Remember half the people you know are below average.

Like my mother in law.  She thinks that her son is perfect.  He played football in college. He majored in business. He has entrepreneurial instincts.

The smartest thing her son did was marry me. Because he hasn’t proven his business skills yet.  Love the guy, but I sure wish he could get the career thing going.

Fortunately, I have my career and keep the bills paid. But we ran into a bump in the road last year with some damage to my car, which was hard because I only carried liability, not collision insurance.  So I was looking at a $700 in damage to a car with a book value of $5000.  Worth it to fix?  Well, yeah, it was mostly cosmetic damage –the car works fine. I didn’t have a decent down payment for a new car, and credit on car loans is tight as it is.

So I looked into getting a car title loan. My mother in law thinks they’re a bad idea. I think driving a junker in the south suburbs is a bad idea. And when I thought about it, it really was a responsible idea — fix up the car that’s paid for instead of taking on a whole lot more new debt with a newer car.  So I went to Olympia Fields Title Loans, found a loan I liked and a repayment schedule I could manage.  I got the car fixed and paid it off in no time.

I’m part of the above average group, I think.

By the way, Olympia fields in near Flossmoor, Homewood, Glenwood, Hazel Crest, and Lynwood.

The reason women over 50 don’t have babies is because we would put them down and forget where we put them.

I really hate to admit things like that but it’s true. I had a list of all the IDs and passwords I need for every friggin website I need access to and, you guessed it, I lost it. My coolest new Tina Fey glasses I bought last summer? – no clue.

OK, so getting older does not have to mean we lose our minds. We just need little helpers (and funny how you quit being so critical of your own parents once you start to experience what they went through). On the finance front, I’ve had to do some dancing with bills and money that I never knew possible. My son is in college and his student loan program disappeared on him due to the banking crisis. So there I was last month, looking at a much bigger tuition bill that needed to be paid in five days or else he would have to skip the semester. What to do? Think, girlie, I said. Then he said something about car title loans, which I’ve seen on Cicero Avenue, and shuddered. No way!

But that’s when we went online and found Matteson Title Loans, a company that works with you entirely through the Internet. You fill out the form, give them your auto title information, you get approved almost instantly – and the money arrives the next day.

A car title loan was the smartest thing my college student son could come up with.  And he’ll never let me forget it, either.

By the way Matteson is also near Homwood, Flossmoor, Hazel Crest, Chicago Heights, and Glenwood.

Because I am a man, I can be relied upon to purchase basic groceries at the store, like milk or bread. I cannot be expected to find exotic items like “Cumin” or “Tofu”. For all I know these are the same thing. And never, under any circumstances, should anyone expect me to pick up anything for which “feminine hygiene product” is a euphemism.

Sheesh. In my house, we really need to stick to our division of responsibilities. My wife, she’s good at her job, with the kids, with cooking and shopping. I’m in charge of the cars, household finances, the house and yard, the dog, and which brand of beer we keep on hand. All that and I work full time as well. We worked this arrangement out years ago.

So when we ran into a bad patch with money last year – medical emergencies, need I say more? – it was up to me to figure out what to do. Our credit cards were maxed, my commissions were down, we don’t have home equity because we bought the house in 2005, at the height of the market. And here in Homewood, it’s not like people talk much about what to do when the piggy bank is empty. I went on the Internet, searching for car title loans. But I didn’t want to have to go to one of those stores converted from a burger restaurant. What I found was online, Homewood Title Loans. They give you a car title loan based on the value of your paid-for car, and that was exactly our situation.

I got the money in a day, just beating the payment-due date by hours – and no shopping for tofu or tampons required.

By the way, Homewood is near Matteson, Olympia Fields, Hazel Crest, Markham, and Glenwood.