A miser's manifesto

Have you ever woken up and been startled to realize you’ve become something you’d never have dreamed in your wildest imagination?

I suppose a lot of you young “kids” can’t relate to this experience as someone my age can.
It’s an eye-opener.

When you’re young, you’re steadfast and no one can convince you that the way you live your life at this moment is made up of many fleeting ingredients, many intermediate stages, which will all pass. Only your bare, skeletal essence will remain until the day you die. Your core essence which will never change or waver with the seasons.

But everything else will come and go.

I realized one day that I have become a pathological cheapskate.
Cheaper than shit.
If you tried to tell me 20 years ago that I would one day be such a miser, I would not have believed you. I would have laughed at you before proceeding to buy a round for the bar or running off to the nearest Bullock’s (yes, Bullock’s, remember that shit?) and use their store credit card to buy some ridiculously overpriced cologne. That would have been my style back in 1990.

There was absolutely nothing I didn’t not enjoy spending or wasting my money on.
I opened up department store credit cards all around town. I didn’t mind paying Guido interest rates because frankly, I didn’t care. What me worry? Just shut up, quit nagging, and give me my pay check. I need to go spend!

I always had a new car, new clothes, new everything.
I was the consumerist poster child.

Somewhere along the way I stepped off that ride. I became frugal.
Now I am cheapskate.

I hold on to every dollar, every penny, as if it were my last. I can’t be troubled to update any of my possessions. I think most electronic bullshit is…just that. A waste. I wouldn’t be caught dead with an i-phone or whatever it is Verizon sells now, I forget the name. I forget because I just don’t care. Spending so much money just to be tethered to this mad society is not my idea of a Wise investment.

Just leave me be.
My penny-pinching world view is emblematic of a larger phenomena in my life. Sparseness, frugality, minimalism…concepts and behaviors I embrace. I’m also stingy with my attention and time. I’m wrapped up in myself. I don’t have much of me to spare, sorry.

I use bars of soap right to the very end. I use them until little slivers of useless soap fragments remain but still I persist in getting the most suds as possible from soap shards the size of a toothpick.

Instead of spending money on overpriced and gimmicky washing solutions, I make my own cleaning fluid with water and bleach. I throw in some squeezed lemon juice if I want that “fresh clean” bullshit smell.

The bleach…I’m stockpiled because I buy gallons and gallons of it when it’s on sale. I am a sales shopper and I clip coupons. I’m the coupon king. I’m usually the only man in the store who has his coupon divider out and drawn as I saunter down the aisles looking to nab the best coupon+sale combo. Last week I bought a large frozen DiGiorno pizza which came with dipping sauce and a dozen bread sticks. Final price with coupon and store sale? $4.99. I was gleaming. I ate the final piece today.

As I detailed here, I bought a new desktop computer a couple of months ago. Prior to that I used a desktop I bought in 2003. The computer was literally falling apart. The casing came off and the CPU guts were hanging out and my monitor was as large as a circa 1973-Sanyo television. It was a high-tech disaster.

I’ve gutted my cable TV package. I keep calling Time Warner to end my television service altogether (I’m ready to use one of the HD converter boxes which hit the market after the high def conversion earlier this year) but the customer service hypnotist keeps lassoing me back with a better offer each time I make that threatening call. Currently, I’m paying less for internet/television than if I had ended my TV service completely. In effect, with my combined service, they are paying me to keep basic television (the free network channels, not the cable channels…I don’t watch television, why pay for it).

I rarely eat out. I cook everything and I have no problem eating leftovers long after they have begun growing a glistening green coat. I’ve done the math, eating out is a tremendous waste of money. I’ve adjusted my eating habits. I eat less (one fast day each week goes a long way at the market) and I stretch food out as long as possible. The freezer is my best friend. I cooked a corned beef seasoned roast in my crock pot last night. That meat will easily feed me 6-8 meals. One dollar spent at the market feeds you mutliple times. One dollar spent at the restaurant feeds you once unless you box up your leftovers, so maybe twice. Although most people I know end up throwing the leftovers out anyways. Learn to love leftovers, don’t fight them. Wasted food is wasted money. You might as well throw the cash directly into the garbage truck.

I think this is one reason I don’t date. Dating is too expensive. Meals, gifts, condoms, tickets…forget it. Easily the biggest money pit there is.

My car is 12 years old, gets crappy gas mileage and has over 146,000 miles on it. I’m not getting rid of it. I refuse to buy a new car (which would be a cinch for me with my savings and credit record) but I can’t see the rationale for incurring a new monthly payment (and an increased insurance premium). I’ll run my car into the ground…which should take a long time since I routinely take public transportation to work in order to minimize wear and tear on the car and also, minimize travel expenses. I’ve done the math. Paying $2.90 for a round trip bus and train fare to work is just slightly less than I would spend on gas (given current gas prices). I’ve done the math…

I rarely go out. Holed up here in my hermitage, I just sock away my earnings. I’ve seen to it that I have minimal expenses and better yet, curtailed my wants which is primarily a psychological battle. I’m addicted to not spending. I structure my entire life around minimizing spending and involvement.

Involvement is wasteful.