10 Days on $1.83 -You do the Math

I’d finished swimming a half-mile at the local pool, a great swim in warm, sunny weather. I went to the men’s locker room and changed out, dried up and dressed to go home. As I started toward my car, I reached into the pockets of my shorts and found a $5 bill! “Wow!” I shouted to nobody in particular. But a lady near me saw my exuberance and chuckled.

Yes, I was excited. It was the day before payday and I was down to my last $10. This unexpected find of $5 increased my net worth by 50%. (Shelley will point out this is wrong – my “net worth” is actually much healthier than $10. I have a car that’s paid off and a no-longer chunky 401K IRA; however, her logic doesn’t blog as well as mine. But I digress.)

So I off-handedly told the lady that I’d just found $5 and was happy to increase my net worth by 50%. And I went on my way.

Life didn’t change much when I increased my net worth 50%. I still made the same dinner when I got home and watched the same two episodes of Judge Judy. So, you see, I can honestly say that if I ever get a job at AIG and become the recipient of undeserved multi-million dollar bonuses, I won’t change much.

I was now down to my last $15. No big deal. It’s been worse. I was once down to $1.83, which I had to live on for ten days. It was an interesting exercise, and I blogged it. But that was at a time when I was in the dating pool, and I didn’t want anyone from Yahoo Personals to google me, find my blog, and learn I was dirt broke. So I removed it.

I’m no longer dating, no longer trolling Yahoo Personals. And my babe Shelley – she KNOWS I have bouts of being dirt broke and she still loves me. So I now share with you my original essay on making $1.83 stretch for ten days:

How it came to be that I had to make $1.83 stretch for ten days is not relevant. I suppose it may the more interesting topic, but the occurrence of my occasional blogging does not obligate me to reveal all personal details of my life. Suffice it to say, I beg, that this occurred through no fault of my own – no poor planning, no reckless spending elsewhere.

Nonetheless, $1.83 it was, and the forced experiment began six days ago, with four days to my next payday.

How many foolish times I’d seen a dime on the floor and walked right past. Or I’d round up an already generous gratuity an additional eighty-five cents. I thought the concept of being “nickel-and-dimed to death” was an antiquated one, something only the older generation could relate to, having lived when nickels were the equivalent of today’s dollars.

But in the midst of my desperate poverty, I was elated to find a quarter underneath the seat of my car. (No, I wasn’t looking for errant French fries. I wasn’t that desperate – yet.)

The first trick to surviving ten days on $1.83 is to become creative with the food staples sitting around the house. I never knew I had such a way with making meals out of seemingly nothing.

If one is very careful to spread the Goobers pb&j a bit thinner than usual, one can actually double the life of the jar. And speaking of which, Goobers isn’t just for bread anymore. It goes great on hamburger buns (especially when there are no hamburgers to put on said buns), hot dog buns, even the saltine crackers you get for free at Wendy’s.

Spaghetti sauce is a great thing. It’s cheap, it’s healthy, it has lipolipids or whatever those things are that are supposed to be good for us. And when you mix 4 parts sauce to 1 part water, you’ve gotten an additional 2o% life out of a jar. When cooking the pasta to go with the sauce, give it an extra 2 or 3 minutes in the water to plump it up more, thus requiring less actual product to make a meal. This stretches the box of spaghetti some.

Bottled water is a luxury. I’ve learned the art of finding good tap water (my office) and recycling those bottles to keep an ongoing supply of drink. (I’d never dream of drinking the Martinsburg tap water – awful!)

Hot dog chili sauce doesn’t have to be saved for hot dogs. One can of the stuff can make a nice, hot lunch. If you’ve exhausted the hot dog buns by use of Goober’s, cut a hot dog or two into the bowl for an extra treat. If you have enough hot dogs.

And now a word about friends…

God bless people like roommates. A roommate can be a very good cook and generous with his provisions. Luckily, during this trying time, my roommate treated me to several scrumptious dinners – leg of lamb one night, pork steaks another night, roast chicken a third. And scrumptious is an understatement. Roger is a killer cook – he should open a restaurant!

Then there are the friends one has been generous with in the past. Got a pastor who you regularly treat for lunch? Invite him to lunch but let him know it’s his turn to pay the bill. This works especially well if he’s handsomely salaried and has attempted, unsuccessfully, to pay for lunch several times prior. (Hint: go to Wendy’s where you can score a handful of saltine crackers for free.)

Are you doing a favor for someone at work? Lightly say, “I’m happy to turn this around for you in an hour. But it’ll cost ya some pop tarts from the vending machine.” Chuckle. Then act surprised when he brings them to you. “Oh, hey, I was just kidding. But thanks!” Voila!! There’s a meal.

This next hint is a bit embarrassing, but what the hell. If my stature hasn’t diminished in your eyes by now, you’re blind. Okay, here’s what ya do. Look around your home for unopened store purchases. Wal-Mart is perfect for this. I found a package of pillowcases and some razor blades I hadn’t opened. I took them back to Wal-Mart and scored a gift card with $6.41! That bought more Goobers, a loaf of bread, a can of spaghetti sauce and spaghetti noodles. 3 dinners and 4 lunches!!

Oh, when you’re down to your very own $1.83, forget about driving anywhere. The car is history. Save the last quarter tank of gas for an emergency. Walking isn’t all that bad.

Lastly, the best thing about making $1.83 stretch is the weight loss. So far, it feels like I’ve lost ten pounds. This is a great way to start a diet and get over the most tempting first few days. One certainly can’t sneak a bowl of ice cream or a pack of Reese’s peanut butter cups when all one has is $1.83.

It’s six days into this experiment and I’ve spent a bit of my $1.83. Today, I’m down to .71 cents. Unless I find another quarter, and I increase my total net worth by 33%. There’s always hope!!!!

Wow – a bad trip down memory lane. I wrote that essay six days into the 10-day experiment, and I survived, of course.

It feels pretty darn good to have $15 in my pocket when payday rolls around. Make that $20. When I got home, I found ANOTHER $5 – this one on the sidewalk around the corner from my apartment door. HEY! I think I’m gonna head down to the crush of people on 6th Street celebrating South by Southwest and look for money.

(Right now, my kids, as they read this, are saying to themselves, “Look for money, look for money, look for money.” Right, kids? LOL)

P.S.: Editor’s note – in an attempt to drive more traffic to my blog, I am now, starting with this entry, including the word “boobs” as a tagword. Those things are good on so many levels!

Tags: $1.83, boobs, frugal, frugality, money, sxsw