 10 percentile nationwide! With my credit cards always being paid off, I always carry a very impressive debt-to-available credit ratio.

CONCLUSION

So, in conclusion, I encourage any responsible credit card user to maximize the cashback incentives that are available to them! Wipe that dust off your credit cards and rack up the cashback dough! You can easily reach $1,000 or more each year if done correctly!  GOOD LUCK!!

So, the Kansas City Chiefs have won yet another Super Bowl. That makes back-to-back Super Bowl trophies, and three trophies in the past five years! Very impressive, no doubt, but will this bring on the haters? Is it possible that the Chiefs become a more hated team than my beloved Dallas Cowboys in the 2024-2025 season?
 
When the Chiefs won their Super Bowl vs the San Francisco 49ers in Super Bowl 54 (2020), everybody was perfectly fine with that. The Chiefs had a calm and cool, seemingly humble quarterback, in Patrick Mahomes, and the franchise was on a Super Bowl draught of 50 YEARS! How can you not root for a team that has not won a Super Bowl in 50 years? Especially when they are playing a team like the 49ers that has FIVE Super Bowl trophies, already. Fans, in general, were more than pleased to see the Chiefs win this game.
 
Last year, in Super Bowl 57 vs the Philadelphia Eagles, the Chiefs won their second Super Bowl in four seasons. You would think winning two Super Bowls in such a short time may bring on some haters, but the team they beat presumably even had even more haters. Eagles’ fans are often referred to as the most obnoxious and unlikable fans in the NFL. On top of that, their head coach, Nick Sirianni, cruised through the season with a very cocky and arrogant attitude, filled with sarcastic smiles and gestures on the sidelines and post-game interviews, which caused Eagle haters to hate the Eagles even more! Furthermore, many fans were getting frustrated with Philadelphia’s rugby-type “Tush Push” play that seemed be unstoppable on short yardage plays. Some even said the play should be illegal. The Eagles had more than their average share of enemies in the 2022-2023 season, so the average NFL fan did not have too much of a problem seeing the Chiefs win their second Super Bowl in a 4-year span.
 
Fast forward to the 2023-2024 season, and Super Bowl 58! As we all know, they won this game against the 49ers to make it a successful back-to-back championship campaign. But were the cheers for the Chiefs in Super Bowl 58 as loud as they were in Super Bowl 54 and Super Bowl 57? I think many of us agree they were not. Even with numerous “Swifties” joining the Chief’s bandwagon because of Taylor Swift’s romance with Travis Kelce, the haters seemed to be steadily growing.
 
As the Chiefs enter the new season, there are many things that will ignite the haters:
 
-1. They won three Super Bowls in five years. Enough is enough. Everybody gets sick of teams that win too much! Just ask the Dallas Cowboys of the early/mid 90’s or the New York Yankees of the late 90’s.
 
-2. Patrick Mahomes: Overall, he seems very likeable, however, he did have one big blemish during the regular season. He showed a side we had never seen before. In the infamous “offensive offsides” game where their game-winning touchdown was reversed by a penalty, Mahomes made a clown of himself. He looked like nothing more than a sore loser as the Chiefs wound up losing this game against the Buffalo Bills. Sure, it was a ticky tack call, but the video footage clearly shows that the wide receiver was lined up an entire FOOT offsides. Not inches. A FOOT! He shouted at the referees and then doubled down in the post-game press conference by continuing to cry about a call that was CLEARLY correct. He looked like a spoiled brat who didn’t get his way. Not many people were taking his side on this one. Ever since this game, many have looked at Mahomes just a bit differently.
 
-3. Travis Kelce: Sure, we all love a football player with passion, but he seemed to get more and more over the top as the season went along. Perhaps he was trying to show off for his new girlfriend and the Swifties? I’m not sure, but his loud antics and numerous moments of “trying too hard to be exciting” have become old among non-Chiefs fan. To make matters worse, he was seen by all viewers of the Super Bowl when he blatantly bumped his own head coach, Andy Reid, because he was upset he was not on the field during one of the offensive plays. It was 100% immature and disrespectful. He looked like a huge ass by doing this. He looked like an even huger ass by not immediately apologizing for it. In the post-game interviews, he laughed it off and basically stated he was just showing his passion for the game. Yeah, ok, Travis. You were an idiot. That bump on his head coach was likely the final dagger for anybody on the fence about liking/disliking Kelce.
 
-4. Taylor Swift: You really cannot blame Taylor for doing anything wrong. She is simply going to the games to support her boyfriend. As innocent as she may be, though, many long-time NFL fans have grown tired of seeing her face displayed on the cameras over and over and over again. They came to watch FOOTBALL. They are more interested in watching the game. They have no interest in watching a pop star celebrity cheering in an expensive press box every week. They just want to watch football and have grown tired of hearing about the Swift-Kelce romance during games.
 
So, we just covered four things that could cause the haters to revolt against the Kansas City Chiefs in the upcoming season. Will the hate be higher than the current hate displayed for the Dallas Cowboys? I mean, come on, do the Cowboys have any players that are very unlikable? Dak Prescott is as laid back and chill as they come (even when he throws interceptions). There is a bit of cockiness among CeeDee Lamb and Micah Parsons, but they seem pretty tame and calm in comparison to Kelce.
 
Although, there is still this guy named JERRY JONES, probably one of the most unlikable owners in the NFL. Heck, he is even disliked by many Cowboys fans!
 
So here is the million-dollar question. If the Dallas Cowboys make next year’s Super Bowl against the Kansas City Chiefs, then who will the non-Cowboys and non-Chiefs fans be rooting for? Who will they will be hating on more??
 
 
. . . yeah . . . I know . . . Dallas will probably still have more haters, but, hey, crazier things could happen!

#KansasCityChiefs #DallasCowboys #CowboysHaters #ChiefsHaters #TravisKelce #PatrickMahomes #DakPrescott #TaylorSwift #Swifties #JerryJones #NFL #BlogPhenom
 

​So, how many people succeeded in their attempts at “Dry January?” I was one of the many individuals that took part in Dry January, but not for alcohol. Honestly, I only drink about two nights a month, so I felt no need to address my infrequent boozing habits!

I did, however, have aspirations to address my coffee-drinking habits. My Dry January goal was to quit coffee for a month! This was going to be a tough task, as I had been drinking approximately 6+ cups a day for the past 3 or 4 years. Normally, I would drink 2-4 cups in the morning, 1-3 cups in the middle of the day, and then another 2-4 cups at night time. There were some days in which I drank up to 10 cups, but the average was around 6 cups per day. 

I felt as if I was drinking coffee out of habit more than anything else. I honestly do not feel that it had any effect on me being able to stay awake. Coffee simply became my “vice” that I could not go a day without. It reminded me of my younger days when I was addicted to smoking cigarettes. There were always 3 or 4 specific times of the day where my brain was telling me that I needed a smoke. I eventually was able to quit after 10 years of smoking, but that habit eventually was replaced by coffee. Obviously, coffee is a much safer option than smoking, but I still wanted to see if I could change things!

Here are my results:

January 2024
Week 1:
rank ZERO cups of coffee. To replace my cravings, I drank about 2 cups of ginger tea each day.
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Week 2:
Same as Week One. Drank ZERO cups of coffee and had 2+ cups of ginger tea daily.

Week 3:
Again, the same as before. ZEO cups of coffee and 2+ cups of ginger tea daily.
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Week 4:
Drank ZERO cups of coffee. I reduced my daily tea intake from 2 cups to 1 cup.

MISSION SUCCESSFUL!!

It was difficult and weird to not have coffee during the first two weeks of January, but after a while, I found myself getting used to it. I have been drinking more ice water in the mornings. To this day (February 17, 2024), I have yet to have a cup of coffee. I am truly amazed how easily I was able to quit coffee cold turkey after drinking 6+ cups daily for so many years!  

How am I doing it, you ask? There are some key factors that have enabled me to keep this streak going. Here are the main ones:

-GUT / STOMACH: My gut and stomach feel MUCH better nowadays. I am less gassy and bloated these days. Keep in mind that I drank much of my coffee on an empty stomach in the morning and daytime. When you drink coffee on an empty stomach, it reduces your hydrochloric acid, which makes it much more difficult for your body to break down protein. This protein then starts to eat all the gut bacteria that produces hydrogen sulfide. I eat a lot of protein every day (in addition to taking protein powder), so you can imagine the troubles I had when drinking coffee. And, gosh, don’t even get me started about flatulence. The farts weren’t just frequent, but they were LETHAL! They did not even smell like regular farts. They smelled like pure sulfur and would linger much longer than should be humanly possible!  I am happy to say that the lethal flatulence is a thing of the past since quitting coffee!

-ACID REFLUX: For over 30 years, I have suffered from severe acid reflux and GERD. I have been taking medication for my reflux for what seems like my entire life. My doctors always advised me to quit the coffee to help relieve my condition, but I always refused. Well, now that I have finally stopped drinking coffee, I can say that my acid reflux has not been as frequent as it was in the past! Have mercy!

-JITTERS: I no longer have to worry about the “jitters.” I did not suffer from the jitters very often, but when I did, it was extremely hard to focus on anything, especially work!

-MONEY: You can imagine the money I am saving! Every month, I would usually buy one container of regular ground coffee ($20) in addition to a 100-pack of K-cups ($40). So, yes, I was spending approximately $60 a month on coffee! Now, I am spending about $7 a month on ginger tea.


How long can I keep this going? Time will tell, but I’m feeling better, no doubt!