Getting to the Royal Wedding is going to be a royal pain in your budget if you don't act soon. Round-trip airfares to London around the April 29 nuptials for Prince William and Kate Middleton will rise faster than the Queen's bar tab at the Buckingham Palace reception.

"Book soon for everything," Tom Hall, Lonely Planet's London-based travel editor, told
WalletPop. "Excitement levels and prices will only rise as the big day gets closer."

When we ran the results of GoodGuide's ratings of pet food, we learned just how passionate some people are about their dogs.

After hundreds of comments, hundreds more emails and untold discussions about GoodGuide's choice of Science Diet as its top brand, we turned back to GoodGuide to respond to the criticism. We've also reached out to Science Diet and -- based on the conversation started by our readers -- we will be doing our own story about what to look for when you going shopping for pet food.

The main issues leveled against Consumer Ally and its partner, GoodGuide.com, involve encouraging support for a product critics said is made primarily from grains and filler. And some suggested the food includes the rendered remains of pets and that veterinarians nationwide are complicit in an elaborate bribery plot that now involves GoodGuide and AOL.

"Your list of good dog foods is a crime. Science Diet is one of the worst dog foods available, as are the rest of the ones you listed as 'good,' one reader wrote. "I can guess who put you up to this ridiculous article. How do you sleep at night, (expletive deleted)?

In the Midwest where I live, we had our own version of the Super Bowl last week when the Chicago Bears played the Green Bay Packers for the NFC championship. My home town of Chicago is still licking its wounds, and most people here don't have the cash or the enthusiasm for another football party. But they don't want to miss Super Bowl XLV, either.

So for those weary fans in Chicago, and everyone else looking forward to Sunday, here's a few ways to throw a great Super Bowl party and not break the bank.

People pretending to be Microsoft employees are calling homeowners and telling them their computer has a "serious virus." But to "fix" the problem, people are being told to pay a fee and give the caller remote access to their computer -- and, as a result, expose all their private data.

Better Business Bureau officials in Oregon, Washington and Alaska are warning residents about the calls.

Microsoft's website clearly states the Redmond, Wash.-based company does not send unsolicited emails or make unsolicited phone calls requesting personal or financial information.

If you feel like you're paying higher credit card APRs than you were just a couple of years ago, it's not just your imagination. According to new data, the average credit card interest rate has climbed to an all-time high recently. Average rates were near 11% as recently as a few years ago, but now that average is hovering just below 15% -- a serious financial burden for anyone who has to carry a balance.

As this article points out, APRs hit a record high of 14.78% in November, and they've only inched down incrementally since then (the most recent data shows a 14.72% average).

If you're not headed to Super Bowl XLV on Feb. 6, then the next best thing is watching it on a big-screen HDTV. So if you're in the market for a new set, you'll need to make sure it can deliver all the excitement of the Big Game itself.

Getting the right TV isn't as simple as just finding the right price. Sporting events like the Super Bowl can really bring out the best -- and worst -- in an HDTV by pushing it to its performance limits, revealing flaws that might go unnoticed with less-demanding types of content.

So here are a few things to consider when you're looking for a new TV for the Super Bowl:

Renting a car shouldn't drive you to the poorhouse or leave you spinning your wheels.


Save a bundle on your temporary ride by knowing your rental options, avoiding costly traps and hunting down discount offers.

We've demystified the process by laying out the costs for booking with:

• a national car rental company
• the car-sharing firm Zipcar
• a bargain-minded car rental aggregator
• an online travel site

An elaborate scheme that fooled prospective immigrants into paying hundreds of dollars in fees to a phony U.S. government agency has been shut down by the Federal Trade Commission.

The defendants, the FTC said, posed as the U.S. government to trick consumers into paying fees ranging from $200 to $2,500 to cover "processing fees" by what they referred to as the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services.

The real U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), a division of the Department of Homeland Security, offers advice and counseling to both immigrants and would-be immigrants. USCIS provides application forms for such benefits as Green Card renewal, work visas, and applications for asylum. The application forms are free, but can cost hundreds, even thousands, of dollars to process.

Back in December, we told you how the Federal Reserve paved the way for sweeping changes -- and likely reductions -- to the fees merchants pay banks for the privilege of accepting your debit card when you make a purchase. Exactly how much money banks stand to lose from this is an open question, especially because the Fed won't issue its final ruling until July, but that hasn't stopped one bank from dialing back its debit rewards program.

OK, we have the drop-dead gorgeous Madison Hildebrand who revealed on national TV that he's gay so now he gets fan mail from both sexes; the scruffy-bearded Josh Flagg who's best friends with his grandma who brought polyester to America; and now we have Josh Altman -- a.k.a The Shark.

Welcome to season four of Bravo's "Million Dollar Listing," which premieres Feb. 4, and is expected to top more than 1.2 million viewers per episode this season as the three rock stars of the high-end real estate world clash, close deals and clink glasses to celebrate -- only generally not with one another.

Tensions between the three are expected to be a large part of this season's drama. Truth is, the three of them are cut from distinctively different cloths and if there is any character casting to be had, figure Altman to be the aggressive cut-throater out to make a killing. In his own words -- "the shark." Speculation is he's the guy viewers will love to hate, a role that some say he relishes.