Black Friday.

Go figure.

Story is at CNN.

But do not spend more money than you need to in order to enjoy the holiday. Plan ahead and you can keep out-of-pocket costs down as much as possible.

Here are some of the expenses to consider beyond the turkey:

• Don’t get nickeled and dimed on airport travel: If there are relatives or friends who can drop you off and pick you up, avoid parking at the airport and use the flight tracker sites and cell phones to make your transportation connections. I’ve needed to use an airport parking garage only once since Detroit Metropolitan Airport set up its cell phone parking lots. It cost me $10 to park the car for my passenger on that occasion. But the cell phone parking lot usage is free. You also know, of course, to limit your baggage to carry-ons as much as possible. If you are traveling with someone, share a checked bag so you do not have to pay so much in luggage fees.
• Look up the best options for toll road fees. If you are traveling from the Detroit area to cities near Cleveland or Chicago on Thanksgiving weekend, be aware that the Ohio Turnpike raised its cash rates on Oct. 1. The turnpike also started accepting an electronic transponder system for toll payment on that date. If you have an EZPass transponder, or a transponder from another toll road that is accepted on the Ohio Turnpike, then use it for your holiday travel.  Go to the turnpike site for the details. You also want to map out the difference in tolls and drive time if you got off the turnpike one or two exits early. Sometimes you have to use the exit you’ve always taken, but sometimes another route is possible.
• Gas prices can be planned around. You know where the gas gouger stations are on your regular travel routes. But if you are traveling in new territory, check the Gas Buddy site to help plan out the best fuel stops en route to, or in, the city you will be spending your holiday weekend in. This won’t help when overall gas prices go up or down – I’m talking about knowing whether one exit or city is better than the nearby options. You also want to travel in the most fuel efficient (usually the smallest) vehicle that holds all your family members. Remember – you’re not hauling all of the family’s sports equipment to go to Grandma’s house for dinner.
• Don’t go crazy with the Thanksgiving menu. You know which foods your family will insist on for Thanksgiving – and if you aren’t certain, ask! Then make your shopping list and buy the groceries when you see the sales announced. Do not make any food that is so far down the “must have” list for Thanksgiving that it will not be eaten that day or soon afterward. You also want plenty of plastic tubs, wraps and foils on hand so to repackage leftovers. That refrigerator can hold only so many serving bowls – and leftovers will go to waste if you do not properly handle them quickly.
• Table settings can be multi-holiday. It’s possible to buy dishes and linens with a Thanksgiving theme. If you do buy them, then stock up during sales instead of paying full price. However, it is more frugal to get multiple uses during the year for your good dishes and table linens. Colors of harvest gold and orange work just as well for Halloween; and colors of cranberry and forest green work just as well for Christmas. White table settings go with any holiday. Put the Thanskgiving theme in with just a couple of accessories or maybe a tablecloth changed out.
• Look for the sales on cooking and entertaining gadgets. If something you could use in the kitchen to help with Thanskgiving dinner preparations is also useful during another time of year, consider making that purchase while the Thanksgiving promotions are in effect. This may be your best time of year to buy items such as folding tables and chairs, cookie sheets, slow cookers, coffee pots, roasters and mixers.
• Stick with frugal family entertainment. You don’t need to buy or rent a stack of DVDs for your visitors. There will be football games and holiday movies on TV, and the movie-lovers might want to go to the cinema to see the newest shows anyway.  When the guests arrive, bring out the playing cards, board games and whatever kids’ movies you already own.
• Don’t pretend your home is a luxury hotel. I know that the suggestions for hospitality these days include stocking a guest bedroom with snacks, magazines and floral arrangements; and placing pretty soaps and towels in the bathroom. The fact is: if you are hosting out-of-town guests who expect hotel-style accommodations, then direct them to the nearest hotel. Families on a budget are permitted to provide their overnight guests with an air mattress on the floor, or a hide-a-bed sofa, with clean and good condition pillows, sheets and blankets; and are allowed to expect their guests to share a bathroom with the family members.

The first Free Fare Day for the Mackinac Bridge has been announced for Sunday Nov. 1.

The Michigan Department of Transportation reports that from midnight to 11:59 p.m. on Nov. 1, the Mackinac Straits Health System Foundation and its co-sponsors will pay the fares for all non-commercial motorists who are crossing the Mackinac Bridge.

Nov. 1 is the 52nd anniversary of the first crossing on the historic bridge.

Toll booth personnel also will distribute travel first aid kits that day.

A snippet:

Increase your auto deductible to $1,000. Why? Because car insurance should cover only major damage, not scratches or dings. If you make a habit of claiming small stuff, you’ll see premiums rise dramatically — or your insurer will drop you.

The only way to keep your fares at the current rate is to get an electronic transponder, which are used on several other toll roads across the country. This service is a great idea for truck drivers, commuters or frequent travelers, but the occasional traveler has to consider the extra fees involved.

Why would anybody in the metro Detroit area care about rates on the Ohio Turnpike?

Well, if you are traveling from southeast Michigan to Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio; to a baseball game or the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio; or if you have a college student who attends school in South Bend, Ind. … you are most likely traveling on the Ohio Turnpike for part of the route.

It’s not worth the extra time and gas money involved to take alternate roads to Sandusky or Cleveland – I’ve tried it. I haven’t timed out an alternate route from Monroe to South Bend, but I suspect I would get the same results.

You will have to set aside more money for those tolls.

How much will that rate increase be for your route? You can find out here.

Here is one example: driving on the Ohio Turnpike from Perrysburg / Toledo exit at I-75 to the Indiana state line now costs $2.75 – and will cost $4 on Oct. 1.

You may remember that the Indiana Toll Road also bumped up its rates last year at the same time it added electronic transponders.

So when my daughter started college in fall 2007, it took $10.30 for the tolls to get from I-75 / Ohio Turnpike junction just south of Toledo, to exit 77 / South Bend on the Indiana Toll Road. Starting in October, we will be spending $16 in combined toll road fees for every round trip to South Bend.

The daughter comes home from college usually only once a semester, and we’re not driving to Sandusky or Cleveland nearly as often as we did even two or three years ago. So the math really doesn’t work out for us to get a transponder.

I do have, however, a “travel sheet” that we take with us on trips to South Bend that lists what banks, gas stations, restaurants and radio stations can be found en route and in that city. I’ve updated the travel sheet with the new fares so we can remember to set aside the correct amount of cash for the trip.

What happens now? There’s a lot of chatter, but no answers yet.

My co-worker Charles Slat filed this story for today’s edition of The Monroe Evening News: Cash for Clunkers creating clamor.

A grant from the Community Foundation for Southeast Michigan is allowing the Traffic Improvement Association to present the Mature Driver Workshop from Aug. 10 to 12 at the Monroe Center for Healthy Aging, 15275 S. Dixie Hwy., Monroe, Mich.

This grant will allow the workshop to be provided at no cost to the participants.

The Mature Driver Workshop is confidential, voluntary and designed to be self-evaluating. The purpose of the workshop is to allow seniors to make their own decisions about driving based on what they learn, and also to enhance their driving skills.

The classroom time is from 9 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. on Aug. 10 and 11. This classroom time will include equipment that helps measure brake reaction time, glare recovery time and depth perception. Participants are also taught risk management techniques, the effects of aging on driving, how to compensate for diminished abilities and defensive driving skills.

No records are kept, and no information is shared or reported.

There will also be an optional opportunity to schedule a one-hour appointment on Aug. 12 for an on-the-road evaluation. Participants must have completed the classroom time in order to participate in the driving time.

Lunch will be provided on Aug. 10 and 11 to participants.

Advance registration is required and class size is limited to 25 students. For registration, call the Monroe Center for Healthy Aging at (734) 241-0404.

Michigan law states that insurance companies may previde a premium discount to drivers age 50 and older who complete an eight-hour driver safety course. The Mature Driver Workshop meets those requirements and a certificate of attendance will be given to those who complete the course. Not all insurance companies participate in the discount program.

The Traffic Improvement Association is a non-profit organization founded in 1967 to provide traffic safety data, administer traffic safety grants and provide educational programs.

A snippet:

“It’s all about debt-to-income ratios,” said Steve Cervin, a credit counselor with Commerce Financial Services in West Bloomfield. “The borrower may pay nearly everything on time, but if he has five credit cards and two of them have a balance, or he was late on one mortgage payment, that could kill a deal.”

Being employed helps, but many lenders want proof of how long the borrower has been in his or her current job. Where banks were once satisfied with a couple of pay stubs, now they’re demanding borrowers produce W2 forms.

The article also explains that credit unions are becoming an increasingly common source of lending for vehicles – the most recent statistics from May indicate that credit unions handled about a fourth of the new vehicle purchases in Michigan.

Hmm …. can we say “Back to the Future”?

When I went through the dealer purchase process for the first time in 1990 (my previous car was bought off my parents), I had good credit and more than two years of work history.

My debt-to-income ratio, however, was pretty high with student loans then in repayment status.

I test-drove a Ford Escort that had payments of about $212 a month.

The credit company wouldn’t approve me for that loan unless I got a co-signer. The reason: I did not have enough income compared to my expenses. To put the car payment in perspective, my apartment rent was $285 a month and day care bills for my toddler daughter were $300 a month.

I refused to purchase a co-signed car.

A few days later, another car dealer called me about a 1984 Dodge Aeries that had just been put into inventory. That car had payments of $142 a month, in my own name. And the loan would be serviced by a local credit union, since that’s where the dealer could find a lender willing to finance me.

My checking account remains at a traditional bank that has branches in most cities we visit on a regular basis.

But since 1990, I’ve also been a credit union customer. I’ve parked my savings account and my major credit card at a credit union. After all, out-of-town ATM network access isn’t an issue for those two accounts.

I don’t earn loyalty points on my credit card, but I do have a very reasonable interest rate. In the long run, that’s the better deal.

• Just Plain Frugal presents Ways you cost yourself money. (If you can put in some effort to save money, why aren’t you doing that? Number one answer: “It takes too much time.” Well, if you live in southeast Michigan, you probably have more time than money these days. Join the frugal living club.)
• Christian PF presents Is it wrong to walk away from your mortgage?: (Lots of comments on the reader follow-up).
• Surviving the Stores presents Surviving the store clerks and cashiers. (Bring your patience along with your coupon box to the store.)
• Ezilon.com presents The scholarship essay. (A reader sent me this link about how to handle scholarship essays, and it’s a great piece. My daughter has had to write several such essays in her search for scholarship money. I can’t figure out the original source, the link I was sent is credited to ezilon.com.)
• Practical Money Skills presents Insurance coverage you shouldn’t do without. (If you’ve been laid off or have changed jobs, do contact your car insurance agent to update the policy. Our car insurance rates went down when my husband no longer had an out-of-town commute).