This week I blatantly ignored one important lesson I had learned years ago: “When your car is making funky noises, you’d better take care of it. It ain’t get better.”

Following this rule would have saved me some headaches back then. Driving old cars has taught me that when you think something is wrong you’d better check. But it’s also a rule that applies to pretty much everything in life. It doesn’t mean to obsess over everything, but things rarely run smooth forever. Acting on a first hunch may be the best chance to avoid worse.

Think about your health, computers, finances, cars, buildings, relationships, businesses, etc.

If you have the feeling you are spending too much then it might just be true. Regular checks and alarms are great to avoid the build up of a big surprise. Programs like Mint, CreditKarma, or Quizzle help you by monitoring your spending and sending you alarms when something occurs beyond the ordinary. These also help you to see where you could save money (Whaaat? I spend how much on gas?!).

We should bring our cars to regular check-ups. But isn’t it curious that we often care more about our cars than ourselves? When did you have your last checkup?

Anyway, this week none of these came to punish my ignorance. A couple of days ago I completed some theme and plugin updates on this site. I wasn’t so sure about the theme update to begin with. But do you know when you practically know you shouldn’t be doing something and end up doing it anyway?

Does this ham smell funny? It even got this slimy layer… (more…)