The Frugal Life: frugal out and about

Frugal failure

Mon, 26 Nov 2007 13:19:45 GMT

Apparently this blog is interfering with my ability to surprise my parents, who live in Ireland, with tales of my thrilling adventures in exciting Billericay. About to launch into one such saga on the phone to my mother last night, she quickly interrupted me. “I know what you’ve been doing this week,” she said, sounding faintly bored. “I read your blog.” Ah…such cutting words. What will I have to do now to keep her entertained during our weekly phone conversations? Maybe I could get a tattoo. It’ll have to be a home-made one though in keeping with the frugal lifestyle. Perhaps I could write DON’T SPEND ANY MONEY on my arm with biro – that would serve two purposes then and hopefully save me from myself.

Shunil’s leaving do on Friday was great fun. But I was a frugal failure. The excitement of seeing my old work mates disorientated me. Despite all best intentions, I found myself uttering the treacherous words “does anyone want a drink?” This was greeted with titters from my former comrades who pointed out I have pledged to live the frugal life, but by that point I felt too embarrassed to retract my offer.

The round came to £10.70…eek…although it could have been worse…but fortunately, whether this was good luck or karma, the evening was largely cash neutral in the end as the very kind Shunil insisted on buying me dinner. He was embarrassed that nobody let him buy any drinks in the pub. Who ever heard of anybody buying their own drinks at their leaving do? Shocking!

But I must try harder next time to be a skinflint, or simply not go to the pub at all. Perhaps it would be less guilt-inducing to opt out of the round system altogether and simply buy my own soft drink and make it last as long as possible.

Meanwhile I have received an exciting FINAL DEMAND from my new best friends at TalkTalk for their daylight robbery £70 ‘cessation fee’ and them stealing our phone number from us. It was a ‘FINAL DEMAND’ as opposed to a ‘final demand’, as this was printed in big red letters at the top and I got the impression that they were definitely shouting. It is all terribly bullying – they say they will soon set rottweilers from a “licensed debt collection agency” on me and my credit rating “may already be affected”. I’m assuming that Simon Rawlings, the author who works in TalkTalk’s charming Debt Prevention and Litigation department, hasn’t read/ appreciated the stinging eloquence of my complaint letter. But then Carphone Warehouse/TalkTalk only give out a PO Box number, not a proper address on their letters so goodness knows where my complaint letter has got to. Especially as they don’t even seem to have a complaints department! I feel multiple complaint letters coming on…

Interestingly, they are also labouring under the impression that we had a phone service with them until 2 October, when we switched to BT on 3 September. So they have charged us for an extra month but provided no service during that time. Excellent! Keep up the good work, Charles Dunstone!

To cheer myself up I am planning on making my own Christmas pud this year, although the challenge will be keeping the price of a homemade one down to the price of a shop bought one. More on that soon!

Technorati Tags: saving money on nights out , cheap nights out , London drink prices , TalkTalk , Carphone Warehouse , Charles Dunstone

Frugal on holiday

Tue, 20 Nov 2007 13:03:06 GMT

Here I am, back at the frugal chalk face after a week off. I didn’t go away as DJ has run out of holiday time and was at work (ah…poor chap! How I pitied him when he rushed off to work and I was still tucked up in bed…!), but just pottered about visiting friends and popping into London.

The tricky thing about holidays is avoiding spending money. Obviously, while you’re working you’re occupied – and being paid for it - but on hols you have to find things to do, and that can mean spending cash. There’s only so much time you can fill lying about reading cheap detective novels until you get cabin fever.

Visiting friends at home is a cheap option, although if, like mine, they are spread out across London you have to pay to travel to them. K and Vix I saw last week live in Enfield and Croydon, which are a bit of a hike. And you can’t really turn up empty handed either if they’re making lunch. But taking a box of chocolates along is cheaper than going out for lunch. In a moment of frugality (probably induced by meeting her for a non-frugal lunch earlier in the week) I baked K a marble cake which cost me nothing as the ingredients were already at home - and it went down well!

Fortunately many of the London museums are free now, unless there’s a pricey exhibition on. I went to the BP Portrait exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery on Friday, which cost £1 although the gallery likes a voluntary £3 donation. Stupidly I didn’t have any change, though, so I wound up buying a £3 pack of Christmas cards from the shop to get my £1!

Admittedly, I dragged DJ to the West End to see Glengarry Glenn Ross last night as it was high time we experienced a little more culture in our lives beyond watching Spooks (usually from behind the sofa). In my defence through Lastminute.com I got £25 off tickets normally £45. OK, we could have got tickets in the Gods for a tenner each, but the view would have been of actors’ bald patches anyway.

We hadn’t been to the theatre for nearly two years - mainly because it’s so expensive. The last thing we saw was Otherwise Engaged with Richard E. Grant and Anthony Head (the librarian in Buffy the Vampire Slayer) and we paid £50 each a ticket. Ouch! Fortunately it was good! It’s a shame because I love the theatre – I was a student thesp - but often in the West End the seats are uncomfortable, the leg room restricted and sometimes the performances disappoint. Whereas, nobody moans about paying a few quid to see a rubbish film. Last week for the first time we used the Orange two-for-one cinema offer and saw Death at a Funeral. It cost £3.50 each, the seats were comfortable and the view excellent. It was every bit as enjoyable as Glengarry, Glen Ross.

We may try the local am dram society’s production later this week if we have time – the tickets are £6!

Do you think the theatre is a rip off? Got any cheap holiday entertainment tips? Let me know.

del.icio.us Tags: cheap holiday entertainment , national portrait gallery , glengarry Glenn Ross , death at a Funeral , orange Wednesdays , lastminute.com , cheap theatre tickets , Spooks

Technorati Tags: cheap holiday entertainment , national portrait gallery , Glengarry Glenn Ross , Death at a Funeral , Orange Wednesdays , Lastminute.com , cheap theatre tickets

Stand up for your frugal rights

Fri, 28 Sep 2007 14:33:25 GMT

I found out why the blackberries in Norsey Wood weren’t at their best the other day - apparently there’s some old wives tale that says you have to pick them before Michaelmas (29^th September) because that’s when the devil spits on them and they start to taste horrible! Well, actually from a slightly more scientific point of view apparently there’s loads of tannin in brambles and they start to taste a bit bitter when they‘re past their best. I went out this morning into the garden and tasted some of the ones on our blackberry bush and they were starting to taste a bit yick so it must make sense I suppose. Need to keep on my toes with this wild food stuff - it’s not like the veg in the supermarket that seems to keep for ages.

There are loads of windfall apples though from our tree which are dual purpose - cooking and eating - and are very tasty so will have to think about making better use of them than leaving them for the chickens to eat. The girls keep pecking at them and apparently you mustn’t let them do that too much to rotting or fermenting apples as they get drunk and start staggering around! Just eating one now off the tree and it’s really tasty. Making me feel slightly better about the last remaining chocolate bar I snaffled from the fridge this morning…

DJ has suggested making some cider which could be a good idea. I’ve just seen a recipe in a magazine for making mulled cider which sounds delicious. He’s also a bit of a mushroom specialist (mis-spent university education!) and reckons the photo of the tree fungus in my little photo album - captioned ‘tasty or deadly’ isn’t edible anyway!

Feeling a bit anxious on the frugal front though. We’re off for the weekend to stay in a cottage in the Cotswolds - it’s been booked for DJ’s friend James’ 30^th birthday celebrations and we paid for it ages ago. Bit of a shame the weather seems to be turning out lousy today. We had hoped we’d go on some nice walks up there, but now I think I‘ll be taking my knitting with me instead! But while I’m looking forward to going, what is worrying me is the peer pressure to spend money you tend to feel when you go on these trips away. If you don’t splash out you feel like you’re being a killjoy. And typical is these big meals out somewhere in some fancy restaurant where you find yourself scrimping and having nothing but lentil soup and a piece of dry bread and water, but then some bright spark who had three courses, wine and brandies says ‘you know what guys, let’s split the bill!’ and your heart sinks. So many times when I was an impoverished student or graduate I’ve allowed people to do this to me but I’ve since learnt my lesson. It’s at these times you have to stand up and say, you know what, let’s not! Let’s everybody pay for what they ordered. Alright!

I’ll see how confident I feel at doing that…! Mmm…I'll let you know!