Page 4 of 5 FirstFirst ... 2345 LastLast
Results 31 to 40 of 42

Thread: March Frugals!

  1. #31
    Senior Member SteveinMN's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2012
    Location
    Saint Paul, Minnesota
    Posts
    6,618
    Congratulations on the "graduation", rosa!

    It's been a couple of hectic weeks here but we still managed some frugality.

    - Getting toward the end of emptying the freezers. This week we ate spare ribs (which were marked down when I got them) on sauerkraut which someone else was giving away. The other couple of ingredients were easy to find around the house.
    - Time for new heartworm and flea/tick treatments for the dog. Pursuant to the thread on mail-order pet meds, maybe we should be ordering these on-line, but the couple of times I checked, their prices were competitive with our vet's prices and I'd rather support him -- he's been good to us. At least I bought them in quantities which qualified us for rebates.
    - DW dunked her phone a couple of weeks ago; it was deemed irreparable. So we ordered a replacement. The entire customer service experience was so bad, though, that when the "tell us how we did" survey invitation arrived, I let loose. A couple of days later I got a call from the manager of the place where we took the phone. Apparently I was so detailed about exactly what went wrong that she wanted to use my experience as a guide to improving customer service. And, to thank me, she offered to cover a good portion of the cost of the replacement (!). I cannot complain about that. I picked up the phone earlier this week and all is well.
    - In preparation for a friend's funeral, I had a bunch of digital pictures to print. Since we print maybe 30 pages a year on our printer, I don't have photo paper and good ink hanging around, so I print at a local camera store. The family and I were talking 5x7 prints for one item, but I learned that there (and elsewhere; I comparison-shopped) printing 4x6s would cost 1/12th the price of printing 5x7. The image still is big enough for its intended purpose and I saved a bundle.
    - When life slows down a bit more we're going to an independent insurance agent to move our auto/homeowner's/umbrella insurance. We should save at least $400 this year. I'm sure rates will go up next year, but they marched up inexorably with our current carrier, so we might as well move back to a lower price and then get ready to switch in another couple of years.
    Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has overcome. - Booker T. Washington

  2. #32
    Senior Member catherine's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jan 2011
    Location
    Vermont
    Posts
    14,635
    Quote Originally Posted by SteveinMN View Post

    - Getting toward the end of emptying the freezers. This week we ate spare ribs (which were marked down when I got them) on sauerkraut which someone else was giving away. The other couple of ingredients were easy to find around the house.
    ...

    - DW dunked her phone a couple of weeks ago; it was deemed irreparable. So we ordered a replacement. The entire customer service experience was so bad, though, that when the "tell us how we did" survey invitation arrived, I let loose. A couple of days later I got a call from the manager of the place where we took the phone. Apparently I was so detailed about exactly what went wrong that she wanted to use my experience as a guide to improving customer service. And, to thank me, she offered to cover a good portion of the cost of the replacement (!). I cannot complain about that. I picked up the phone earlier this week and all is well.
    -
    So we're doing pretty well at keeping to a $400/month food budget. We were a little top-heavy on it the first two weeks in March, so I've resolved to do what you did, Steve, work on what we have. I made a vegetarian chili last night. I'll have that for leftovers. I'm trying to stick to my Tazo Zen green tea ($.13.5 per serving) or coffee ($.07 per serving) or water (<0.00 per serving--just the cost of semi-annual filter-swapping). I think I'm motivated by my BIL's not-so-thrifty habits. Now that he's living with us, I see how often he takes off to buy convenience store coffee, and if it's not convenience store coffee, it's Keurig cups. He shops for food at the most expensive place in town. Then he complains that he doesn't have the money fix his muffler--his car sounds like a horde of Hell's Angels coming down the street.

    I've tried to gently steer him in the direction of YMOL or Dave Ramsey, but you know what they say about taking a horse to water. And to be honest, I have my own spend-y sins to atone for, so, I can't judge him. I don't know why his frivolous spending just irritates me.


    Good job on the phone. I have to figure out a cheaper alternative. My kids are on my family plan and while one of them is religious about PayPalling me his portion, my other two kids have the "oh, Mom's not going to shut off my phone" mentality. I have to address that with them, because it's not fair to their responsible sibling, and it's not fair to me
    "Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it--every, every minute?" Emily Webb, Our Town
    www.silententry.wordpress.com

  3. #33
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2016
    Posts
    7,451
    Quote Originally Posted by catherine View Post
    So we're doing pretty well at keeping to a $400/month food budget. We were a little top-heavy on it the first two weeks in March, so I've resolved to do what you did, Steve, work on what we have. I made a vegetarian chili last night. I'll have that for leftovers. I'm trying to stick to my Tazo Zen green tea ($.13.5 per serving) or coffee ($.07 per serving) or water (<0.00 per serving--just the cost of semi-annual filter-swapping). I think I'm motivated by my BIL's not-so-thrifty habits. Now that he's living with us, I see how often he takes off to buy convenience store coffee, and if it's not convenience store coffee, it's Keurig cups. He shops for food at the most expensive place in town. Then he complains that he doesn't have the money fix his muffler--his car sounds like a horde of Hell's Angels coming down the street.

    I've tried to gently steer him in the direction of YMOL or Dave Ramsey, but you know what they say about taking a horse to water. And to be honest, I have my own spend-y sins to atone for, so, I can't judge him. I don't know why his frivolous spending just irritates me.


    Good job on the phone. I have to figure out a cheaper alternative. My kids are on my family plan and while one of them is religious about PayPalling me his portion, my other two kids have the "oh, Mom's not going to shut off my phone" mentality. I have to address that with them, because it's not fair to their responsible sibling, and it's not fair to me
    Catherine, I would definitely switch to another non family plan and let them decide if they want to keep a family plan together. I am having good luck with my new Cricket plan, 30 dollars a month with unlimited talk and text and some data--not a huge amount of data but works for me.

    For a while my twin sons had a family plan but I think they had issues over slow pay from one, so they disbanded the family plan at that point. We actually never had a plan with any of them--well, I had one with my parents but I bought and paid for everything until my dad figured that out and then insisted on cancelling it so he could pay for himself.

    Now that I see us trying to do geriatric careplan for my parents, I can see these early rumblings of discontent--we could not even pull off a family phone plan!

  4. #34
    Senior Member Teacher Terry's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2013
    Location
    Nevada
    Posts
    12,889
    WE switched to Cricket from AT & T because they supposedly use the same towers. Well we went to a town a hour away and my DH needed to be on a phone meeting for work and he had no service. It turns out that out there AT & T buys usage from other cell carriers but Cricket does not. Also found out that most of the entire state has no service with Cricket except for the 2 major towns. It was a expensive mistake and we had to go back to AT & T.

  5. #35
    Senior Member Teacher Terry's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2013
    Location
    Nevada
    Posts
    12,889
    We saved a ton of $ by switching our auto and home owners insurance to Geigo. We know people that use them and had accidents and had no trouble collecting, etc.

  6. #36
    Yppej
    Guest
    My vacuum cleaner died. I bought one but did not like it and immediately returned it. I went to some other stores and got overwhelmed by choices and decided to get a carpet sweeper, but could not find an affordable one. I ended up coming home and picking up stuff off the carpet with my hands while doing my 30 minutes of walking indoors. In the meantime my mom said she thinks they have an extra carpet sweeper at their house.

  7. #37
    Senior Member iris lilies's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2013
    Location
    Always logged in
    Posts
    25,378
    Our insurance guy called, and he is knocking $200 off our annual insurance bill for our weekend house. It has asbestos siding and that stuff is impervious to hail. They dont get claims for houses with this kind of siding. Yay, carginogenic materials! Who woulda thought!!?

  8. #38
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2016
    Posts
    7,451
    Iris, we had asbestos shingles in our SC house. Quick hint--if you have any broken pieces, you can replace them with Hardyboard, it looks identical.

  9. #39
    Senior Member iris lilies's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2013
    Location
    Always logged in
    Posts
    25,378
    Quote Originally Posted by Tybee View Post
    Iris, we had asbestos shingles in our SC house. Quick hint--if you have any broken pieces, you can replace them with Hardyboard, it looks identical.
    Yes, good tip, thanks!

  10. #40
    Senior Member iris lilies's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2013
    Location
    Always logged in
    Posts
    25,378
    Re the phone problems: DH has StraightTalk for cell phone and it is supposed to,use At and T towers, but he cannot get cell phone service in Hermann. He has been researching it and apparently he needs a new phone. Screw thatt. I guess he will have tomget it, though. My free Tracphone works ok in Hermann.

Thread Information

Users Browsing this Thread

There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •