Your Library Card is Your Golden Ticket!

I was watching a movie the other day called Confessions of a Shopaholic.  It was a sweet and funny story about a girl who is addicted to shopping and way over her head in debt.  Early on in the movie there is a scene in which she goes to the book store and tries to buy a Finances for Dummies book.  When she tries to pay for it, her credit card is declined.

It got me thinking...  If I were broker than broke and trying to find a way out of debt, I wouldn't buy a book to help me.  I'd head to the library.  To me this is just common sense.  But the longer I live the more I realize that not everyone thinks this way.  So maybe a discussion about the virtues of libraries would still be useful to some.

Look at this friendly librarian handing out knowledge for free!

Libraries.  They're where people used to find answers before Google was invented.  If you aren't familiar with how libraries work, they are like free book rental stores.  (I apologize if this is painfully obvious to you.)  You want a book, you go in and get it, you take it home, you read it, and you bring it back.  It's that easy.  And it's free!

Why would you pay $10 (or more!) for a book you aren't sure about if you could just borrow it first for free and see if you like it.  Then if you do like it, you can decide if you want to buy it for yourself (either as a digital download or from a used bookstore of course!).  If you only need a book for a short time (like to read up on a certain subject or for a class at school), just borrow it and bring it back.  You don't need to clutter your bookshelves with a million How To volumes.  Just check out what you need for free from the library.

And it's not just books.  They've got e-books, movies, music, games, and all kinds of cool things.  Seriously.

Every library is different and offers different resources, so go check out your local library and see what they have.  You will probably be surprised at how much free education and entertainment they have to offer.  It's like your own golden ticket to a magical world of freebies.

Marcia