Posts Tagged ‘save’

Clipping Coupons

Friday, March 20th, 2009
Some coupons are more useful than others.

Some coupons are more morbid than others.

Everybody knows if you get the Sunday paper (or steal it from your neighbor’s porch), you can find a ton of little coupons inside it for stuff you use everyday. Well, let me tell you, those really add up. I mean, over time, if you use them consistently, and don’t mind spending hours cutting them out for 25 cents here, 40 cents there.

Well, actually, that is a thing of the past. If you know what a blog is and realize your reading one right now, you probably know you can get coupons on the internet and print them out-no Sunday paper needed. That’s not to say there isn’t other reasons why you would want to read the paper (warning, mildly crude joke). However, in all seriousness, I didn’t really realize how easy or beneficial this can be. There’s this lady out there called the “Coupon Mom” who has an entire website devoted to coupons. I mean, it doesn’t really sound like I’d want to hang out with her on a regular basis, but you can’t beat saving money. Other, frankly better, sites that rocks my socks are www.retailmenot.com and www.smartsource.com. I found this great blog that has many resources, but she mentions a 6 good places to get coupons. If you can get coupons to buy stuff you already have to get, that’s more money for other stuff (like those backed up child support payments)!

Now, as geeky as it may sound to go around clippin’ digital coupons, it actually works. Right now is about the time I’d usually inform you of some outlandish tale of someone getting more back from their coupons than they actually have spent. Well, unfortunately, all I could find was this measly middle classer saving $1000 a month with coupons. I mean, it is no free car, but you can’t sneeze at a grand. Well, I can’t, because I’m not sure I have a grand. Nor is it dusty in here.

I think the main point I am trying to make is that although coupons may only save you fractions of a dollar, fractions of a dollar add up. I would rather save money than spend it, wouldn’t you? And hey, this is something you can really hide from the neighbors. How are they ever going to find out you (gasp!) use coupons? If they do find out, however, your social life is going down in flames. Nobody wants to be friends with a ‘clipper’. So, keep it on the down-low at all costs. Shred the newspaper after your done with it, and burn the remains. Erase your hard-drive and browsing history. And darn it, make sure you wipe down your scissors with alcohol after your done using them!

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Used Car Time

Thursday, March 12th, 2009

You make enough money to buy a new car. The payment is, what, three, four hundred a month? That’s not bad, you can afford that.

Whoa nelly! If you are thinking I’m leading you to buy a new car or keep the car you have with it’s payments, you are reading the completely wrong blog. You can afford it…but why try? Here you are, turning your ketchup bottles upside down for a month to get that last little bit, and you have a car payment?

Some simple math to put it in perspective:

$300 a month, every month, every year, until your 70, from when your 20.

By your 70th birthday (Congratulations, baldy!) you will have spent $300,000. And face it, in fifty years, due to inflation, $300 isn’t going to buy jack crap when it comes to cars. However, LLotC isn’t about living frugally, it is about living the high life without anyone knowing you aren’t spending that much.

So, you still want a bangin’ car, right? Here’s an idea. Get an awesome car new and drive the wheels off of it. This guy has a 1966 Volvo P1800 that has 2.6 million miles on it, and he is still tooling around in it. I can guess that he dislikes car payments. For giggles, I figured out that if you bought a new one for $3,970 and stretched the payments out from 1966 to 2009 (at 0%, because of your assumed excellent credit), you would be paying roughly $7.69 a month.

I’ll let that sink in. For less than your Netflix bill, for less than a bi-weekly meal at McDonald’s, for less than your damn monthly dog food allowance, you could be cruising around in your own classic car. Of course, you have to wait a long time in order for your new car to become a classic. You would have to endure those strange ‘between years’ when your car is too old to be new and too young to be classic, and everyone thinks you shop at the local Thriftko. The fact that you actually do shop at the local Thriftko has nothing to do with it.

Besides, do you really want to death-to-us-part with a car? What happens if the next year’s model gets two mpg’s better on the highway, or even, gasp, a soda-can Chill Zone? You’ll be left out in the cold (and your pop will be left inside in the warm) with your silly previous-year model. Or, even, what happens when the new lithium-powered hybrid-turbo’d diesel hydrogen heli-cars come out, and your stuck circling the city trying to find a Exxon-Mobil station without tree-hugging hippies out front protesting the last of the dead-dino sipping cars that are left on our sorry piece of planet?

This leads me to my next thought, and the one I adhere to religiously. Be sensible, try and find that car that apexes on quality, amount of miles, versatility, frugality, age, and because you are living largely, awesomeness. Example A, I have a 1996 Dodge Neon that had 108,000 miles on it when I scooped it up for $850 out the door. That has great value, but it is lacking in the awesomeness factor. So, I slapped on the AWD sign. While it will never be as cool as a new Lamborghini (which, strangly, doesn’t need a freakin’ “Chill Zone” to be desirable), I do try to keep it clean.

There are many more options out there if you are really looking to up the ante on the “awesomeness” factor. I will be telling them to you tomorrow on this two-part series.

Until then, I guess you could always walk.

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Use the Panhandle Scandal

Wednesday, March 4th, 2009

When you get tired of working minimum wage down at that greasy burger joint handling pans, consider working for more than average wage down on the local stoplight panhandling. This could be a touchy subject. Out of work, have two kinds of cancer, lost my left testicle in the war. All of these pleas written on tiny cardboard signs pull at your heart-strings, urging you to give a buck or two, or even a few cents.

Of course, when the panhandler is wearing Jordans, the cat is out of the bag. They say that up to 70% of the people on the street that are panhandling are not really in the situations that they say they are, and they can make as much as $50 bucks an hour. They go on to suggest giving to charities or soup kitchens rather than risking giving money to fakes, so follow my advice and hope others don’t follow their’s. This is a big slice o’ pie that you could be mining! Or, a big mine that you could be eating.

The essentials to start are slim: a piece of cardboard (try to find the most raggedy piece you can find), a marker, some raggedy clothes, and a bottle of water. This is all to be included in my Jared’s Panhandling Franchise-Made-Easy Kit, soon available at your favorite local panhandling supply store. If you get the Rags-to-Riches Edition, I’ll include a 100% wool stocking cap, available in Freeloader Fuchsia or Bluffing Bum Beige. In some places, you will also have to apply for a panhandling license. In order to do so, you might have to prove you are homeless. You can do this easily by telling them you don’t have a permanent address. Other places that require a license also require you to have a permanent address. In this case, tell them that that is the dumbest thing you have ever heard and leave in a huff. Once you do procure the license, if you have to, make sure you follow the rules or else there is a slight chance of being jailed. Then, find a busy traffic corner or sidewalk and sit and wait. If you are good at acting, pretend like you are crying or something. I’ve found that people are more sympathetic if you are not wearing shoes or have a deformity, real or made up. Don’t go out and chop off your arm, but if you want to tape a mammary for the ‘breast cancer’ look, be my guest.

Alan Abel, a famous hoaxster, once started a hoax that there was a school to educate people on how to become beggars called Omar’s School for Beggars. It was a satire on the economy’s downturn at the time. If he ever stopped making money hoaxing, getting a job would be a real chore. “Why did I leave my last job? Everything I was involved with turned out to be a hoax.” Anyway, he wasn’t too far off of the mark when it comes to begging. There is actually money to be had panhandling!

Also, you don’t have to let the neighbor’s know. Get a nice suit, go out to your car at 7:00 a.m. every morning to get ahead of the morning rush, change in the car, beg for a couple of hours, and come home. If they ask, just say you work for H&R Block, and “there’s not much to do until April”. That way you can get the cash without tainting your reputation.

Also, please, don’t use a sign that says “Need money for alcohol, drugs, and hookers. Hey, at least I’m being honest.” That’s just tacky.

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Wattage: Human Powered Revolution!

Tuesday, February 24th, 2009

A big part of living largely on the cheap is making good use of your electricity. Those watts are expensive; there must be a way to power the big-screen you picked up from the Salvation Army without breaking the bank! One way to do this is to use what you got; you, yourself, are a great source of energy to supplant your use of electricity, or other forms of energy.

This isn’t the Matrix, you can’t just lay down all day and expect to get your money’s worth. You have to work for it! Operating your own hand-powered devices is a great way to start, and I’m not just talking about a hand-powered suction device with a mucus trap and suction catheter for tracheostomy tubes . I’m talking about making use of your muscles to save your electricity usage!

There are literally hundreds of products out there that use hand-cranking power to power flashlights and radios, but I think we can aspire to greater things than that. Like, for example, the human-powered washing machine. This will surely save on your electric bill, and if you don’t have a washer, then you’ll save all those quarters. Besides, what is a more nobler feat than pedaling your way through Dharma & Greg while stuffing your face with Powerbars? You may scoff, but you are thinly disguising your thrift with eco-friendliness.

Oh, you didn’t know? Yes, when your friends or neighbors come over and see a gigantic bicycle/washing machine device taking up most of your living room, you can explain that it is going to save the planet. From the men, this will result in high fives, grunts, and questions about ‘how fast it’ll go’. From the ladies, it will result in much swooning, eyelash fluttering, and questions about ‘if you have a brother’. You will become the toast of the town, save some money, be eco-friendly, and explore your inner Rube Goldberg.

What’s to lose? First of all, your paunch. Besides that, not much. Of course, this depends on how crazy you want to get with the human-powered devices. For example, instead of waiting in rush hour, why not go to work in your own human-powered helicopter? Sure, it may have only got off the ground a few inches for a few seconds, but the potential is there. The average human can create 80 watts continuously if pedaling with their feet. This means, you can power the average T.V., or a few halogen lights. The average family home in New York used 535 kWh a month in 2002, which was low for the national average. That means that it is 535,000 watt-hours. When you are pedaling at a constant rate, you create 80 watt-hours. So, if you pedal constantly all of March (invest in Depends, as you can’t stop for food, sleep, or excretion), you would knock 59,520 watt-hours off your bill! That would only leave you with a 476 kWh bill to contend with. At 16.92 cents a kWh in New York, you would be saving a total of about $10.02. Divided between all 744 hours you were pedaling, you would be saving 0.01 cents an hour. That doesn’t round up.

Depending on who you are, a penny an hour might actually be worth it.

If my math is incorrect, please let me know. I almost failed Algebra…twice.

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Whip Tip: Emblem Awareness!

Monday, February 23rd, 2009

What kind of car you drive says a lot about who you are and what you are all about. A new Volkswagen Beetle? You are hip, cool, sure of your self, and possibly homosexual. A Volvo wagon? You are safety conscious and practical. A Volvo wagon painted Lamborghini orange with metal-flake flames? Safety conscious and practical…and crazy awesome. So, granted, this is a blog that is ultimately about saving money, so I can’t expect you to go out and get a brand-new car to flaunt your inner self. You might have to make do with that hand-me-down beat-up Plymouth Acclaim.

However, there is an amazing way to flaunt what you’ve got. When they came out with your vehicle, they probably came out with several models. Often, the main way to distinguish between them is a letter or number combination after the name of your vehicle. The Dodge Neon SXT, the Toyota Yaris S, the Izuzu GIGA 20 Light Dump.

Whatever you’ve got, it could always be improved with a little alphabetical or numerical bling. Just go to a junkyard and find these emblems, and make up your own for your vehicle. You could add an S, an SE, an X, or any combination of these three letters easily to add some major alpha dog charm to your car. There is always the option of going to the dealership and actually finding a vehicular suffix that was available for your car when it was new, but the dealership is expensive, and they probably won’t let you leave the lot without selling you a new car anyway. Besides, it is always more fun to try and scrounge up your own endings so your car is very unique.

I’ll give you a personal example. My car is a 1996 Dodge Neon AWD. How did it become all-wheel drive? Simple, the letters used to be on a Volvo XC90. Now, I get to tell people that my Dodge Neon was a manufacturer prototype or a former rally car. Create your own backstory to why you have a Volkswagen Jetta 425 Turbo Super Sport! For even more giggles, create a game where you see how long you can keep a straight face while telling the tale of how you bought this car off of a former automotive employee and saved the little experimental gem from being crushed. Hey, if you can keep it up, they may even offer to buy it off you, and then your hard work will have really paid off.

See, doesn't it look able to go over snow and ice?

See, doesn't it look able to go over snow and ice?

Of course, if you want to make do with the emblems you already have, you can just make your car have the “appearance package”. This is fancy talk for taking all your existing emblems and painting them gold. Or blue, or green, or whatever strikes your fancy. The important part is your car is different, and your neighbors will think you got a raise or something.

So, for the cost of a trip to the junkyard or a can of paint, you can make it look like your car was bought for a couple grand more when it was new. And that is priceless. Or a couple thousand dollars, when it was new.

P.S. It is generally not a good idea to include “Light Dump” at the end of your vehicle’s model name. I know I put it as an example, but seriously. Gross.

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