Still Here

Hey all, sorry I've been such a bad blogger. I don't even really have an excuse. I've just been preoccupied.

To touch upon a subject I wrote about last time, my frugal tip of the day is this: hang out with your parents!

On Wednesday, my mom happened to be in San Francisco, so I suggested we meet up for lunch. She drove over to my neighborhood and we met at Fog City Diner, a classic diner with something of an upscale twist. We each got a beer and a delectable lunch. Let me tell you, after weeks of pasta and sauteed chicken strips and Trader Joe's potstickers, chicken schnitzel in a lemon cream sauce with garlic mashed potatoes tasted like heaven. Just thinking about it is making me hungry. So, all in all, a lovely lunch. When the check came, I reached for my purse.

"Do you want me to help with my half?" I asked my mom. She snorted with laughter.

"It's very nice of you to offer, but you are too poor to afford this lunch. Don't worry about it."

After lunch, I took her for a stroll through the local park, then we went to my office, so I could introduce her around. She was, of course, a big hit, and a lovely afternoon was had by all.

I love my mom.

Today we are celebrating my grandpa's 79th birthday as we celebrate all his birthdays. The entire family will all go to a little restaurant in Santa Cruz made up to look like a hunting lodge. Complete with animal heads on the walls. I try not to look at them while we are eating. We will sit at the bar while the family members trickle in, sipping delightful cocktails. Inevitably someone will spill their drink. I did it a few years ago, so it should be someone else's turn. After the ensuing hubub and dabbing of napkins, we will be escorted to the huge table by the fireplace in the main room. There, we will all gather round and order delicious meals. My mom and Aunt Joy will have the lamb. My cousin Ryan will have oysters. I will have whatever catches my fancy, but I know whatever I choose, it will be mouth-watering. And when the check comes, we "kids" will sit blissfully back while the grown ups take care of everything. We always offer, and they always scold us for even trying.

The moral of the story: hanging out with the family is delightful and is the occasion for free gourmet meals. Awesome.

Staying In

So it's a lazy Saturday morning, and I bet you all are wondering how an impoverished 20-something spends her weekends. I'm not meeting my friends for dinner. I'm not going out for a few drinks with the girls. I'm not hitting the mall to get started on my Christmas shopping. I'm not even going to see Pirate Radio, Zombieland, or The Men Who Stare at Goats. (Even though I really like George Clooney.)

My budget for entertainment is, needless to say, limited. I live in the Bay Area, though, and there are tons of great cheap and/or free events. There is no excuse to ever be bored. For example, the UC Berkeley Symphony puts on free concerts. The Fox Theater down the street plays fantastic classic movies, complete with newsreel and cartoons for just five bucks. Local bookstores are forever hosting talks and readings. Now, to be fair, I don't do all these things on a regular basis, but I do know about them and could ostensibly take advantage of such cultural richness.

Here's what I am more likely to be doing on a typical weekend:

What money I do have, I try to spend wisely. I do not have cable in my house. I have, however, signed up for Netflix and I am getting every penny's worth out of the $9.87 a month. I watch the occasional movie, but where I am really getting mileage out of my Netflix account is in the TV shows. I've watched lots of Dexter, old episodes of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, and several seasons of South Park. The watch instantly feature is fantastic! I also keep up with The Daily Show and The Colbert Report by watching them on Hulu.

I also have a sizable library and many bookish friends, so there are always at least a couple books I'm reading at any given moment. Quiet, yes. Dorky, so they say. But I love it and I think reading makes the reader a more interesting person. Plus, let's face it, it's just fun.

Tonight, though, won't be spent watching a movie on my laptop or curled up with a book. Tonight is reserved for some free, wholesome fun. Sounds boring, right? It's totally not. My boyfriend and I are going over to my parents' house for a game night. We'll probably play Parcheesi. Still sounds boring? Factor in the deeply competitive nature of my family, my mom's awesome tri-tip, and her propensity of providing us with delightful snacks, and we are in for an evening of good food and tense scowls across the game board.

So I'm not going clubbing. I won't get trashed or meet anyone at a party. And sure, I'm probably missing out on some interesting experiences. Other kids my age are probably having a wild time. But I'm just as happy to be kicking butt at board games and eating all the food I can at my Mom and Dad's.

Stocking Up

Friday the 13th maybe have been unlucky for other people, but for us it was pay day, and you know what that means: I can go buy groceries! Hooray! For the week preceding, I had been scraping meals together out of the few things I had left. There were lots of eggs-- poached, preferably. There was toast, with a scrape of butter. There was zucchini since I had, in my wisdom a few weeks before, purchased about a dozen. There was cereal. Dry, since I was out of milk, but tasty nonetheless. My freezer was empty save a bag of ice and some sad looking strawberries. The fridge contained only hummus of an indeterminate age, some long forgotten romaine, and a collection of salad dressings. I had eaten the last of my pasta. All my handy stir fry dinners had long since been devoured. In short, I was consuming nutrients. I only half count that as really eating.

I go to the grocery store about once a month, and stock up, as if for a siege. Since I try very hard not to go out to eat, I have to buy enough staples for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for the next several weeks. In addition to eating cheaply, I also try to make sure my diet is relatively healthy. (Relatively because a life without the occasional treat is a life not worth living.) It's hard to do that on a budget, but with the help of a few great cooking websites and Trader Joe's, I manage to do alright.

Here are the things I always stock up on:

Rice, because it's long lasting and a good base for my bento box lunches

Pasta, because it makes for nice dinners, which then make delightful leftover lunches

Chicken. I buy boneless, skinless breasts, filet them myself at home, then put them in individual bags in the freezer. That means I always have some kind of easy protein on hand, and I never have to worry about any of it going bad. They sell chicken prepackaged this way and it's $10 more a pound! Ridiculous!

Oatmeal. It's my favorite breakfast. When I'm being good, I buy in bulk and make it at home on the stovetop, but I like to keep some of the instant kind around so I can throw it in my purse and eat it at work on a rushed morning.

Omega Trek Mix from Trader Joe's- It's a bit pricey, but it's one of my favorite afternoon snacks--healthy and tasty. They come by the pound or in handy individual packets of a stow-in-the-purse nature.

Potatoes. Long lasting, delicious, versatile, and totally cheap. Everyone should eat potatoes. Preferably with lots of butter.

Milk. I know not everyone likes milk, but I drink it by the gallon. I buy a gallon and, if I drink it sparingly, can still finish well within the expiration date.

Breaded frozen fish and frozen chicken patties. These are great for a hurried morning. I just pop them in the toaster oven while I shower and by the time I'm done, they are ready to toss into my bento. And at just a couple dollars for enough patties to last me weeks of lunches, I'd say it's a pretty good deal, too.

Here are my splurges:

A bottle of cabernet sauvignon. It was a mid-range price. I figure I don't drink wine often so it may as well be good. I intend it to last over the course of a few meals.

A pot of hydrangeas. Here's my logic: I love having flowers in the house. Cut flowers cost as much as the pot. If I can keep the potted plant alive, my flowers will last way longer and therefore be far more cost efficient. That, of course, depends on my keeping the flowers alive...

A box of French truffles. Sorry guys, I'm not perfect.

I also got a bunch of fresh vegetables and one of those giant bags of Clementines. Since I bring my lunch to work every day, I like to make sure that I am eating some fruits and vegetables, not just carbs and meat. This is also in keeping the philosophy of bentos, which I will go into further in a later post. If you're curious in the meantime, check out http://justbento.com/handbook/bento-basics

With all my delicious food stowed tidily in the kitchen, I feel I could weather a storm or an earthquake, or even the four weeks before I can go grocery shopping again.

Starting Out

I've heard that every blog starts with an ah hah moment. One lazy Sunday afternoon, I was wandering down Telegraph Avenue with a couple friends, looking for cheap flannel shirts to give to homeless people. After finding only unattainable goods, my friends decided that the drive to Telegraph would not be wasted; they would at least have lunch. I froze.

Stop.

Here are some important facts you need to know to understand why lunch is quite so horrifying. I have a wonderful, but low-paying job. I love it, but I am impoverished. In order to qualify for said delightful job, I amassed about $80,000 in student loans. On top of the loans, I also live alone in a charming studio in an admittedly upscale area of Oakland. On top of rent, I also lived off of my credit card for a few months between college and employment. All of this has created a maelstrom of a financial situation. I am poor. Now, to continue:

This lazy Sunday happened to be a few days after I paid my rent. It also happened to occur soon after the maxing out of my accursed credit card. (This maxing out has more to do with interest than shopping, at this point.) In fact, I wasn't even entirely sure my rent check wouldn't bounce. I had less than nothing. And I was famished. You know when you get so hungry that you start getting shaky and flushed? That's how hungry I was. Never before had I been in a situation where I could not join in a simple, cheap meal. Shouldn't join I was very familiar with, but when push came to shove, I'd always had the choice. Until this time.

I told my friends I would just cook for myself when I got home, so they just nodded and sauntered up to the counter to order. I found myself sitting at the dingy table and watching them eat breakfast burritos. It was only with great effort I could tear my eyes away from their food. I examined the murals on the wall. We chatted. All the while I was trembling with hunger and starting to feel sick. If I had asked, I'm sure they would have shared, but I didn't want to beg, not knowing when or if I would be able to pay them back. I knew I wouldn't starve to death in the next hour or so, but I was also pretty certain that if I didn't eat soon I was going to puke.

At long last they finished and we all went back to my house. While they putzed around on my laptop, I dashed into the kitchen and whipped a lunch as fast as I possibly could. They did not seem to notice my haste, nor that I wolfed my food down moments after I took it off the stove.

This was the clearest example I have yet experienced of my situation. I cannot waltz into a cafe for lunch with a friend. I cannot walk across the street for coffee with the girls for work. Shopping, once a beloved pastime, now seems an unattainable luxury. I was raised to be a comfortably middle class citizen. My tastes lean towards sushi and Bloomingdale's. Things I once considered my birthright are now impossibly out of reach.

I am slowly learning to navigate the gaping disconnect between the life I was taught to live and the life I actually afford. I suspect this situation is not unheard of, or even uncommon. I don't claim to be a perfect example, but I am pleased to say that I have found a few thrifty hacks. I manage to have a pretty decent time. This blog is intended to share my tricks and shortcuts for fashion, food, furnishings, and anything else that starts with f. Suggestions are always welcome!