Hey…the soapball thing is in my husband’s column…not mine!
Did they have little Golden Arches embossed on them? That would be even funnier.
(1) I make “freezer soup” - made out of the end pieces of roast/meatloaf/chicken/whatever and those mysterious cans of vegetables that somehow make their way into my cabinet
(2) I save the soap slivers. When they are small I let them melt into the bathwater for a soapy water bath. Then I rinse in the shower (water is free in my apt.)
(3) The kids’ jeans and pants usually become summer’s shorts
(4) I have stolen food and toilet paper from work [not in a long time, though]
(5) Food is never to be wasted - it can either be frozen for a soup or casserole. Anything not worth saving is fed to the dog.
(6) Tin foil can be reused most of the time.
(7) By one water bottle and refill it from the water fountain at work.
(8) Toasted end pieces of sandwich bread make meatloaf go a lot farther.
(9) Never throw your old glasses away just in case you break the pair you have and you have to wear something, anything until you can pay for a new pair.
(10) After strong-arming the toothpaste tube, you can slit it down the side, fold it open and get a couple days worth of toothpaste out of it.
(11) Hot dogs can be made into a million different recipes. (They all taste like a hot dog, though)
(12) When you use the last of the liquid clothing detergent, pour water in the bottle and slosh it around. You can get at least one small load’s worth of suds out of it.
(13) Everything has a generic counterpart if you look hard enough.
I still do most of this even though it’s not as “do or die” as it used to be.
Long ago I used to do be a “normal control” for whatever was going on at the medical school. I became friends with a woman in clinical studies and she would call me with info on high pay/low risk studies. My favorites were the sleep studies. The worst one ever was looking at severe dehydration and subsequent rehydration. I felt pretty awful for a few days after that one.
I had a client who would bring a couple of water bottles in her huge purse and fill them from my waiting room water dispenser. She also took handfulls of candy from the candy dish on the reception counter. She did all this without any shame; she never tried to hide what she was doing. She was a teacher who owned her own home and dressed well.
My parents-in-law grew up in the Great Depression, then (later) raised five kids on basically one salary. They’ve done pretty well for themselves since, but I think the thrifty habits they had developed are kind of hard to break: they stopped saving the plastic bags inside cereal boxes for use as a wax paper substitute just a few years ago, and there are scraps of aluminum foil in their kitchen drawers that probably date to the Nixon administration.
So this woman would in effect, steal your bottled water instead of drinking the tap water? I’d have kicked her sorry, thieving ass out!
As for when I was broke (graduate school), I was pretty good about stocking up when I had cash (after loans came in), so by the point that I was broke, I still had plenty of soap, laundry detergent, etc… In some categories (shaving cream, shampoo, dish soap), I’m just now finishing off the last of the stockpiles, and it’s a year and a half later!
I did get in the habit of wearing somewhat cheaper-than-usual clothing, i.e. $20 slacks from Target, and the like. Actually… I still buy the slacks, since they’re almost the exact same as the dept. store ones for twice the price.
Soap scraps? Change in the streets? You people don’t know how good you had/have it! Between 1992 and 1996 I think I consumed a total of about 32 calories per day, assuming warm tap water has about 8 calories per glass.
This was during Cuba’s special period, and to help paint a picture here’s a recipe you’re not going to believe, but I can personally call chewy but oddly unsatisfying:
One well work hand towel (that’s right, towel) cut into squares about four inches on the side. Season squares of towel with salt and pepper if available and let soak overnight in sour orange juice. Fry said pieces of towel until they have some color and they are fork tender (so help me they do get fork tender). Serve over rice, on bread, or eat plain.
God I love the US!
A funny coincidence: One of the books I have on hold at the library is ready for pickup…The Everyday Cheapskate’s greatest tips : 500 simple strategies for smart living by Mary Hunt.
I also recommend all the Tightwad Gazette books by Amy Dacyczyn. Good stuff.
I do have a question though…
Why, when people are short on cash, do they do bizarre-ass things like saving soap slivers and tin foil scraps, and recycling cereal box waxpaper?
I mean, 10 bars of soap costs $5, and a box of tin-foil is something like $3, and waxpaper is similar in cost.
Surely there are areas in which much greater savings can be achieved without having to resort to such bizarre practices?
When I was really young we were po’ Mom and Dad used to take my toys from the previous Xmas and rewrap them and give them do me for the current Xmas. I was too young to really notice.
Also, until I was about 8 we used to have a few meatless meals a week (it was considered very odd back in the early 70’s) and every Friday was Spam, rice, and peas. (I could easily consider that a “meatless” meal too) In fact, I lost my very first tooth chewing on a bite of Spam. Oh the memories.
When things started looking brighter I vowed never to eat that shite again, and I haven’t.
Poverty period #2. I was married and raising 2 step kids. Due to the exes horrid drinking problem we never had any money. So, in order to make sure the kids ate I would often eat popcorn or a “ream” of soda crackers for dinner. Often that was all I’d eat all day. Sometimes it was a can of cold green beans. I sold my blood- plasma for gas money if given a choice between buying cigarettes or food I’d buy the smokes. :smack: The only upside was being thin from my lack of food. (Never got heroin-thin though, thank OG)
Things are** much ** better now.
Not if you’re already not buying anything but food and shelter. These people were already driving ugly, old cars (or none at all), not buying clothes, not paying a cable bill…
Well, they could try letting the gardener go. 
All these things may be bizarre practices, but they’re fairly easy and painless ways to tighten your belt.
The people who start scrimping on bars of soap have ALREADY exploited their opportunities to save in those areas in which much greater savings can be achieved without bizarre practices.
When it’s four days til payday and you run out of soap, all you have is slivers. We would put the sliver ball away after we went shopping. We’d save it for the next rainy day. Ditto on being able to wrap your lunch for another day.
Golly gee whiz, if it’s a choice between using a nice new bar of soap or buying a jar of peanut butter and a box of saltines (both generic) what would you do?
What do you mean by that? Do you really think people who are so poor that they have to resort to soap slivers haven’t already scrimped effectively in other areas? Like they pissed away their soap money on champagne or something?
Kalhoun, I think you’re mis-interpreting Mr.Slant. I think he’s saying what most people here are saying - saving soap slivers is part of a comprehensive money-saving plan.
It’s a little saddening for me to see just how many of these look familiar to me. Sigh. Oh well. We always had food on the table and a roof over our heads, even if that food was cheap hamburger and home-grown vegetables most of the time. I know how lucky I was to be raised in Canada, where poor was nowhere near what poor in a third-world country is like.
A penny here or there adds up when you do it all the time. Plus, when you’re poor it feels like you don’t have much control. It’s a way to gain some control over the situation. Sometimes the 5 cents you saved on toothpaste gives you a good enough feeling that you don’t have to think about the fact that you just scraped the inside of a toothpaste tube. Or maybe it’s just me.
Sorry. I thought he was saying that if they were better money managers they wouldn’t have to resort to “bizarre” practices like making soap sliver balls.
I remember being so poor that the entire neighborhood had to bring stuff to make Stone Soup. It sucked.