Frugal in the Fruitlands

Spendthrift Sunday is a new feature designed to highlight one distinctly un-frugal product that we’re being convinced we need.

Fashion is not a luxury, says the strident tagline of Sarah Jessica Parker’s new line of clothing, Bitten.

There was something about the signs that enraged me the moment I saw them, on a visit to the Leominster mall two weeks ago. I saw these ads immediately as the mind control they were: Forget your thousands of dollars of credit card debt, you deserve fashionable clothes, it said to me. Months of staying out of malls has made me keenly aware of the psychology used to part me with my money.

The topic didn’t come to the fore again until my mother visited this past weekend. She had seen the episode of Oprah where Bitten was featured, and thought she might find some clothes for her teaching gig this fall. Apparently the clothes are advertised as fitting a wide range of women.

So to Steve and Barry’s we went. Far be it from me to deny my mother.

The first thing that amused us is that of the Bitten items that were displayed at the front of the store, the XL shirt wouldn’t have fit me, let alone my larger mother. So much for fitting larger bodies. However, the prices were low, low, low.

We were soon to find out why.

In all fairness, there were definitely some styles that caught my eye, and I needed some new pants, so I retreated into the dressing room with a pair of khaki capris with odd ties at the bottom. The poor workmanship of these clothes became evident immediately. “This waistband is fraying,” I remarked, eyeing the “Made in China” label. Maybe it’s supposed to be distressed? Who knows? But the hems were fraying, too, and there were threads coming off all the seams, and the fabric itself was the same cheap, silky synthetic that all the Bitten pants are made out of.

The price for these pants? Fifteen dollars. $15 isn’t much at all for a pair of pants, but I felt like I could buy one of those 1960s paper dresses and be getting a better value for quality.

Visiting the website, I discovered that Bitten has a manifesto - I kid you not. I hope the pants feel empowered by it. “It is every woman’s inalienable right to have a pulled together stylish, confident wardrobe with money left over to live.” Inalienable right? Isn’t that going a little far? I mean, to hell with suffrage, if I can get some cheap clothes, right? Probably the person who made those clothes makes as much in a month as one pair of pants costs - what about their inalienable rights? How do they feel about being stylish and pulled-together?

I guess I can get past the trampling-on of a phrase that is so key to real independence everywhere, but I can’t get past the fact that this is advertising up to its same old tricks. They’re not selling you the clothes, they’re selling you a vision of who you will be when you’ve acquired those clothes. You’ll be “pulled together,” “stylish” (or “pulled together stylish,” if you go by the grammar above), and “confident.” And, assumably, be able to hide behind a toothpick like Sarah Jessica Parker.

The logistics of the manifesto fall apart as soon as you have a real look at the clothes. How can you argue that a pair of pants that’s going to fall apart in a year is worth $15? Here I revert to the wisdom that it is better to have a few high quality, classic pieces, and accessorize on the cheap, than it is to have lots of inexpensive, flimsy clothes. Ten out of ten classy French women would agree!

Admittedly, my own fashion concerns don’t extend beyond, “Do I stink?” and “Are my naughty bits covered?” but I encourage you to do what I did, and walk out of the store without spending a cent. Or don’t walk into it. Your money - your life energy - is better spent elsewhere.

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I’ve decided that the solution to my non-dairy dilemma is to cut coffee out of my life. Nay, not just coffee but all caffeine.

… at least for two weeks.

The first thing to understand about my tragicomic relationship with caffeine is that I appear to be hypersensitive to it. Only two cups or so has the power to send me on jittery, edgy - and yet delightfully hypomanic - trip. The further problem is that I am by nature an anxious person. Stress alone can keep me awake; but caffeine sends my body into an adrenaline spiral that remains even after the caffeine itself has filtered off.

I’ve known this for a long time about myself, but lately I’ve chosen to ignore it, because I do so like that edge between hypomania and dysfunction. This is not a unique phenomenon - caffeine is glorified in geek culture for exactly this reason. Maybe some geeks have a better tolerance for caffeine that I do, but not surprisingly, as I’ve been drinking more of it, I’ve had more problems sleeping. Because I have problems sleeping, and I’m tired in the morning, I drink more of it.

Now it’s time to put this cycle to rest.

Two strategies I plan to use:

1. Enlist help. I’ve enlisted BardWench to join me in this caffeine detox - actually, it started out as her idea. The ‘feen doesn’t have quite the hold on her that it does on me, but I look forward to checking in with a kind friend every morning, nonetheless.

2. Start a new morning habit. My morning habit used to involve coming into work, starting up my computer, and getting a cup of coffee. Now I’m going to start my day with a cup of herbal tea instead.

And two inspirational links:

1. Dear Caffeine, We Need to Talk @ Modern Worker.

2. Stop Being a Slave to Starbucks: How to Quit Caffeine @ Wise Bread.

So far I’m on day three, and I’m doing very well - I’m sleeping better and I don’t feel deprived. The only problem is that a humongo box of tea just arrived from a tea swap - ho noez! I’ve decided that I’m allowed to pick out caffeinated teas, but I’m not going to drink them until my two weeks is up.

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My family was never ashamed of thrift. They knew how to live cheaply without feeling deprived. I often wish I had half the wisdom they did - but I have learned a few things about feeling rich on limited funds.

1. Garage Sales. I spend my childhood following my family to garage sales, fleamarkets, and auctions. Here I learned the ultimate lesson of garage sale-ing: you have the power. A person holds a garage sale because they want to get rid of stuff. You, as the person in a position to take that “stuff” off their hands, are valuable to them. You can thus enrich yourself while enriching the other person - what could make you feel richer?

Garage sale-ing is like treasure hunting, complete with its own ups and downs. But when you come away with something that you would have paid $50 for in a store for a dollar or less, you feel not only rich, but virtuous.

2. Libraries. I’ve always loved libraries - their bounty and their order and their rules. The public library is a shining example of your taxes at work; you have to pay them, so why not make full use of your dollar?

I think a lot of people have an assumption that libraries only have ten-year-old, dog-eared paperbacks, and that’s why they’re not as visited as they could be. The truth is libraries are better than they’ve ever been. The Internet has done wonders for the kind of resources they can provide to the public.

I’d gone for many years without a library card when I walked into the Lunenburg Public Library a month or so ago. I was immediately greeted by an ebullient librarian at the circulation desk, who was only too happy to issue me a card, for which there was no cost. With it I received a brochure listing all the library’s vital information and instructions on how to request or renew books online. Since then I’ve requested two books from local libraries, and they’ve all arrived within two days, with an email notifying me that they were ready for pickup. The library hosts numerous events, too. This week I may go to see Ostrov (The Island), a Russian film that they’re screening. They also have video gaming events for teens and babysitting for harried parents.

Check out what your library has to offer - you might be surprised at the wealth of resources it can provide.

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* Lanni Orchards on Rte 13 in Lunenburg is offering pick-your-own raspberries and blueberries through the month of August. Raspberries are $2.50/lb and blueberries are $1.75/lb. My mom is coming to visit this weekend, and I fully intend to drag her there.

* The Yankee Brass Band will be playing “a selection of quicksteps, gallops, polkas, waltzes, overtures and medleys once popular in the mid-1800s” at Lunenburg High School on Thursday, July 26th at 7pm. Admission is free, but donations are accepted. See the Sentinel & Enterprise article here.

* Lunenburg Public Library is offering a free showing of the Russian film The Island (Ostrov) this Friday, July 27th at 8pm. IMDb describes it thus: “Somewhere in Northern Russia in a small Russian Orthodox monastery lives an unusual man whose bizarre conduct confuses his fellow monks, while others who visit the island believe that the man has the power to heal, exorcise demons and foretell the future,” and one reviewer describes it as “a movie that has the power to save souls.” Russian with English subtitles.

This does not, strictly speaking, have to do with local events, but I had to draw your attention to this Sentinel & Enterprise article: Finding the Perfect Yard Sale… Online. Apparently a Leominster resident had many of the same ideas I did about using the Internet to aid your yard sale search, and started up a yard sale database. Admittedly, there are lot of such databases out there these days, but I will add Yard-Sale-Search.com to my list, if only because it has a local focus. Go Mark!

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Spendthrift Sunday is a new feature designed to highlight one distinctly un-frugal product that we’re being convinced we need.

I think I have a drinking problem: every day I pour two to three cups of coffee into my body, and I can’t seem to stop. One good thing is that I have a free source of it: the coffee at work. The bad thing about this, however, is that it needs some nuclear-powered chaser to bust through its bitterness. Half and half with sugar? Too weak!

The balance of light and dark in my (work) coffee is only restored by the power of non-dairy creamer. The liquid kind, and a brand name, at that - I won’t disclose which one, but it rhymes with “irate.” By its power alone, the coffee at work is rendered drinkable.

Now, the creamer is not provided free of charge - someone usually has to buy it. Since I seem so dependent on it, it tends to be me. And here’s where the spendthrift part comes in: I spent around $7 last week providing my office with creamer, a large part of which I won’t even get to drink.

If it were simply a question of money, I might accept this fact. But let’s examine the fact that there is nothing even close to “cream” in non-dairy creamer. The British call it whitener, and that’s a far more accurate term. What are some of the tantalizing ingredients? The top three are water, sugar and partially hydrogenated soybean and/or cottonseed oil. Mmmm. I luvs me some of that trans fat.

But wait! The label claims that there is “no trans fat.” How is that possible? Oh, I see. They’ve engineered the serving size so that the amount of trans fat slips in under label regulations. Clever.

So every day I’m putting a shitload of trans fat into my young-and-yet-cholesterol-ridden body. AND I’m paying for the privilege.

Sadly, all the options for changing this habit seem less than ideal:

1) Make coffee at home. When I make coffee at home, it’s usually Kenya AA or Kona coffee (some of the world’s finest), and it’s not bitter enough to need more than a splash of half and half and some chocolate syrup. This combination would probably make my at-home coffee expense more than my at-work non-dairy creamer expense, but it would be moderately healthier - well, except that half and half is not exactly a healthy food, either.

2) Drink tea. I have plenty of teas at work, caffeinated and otherwise, so that’s an option. Generally I don’t get much of a high off tea anymore, and it is by caffeine alone that I put my hands in motion.

3) Wean myself off caffeine. I am not, by any means, a h4rdc0r3 coffee drinker. Two or three cups is enough to turn me into Rainman. So this would likely not be terribly difficult. What I would miss most would be the ritual: the coming into work, turning on my computer, and sitting down to a cup of sweet, sweet transfatty caffeinated goodness.

Any other suggestions for avoiding this spendthrift pitfall, my good readers?

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Spendthrift Sunday is a new feature designed to highlight one distinctly un-frugal product that we’re being convinced we need. (And this time it’s one day late).

Who knew that you needed an entire, Flash-based site to sell iced coffee? I mean, really, it seems like a no-brainer: people like icy, caffeinated drinks. Not so with Dunkin Donuts, apparently: they recently launched MyIcedCoffee.com, an intricate site designed to sell you such icy, caffeinated drinks (ironically, if you search Google for “dunkin donuts iced coffee,” this site does not come up) and paraphernalia.

… paraphernalia such as a Dunkin Donuts Cup Cooler. Lest you think that no one would ever spend $3-$4 on one of these, I was introduced to this phenomenon by my coworker, who had bought one. “It’s really great,” says she. “It keeps the cup from being slippery and you have a little slit to see how much you have left.”

DOT DOT DOT.

It’s… a cozy. For your iced drink. Nay, it’s a cozy specifically for your Dunkin Donuts iced drink. What would happen if you tried to use it with a Starbucks frappucino? YOU DON’T WANT TO KNOW. We never found that one guy who tried.

I’m waiting for the branded straws. At $1.99 a pop, I’m sure they would double - maybe even triple - my enjoyment of a large raspberry chocolate iced coffee with cream and sugar.

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Last week I reviewed the first chapter of Arnold Bennett’s How to Live on 24 Hours a Day, a Victorian-era personal productivity guide. Next in this continuing series (which has absolutely nothing to do with Jack Bauer) is chapter two, deliciously titled “The Desire to Exceed One’s Programme,” a chapter that he addresses to “that innumerable band of souls who are haunted, more or less painfully, by the feeling that the years slip by, and slip by, and slip by, and that they have not yet been able to get their lives into proper working order.”

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I am often paralyzed with the awareness that I have a finite amount of time, and a list of goals and tasks that expands every day. Sometimes it helps to realize that this isn’t a modern phenomenon; that the PDA hasn’t made it better, but neither has it made it worse.

So relevant to the modern person is Arnold Bennett’s How to Live on 24 Hours a Day that it could have been published yesterday. Except for a few markers of its Victorian timeframe (mention of servants and “spirit-lamps,” for example), you might be tempted to think that it was written by a very British David Allen. I thought I’d take a stab at reviewing it for the readers who may not be familiar with this proto-personal development chapbook.

Chapter One: The Daily Miracle

“But though you have of the wealth of a cloak-room attendant at the Carlton Hotel, you cannot buy yourself a minute more time than I have, or the cat by the fire has.”

“In the realm of time there is no aristocracy of wealth, and no aristocracy of intellect. Genius is never rewarded by even an extra hour a day.”

Not so much a lifehack as an essay on the qualities of time, this chapter is. Bennett’s observations are fairly straightforward but beautifully worded, and I’d encourage anyone to read this as a stand-alone essay.

There are two takeaway points in this:

• Time in even more valuable than money. There are always ways of making more money, but each of us has our allotment of time, and must make of it what we will.
• Your happiness depends on how well you manage that time. “Out of it you have to spin health, pleasure, money, content, respect, and the evolution of your immortal soul,” says Bennett. I suppose as an atheist I have an out on that last one.

… actually, that raises another point. This work is remarkably lucid about mortality for a Christian author. If you believe in eternity, what does it matter what you accomplish in your mortal life? Or perhaps, as Christopher Hitchens points out in God is Not Great, Bennett is only concerned with the “immortal soul” because he lived in a time when to do otherwise was dangerous.

One thing that Bennett doesn’t touch on is how paralyzing this fear of finitude can be by itself. This is a problem I often have–I end up doing nothing because there is so much to do.

I think that this way lies the path of addiction as well. In retrospect, I can say that I was truly addicted to World of Warcraft, and the reason I was is because it numbed the pain of finitude. Anyone who has not played an MMO may not realize their power to stop time for the individual playing them, but let me emphasize that when I was playing, everything else ceased to exist. Now that I’ve stopped playing, all that fear and pain has come back, and the challenge is to look at my daily time as a miracle, as a gift, and not as a burden.

Arnold Bennett is dust. What did he make of his life? All that’s left to us is to wonder how we will make an example of our own lives.

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