I know this isn't what you asked for, but when I went to the dermatologist recently she gave me something called "Replenix" to try. I have tried retin-a products in the past but they were always too harsh for my skin so she recommended this. It is a retinol product which is milder than retin-a products but works like retin-a to make pores smaller and reduce sun damage and I believe it would probably eventually remove the spots you are talking about. It is not a prescription item - you can buy it on amazon and other places. There are various strengths - I started with 3x and have just ordered 6x and I think it goes up to 10x. I use a tinted moisturizer from Smashbox which I like and it has sun protection in it too I think, but it is lighter than a concealer. Good luck - I too am fair-skinned and beginning to pay for all the years when I was younger and lived in the sun, using baby oil mixed with iodine for a tan.

Also, a lot of people who anticipate only being between jobs for a short time will play the COBRA waiting game and use it as a temporary insurance. They give you 60 days to decide so if you don't decline it, you can be covered in the case of emergency for those two months. If you don't end up needing insurance, then you don't pay anything but if you do need it within those 60 days, you can elect COBRA and it covers you retroactively from the day it was offered. Also, once you elect it, you have 45 days to send in payment, so you could elect it and then just not pay if you don't need it, So in theory you could have over 100 days of emergency insurance for free if you don't end up needing it, and you would only have to pay the premium if you do need it, which is far less than a hospital bill . I don't know how strictly ethical it is to do that but it's how their rules are set up and it is often a lifesaver for people in difficult situations.

I'm no expert but I've refinanced a few times and never for a higher rate or longer term. One of the prinicples that guides my financial decisions is whether or not what I'm doing increases my net worth. Paying more interest and less principle on a mortgage doesn't. We have had a couple situations where DH has not been working and the first thing we have done is cut all non-essential spending. Fortunately we've never had to refinance a mortgage to cut our expenses. Is it not possible for your wife to find a new job in the next year and not cut her income?

No, cmarlin, I was not talking about self-employed people. And as for 'Ughhh, I don't want to be like those other countries. Look at the total picture, do you really want to have that?' Yes, I would. Among other things, a system in which such things as healthcare are not at the whim of the employer would stabilize a lot of lives. If it weren't for the huge jump in my healthcare costs due to changing jobs - new copays are much, much higher - we would be able to keep our house. (Guess that's my own fault for having the bad taste to get a chronic illness and not recover or die. :-) I'm very grateful for the coverage I do have, of course, considering I spent the first 2 1/2 years I was ill with no medical care whatsoever. But it doesn't make it any more pleasant when a prescription that cost me $10 in December now costs me $50 or more.) 'How can a full time employee get no paid vacation? I work in employee benefits and don't understand that one.' Before I became disabled in the mid-1990s, I had never received either paid vacation days, paid holidays, or paid sick days: I didn't work, I didn't get paid, it was as simple as that. I don't know what there is to understand or not understand. I worked in the restaurant business - almost entirely for independents, not chains, since I preferred actually cooking to reheating and assembling prepackaged stuff. ;-) Most of my friends and family are at the lowest income levels (some of them make not much more than minimum wage) and work for smaller companies, and those two factors tend to drastically reduce access to benefits like paid time off. The more you get paid in the private sector, the more likely you are to get paid time off and other nice bennies... at the other end, you get to be happy you have a job at all. (Anyone read Barbara Ehrenreich's 'Nickel & Dimed'?) In the US there is NO 'right' to paid time off of any kind; even the FMLA provides only for unpaid time off, which in the lower income levels is a joke. The Fair Labor Standards Act says specifically that there is no legal right to pay for hours not worked (even for Federal holidays where the employee may be involuntarily prevented from working because the workplace is closed). I have posted a link below to the report from the Center for Economic and Policy Research on vacation/paid leave time in the US versus other countries. Here is a link that might be useful: 'No-Vacation Nation'