I Bet "Frugality" Gets Popular Again. Tips for Newbies to the Spend Less Be Frugal Crowd

 What with stuff costing more.    

And our 401k's crashing and burning.  Mine hasn't recovered from the nonsense in the 90s, 2000s and 2010s.  And here we are with the 2020s debacle.  You never get back the lost compound interest.   Doesn't happen.  Lose ground. that ground stays lost at the level of investment I have.  Which is the max I can afford.

Anyway, higher prices, lower benefits.   Frugality gets popular.

The thing is, frugality or thrift ....that's a long game.  Not a short term "oh crap" strategy.  Still, may as well start in the "oh crap" moment.

So ,for the newbies ,here are places to start:

1  Use it up

2  Wear it out

3  Make it do

34  Do without

Easy!

Bit more info needed

1 Use it up.   This works in every part of life.  Vehicles/transport...run whatever you are driving IN TO THE GROUND.  Repairs are almost always cheaper than a car payment.   Food...START your meal plan in the stinky crisper drawer in the fridge.  What is about to go bad?  Can you eat it as is?  DO THAT!  Can you fry it up in an egg?  DO THAT.  Can you throw it in the Freezer Soup Container (any container in the freezer for left overs and edible scraps...when it gets full, take it out to thaw, if you have an onion or some garlic, fry that in a soup pot (if not, skip it), dump in the thawing soup (or, who are we kidding...the frozen block of soup) and heat it up.  Taste it.  If it's awful add something salty/savory (salt, Worcestershire sauce, soy sauce, etc, or sour (lemon juice, vinegar, a can of tomatoes) or some herbs (whatever is getting old in the cupboard) and try again.  If it's bland, I go for sour or a scoop of homemade mustard.  Just use your brain and whatever you have.  Also...you won't die of bland soup.  Just eat it.   For clothes...go shopping in the closet or dresser or call a friend to borrow or swap clothes for an event.  When clothes wear out, cut them up for rags and hair bands and free gardening supplies (undies elastics make great tomato plant support ties, t-shirt sleeves are really good headbands, old undies were my gramma's go-to soft polishing clothes which was gross but effective, I make gardenting and berry picking bags out of old jeans legs with a few stitches and a grommet or sewn on tab for attachment to my belt.  Books...firestarters after you drop them in the tub and dry them out but they are wrinkly.  and on and on

2  Wear it out.   Clothes...keep wearing them.  Boring...maybe.  NO ONE CARES what you wear.  If they do, they are shallow buttheads whose opinion does not matter.  Change into chore clothes if you do office work and then come home to outside work.  Vehicles....keep driving that rattle trap. USE IT UP.  When it really really croaks or you have to trade it in on a reliable rig for some reason, strip it of usable things like extra rims and tires so you can sell them separate or trade them or give them to friends who will wear them out and maybe, or maybe not, return the favor.  I gave away a car once.  The receiver loved it but it didn't work for them, they took one set of wheels for the vehicle they do drive, sold the car to a poverty stricken mechanically talented person who meshed it with other similar vehicles and hopefully came up with 1 running car.  Glasses...my godson gets his previous pair of glasses tinted as sunglasses when he gets a new pair of regular glasses.  Wears the sunglasses until they are scratched beyond usefulness.  Kitchen gear...learn to sharpen a knife.  A good knife resharpened will last generations.

3 Make it do.   I have an event coming up where Western States Business Casual is the dress code.  So I'm darkening up my black jeans and wearing my best thrifted eddie bauer shirt with some turquoise jewelry.  Good enough.   Vehicle...I have a crap truck that will haul 1/2 ton.  I need 1 ton of pressed sawdust logs for winter heat.  I found a place that will sell me the 1 ton pallet of logs for a price and let me haul it as 2 half ton loads.  It cost me 10$ more in gas, but that's 40$ less than delivery on 1 ton, AND 50$ less than buying 2 half ton mini-pallets most years.  I make do.  And I do the math (that's a more advanced tip...DO THE MATH).  Shovels...I have 4 broken shovels (because...shovels are not prybars but I am a slow learner on that).  So now I have 4 large hand scoops and I am learning to replace handles. "make it do" also means FIX STUFF.  I bust my glasses a lot as well.  Then, I bust out the superglue.  The latest triumph...lost the lense out of a favorite pair of progressive readers mid winter.  The frame broke on a snowy dark morning as I walked to the car.  The lens could be heard skittering away on the snow.  Couldn't find it so I got out the 2nd pair (they were cheaper by the pair of I bought a pair of pairs) and got on with life.  MONTHS LATER the snow thaws.  I am off the main walkway to the car one day and spot the lens!  TADA! I pocket it.  Find it again a week or so later.  Then eventually the glasses and lens are reunited with superglue (all braced in place with rubber bands off egg cartons and broccoli bought through the winter and stashed for re-use).  I glued it before I went to work so the stank would dissipate while I was gone.  It worked.  While I was at it, I glued some other stuff.   The glue was from a 5$ craft kit so basically free as I did and enjoyed the craft (see above...use it up).  

4  Do without.  Do without until you find a good deal, can borrow/trade for an item, or ...most often...figure out you didn't need that thing anyway.   E.g.  I would LOVE a cool garden shed or storage shed.  BUT, those cost money.  Or skill.  I don't want to spend on it and I have no skill.  So, the camper I used to live in is the garden shed.   Works fine.  Cost 1100$ many years ago.  I lived in it over 2 seasons for a total of about 12 months...that's cheap rent!  Then turned it into the storage shed.   Fine.  I have a friend who drinks tea every day and does not own a teapot.  She's happy with a sauce pan and pouring the water into a cup from that.  I use a teapot (bought at thrift) but have no wish for a teaball or strainer.  I just strain the tea leaves out with my teeth when I use loose leaf.   I just don't care.  Computer...my home computer is ancient.  I "make do" with my sister's dead iphones minus the simcards.  Which is also amusing when I insist I do not have a smart phone...then clearly pull one out of my pocket to use public wifi.  As for vehicles, due to lifestyle choices I would have trouble making do without owning one, but I have friends who have gone that route.  The do fine.  And live in town.  You can rent a car if you need one or borrow them.  A friend let go of his pick up when I assured him he could borrow my old beater one anytime.  Other friends lend me their rototiller.  Another and I share rental of a log splitter rather than either of us buying one.   Main point;  do not just go buy something you think you "need".

Just try all of those before you buy crap or panic.

So, there are your starter tips.  Welcome!

Forever Foods Instead of Forever Chemicals #4

 Parched Wild Rice

Manoomin.

Also unparched (raw) wild rice.   

It is super dry, easy to store (just keep it dry).   In an accidental test I checked its tolerance for extreme temperatures in storage.  This is because I live off grid and don't heat the place when I'm not home.  So, some stored wild rice in a tightly closed mason-type jar went through a few freeze thaw cycles down to well below zero (fahrenheit) and above 100degs (also fahrenheit!) multiple times.   Then, I found the jar and cooked it up.  Still fantastic.

The parched style costs more, but is also quicker to cook, easier to bust up into a flour type product without fancy grainmill, just a little mortar and pestle or a couple of rocks or a cloth bag and a hammer (put the rice in the bag, use the hammer on it....don't try to bust rice with a cloth bag alone).  

Forever Foods Instead of Forever Chemicals #3

 Chicos

These are SUPER DRY slightly smoky corn kernels from the SW of the US.  

Because they are BONE DRY and a bit shriveled and kind of pre-cooked, once I put them in a jar, they store virtually forever.

"Virtually" partly because I will never be able to test truly long term storage.  They are DELICIOUS so I end up eating them in a matter of months.   

Still, rumor and lots of actual knowledge attests that they are still good after years of dry storage.

To cook: presoak (or not if I forgot to do that and I want to eat).  Cook in water, broth, in soup you already have going.  They need MOISTURE because, as noted above, VERY DRY.   They puff up to about 3x the dry size and add a smoky flavor to whatever they are cooked with or thrown on top of.

Quite chewy and I've never had them go mushy or decompensate even after days in leftover soup or simmered for hours. 

LEONARD PELTIER IS FREE!!!!!

 https://youtu.be/4bVeoNfsYGw?si=nYaTlZ7BaDkqeVhh

I cannot believe this!

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/18/leonard-peltier-prison-release

It's Getting Better

 OK, you get real humble real fast with a back issue.

I haven't been able to lift or workout much/at-all which annoys me (I am a late bloomer as far as gym rats but I hate losing strength it took me a decade to build up). but I have been doing really light no-impact hiit workouts for the elderly and yoga daily.  And taking some aspirin.  

The aspirin works since I rarely take ANYTHING for pain.  It's not eliminating the pain, which would probably result in me overdoing things and re-injuring my back.  Aspirin takes the edge off so I can get around without cussing every time I move.

Yesterday I put my pants on without strategizing first!  And got out of the car without pushing the seat all the way back and pivoting on my butt as a solid unit.  Just stuck my leg out of the door and got up!  A MIRACLE!  Or, patience and letting things heal.

I am planning on hitting the gym for a very short, light session today mid-day.  I usually like to be  there in the wee hours of the morning when no one can see me, but for the moment, it's too cold out to drive that early...correction, too cold out to get stuck behind a wreck that early....and I want to be able to flag down a passerby or call the gym manager if I re-hurt myself and end up stuck on the floor.  It's a gym where one is usually ALONE (awesome!)

I think the back is ready for some controlled lifting of very very light weights. I could do a back bend this morning during my yoga session and that was impossible for the first week.  

things that went well during the injury:

having the 8lb NIEL logs to burn rather than having to split wood or pick up wood chunks of unknown weight.  

having enough water on hand  (have to haul it up hill during the winter for drinking purposes as the well water gets stale and gross.  And I'd have to lift the handle on the outdoor spigot which was not going to happen) to get through the first few days without hauling.

having multiple boot/show options as not all were possible to to put on.   

having enough clean clothes to make it though just one more week before hitting the laundry (more hauling and toting.  I COULD have made it work with multiple trips up and down the hill but ugh.  Those extra sox and undies meant I did not have to worry about it

having a floor-sleeping option.  Getting in and out of the loft when I had to be on hands and knees to get out of bed...there is only 6" of space beyond the camping mattress in the loft to work with.  That's FINE when I'm FINE, but not if I needed a level hard surface big enough to let me maneuver through various contortions to get on hands and knees to get out of bed.  So, camping mattress to the floor, chair blocking the door (not ideal but it's not like I could get up and run out if the place burst into flames anyway).   

having completely indoor toileting options.   People kept telling me "just pee outside!" uh...right.... 1+ times in the middle of the night every night you want me to come down from the loft, put something on my feet, find the headlamp, mosey OUTSIDE (down the stoop), find somewhere not visible on a moonlit night (and all day every day I'm home) from the highway, squat down, not pee on my ankles and then reverse those steps back into bed?  NO.  Also staying ahead of the toilet situation so i had a day or two to sort my back out before hauling the compost (which one hauls before it gets too heavy) bucket to the processing location OUTSIDE far from the homesite.

having enough food on hand.  Duh.

having first aid supplies on hand including aspirin and pain rub (arnica hippy dippy stuff)

Things that were not crashing successes...

losing my stability poles (ski poles from thrift) so I stopped at a thrift store ASAP and got another pair.  

having a leaky hot water bottle and no instant handwarmers!   so I didn't have an easy option to put heat on my back.  Still working on fixing this one.

falling down in the first place but...I fall often so this probably isn't going to change.  

OW!!!! I FELL!

 Hard.  I was walking from the wee shed to the car this morning so I could go in and get a shower at the gym before work.

I had my lunch (in jars) in a bag with an empty gallon jug to fill with water at work (unfrozen water...) to cook with tonight.  And a backpack with clean clothes to put in my gym bag which lives in the car.

I'm following some animal's tracks, trying to figure out what it is and generally just walking to the car.

THEN at the bottom of the hill like 6 feet from the car and also right next to the car, the animal tracks are all smeary like it was slipping and sliding.

THEN I'm on the ground, on my back, with a jar of lunch jammed between me and the icy path, apparently, my hat and head lamp (it was still dark out) are somewhere, my glasses, which had been in my hand are somewhere else.  The jar of lunch under my back REALLY HURT.  IT was just outside a kidney location and FORTUNATELY DID NOT BREAK.  Because, that could have been really bad.  I was wearing a pretty thick coat.  I have not idea why the jar didn't break.  I hit hard.  And there isn't much meat there.

My back is wonked on the left side now.  It took a couple of minutes to find my stuff, and get up.  And old-lady flatfoot shuffle to the car.  VERY CAREFULLY and PAINFULLY.   Once my butt was in the seat, it was better . As long as I didn't move at all.  which is awkward when you need to steer and brake, etc.

I took a 30min hot shower with the massager right on my owie mid-low-back.   I didn't see a bruise.  

The shower helped.  Getting sox on with half a stuck back was an adventure.  Compression sox.  I had to sit down  Usually don't have to.

Once at the office I walked VERY CAREFULLY across some slick sh*t into the office and got my chair reset to the most supportive option.  And cranked my belt down like it is a weight belt.  If I jam my fist into the sore spot on my back, I can walk a bit more.

FORTNATELY I had forgotten some arnica salve from a previous Santa Fe trip at the office.  That is good for strained muscles and bruises so that's on there.  I may rig up a heating pad of some sort later.  Not sure how.  I have a date with a hot water bottle once I get home.  

This was my first fall of the winter and it was full on Bugs Bunny.  I wasn't even facing the way I was walking by the time I hit the pavement.  It's like I jumped up and body slammed myself.

Forever Foods Instead of Forever Chemicals #2

 So....obviously....Honey.

I mean, they find it in tombs and it's still good.

I do keep this on hand.  I doesn't matter if it crystalizes.  Leave it.  It doesn't have huge amounts of vitamins and minerals, but some.  

It's also good for cuts and other owies so more than food!

Actually, that is true of vinegar as well.  Good for what ails you.

If you have bee hives, the raw honey with the leg bits in it is fine.  You won't die of dead bee bits.

The wax is nice to chew, make candles, whatever.  And nice for making salves. 

I cook quite a bit with honey which is different than with sugar, bit more fragile and baked goods are better on the 2nd or 3rd day as they sort of get moister.  But I am rarely able to leave a baked good untouched for that long.

I don't do industrial store bought honey anymore.   Much of it is adulterated.  Local honey costs more but supports local agriculture  The giant bee operations that migrate hundreds or thousands of hives tend to annihilate local native pollinators so I'm trying to get honey from folks who have 5 or fewer hives.   At that level hives can actually support native pollinators. Nothing is perfect so I don't eat as much.   The cost of local small producer honey serves as a good road to overconsumption.

Forever Food Pantry list so far:

Vinegar

Honey