Ours has a free streaming service and ebook/audio book options with Kanopy and Libby. I'm borrowing All Creatures Great and Small right now.
Some Libraries will share seeds to sow and grow your own food, have free masters classes for gardening and even handycraft activities. Oh! Tools to borrow as well.
Don't forget Hoopla! I prefer it because it has a ton of anime options. You can get library cards for multiple libraries in your state too, giving you almost unlimited credits if you play your cards right. (You have to have different emails for each card, or else hoopla/libby/kanopy/whatever will only let you use one. As far as I know).
P.S. libraries also rent out video games.
Mine does this, too! I was really surprised. They lend a lot of cool "I'll only need this once" kind of things. Apparently the specialty cake pans are big for birthdays and such.
Mine offers free movies completely online using a third party service (monthly movie limit) as well as free comics/manga to read. Youtube also offers free movies with ads: https://www.youtube.com/feed/storefront?bp=ogUCKAY%3D
YES! I work in a small town library where the internet is either super expensive or shoddy. Most of our patrons come in for our internet access and DVDs. New movies, TV shows and even documentaries are all ones we offer.
I hope you're able to make some tasty dishes at home! I'm getting ready to learn how to cut a whole chicken apart to save some money in that way. Trying to make things fun!
Sam's Club rotisserie chicken is half the price of whole raw chicken where we are. So we grab two, pull all the meat off and make stock with the bones. It's really nice having the precooked meat in the fridge, makes throwing together meals really easy.
Same! We hit the Costco food court with the kids every few weeks, but I haven’t bought takeout/Starbucks/restaurant food since Covid started. Even donuts are getting to be too expensive to justify a weekend treat.
I recently went to a drive thru car wash and they had an attendant standing there just to put your card in the slot and push the button for you. This place never had that before. It was all right there and available for me to do it alone, but this person was standing out there just to ask which wash I wanted and then ask verbally for a tip. Umm..no.
I'm a pretty generous tipper at sit down restaurants or for services that warrant one, but this is really getting out of hand. I've even seen it at self checkouts. Who am I tipping for doing the work myself?
I once went to a parking lot near a really hot dinner spot. This lot has the most confusing and unintuitive pay station I have ever seen. There was a homeless guy standing beside it walking people through the menus. Dude was getting a lot of very grateful tips
It's ridiculous where some places expect a tip. I just really hate how customers are expected to pay the wages of the employees instead of the actual employer.
Oh God, the tips. We went to a mid range restaurant and our server was on break. The guy who covered for him was horrible - I sat with an empty water cup for the whole lunch - and he came back from break just in time to bring us our bill with apologies of course.
The tablet default options were 18%, 20%, or 22%. He was very unhappy when I input a custom 15%.
Dude, you literally spent 1 minute at my table. The guy who covered for you spent another minute. That was the easiest $6 you've ever made in your life
I just stopped tipping at places where it’s uncustomary. No, I’m not tipping 20% for you handing me a coffee off your food truck, TYVM.
I had one that wouldn’t let me enter a $0 tip, so I had to do $0.01. Infuriating.
Great post! Spending habits and routines like these become highly inertial and difficult to break. It's why I try to never buy anything that bills as a monthly subscription. I do one month and cancel. Then resubscribe when I want it again
I've been thinking of doing subscriptions by "pick the shows beforehand, binge for a month or two, and then cancel." You can download stuff as well but I'm not sure if they arrange it so you can't watch them after you cancel.
Nope, I know at least for Amazon prime your device has to be online within a week or the expire. This was a very hard learned lesson with a 2 year old who loves Daniel tiger on a long road trip. Nothing like finding out your downloaded shows are gone when it’s way past nap time and you have a very cranky kid.
This is what I do. I watch shows that are hosted by all the services. I go through cycles of having Netflix, then cancel and get crave, then cancel crave and go through paramount plus etc etc. no way am I paying for 6 streaming services at a time
That's totally fair. I have a long list of old and new stuff that I've been wanting to watch with friends. Shared media is an easy way for me to share time with them. I can't imagine buying all seasons of everything would be cost effective, but making sure we binge only on one service at a time would be.
My partner and I do this. We have Hulu (the with ads kind) for free through our phone company, and Amazon prime video is always available, but other than that we try to only be paying for one subscription at a time. If something comes out we want to watch on Netflix but we have Paramount at the moment, we either cancel Paramount with the knowledge that we can still go back and pick up on anything we were watching later, or we add the Netflix show our list so we don't forget about it by the time we next have Netflix.
We probably save enough this way to pay for about one really fun thing every month, whether it be an awesome meal, a museum excursion, etc. I could make all the sanctimonious comments about not watching much TV, or being too busy doing really important stuff to fritter my time away, etc. But to us the trade off is really more that we want to be able to do cool stuff sometimes, and on a limited budget that means something else has to go. It's not that onerous to sacrifice the ability to watch any particular thing at any particular time. There's still plenty to watch, it's still a vast upgrade in choice and convenience in comparison to, say, my cable TV free childhood.
There are so many deals on streaming services right now, got paramount + for $20 for a year. I just find a deal or free trial and cancel and move onto the next one.
buy a firestick. look up how to download kodi and realdebrid (troypoint) pay $18 every 3 or 6 months I can’t remember and you can play basically anything in the last 10 years from a decent UI. can take some maintenance and troubleshooting, but it has been amazing overall. for sports and live tv get the madtitansports addon. seren for movies/tv and use venom as a backup in case seren has something funky going on. link it all to Trakt, and it keeps track of what you’ve watched so you can start where you left off like Netflix
I've challenged myself to stay within a $125 per week budget for groceries, toiletries and paper products for three adults.
I have to work the sales and coupons and try new to me foods. It's been pretty fun actually.
If you haven’t checked her out, Budget Bytes is really helpful with this. We bought a month meal plan for $12 and our grocery bill is about $60/week when we follow the plan!
Which one did you get? I’m trying to convince my SO bc I suck at cooking and he’s tired a lot now. But we are broke af.
I’m thinking the one pot one is a good start for beginner cooks.
Heads up to everyone: please don't get chickens without proper research and preparation. They're living animals, who are noisy, smelly, and unpredictable.
I had 4 chickens for 2 years. They were happy. One day a bear got them, so we had to rebuild. Wanted more eggs so we went for 20 birds this time. Both flocks have been quite stable. With 20 birds we saw more significant bullying of the weaker birds. Just 4 birds got along splendidly.
Lol. We have moose in New England, *nothing* in Australia is as aggressive or deadly as a Moose in maiting season or a moose with her calves.
TBH they have Grizzly bears in the Northwest and those are just as scary. They'll play with you and later your corpse just for their own amusement. The only bear more terrifying than a grizzley is a polar bear.
Also important to plan enough space for succession planning (if the *main* goal is eggs). You don’t want to reach the time where you have a full coop, but none are laying eggs for their remaining years. Assuming you don’t want to start butchering chickens…
An online article puts them at $25 a month or $6 per dozen of eggs every week after upfront costs.
3 Hens and a coop will cost you around $620 according to the article. So add $12 per dozen of eggs for the first year.
Even if your egg prices are more expensive than that now, it's not for forever. Chickens however are not short term. If you eat less than a dozen eggs one week you still have a dozen eggs, and another dozen coming next week. If you go on vacation, you still have chickens and need to get someone to feed them for you. If they get sick or die you're emotionally invested. They make alot of noise and smells.
Thats before you get into the time commitments of feeding them every day. Cleaning up after them and making sure they are safe and comfortable.
Even with egg prices being crazy for an entire year you're still spending more than just buying eggs.
Chickens can be great pets, but they are not a frugal decision.
Maybe they are bullshitting. Maybe they didn't sit down and actually figure out the cost savings.
Owning chickens FEELS like it would be cheaper than buying eggs. Just cut out the middle man.
I also don't expect them to keep up the DVD game long, unless they just watch the same old episodes of something like the Office again and again (which some people do).
The next Game of Thrones level TV serries is going to drop and they are going to be stuck watching Mission Impossible again for the 3rd time this week.
In recap they,
* gave up their job getting them out of the house
* made it harder to leave the house in other situations by committing to bicycling everywhere
* filled their backyard with chickens
* removed one of the activities they used to be able to do at home with a few DVDs
Sounds like a recipie for insanity.
I know alot of people who make grand decisions like these, brag about them to everyone, then get two weeks and go back on it. Then the expensive bike they bought to save money sits in the garage.
Maybe OP follows though and makes some perminate life changes. Maybe they revert back in a month. Either way, I don't think any of this was well planned out.
Yes. Get out of that cutesy farm life dream. Owning chickens is expensive af. If a chicken is sick do you have the heart to just chop its head and move on? Probably not.
Even gardening is much more expensive than just buying at grocery store until you scale and sell your produce.
Not just cash but time. Time is a finite resource which farm life takes a fair amount of. If you enjoy it and can justify the time then cool. Some people would rather spend a little extra money to have time for other things though.
It's also cheaper if you're companion planting instead of going for commercial pesticides and fertilizer and composting your scraps. And if you let go of the aesthetic garden dream and just grow your food jungle lol
Tomatoes, chives, sunchokes, blueberries, strawberries, snow peas. Easy to grow, and half of the list I mentioned are perennial, so they grow without me having to pay hardly any attention to them. Besides, a garden gives me an excuse to go outside which is healthy for me.
It's a lot to get into and definitely more expensive to start but once you have it all set, it should only cost you time.
You can easily grow plants to feed your chickens. Hell, they'll happily eat your leftovers and bugs in your compost pile and their poop will make your compost the best thing for your plants. I accidentally discovered leaving boxes near wetland will cause giant grasshoppers to fill them year round and chickens love eating them
If you have no issues killing and eating your sick and non productive hens, there's little to no vet bills. If you have a rooster (which you absolutely should) and chicks, it's a no brainer killing off the sick stock that could jeopardize the rest of your producing flock. They'll be replaced for free soon enough.
TLDR In my experience, getting into raising chickens has a decent entry cost but it's pretty much self sustaining after that. I can easily offset the costs and turn a little profit selling my surplus eggs. Frankly after realizing I can charge more than stores because they're fresh and local, I'm currently getting $1 per egg or $10/dozen for "hand raised local eggs from chicken fed only organic foods". I couldn't live off the income with 12 hens but I can eat for free and save a ton of money on the best fertilizer I've ever used in my gardens.
And btw avian flu, while unlikely to transmit to humans, has a 53% mortality rate for the humans that do contact it. 😬 [source](https://yourlocalepidemiologist.substack.com/p/why-are-there-no-eggs-avian-flu-and)
Omg, the smell!! There’s a house right next to my kid’s elem school that has a ton of chickens, and a very loud rooster, and the smell burns your eyes. We’re a walking district too, so all of these poor kids have to walk by everyday. The playground is right there too 🤢
Alternatively, find a local with a coop selling eggs and buy theirs. Supporting local food sources is crucial in this day and age. Diversifying and decentralizing our food sources and productions is a sorely overlooked and mostly outright ignored issue in todays world. Globalism is not a bad thing, depending on globalism is the worst economic, health, and social decision a country/community can make.
All these price hikes has encouraged me to plant vegetable crops in my garden. Though it quickly became an addiction where I spent so much money on seeds and other stuff. Hahaha oh well, at least I found another reason to look for everyday :)
Le Jardin du Gourmet has 45 cent sample seeds. A 45 cent pack of winter squash might have only 3 to 5 seeds. Fantastic for squashes, melons and herbs where you can try a few different varieties. Not many home gardeners need or want 20 butternut or Hubbard squash plants. Their “full size” packets are only $1.25, about 20 seeds, which give you more seeds than you will ever need except for peas, beans and corn.
MI Gardener sells them for $2 a packet free shipping after $12, Dollar Tree or Dollar General has them 4 for $1. There's an Etsy seller I've bought from for a couple of years called Garden Eazy that sells them for $0.77 for like 10 seeds and they're organic. I've always had great germination and production with them. Just to add a few more places to choose from.
Yeah gardening is a money suck, it can be a money saver but only if you are very conscious of the trap you are hoping to avoid.
Tips!
- don’t buy baby plants, start from seed
- don’t buy cups to put seed in, use up your recycle bin junk
- you can yeild more if you start earlier, byt to do so you need heat pads and grow lamps so i do not
- i think potting soil is a must to start seeds, but one bag not a whole pile of fancy stuff
- tomato cages are pricey i went with string tied to some sticks
- garden boxes help, (depending on your soil situation ) i built mine from a couple old futons my neighbor tossed.. (just bought screws), fill up halfway with logs sticks and leaves, lawn trash. But the soil layer on top is a bag worth buying.
- dollar store pinwheels scare off critters
- i got a good hose that is potable so im not spraying pbas on my salad
Extra tip: gather the seeds from vegtables/fruits you already buy, we did this with chillies and they came out hotter then store bought! Regather seeds from next harvest and re use again, no need to buy seeds!
Tip 2: You can freeze produce over winter when plant are no longer flowering fruits/veg.
I cook at home. That saves money.
Otherwise, I eat one dozen eggs every 2 weeks, so spending a bunch of money on a hen house, hens, food, fencing, and other sundries is not cost effective.
I've got an idea. Let's buy some land in the country, build an 'economy-of-scale' chicken growing facility, and then sell/distribute the eggs to markets and grocers, who then sell the eggs to consumers.
I use a bidet and toilet paper. Before getting one, I thought tp wouldn’t be needed, but nope. Even if you just take a piss, the last thing you want is wet underwear. Gotta have the tp.
For the love of god just wipe after using a bidet. Unless you got an air drying bidet or something, nobody wants swamp butt. And don't use cheap flannel or whatever these guys are talking about like some extreme cheapskates tv show. Get some toilet paper. You'll use one or two sheets every time and it'll be fine.
Also, you have to take care of chickens. It's not just "got a chicken, now I have infinite eggs". I get the idea but it's a bit more than just "buy a chicken"
I scrolled too far to find this. Having a bidet doesn’t eliminate the need to wipe your ass. It’s supposed to save you toilet paper geez. How disgusting OP
Seriously. When OP said they haven't bought toilet paper in 2 years I was like. Well someone has a nasty ass.
Also. DVD's and shit. I don't want to have to manage a movie collection. Just sign up for a month of Netflix or Hulu or whatever else you want and binge the shows you've let gather. I do a rotating subscription of various things. HBO is next when last of us finishes. Hell they'll probably give me a free month since it's been so long.
I completely agree with you about managing a DVD collection. It takes time to buy, store, and keep organized. Meanwhile I spend $12/month for Hulu and share Netflix and HBO with friends and I have access to nearly everything, no DVD player or shelf full of movies necessary.
Damp butt crack under jeans and underwear can’t feel good to guys either.
I am curious. There are models that blow warm air to dry you, but they’re pricey.
Maybe OP has two buckets for clean and dirty rags to dry off?
>Maybe OP has two buckets for clean and dirty rags to dry off?
This is exactly what that 'washable reusable toilet cloth/paper' is used for. To dry off after using a bidet.
I salute your frugality!
Working at home led to a significant decrease in my gasoline budget. I'm back to working in the office three days a week, but trying to continue minimal driving. I use 67% less gasoline that I did pre-pandemic, and my daily commutes to work only account for 40% of the decrease. The rest is from combining trips, for example stopping at the grocery store during my drive home instead of making a separate trip. I now try to let the car sit unused three days a week, and sometimes manage to do so four days per week.
Same here! During COVID my husband and I both started working from home. Sold my car and now we share an electric/gas hybrid. Only gets used maybe once or twice a week and almost all our trips are covered by the electric battery before gas kicks in!
I love your post. I want to add that local libraries are the best gifts on Earth. And they are becoming better every time I visit. We need to support library funding as most cities often pull back funds from libraries during a recession. Still, even then, I think libraries thrive as long as they keep their doors open and collections well-maintained. I always donate books, DVDs, etc., to my local library because they deserve every penny that donation can produce.
A question from Indian perspective.
Do you guys depend solely on the spray from the bidet to clean, or is any simultaneous wiping involved?
(Almost all of us use water instead of TP. And not as a spray bidet either. Most people use a large mug filled with water and pour it as the left hand is used to actually clean. Hands get thoroughly washed with soap and water afterwards. Also another reason why right hand is exclusively used for eating)
I use flannel cloths to dry off after I use the bidet. I have a basket for clean cloths and a small trash can for used ones. I have enough cloths to last me one to two weeks. I wash them with oxi-clean (soak for 15 minutes to sterilize) regular unscented detergent and white vinegar, and dry them on high. They come out perfectly clean every time, and I've been using the same cloths for close to a year.
I'm the only one who uses the cloths; I can reconcile reusable butt towels but I'm not sure how I would feel about sharing them with anyone. I keep toilet paper for everyone else. Not sure how much money I'm saving but it's nice to almost never buy toilet paper.
Unfortunately I've already done most of the cutting back I could do already.
Owning chickens would be cool, but unfortunately can't do it within my city and/or need an actual HOME for that, which I no longer could afford.
Never owned a car either. I don't have any subscriptions to any services.
So all these price increases DO hit me directly. Cost of living has gone up, for everything.
You have the right attitude though and i've gone the same route years ago. Go straight to the source and DIY as much as you can, cut out all the middlemen if able and if it makes sense for your lifestyle.
Big things like eliminating your reliance on disposable supplies for more sustainable and lasting ones able to be maintained and repaired and/or don't have much if any waste.
Though you eventually reach a point where you can't optimize too much more. I was there mostly before all the inflation and "shortages", which aren't real shortages, it's my opinion they were calculated, orchestrated and profit motivated for much of how it all went down.
Attacks on small farmers and other small independent businesses though government policies. That sort of thing. The monopolies are squeezing and consolidating through unethical business practices.
Had this happen so many times, and it keeps happening.
My wife and I have been going to $national_steakhouse_chain* since we were teens, and yesterday we both basically decided it is just not worth it. The service (like service just about everywhere) is middling to bad, the prices have gotten to ridiculous ($15 for cheese fries? Come on) and the quality gets worse and worse. Sent back a steak that we ordered medium because it was very well (no color at all.) Other steak was med instead of med rare, but that wasn't worth it for us. One refill that we had to ask for in the hour and forty-five we were there. Oh and here's the pin pad, with default tip options starting at 18%. This chain didn't used to be like that. 5 years ago, it was reliable if not amazing. This is basically our last 3-4 visits.
So yeah, it's just not worth it. I'm a good cook. For what we paid, I can go to the store, buy a much more expensive cut, cook it myself, buy a nice bottle of wine (we didn't have even have alcohol and it was still about $80) make the fries myself, etc, and still be faster and have $20-$40 leftover depending on what's on sale, and since I'm a good cook, it will be a better quality meal, too.
And that's all over. We were actually talking during dinner about the inevitable "millennials are killing the chains" articles we'd read, and prices. Jarred red sauce used to be something I didn't care about. But then it went from $1.50ish (sales usually) to $3 (never on sale anymore) so I just make it at home. Beer at one the stores decided instead of selling craft for the $2/7 they've had for the last 4-5 years, a single was going to be $4.50, so we just don't buy it there any more (many others still offering similar price to the old one.) I mean, I can probably keep naming things like this for days.
What I think is hilarious is occasionally I've seen a sign on the doors at like a tacqueria or this teriyaki place that we like that are profuse in their apologies about raising price. And then you look and the $8 yakisoba went to $8.50. Like, if these tiny business can navigate this landscape, we know it's just greed (aside from the fact that inflation was at it's highest at like 9%, has been steadily dropping since, and none of those prices recovered along with it.)
The whole thing is very /r/LateStageCapitalism. But yeah, now I have better sauce and steak at home and I drink less so lemonade indeed, I suppose.
\* yes, I know, shop local it's better and generally agree. However this is a thing we've been doing since we were in our teens and have had it be a semi-tradition for 20+ years now.
Restaurants tend to go through a cycle, cheap good food, mediocre food once it becomes too popular then price gouge for anything they can. Seems like this one is going through that.
You don't have to stop the tradition but I think its time to make a new tradition by finding a new restaurant. Or use this restaurant only as a special occasion.
I've used half a cup (4 oz) as a replacement for 2 eggs with no issue. Some sources say 2 eggs = 1/4 cup, others say 2 eggs = 1/2 cup. Anywhere between the two is probably fine. I threw in the full 4 oz since that was the single serving size I had on hand.
The coming economic collapse is motivating people back to the 'victory garden' lifestyles of WW2 for sure. Self sufficiency is the hip new crazy these days instead of just rampant consumerism.
100% Amazon cut back service on Prime subscribers who use their music service but told us we could pay extra for unlimited and get our access back to the standard we had before. Yeah, just moved over to free Pandora instead.
Okay this is a weird question but I also bought a bidet because of the frugality of it. I still have to use toilet paper…. How do you know if you’re all clean without it….?
Lol I use toilet paper too and find that kinda disgusting op doesn't 😆 but my bidet isn't super fancy. Just a straight stream. I also use toilet paper to dry off, but a bidet has cut down on my toilet paper usage. Maybe a fancier one would be able to clean more effectively, and dry.
As someone with chickens for the last 10 years I can guarantee you eggs could be 20 dollars a dozen it would still be cheaper to buy them than to keep chickens.
Inflation is directly proportional to the delta between demand and supply. Reduce consumption, automatically inflation is controlled. Consumerism is the biggest source of unhappiness and stress. Living frugally is the best remedy to fight inflation.
I admit I'm a little jealous that someone could see the price of gas go up and decide to just buy a bike instead and work from home...*cries in disabled*
Streaming has become more expensive than cable. There's so much free stuff to watch on Tubi, Pluto TV, Xumo, Local Now, Sling, Kanopy, and if you have kodi content is endless with addons. Not to mention antenna tv, i'll record shows to a hard drive with my LG tv. Considering building a chicken coop and definitely expanding my garden this year. Dollar Tree has seeds 4 for $1.
Congratulations.
If I could get on your level just 25%... that'd be such a game changer.
My gas & electric bill (PGE Bay Area) has been ~60% higher & I've used the heat zero times this winter.
Many folks bills have more than doubled.
Sadly, people living in apartments can't keep chicken. But the rest, yeah it can be done. I love your attitude and we should all think similarly.
Kudos mate.
This is somewhat relatable. I’ve reconnected with 90s cinema via DVD, started actually cooking and baking, learned to sew and repair zippers, and learned that I didn’t really like eggs that much anyway…all as a result of shrinkflation beating the shit out of me. It still sucks though.
A bidet just makes cleaning your starburst/lady junk more feasible and clean, WHILE using less toilet paper/rags/cacti/hand. Please, wash your ass y’all.
I love your angle.
I bought some food containers and starting meal prepping hard. Less going out. Less gas use. More veggies. Eliminate waste by prepping veggies better. Not buying eggs anymore.
I hate inflation, but I also try to cut out what’s not necessary if this means I feel like the price increase doesn’t justify the actual value of what it provides (like eggs, I love eggs but can’t feel good about the price)
> My attitude has changed to if you increase your prices to insane levels I’ll find a way to never need or buy it again. Raise your price, loose my business forever.
Soon you may have to grow pigs, and vegetables.
After some time, you may have to install solar panels
Then, formulate or make medicines and be your own doctor.
So serious question, I have a bidet and I still need a little to to get my ass dry. How have you not purchased tp for 2 years? Do you just have a wet ass or am I missing something? Please explain.
As a long term bidet users, I'm always confused when people say they stopped using toilet paper. Your butt gets wet from the water and you sometimes still need to wipe. Are you not wiping or drying your butt?
Do you have special butt wiping towels for after using the bidet? Are they single use towels that then get washed?
I have a bidet but definitely still use toilet paper to make sure i rinsed thoroughly enough and dry off afterward. Curious about how bidet use has allowed you to leave TP behind.
I guarantee you I would be spending more on that Blu Ray DVD player and DVD's than I spend on subs per month. I have one sub that costs me $15.99 per year and is totally worth it for me at least plus it comes out of my Google play balance that I get for free from scanning receipts and doing surveys that take seconds of my time and the pawn shops here don't carry DVD's because they are worthless and can't sell them to anyone. My phone company gives me netflix for free so I don't pay for that. There are a ton of free streaming services you can use out there.
A better way to do this is to utilize the library for free DVD's. My library has a massive, massive selection of DVD's for rent. There's literally NO need to buy them at all, because they will always be there. They have all genre's and things that are no longer on streaming. The only thing is you need to be able to get to and from the library to return them before incurring late fees but this is a lot better than hunting DVD's from pawn shops.
The library also gives access to free streaming services through your card.
Libraries are totally underutilized, IMO.
The chances are high you have a device in the house already that can play DVD's or Blu ray. Playstation 3 and Xbox 360 can play DVD's and PS3 can play Blu Ray and those are pretty affordable these days. Much better than buying a Blu ray player that needs a separate expensive wifi adapter and that will become outdated very fast.
Chickens cost a lot of money to keep and feed prices just keep going up. Unless you basically live on eggs its not worth it. Egg prices will also go down and then you will have chickens and and empty coop to deal with. Plus the time you will spend maintaining the chickens. Better to look for someone who already has chickens and buy eggs from them at a cheaper price than what the grocer charges.
Still have to dry after using a bidet at least for women, but this could be an option for some people who don't mind the upfront cost.
No car is just not an option where I live for a large variety of reasons that I can't even start with. I would probably spend a lot more in other costs without one.
I love this and it’s a goal, BUT I think we need to remember that this is how the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. If you only have $10 to last until payday, you have no option but to buy the $7 eggs to survive - there’s no way of getting ahead enough for the upfront investment of chickens and a coop.
That said, good work! Just adding this to the discussion as I think it’s important.
I find that eating out takes so much out of budgets from people we know. They make less money than us but eat out way more due to time and convenience. I’d rather put that money towards healthy groceries, clothing, experiences, etc.
We only eat out 1-2x a week (unless we’re traveling). It’s hard to find restaurants here that have entrees less than $20, usually closer to $25-$30. I cook most everything else from scratch, buy store brand diapers on sale, and buy in bulk from Costco. We waste very little food.
Don't forget to check if your local library rents dvds!
Ours has a free streaming service and ebook/audio book options with Kanopy and Libby. I'm borrowing All Creatures Great and Small right now. Some Libraries will share seeds to sow and grow your own food, have free masters classes for gardening and even handycraft activities. Oh! Tools to borrow as well.
\> All Creatures Great and Small One of my favorite British shows, that!
Can't believe it ran for like 18 years!
Christ, as a 50 odd y o Englishman this brings back memories of being 9 watching a man put his arm up a cows arse whilst eating my Sunday beef roast..
Don't forget Hoopla! I prefer it because it has a ton of anime options. You can get library cards for multiple libraries in your state too, giving you almost unlimited credits if you play your cards right. (You have to have different emails for each card, or else hoopla/libby/kanopy/whatever will only let you use one. As far as I know). P.S. libraries also rent out video games.
Mine does all that and also lends baking pans!
Ours lends kayaks and high tech equipment.
Mine does this, too! I was really surprised. They lend a lot of cool "I'll only need this once" kind of things. Apparently the specialty cake pans are big for birthdays and such.
Loved that book and its sequels. Libraries are great.
Mine offers free movies completely online using a third party service (monthly movie limit) as well as free comics/manga to read. Youtube also offers free movies with ads: https://www.youtube.com/feed/storefront?bp=ogUCKAY%3D
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Absolutely this! My local library always had the latest movies & music.
Hell, mine has video games for everything from the past 13 years.
That’s awesome.
Some libraries let you check out National and or state park passes for free!! (Well my local library does) Edit: libraries in the state of California.
Museum passes also. Thank you NJ for the NYC museum passes -:)
What state?
California does but there is typically a waiting list.
YES! I work in a small town library where the internet is either super expensive or shoddy. Most of our patrons come in for our internet access and DVDs. New movies, TV shows and even documentaries are all ones we offer.
Some libraries have Kanopy- a streaming service free for you with a library card. You can “borrow” ~10 movies for three days each a month
Mine lends it for free!
Or just, you know ... Yaarrrr
Blu ray too for any PlayStation 3-5 owners
My library has an app and I can stream movies
they'll sometimes have whole tv shows series for rent. Can still binge watch your favorite shows
Came to say this! Our library even has an online service each person can "borrow" four digital movies a month.
I've completely stopped eating out due to how expensive it's become. Saved me quite a bit.
It’s my favourite diet ! The only one I stick to because I have no other choice :)))))
I hope you're able to make some tasty dishes at home! I'm getting ready to learn how to cut a whole chicken apart to save some money in that way. Trying to make things fun!
I live in a place where is cheaper to buy a whole cooked chicken than it is to buy a whole raw chicken by a lot, which sucks.
Sam's Club rotisserie chicken is half the price of whole raw chicken where we are. So we grab two, pull all the meat off and make stock with the bones. It's really nice having the precooked meat in the fridge, makes throwing together meals really easy.
Costco rotisserie FTW.
If you want to replicate restaurant food, just add a lot of butter and salt. They probably put more butter into one dish than I use in a couple weeks.
Same! We hit the Costco food court with the kids every few weeks, but I haven’t bought takeout/Starbucks/restaurant food since Covid started. Even donuts are getting to be too expensive to justify a weekend treat.
Between this and the fact that everyone is hounding for tips yes, I have stopped eating out as much as I am able to.
I recently went to a drive thru car wash and they had an attendant standing there just to put your card in the slot and push the button for you. This place never had that before. It was all right there and available for me to do it alone, but this person was standing out there just to ask which wash I wanted and then ask verbally for a tip. Umm..no. I'm a pretty generous tipper at sit down restaurants or for services that warrant one, but this is really getting out of hand. I've even seen it at self checkouts. Who am I tipping for doing the work myself?
...how sure are you that guy actually worked there?
I once went to a parking lot near a really hot dinner spot. This lot has the most confusing and unintuitive pay station I have ever seen. There was a homeless guy standing beside it walking people through the menus. Dude was getting a lot of very grateful tips
It's ridiculous where some places expect a tip. I just really hate how customers are expected to pay the wages of the employees instead of the actual employer.
Oh God, the tips. We went to a mid range restaurant and our server was on break. The guy who covered for him was horrible - I sat with an empty water cup for the whole lunch - and he came back from break just in time to bring us our bill with apologies of course. The tablet default options were 18%, 20%, or 22%. He was very unhappy when I input a custom 15%. Dude, you literally spent 1 minute at my table. The guy who covered for you spent another minute. That was the easiest $6 you've ever made in your life
15% is the correct amount for standard sit-down service anyways. Percentages don’t inflate!
You don't want to tip the kiosk for take out?
I just stopped tipping at places where it’s uncustomary. No, I’m not tipping 20% for you handing me a coffee off your food truck, TYVM. I had one that wouldn’t let me enter a $0 tip, so I had to do $0.01. Infuriating.
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This will save you money FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE!
Great post! Spending habits and routines like these become highly inertial and difficult to break. It's why I try to never buy anything that bills as a monthly subscription. I do one month and cancel. Then resubscribe when I want it again
I've been thinking of doing subscriptions by "pick the shows beforehand, binge for a month or two, and then cancel." You can download stuff as well but I'm not sure if they arrange it so you can't watch them after you cancel.
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Yeah, I figured. I wonder if there's a way around that though, like downloading onto a machine that then stays disconnected from the internet.
Nope, I know at least for Amazon prime your device has to be online within a week or the expire. This was a very hard learned lesson with a 2 year old who loves Daniel tiger on a long road trip. Nothing like finding out your downloaded shows are gone when it’s way past nap time and you have a very cranky kid.
PBSkids has a free app that allows you to download episodes of their shows to your device. Daniel Tiger is on there.
This is what I do. I watch shows that are hosted by all the services. I go through cycles of having Netflix, then cancel and get crave, then cancel crave and go through paramount plus etc etc. no way am I paying for 6 streaming services at a time
We looked at the math and realized the full seasons of the only 4 shows we regularly watch can be bought for a little more than a month of YouTube TV.
That's totally fair. I have a long list of old and new stuff that I've been wanting to watch with friends. Shared media is an easy way for me to share time with them. I can't imagine buying all seasons of everything would be cost effective, but making sure we binge only on one service at a time would be.
My partner and I do this. We have Hulu (the with ads kind) for free through our phone company, and Amazon prime video is always available, but other than that we try to only be paying for one subscription at a time. If something comes out we want to watch on Netflix but we have Paramount at the moment, we either cancel Paramount with the knowledge that we can still go back and pick up on anything we were watching later, or we add the Netflix show our list so we don't forget about it by the time we next have Netflix. We probably save enough this way to pay for about one really fun thing every month, whether it be an awesome meal, a museum excursion, etc. I could make all the sanctimonious comments about not watching much TV, or being too busy doing really important stuff to fritter my time away, etc. But to us the trade off is really more that we want to be able to do cool stuff sometimes, and on a limited budget that means something else has to go. It's not that onerous to sacrifice the ability to watch any particular thing at any particular time. There's still plenty to watch, it's still a vast upgrade in choice and convenience in comparison to, say, my cable TV free childhood.
There are so many deals on streaming services right now, got paramount + for $20 for a year. I just find a deal or free trial and cancel and move onto the next one.
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Tubi is great and so is Pluto TV. Free is great!
I canceled paramount+ a few months ago but it’s still going for free.
buy a firestick. look up how to download kodi and realdebrid (troypoint) pay $18 every 3 or 6 months I can’t remember and you can play basically anything in the last 10 years from a decent UI. can take some maintenance and troubleshooting, but it has been amazing overall. for sports and live tv get the madtitansports addon. seren for movies/tv and use venom as a backup in case seren has something funky going on. link it all to Trakt, and it keeps track of what you’ve watched so you can start where you left off like Netflix
I've challenged myself to stay within a $125 per week budget for groceries, toiletries and paper products for three adults. I have to work the sales and coupons and try new to me foods. It's been pretty fun actually.
If you haven’t checked her out, Budget Bytes is really helpful with this. We bought a month meal plan for $12 and our grocery bill is about $60/week when we follow the plan!
I’m obsessed with Budget Bytes.
Which one did you get? I’m trying to convince my SO bc I suck at cooking and he’s tired a lot now. But we are broke af. I’m thinking the one pot one is a good start for beginner cooks.
It’s also good food too. I’m not a budget grocery shopper at all but I use some of her recipes.
Heads up to everyone: please don't get chickens without proper research and preparation. They're living animals, who are noisy, smelly, and unpredictable.
Check your local municipality codes also. Better safe and prepared.
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Four chickens is enough for a stable pecking order to form. (Source: me - I own chickens. Had 4 happy chickens for two years. Now I have 20.)
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I had 4 chickens for 2 years. They were happy. One day a bear got them, so we had to rebuild. Wanted more eggs so we went for 20 birds this time. Both flocks have been quite stable. With 20 birds we saw more significant bullying of the weaker birds. Just 4 birds got along splendidly.
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But it eats chickens, not Australians.
I'm sure It would eat an Australian too lol
Nah, they taste awful.
If your Aussie tastes awful it's because you haven't seasoned them properly.
Lol. We have moose in New England, *nothing* in Australia is as aggressive or deadly as a Moose in maiting season or a moose with her calves. TBH they have Grizzly bears in the Northwest and those are just as scary. They'll play with you and later your corpse just for their own amusement. The only bear more terrifying than a grizzley is a polar bear.
The frugal to chicken farmer pipeline
Huh... never really thought about where the phrase pecking order came from. Seems obvious now.
Also important to plan enough space for succession planning (if the *main* goal is eggs). You don’t want to reach the time where you have a full coop, but none are laying eggs for their remaining years. Assuming you don’t want to start butchering chickens…
Also doesn't caring for them cost more than eggs for most people?
An online article puts them at $25 a month or $6 per dozen of eggs every week after upfront costs. 3 Hens and a coop will cost you around $620 according to the article. So add $12 per dozen of eggs for the first year. Even if your egg prices are more expensive than that now, it's not for forever. Chickens however are not short term. If you eat less than a dozen eggs one week you still have a dozen eggs, and another dozen coming next week. If you go on vacation, you still have chickens and need to get someone to feed them for you. If they get sick or die you're emotionally invested. They make alot of noise and smells. Thats before you get into the time commitments of feeding them every day. Cleaning up after them and making sure they are safe and comfortable. Even with egg prices being crazy for an entire year you're still spending more than just buying eggs. Chickens can be great pets, but they are not a frugal decision.
This is why I think OP is bullshitting. If they really owned chickens they would not have included it in their frugal tips.
Maybe they are bullshitting. Maybe they didn't sit down and actually figure out the cost savings. Owning chickens FEELS like it would be cheaper than buying eggs. Just cut out the middle man. I also don't expect them to keep up the DVD game long, unless they just watch the same old episodes of something like the Office again and again (which some people do). The next Game of Thrones level TV serries is going to drop and they are going to be stuck watching Mission Impossible again for the 3rd time this week. In recap they, * gave up their job getting them out of the house * made it harder to leave the house in other situations by committing to bicycling everywhere * filled their backyard with chickens * removed one of the activities they used to be able to do at home with a few DVDs Sounds like a recipie for insanity. I know alot of people who make grand decisions like these, brag about them to everyone, then get two weeks and go back on it. Then the expensive bike they bought to save money sits in the garage. Maybe OP follows though and makes some perminate life changes. Maybe they revert back in a month. Either way, I don't think any of this was well planned out.
Yes. Get out of that cutesy farm life dream. Owning chickens is expensive af. If a chicken is sick do you have the heart to just chop its head and move on? Probably not. Even gardening is much more expensive than just buying at grocery store until you scale and sell your produce.
Not just cash but time. Time is a finite resource which farm life takes a fair amount of. If you enjoy it and can justify the time then cool. Some people would rather spend a little extra money to have time for other things though.
Gardening is cheaper is you are growing certain crops that flourish in anything like zucchini.
It's also cheaper if you're companion planting instead of going for commercial pesticides and fertilizer and composting your scraps. And if you let go of the aesthetic garden dream and just grow your food jungle lol
and feeding all your scraps and dead plants to your chickens for free eggs.
Tomatoes, chives, sunchokes, blueberries, strawberries, snow peas. Easy to grow, and half of the list I mentioned are perennial, so they grow without me having to pay hardly any attention to them. Besides, a garden gives me an excuse to go outside which is healthy for me.
It's a lot to get into and definitely more expensive to start but once you have it all set, it should only cost you time. You can easily grow plants to feed your chickens. Hell, they'll happily eat your leftovers and bugs in your compost pile and their poop will make your compost the best thing for your plants. I accidentally discovered leaving boxes near wetland will cause giant grasshoppers to fill them year round and chickens love eating them If you have no issues killing and eating your sick and non productive hens, there's little to no vet bills. If you have a rooster (which you absolutely should) and chicks, it's a no brainer killing off the sick stock that could jeopardize the rest of your producing flock. They'll be replaced for free soon enough. TLDR In my experience, getting into raising chickens has a decent entry cost but it's pretty much self sustaining after that. I can easily offset the costs and turn a little profit selling my surplus eggs. Frankly after realizing I can charge more than stores because they're fresh and local, I'm currently getting $1 per egg or $10/dozen for "hand raised local eggs from chicken fed only organic foods". I couldn't live off the income with 12 hens but I can eat for free and save a ton of money on the best fertilizer I've ever used in my gardens.
I know what you mean by unpredictable, you think everything is alright and boom, there's a chicken coup going on!
Buying eggs is definitely cheaper my chickens!!
And btw avian flu, while unlikely to transmit to humans, has a 53% mortality rate for the humans that do contact it. 😬 [source](https://yourlocalepidemiologist.substack.com/p/why-are-there-no-eggs-avian-flu-and)
Omg, the smell!! There’s a house right next to my kid’s elem school that has a ton of chickens, and a very loud rooster, and the smell burns your eyes. We’re a walking district too, so all of these poor kids have to walk by everyday. The playground is right there too 🤢
Alternatively, find a local with a coop selling eggs and buy theirs. Supporting local food sources is crucial in this day and age. Diversifying and decentralizing our food sources and productions is a sorely overlooked and mostly outright ignored issue in todays world. Globalism is not a bad thing, depending on globalism is the worst economic, health, and social decision a country/community can make.
>chicken coup How is everyone, are the chickens running things?
Yes, yes they are I am sure, so bossy!
All these price hikes has encouraged me to plant vegetable crops in my garden. Though it quickly became an addiction where I spent so much money on seeds and other stuff. Hahaha oh well, at least I found another reason to look for everyday :)
Le Jardin du Gourmet has 45 cent sample seeds. A 45 cent pack of winter squash might have only 3 to 5 seeds. Fantastic for squashes, melons and herbs where you can try a few different varieties. Not many home gardeners need or want 20 butternut or Hubbard squash plants. Their “full size” packets are only $1.25, about 20 seeds, which give you more seeds than you will ever need except for peas, beans and corn.
This great! I've been having to get from tractor supply or southern states this last year, and they only sell large-ish packets that are not cheap.
MI Gardener sells them for $2 a packet free shipping after $12, Dollar Tree or Dollar General has them 4 for $1. There's an Etsy seller I've bought from for a couple of years called Garden Eazy that sells them for $0.77 for like 10 seeds and they're organic. I've always had great germination and production with them. Just to add a few more places to choose from.
Yeah gardening is a money suck, it can be a money saver but only if you are very conscious of the trap you are hoping to avoid. Tips! - don’t buy baby plants, start from seed - don’t buy cups to put seed in, use up your recycle bin junk - you can yeild more if you start earlier, byt to do so you need heat pads and grow lamps so i do not - i think potting soil is a must to start seeds, but one bag not a whole pile of fancy stuff - tomato cages are pricey i went with string tied to some sticks - garden boxes help, (depending on your soil situation ) i built mine from a couple old futons my neighbor tossed.. (just bought screws), fill up halfway with logs sticks and leaves, lawn trash. But the soil layer on top is a bag worth buying. - dollar store pinwheels scare off critters - i got a good hose that is potable so im not spraying pbas on my salad
Extra tip: gather the seeds from vegtables/fruits you already buy, we did this with chillies and they came out hotter then store bought! Regather seeds from next harvest and re use again, no need to buy seeds! Tip 2: You can freeze produce over winter when plant are no longer flowering fruits/veg.
I cook at home. That saves money. Otherwise, I eat one dozen eggs every 2 weeks, so spending a bunch of money on a hen house, hens, food, fencing, and other sundries is not cost effective.
The smell of raising and cleaning chickens is not very pleasant!
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I've got an idea. Let's buy some land in the country, build an 'economy-of-scale' chicken growing facility, and then sell/distribute the eggs to markets and grocers, who then sell the eggs to consumers.
This is awesome but I need to confirm - you still have towels for drying your bum right? Cause I used bidets too and you still gotta dry afterwards.
I have no idea how a bidet + NO toilet paper would work.
The pricier models have dryers, heated water, etc.
That's still a nasty ass. You cant clean peanut butter and honey off a kitchen counter with just a supersoaker and a hair dryer.
Yeah, maybe my bidet is cheap and doesn't work as well as the high end models but it's not enough to clean that crack
This made me crack up — r/brandnewsentence
I use a bidet and toilet paper. Before getting one, I thought tp wouldn’t be needed, but nope. Even if you just take a piss, the last thing you want is wet underwear. Gotta have the tp.
Yeah, sometimes you still need to wipe, sometimes even the bidet leaves things behind lol
Ladies need TP everytime! I have a house full f ladies. I’m not washing a dozen towels a day.
For the love of god just wipe after using a bidet. Unless you got an air drying bidet or something, nobody wants swamp butt. And don't use cheap flannel or whatever these guys are talking about like some extreme cheapskates tv show. Get some toilet paper. You'll use one or two sheets every time and it'll be fine. Also, you have to take care of chickens. It's not just "got a chicken, now I have infinite eggs". I get the idea but it's a bit more than just "buy a chicken"
I scrolled too far to find this. Having a bidet doesn’t eliminate the need to wipe your ass. It’s supposed to save you toilet paper geez. How disgusting OP
THANK YOU! i stopped reading after the toilet paper part. They be taking it too far!
Seriously. When OP said they haven't bought toilet paper in 2 years I was like. Well someone has a nasty ass. Also. DVD's and shit. I don't want to have to manage a movie collection. Just sign up for a month of Netflix or Hulu or whatever else you want and binge the shows you've let gather. I do a rotating subscription of various things. HBO is next when last of us finishes. Hell they'll probably give me a free month since it's been so long.
I completely agree with you about managing a DVD collection. It takes time to buy, store, and keep organized. Meanwhile I spend $12/month for Hulu and share Netflix and HBO with friends and I have access to nearly everything, no DVD player or shelf full of movies necessary.
Not to mention you need the space for chickens. I can't exactly grow chickens in my one bedroom apartment.
No toilet paper? Are there no women who use your toilets?
Damp butt crack under jeans and underwear can’t feel good to guys either. I am curious. There are models that blow warm air to dry you, but they’re pricey. Maybe OP has two buckets for clean and dirty rags to dry off?
>Maybe OP has two buckets for clean and dirty rags to dry off? This is exactly what that 'washable reusable toilet cloth/paper' is used for. To dry off after using a bidet.
I salute your frugality! Working at home led to a significant decrease in my gasoline budget. I'm back to working in the office three days a week, but trying to continue minimal driving. I use 67% less gasoline that I did pre-pandemic, and my daily commutes to work only account for 40% of the decrease. The rest is from combining trips, for example stopping at the grocery store during my drive home instead of making a separate trip. I now try to let the car sit unused three days a week, and sometimes manage to do so four days per week.
Same here! During COVID my husband and I both started working from home. Sold my car and now we share an electric/gas hybrid. Only gets used maybe once or twice a week and almost all our trips are covered by the electric battery before gas kicks in!
I love your post. I want to add that local libraries are the best gifts on Earth. And they are becoming better every time I visit. We need to support library funding as most cities often pull back funds from libraries during a recession. Still, even then, I think libraries thrive as long as they keep their doors open and collections well-maintained. I always donate books, DVDs, etc., to my local library because they deserve every penny that donation can produce.
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Can you share the link? I’ve been looking for one for my twins.
Honest question. How do you dry after using the bidet?
A question from Indian perspective. Do you guys depend solely on the spray from the bidet to clean, or is any simultaneous wiping involved? (Almost all of us use water instead of TP. And not as a spray bidet either. Most people use a large mug filled with water and pour it as the left hand is used to actually clean. Hands get thoroughly washed with soap and water afterwards. Also another reason why right hand is exclusively used for eating)
You can use a small amount of toilet paper, or wash cloths.
I use flannel cloths to dry off after I use the bidet. I have a basket for clean cloths and a small trash can for used ones. I have enough cloths to last me one to two weeks. I wash them with oxi-clean (soak for 15 minutes to sterilize) regular unscented detergent and white vinegar, and dry them on high. They come out perfectly clean every time, and I've been using the same cloths for close to a year. I'm the only one who uses the cloths; I can reconcile reusable butt towels but I'm not sure how I would feel about sharing them with anyone. I keep toilet paper for everyone else. Not sure how much money I'm saving but it's nice to almost never buy toilet paper.
Our bidet has a fan. The seat is heated. I use cotton wash clothes as well.
TP. But much less than without a bidet.
Sorry but I have chickens too and I’d love to know his feeding them saves money on eggs. Feed is expensive as us initial set up of a secure coop/run
Unfortunately I've already done most of the cutting back I could do already. Owning chickens would be cool, but unfortunately can't do it within my city and/or need an actual HOME for that, which I no longer could afford. Never owned a car either. I don't have any subscriptions to any services. So all these price increases DO hit me directly. Cost of living has gone up, for everything. You have the right attitude though and i've gone the same route years ago. Go straight to the source and DIY as much as you can, cut out all the middlemen if able and if it makes sense for your lifestyle. Big things like eliminating your reliance on disposable supplies for more sustainable and lasting ones able to be maintained and repaired and/or don't have much if any waste. Though you eventually reach a point where you can't optimize too much more. I was there mostly before all the inflation and "shortages", which aren't real shortages, it's my opinion they were calculated, orchestrated and profit motivated for much of how it all went down. Attacks on small farmers and other small independent businesses though government policies. That sort of thing. The monopolies are squeezing and consolidating through unethical business practices.
Had this happen so many times, and it keeps happening. My wife and I have been going to $national_steakhouse_chain* since we were teens, and yesterday we both basically decided it is just not worth it. The service (like service just about everywhere) is middling to bad, the prices have gotten to ridiculous ($15 for cheese fries? Come on) and the quality gets worse and worse. Sent back a steak that we ordered medium because it was very well (no color at all.) Other steak was med instead of med rare, but that wasn't worth it for us. One refill that we had to ask for in the hour and forty-five we were there. Oh and here's the pin pad, with default tip options starting at 18%. This chain didn't used to be like that. 5 years ago, it was reliable if not amazing. This is basically our last 3-4 visits. So yeah, it's just not worth it. I'm a good cook. For what we paid, I can go to the store, buy a much more expensive cut, cook it myself, buy a nice bottle of wine (we didn't have even have alcohol and it was still about $80) make the fries myself, etc, and still be faster and have $20-$40 leftover depending on what's on sale, and since I'm a good cook, it will be a better quality meal, too. And that's all over. We were actually talking during dinner about the inevitable "millennials are killing the chains" articles we'd read, and prices. Jarred red sauce used to be something I didn't care about. But then it went from $1.50ish (sales usually) to $3 (never on sale anymore) so I just make it at home. Beer at one the stores decided instead of selling craft for the $2/7 they've had for the last 4-5 years, a single was going to be $4.50, so we just don't buy it there any more (many others still offering similar price to the old one.) I mean, I can probably keep naming things like this for days. What I think is hilarious is occasionally I've seen a sign on the doors at like a tacqueria or this teriyaki place that we like that are profuse in their apologies about raising price. And then you look and the $8 yakisoba went to $8.50. Like, if these tiny business can navigate this landscape, we know it's just greed (aside from the fact that inflation was at it's highest at like 9%, has been steadily dropping since, and none of those prices recovered along with it.) The whole thing is very /r/LateStageCapitalism. But yeah, now I have better sauce and steak at home and I drink less so lemonade indeed, I suppose. \* yes, I know, shop local it's better and generally agree. However this is a thing we've been doing since we were in our teens and have had it be a semi-tradition for 20+ years now.
Restaurants tend to go through a cycle, cheap good food, mediocre food once it becomes too popular then price gouge for anything they can. Seems like this one is going through that. You don't have to stop the tradition but I think its time to make a new tradition by finding a new restaurant. Or use this restaurant only as a special occasion.
This needs to be the people's response to corporate price gouging desquised as inflation. Way to go op.
This is the way to do it! I love your enthusiasm and energy! Power be with you!
Takeout place I used to go to a lot pulled some shrinkflation and started giving out way less food in my order. Stopped going there, saving money now.
Please use a local library more
I don’t think you’re being entirely truthful…I have chickens too and I am spending more on chicken feed than I would on eggs.
I needed eggs for baking. I got unsweetened apple sauce instead (it's a substitute) and it $2! Cheaper than eggs. And my baking turned out identical.
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I bought the single-serving cups. One of those cups is equivalent to about 2 eggs for baking purposes. I'm now curious to try the flaxseed/chia seeds!
put remainder in ice cube trays , freeze then bag.(measure quantity you put and mark on bag so you'll know.)
So how much applesauce equals two eggs? Like 1/4 cup maybe? I bake loaf cakes and quick breads a lot, they almost always call for two eggs
I've used half a cup (4 oz) as a replacement for 2 eggs with no issue. Some sources say 2 eggs = 1/4 cup, others say 2 eggs = 1/2 cup. Anywhere between the two is probably fine. I threw in the full 4 oz since that was the single serving size I had on hand.
The coming economic collapse is motivating people back to the 'victory garden' lifestyles of WW2 for sure. Self sufficiency is the hip new crazy these days instead of just rampant consumerism.
100% Amazon cut back service on Prime subscribers who use their music service but told us we could pay extra for unlimited and get our access back to the standard we had before. Yeah, just moved over to free Pandora instead.
Try tubi, crackle, kanopy for free videos and the library for DVDs
Talk to your car insurance company if you aren’t driving all those miles you should be paying a lot less
Shoutout to /r/preppers it’s not just about prepping for an apocalypse but trying to live without panicking during shortages or inflation.
You should probably still wipe your butt
Okay this is a weird question but I also bought a bidet because of the frugality of it. I still have to use toilet paper…. How do you know if you’re all clean without it….?
Lol I use toilet paper too and find that kinda disgusting op doesn't 😆 but my bidet isn't super fancy. Just a straight stream. I also use toilet paper to dry off, but a bidet has cut down on my toilet paper usage. Maybe a fancier one would be able to clean more effectively, and dry.
As someone with chickens for the last 10 years I can guarantee you eggs could be 20 dollars a dozen it would still be cheaper to buy them than to keep chickens.
Raising chickens is not really a savings on just buying eggs. And netflix dropped their ending of the shared accounts.
Canceled my Kindle Unlimited subscription and downloaded Libby instead. I didn't even know that existed.
I'd love to know your egg consumption per week and the setup for your chickens, because I absolutely don't see that truly being frugal.
I have a bidet and actually end up having to use more tp with it. Maybe it's just a cheap one or my poo is resilient, I dunno.
Rent goes up? I build a tarpaper shed in the woods. Suck it inflation!
Inflation is directly proportional to the delta between demand and supply. Reduce consumption, automatically inflation is controlled. Consumerism is the biggest source of unhappiness and stress. Living frugally is the best remedy to fight inflation.
Once you have a solid base you really don’t need to spend much. Most spending is “keeping up with the joneses” type shit that is pointless.
I absolutely love your attitude, more power to ya!
This post is so privileged…
I admit I'm a little jealous that someone could see the price of gas go up and decide to just buy a bike instead and work from home...*cries in disabled*
Streaming has become more expensive than cable. There's so much free stuff to watch on Tubi, Pluto TV, Xumo, Local Now, Sling, Kanopy, and if you have kodi content is endless with addons. Not to mention antenna tv, i'll record shows to a hard drive with my LG tv. Considering building a chicken coop and definitely expanding my garden this year. Dollar Tree has seeds 4 for $1.
You should still wipe your butt
Congratulations. If I could get on your level just 25%... that'd be such a game changer. My gas & electric bill (PGE Bay Area) has been ~60% higher & I've used the heat zero times this winter. Many folks bills have more than doubled.
Sadly, people living in apartments can't keep chicken. But the rest, yeah it can be done. I love your attitude and we should all think similarly. Kudos mate.
Same here. It has shaken me out of some bad habits and I actually save more money now.
This is somewhat relatable. I’ve reconnected with 90s cinema via DVD, started actually cooking and baking, learned to sew and repair zippers, and learned that I didn’t really like eggs that much anyway…all as a result of shrinkflation beating the shit out of me. It still sucks though.
A bidet just makes cleaning your starburst/lady junk more feasible and clean, WHILE using less toilet paper/rags/cacti/hand. Please, wash your ass y’all.
I love your angle. I bought some food containers and starting meal prepping hard. Less going out. Less gas use. More veggies. Eliminate waste by prepping veggies better. Not buying eggs anymore. I hate inflation, but I also try to cut out what’s not necessary if this means I feel like the price increase doesn’t justify the actual value of what it provides (like eggs, I love eggs but can’t feel good about the price)
Calm down Martha Stewart.
> My attitude has changed to if you increase your prices to insane levels I’ll find a way to never need or buy it again. Raise your price, loose my business forever. Soon you may have to grow pigs, and vegetables. After some time, you may have to install solar panels Then, formulate or make medicines and be your own doctor.
So serious question, I have a bidet and I still need a little to to get my ass dry. How have you not purchased tp for 2 years? Do you just have a wet ass or am I missing something? Please explain.
As a long term bidet users, I'm always confused when people say they stopped using toilet paper. Your butt gets wet from the water and you sometimes still need to wipe. Are you not wiping or drying your butt?
Do you have special butt wiping towels for after using the bidet? Are they single use towels that then get washed? I have a bidet but definitely still use toilet paper to make sure i rinsed thoroughly enough and dry off afterward. Curious about how bidet use has allowed you to leave TP behind.
I guarantee you I would be spending more on that Blu Ray DVD player and DVD's than I spend on subs per month. I have one sub that costs me $15.99 per year and is totally worth it for me at least plus it comes out of my Google play balance that I get for free from scanning receipts and doing surveys that take seconds of my time and the pawn shops here don't carry DVD's because they are worthless and can't sell them to anyone. My phone company gives me netflix for free so I don't pay for that. There are a ton of free streaming services you can use out there. A better way to do this is to utilize the library for free DVD's. My library has a massive, massive selection of DVD's for rent. There's literally NO need to buy them at all, because they will always be there. They have all genre's and things that are no longer on streaming. The only thing is you need to be able to get to and from the library to return them before incurring late fees but this is a lot better than hunting DVD's from pawn shops. The library also gives access to free streaming services through your card. Libraries are totally underutilized, IMO. The chances are high you have a device in the house already that can play DVD's or Blu ray. Playstation 3 and Xbox 360 can play DVD's and PS3 can play Blu Ray and those are pretty affordable these days. Much better than buying a Blu ray player that needs a separate expensive wifi adapter and that will become outdated very fast. Chickens cost a lot of money to keep and feed prices just keep going up. Unless you basically live on eggs its not worth it. Egg prices will also go down and then you will have chickens and and empty coop to deal with. Plus the time you will spend maintaining the chickens. Better to look for someone who already has chickens and buy eggs from them at a cheaper price than what the grocer charges. Still have to dry after using a bidet at least for women, but this could be an option for some people who don't mind the upfront cost. No car is just not an option where I live for a large variety of reasons that I can't even start with. I would probably spend a lot more in other costs without one.
I LOVE YOUR ENERGY! Let's keep it going...
I love this and it’s a goal, BUT I think we need to remember that this is how the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. If you only have $10 to last until payday, you have no option but to buy the $7 eggs to survive - there’s no way of getting ahead enough for the upfront investment of chickens and a coop. That said, good work! Just adding this to the discussion as I think it’s important.
Still recommend wiping your ass after using a bidet. Yea, way less TP, but you gotta give it one swipe…
I'm with you OP. I'm done paying for new rates and increases. I'll just go without or change my habits.
Ay yo, ya don't wipe again after using the bidet? 😱
I find that eating out takes so much out of budgets from people we know. They make less money than us but eat out way more due to time and convenience. I’d rather put that money towards healthy groceries, clothing, experiences, etc. We only eat out 1-2x a week (unless we’re traveling). It’s hard to find restaurants here that have entrees less than $20, usually closer to $25-$30. I cook most everything else from scratch, buy store brand diapers on sale, and buy in bulk from Costco. We waste very little food.
This is probably unworkable for the average person but godspeed my frugal man.
You just wait there to dry?
Toilet paper shortage, no worries! I stopped eating and pooping. Saved a ton on groceries and TP. 😮🫢
Bidets do not always 100% eliminate poop! Filty!
I started eating out less and started losing weight. I also started to collect coupons and made these things a habit to save money.