Friends and family have called me “thrifty”, “cheap” and “miserly”. I’m OK with that categorization as I don’t think (I hope) that I don’t come across as a crotchety old bag about it. Granted, those closest to me might feel the sting of my miserly nature more acutely, but I don’t see the point of spending money foolishly.
Yes, I have my moments of spending foolishly: this past week we bought new sheets, duvet cover and curtains1 for the bedroom, but if you ask my sister, I’ve been agonizing buying a new duvet cover for months. The sheets, well, were needed as the sheets we have now are starting to wear out2 and the curtains were a more frivolous purchase, but I wanted them to match the new duvet. But, the curtains I have now don’t match the current duvet/sheets because they were a hold over from when I had a quilt3 on the bed from nearly 5 years ago.
Like I mentioned earlier, I do spend money on myself for sheer frivolity every once in a while, but those are few and far between. Most of the stuff I spend money on (outside of the necessities) are for practical items.
In the past few months, however, I’ve gotten lax in my thriftiness. I got a new smart phone (granted, it was cheap and I got an unlimited data and 300 texts plan for $15 on top of my already miserly $29/month cell plan) and I keep thinking of repainting 1/2 the inside of my house, getting new cushions, rugs, possible flooring. I bought a couple of video games because I “needed” something to play. I bought more frivolous Lush stuff (bath bombs? really?) and a new pair of sunglasses (my old ones had lost the nose pads, and I pro-dealed them from my PT job). New clothes. New shoes. Mostly on the plastic, which hasn’t been paid off from the office remodel yet4.
Now I sit here thinking about moving to a bigger house, getting a new car, a second “fun” pair of prescription glasses and getting even more crap for the house. NONE of which I need. The stuff we have now is fine! My car’s almost paid off! Why in the hell do I think I need to go further in debt when I don’t need to?
Thus, I’m putting myself on a self-imposed spending ban. No stupid purchases and NOTHING gets put on the card until I get 1/2 of its current balance paid off. This could take some time, but I just put a small post-it note on the front of the card:
REALLY?! Don’t fracking use me! Idiot!
So if I pull it out to buy something else that’s stupid, I’ll see the note and curse myself for being an idiot.
Should work, right?
I’m going to bring frugal back!
_________
1 – From Target and Ikea, respectively. Go big spender!
2 – Why is it so hard for fitted sheet manufacturers to put elastic in their sheets that doesn’t wear out after a year?
3 – A quilt that required going to the laundromat to wash because it was too big for my compact-sized washer/dryer. I also have a small black and white cat that prefers to barf on the bed, thus the need for a duvet cover that I can take off and wash.
4 – Of which we went overbudget by getting the chairs we wanted, which makes me feel guilty to no end spending that much on a frivolous item.
August 13, 2010 at 9:52 am
Buying stuff is what we are trained to do from a very early age in these western countries of ours. It;s how the whole thing works. Trying to prevent yourself from doing that is like trying to break years and years of social conditioning. Very hard to do, something I’ve certainly never managed as my several heavily loaded credit cards will tell you. There will be an attempt, post wedding, to try and get back into the black (save for the house and the car) but if we actually pull that off I will be amazed!