New Credit Card

After much debating (on which to get, not whether to get it, that much was certain) I picked up a new credit card. This Citi Forward card to be exact.

My (until now) sole current card was a Paypal Plus card. It offers 1% cash back on all purchases in the form of paypal certificates, so I make an effort to filter as much of my buying through it as I can. The Citi Forward offers that plus a few bags of chips. The general stats:
The rewards come in 'thank you points' such that 1 point is approximately 1cent as long as you take gift card type deals, less if you just want straight cash.
5 points per dollar (~0.4%) for entertainment type categories, e.g. books, movies, resturaunts.
1 point per dollar (~0.75%) in all other categories
5000+6000 points on signup (sign up for paperless billing + spend at least $250 in three months)
100 points a month for not going over your limit

So in the categories it's good in, it's a definate boost. , I'll mostly not be using it. It's mostly for my fiancee to be using it. I applied for two cards so she also has one in her name, even though the actual line of credit is only attached to myself. I know, I know, mixing finances and all that worry. But I don't. And even if I were worried, it's simple enough to make a few calls to just turn off the card entirely. The way we've split up spending and budgeting works so she's the one in the relationship in charge of making decisions about what the card is best at, eating out, buying books, and general entertainment. However, she currently doesn't have an income (in school) so I'm the one with the financial stats to get approved for the line of credit.

So the big caveat is that people tend to spend with plastic more freely than cash. I think that I'm a special enough snowflake that I break that trend. To me, when I spend on something the number of it's price is the number. Maybe because I'm one of those mathy nerds, or throughly immersed in the digital age, but the numbers are what's real. I'm actually more free about pulling out dollar or five for vending machines or lunch than I am about pulling out a credit card. In a way, I think that I feel that money in the form of cash is already 'spent' since it's already been pulled out of the cloud of bank accounts that I consider 'my money'.

Though the weakness I do admit to is perhaps buying a bit frivolously when I am using up my rewards. I'm making more of an effort to only pull out the rewards for things that I otherwise would have needed to buy, but often the temptation to spend this 'free' windfall on some niceties (which of course cost more than the reward's value) and end up spending more money. To this end, there's a nice option to drop the rewards money on an extra mortgage payment (up to $100).

So all in all it looks like I'm ready to start earning a bunch of rewards, keep up my credit history, and not pay any interest.