This guest post comes from David Weliver at Money Under 30.

When Forbes named Portland, Maine, the most livable city in America this year, it didn't surprise me or my wife or any of Portland's other 64,000 denizens. With a low cost of living, great culture and dining (we were also named Bon Appetit's "foodiest small town") and easy access to the ocean and mountains, Portland freaking rocks.

• Bing: Worst places to find a job 

The only big thing Portland lacks for well-educated, ambitious 20-somethings? An abundance of career options.

Halloween is coming, and that’s as good an excuse for free stuff as anything. This year, merchants have all kinds of freebies for us.

Monroe on a Budget has a good list of sales on costumes and candy at national chain stores. Nestle has printable coupons good for $1 off Nestle and Wonka candy products. (Look for the boxes on the right.) You can get coupons for $2 off larger bags at Coupons.com.

• Bing: Inexpensive Halloween costumes

Other deals are as wide-ranging as coupons for free bowling, yogurt for used candy wrappers and free burritos for anyone who dresses like one.

What does San Antonio have besides great food and the Alamo? The right stuff to beat back the Great Recession.

San Antonio ranks No. 1 in a BusinessWeek ranking of the top 40 strongest U.S. metropolitan economies, based on a Brookings Institution MetroMonitor survey.

In Texas' second-largest city (yep, San Antonio is now bigger than Dallas) the unemployment rate in June was just 6.9%, two points higher than a year ago, according to BusinessWeek, which produced a slideshow of its top 40 cities. San Antonio, it says, "has one of the strongest job markets in the nation."

No. 2 on the list is the Austin-Round Rock area in Texas, the last state to experience the recession. Also representing Texas on BusinessWeek's list are Dallas, Houston, El Paso, and McAllen, despite that metropolitan area's 11% unemployment rate.

This post comes from Jon Hood at partner site ConsumerAffairs.com.

A chastened Disney is offering refunds to consumers who own copies of the company's Baby Einstein videos, bowing to pressure from a parents group that says the video is more likely to turn children into Baby Alfred E. Neumans.

Disney's move allows anyone who bought a Baby Einstein video between June 5, 2004, and Sept. 4, 2009, to get their money back. Alternatively, consumers can trade their DVD in for a Baby Einstein book or CD, or redeem it for a 25% discount on future Baby Einstein purchases. The offer is good through March 4, 2010, and is limited to four per household.

• Bing: How do commercials affect children?

For years, the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, a group fighting to "reclaim childhood from corporate marketers," has said the videos don't live up to Disney's promises.

This post comes from J.D. Roth at partner blog Get Rich Slowly.

My wife recently spent a long weekend touring eastern Oregon with two of her co-workers. They drove from small town to small town, shopping for antiques and visiting museums.

On Saturday -- with an early October snow falling outside -- Kris and her friends stopped to eat lunch at La Laguna in the small town of Joseph (population 1,054). As part of the worst job I ever had, I spent several weeks selling insurance door-to-door in Joseph, so I know the locals are friendly. Such was the case at La Laguna. Kris's party struck up a conversation with their waiter.

• Bing: Best small towns in the U.S.

He told them that he was raised in Joseph. When he was a young man, he moved to Portland; the big city seemed exciting. He had a good time, and is glad to have had the experience, but after a few years he moved back to small-town life in Joseph.

"Life is simpler here," he said. "And it's less expensive. When I lived in Portland, I couldn't save anything; there was always something to spend my money on. There just aren't as many temptations here."

Frugal people sleep better.

That’s a recurring theme in a Smart Spending message board thread called "Why are you frugal?" Readers say it’s hard to beat the contentment of a good night's slumber, untroubled by debt.

Some readers say they're frugal because they love finding great deals, but most have more complex reasons. They're thrifty now to meet future goals: a car, a house, a family. They've chosen to reject hyperconsumerism. They're called to careers (e.g. the arts) that are fulfilling but require careful money management. Or they simply enjoy the peace of mind that comes with having an emergency fund.

A year ago, a regular reader who calls herself "SC CDF" really wanted an ice-cream maker. These days she can barely remember having wanted it. She proposed that we write down what we want and then check back later to see if we still want it. That's why in April I started a Smart Spending message board thread called "What do you want? Will you still want it a year from now?" 

Readers posted their burning desires: a great camera and printer, electronic gadgets, new cookware, computers, automobiles, furniture. Most of those who reported back later on the updated thread said they did not get what they wanted. But all of them were OK with that. 

I've got a dirty little secret: sometimes I wear a shirt twice before washing it.

Before you hold your nose and run screaming from the room, hear me out. I'm not talking about a shirt in which I've done a day's worth of hard manual labor in the hot sun. It's usually a shirt I've worn for half a day or less.

The other day, for example, I didn't dress to leave the house until close to lunchtime. Before that I was the stereotypical freelance writer sitting around in sweatpants and a T-shirt my daughter bought to celebrate entering the eighth grade. (My daughter is now 29. Freelancers really don't care what they look like.)