Please Sir, I Want Some More

January 28, 2012 in compassion, Food, Hunger, poverty, recession, Uncategorized by boxcarkids | No comments

Some half dozen years ago I spent the better part of a day volunteering at a local soup kitchen/food pantry on the weekend before Thanksgiving.  There’s something about the holiday season that heightens my desire to care for strangers and this was a perfect opportunity for a busy single mom of 2.  A friend who admired my initiative but didn’t share the same commitment was happy to take my daughters for the afternoon so I donned my work clothes – jeans and a sweatshirt - and a feeling of benevolence, and headed off to dole out charity.

The first hour or so was spent sorting food that had been donated – mostly canned goods, bags of pasta and rice, but also loaves of day old bread, and produce; heads of wilted lettuce and limp bundles of carrots.  There were dented cans, food that was past the expiration date, and foods clearly given more as a means of cleaning out the pantry than to provide a meal for the hungry.  Cans of sauerkraut, pearl onions, gravy, and surprisingly (given that Thanksgiving was still to come) cranberry sauce.  The only meat I saw that wasn’t in a can of soup, was a can of Spam.

As we packed the food into paper grocery bags, a more experienced worker gave us tips.  “Put the generic veggie cans and odd stuff on the bottom,” she said, “then rice, bread or pasta and produce.  Try to top it off with something appealing if you can – like this.”  She handed me a box of Frosted Flakes cereal.  Naturally there was no dairy, nothing that needed to be refrigerated or frozen.

Once the bags were filled we were directed to the kitchen to help prepare the ‘Thanksgiving’ Meal.  This was a lot closer to the meal I would be having the following week – it was ham instead of turkey, but the other fixings were much the same.  Mashed potatoes, peas, dinner rolls, salad, and pumpkin or apple pie for desert.  We peeled mountains of potatoes, chopped lettuce, opened industrial-sized cans of peas and heated rolls.  It was an assembly line effort and we were hurried along by bustling workers who warned us of the growing lines forming outside the doors.

Eventually the food was ready, tables were set and the doors were opened.  The people filed through and lined up cafeteria style to receive a plate filled with a hot meal.  There were older homeless men who shuffled through silently, maintaining a tight grip on their soiled backpacks.  There were migrant workers, darkly tanned and hardened by hours standing and bending and lifting in the sun.  There were families – not so many (this was before the recession) but a few.  Children so eager, eyes alight, tummies rumbling, reaching for their plates.  Parents with downcast gazes, hurrying the children through the line, hating the need to be there at all, mumbling their thanks.

We dished out over 100 meals that afternoon, and gave each adult one of the grocery sacks packed with food that we wouldn’t take home and serve to our own families because it wasn’t our brand, or was too old or unpalatable in other ways.  We were brightly cheery in the presence of the needy, proud that we had taken the time to come and serve them.  We accepted their gratitude as our due and frowned at the child who had a tantrum and refused to eat her peas, instead shoving her entire plate to the floor.  We murmured among ourselves, wondering what led people to make a life on the street instead of getting a job and living a ‘normal’ life.  Drug use?  Lack of education?  Lack of drive?  We couldn’t imagine it.

Yesterday I stood in line at the biweekly food pantry at a local church.  Ahead of me were other single adults, an elderly lady white-haired and hunched over, a man who limped along with the aid of a cane, and a woman about my age, nicely dressed in a colorful skirt and blouse.  Behind me a young mother tried to keep her toddler son entertained as the line edged slowly forward.  Most of us moved forward silently, keeping eye contact and conversation to a minimum. At the head of the line was a small card table, manned by several nicely dressed and groomed middle-aged volunteers.

They politely asked each person their circumstance and the number and ages of the people in their household before handing out a little green ticket that afforded one entrance into the part of the parking lot that housed the food.  Tables laden with sacks of paper grocery bags, bins filled with local produced rejected by the stores, and another table stacked with loaves of bread.  I handed over my green ticket and took the grocery sack I was offered.  A box of Frosted Flakes peeked over the edge, resting on a head of limp lettuce.  I declined the offer of extra cabbage and carried my bag to the car where I pushed aside the cereal and produce and reaching in, pulled out one of the cans.  Cranberry sauce.

I took the bag home, put away the food and made two tuna fish sandwiches.  These I took to the homeless man who was squatting outside in the bushes, leaning against the wall that surrounds our mobile home park.  I put the cranberry sauce aside for the next food drive at the kids’ school.

Money Management Part 2: Pinching Pennies

January 24, 2012 in blogging, economy, frugal living, monetizing blog, money, recession by boxcarkids | 24 comments

The following are a few examples of how we manage on our meager income, plus tips from other websites and sources on ways to save money and live frugally.  Everybody has some fixed expenses – fixed however doesn’t always mean completely unchangeable.  For instance, interest rates are down – it might be possible to renegotiate your mortgage for a lower payment.  You might have a monthly cable TV bill that is ‘fixed’ but of course it’s up to you to decide whether you need cable TV (or the specific plan/provider that you have).  Then there are the expenses you should be able to curtail to some extent – such as food, entertainment, and purchase of clothing and other household or personal goods.  These are the areas you have the greatest control over and the easiest first step in preparing a frugal budget.

Food

Our challenge is feeding a family of five, plus pets, on a limited budget while living in a small space.  How do we do it?  Well, naturally we clip coupons. But I don’t even try to ‘extreme coupon’ (haven’t seen the show but have an idea of what they do).  We don’t subscribe to the newspaper (too expensive) but I generally buy the Sunday edition for the coupons and I find coupons online (Shortcuts.com and mypoints.com for example).  I can either load the coupons onto my grocery club card or print them.  If I use coupons from My Points, I get points in addition to savings – those points eventually translate into grocery or gas gift cards.  Unfortunately a lot of coupons are for name brand products that, even with the coupon, cost more than the store brand, so I get limited use out of them.  The days of grocery stores doubling the face value of a coupon are over (at least where we live, although they will double up to $1) so I generally only use a coupon if it is an item we use/need and whenever possible I try and combine sales and coupons.

We shop at the bargain and warehouse stores – Dollar Tree, 99 cents store, Big Lots, Food for Less, Smart and Final – and sometimes these are good deals, sometimes not.  It helps that I have time to shop around but due to the price of gas I try and limit my visits to multiple stores and only go to those near another destination (generally one of our schools).  It’s not worth the gas to drive out to the closest Walmart (12 mile roundtrip) to save a few cents on one or two items.   And sometimes the bargain stores aren’t such a bargain – yes I can get a small bottle of dish soap for .99 but I have to calculate the unit price (is the $2.99 larger bottle at the grocery store a better price per ounce?) and decide whether I’m OK with trading quality for the lower price. If I use twice as much to get the dishes half as clean is it a bargain?

The warehouse store issue is buying in bulk.  The cost of some foods is less at Smart and Final when I buy the ‘value pack’ and I like S&F because you don’t need to pay to join like you do with CostCo and Sam’s Club.  But even though the cost per unit is sometimes quite a bit cheaper at S&F, the total cost is frequently more than I can afford.  And, with limited storage space, even when I have the money to buy super large bags of rice or flour or multiple packs of canned goods, I have no where to put them.  Nevertheless these stores are worth scouting out if you have a garage or large pantry.  When we lived in a house we had a freezer in the garage and I regularly stocked up on bulk frozen goods.   I miss that freezer!

In addition to shopping habits we’ve changed our eating habits.  We don’t buy treats (cookies, soda, ice cream, etc.).  We buy things on sale.  We buy fewer convenience goods and I cook more from scratch, although I have found out that sometimes the packaged meal is cheaper than buying all the ingredients and making the meal.  We have all given up foods we like and we seldom eat meat (which I must say I think I miss more than the kids do).

We get a box of food from a local food pantry about once a month if things are very tight – and sometimes end up with odd cans of things like cranberry sauce and mushrooms but sometimes get treats like strawberries and pork chops.  One month our box was nearly entirely made up of bread and bread products – loaves, rolls, bagels – and a frozen container of bread stuffing!

Entertainment

We own a TV but do not have cable TV service.  It’s too expensive and essentially a luxury for us.  We used to just use the TV to watch DVDs that we rented through Netflix or from one of the video rental boxes (Redbox, Blockbuster and the like).  And we picked up DVDs on sale (Blockbusters sells ‘previously watched’ dvds sometimes quite cheaply) or borrowed from friends or the library.  This was great for the kids who don’t mind watching the same show/movie over and over, but not something I used much.

We were given a Wii for Christmas some years ago and found that with an internet connection we could stream Netflix videos through the Wii.  This works perfectly for us and we use the Wii more for streaming than to play games (although the kids are really enjoying playing Wii Party Games – a Christmas gift from a friend this year).

Frankly an internet connection (something we did without for some time) is something more than a luxury.  It is a necessity for job hunting, and responding to requests from prospective clients.  I use it to sell on Etsy (cat beds) and, at one time, eBay.  I have multiple job searches set up via various websites, and use it to network (LinkedIn) and of course, write and maintain my blog. It is also the way I keep up on the news (our old trailer had a built in radio, this one doesn’t) and weather forecasts. The kids use it for homework (particularly my oldest two) and entertainment.

Our other ‘entertainments’ are on the cheap – we hang out with friends when we can; go to the YMCA, public playgrounds or the beach; read books checked out from the library (which occasionally does involve an expense as the library is out of our way and books are sometimes not returned on time); do puzzles and play games.  I try to put aside a little money for things like fieldtrips (my oldest is going to a science museum in LA next month) that have entry or bus fees so that the kids can do things with their school classes.

Clothing

Unfortunately due to the size difference between my daughters and the lack of storage space we can’t do too much in the way of hand me downs.  So we shop at thrift stores and bargain stores like Ross.  Internet coupons for stores like Kohls, plus shopping the clearance racks are great go-to places when we need a specific piece of clothing, like the black skirt/white shirt combination my middle school daughter needed for her band uniform.  Mostly we just wear things until they are worn out!

I think we are saving some money by washing clothes at home instead of going to the Laundromat.  Our electric bill is somewhat more expensive in our new trailer and I’m sure some of that is the washer/dryer use, but I no longer have to drive to the Laundromat so there’s a savings in gas to offset it.  I wish our washer had more than one setting – you can only wash a full tub of clothes since it fills all the way up with water regardless – but even so it is a big convenience to have it.

Internet Bargains

I use the internet to comparison shop, look for coupons and sales, and check craigslist for garage sales and freebies.  I used to look at freecycle but since we don’t really need to acquire much I tend not to go there these days.  If we ever have an apartment to furnish I’ll resubscribe.  I also sometimes pick up a Groupon deal – such as the $20 worth of Old Navy Clothing for $10 that I got just before Christmas.  Between the Groupon and the clearance racks I was able to find several pieces of clothing for nearly 80% under the list price.   I picked up another Groupon right after the holiday with a little of my Christmas money – $30 for THREE oil changes at a local auto shop.  That means the next 3 oil changes will only cost me $10 each, and are already paid for.  Yes, I expect the auto shop will try and talk me into new air filters, and any other add-on they can come up with but if I stand firm I’ve got a real deal!

I’m a member of My Points and redeem the points that slowly add up (you can rack them up faster if you shop on line but I generally earn points through emails, surveys, and coupons rather than shopping – although I do purchase my Groupons through My Points to get points in addition to the deals) for gift cards for the grocery store (Safeway) or gas station.  Since gas is one of those necessary expenses that I cannot stock up on it helps to have a gas card tucked away for the times when money is in short supply.

And of course I used the internet to ‘monetize’ my blog with Google ads and the Amazon.com affiliate shopping link.  Thanks to all of you who did your Holiday shopping through that link we will receive a check for nearly $200 in March (payment trails earnings by about 2 months).

What are your frugal living tips?

Money Management – Part 1: The Big Picture

January 24, 2012 in economy, frugal living, job search, money, poverty, recession, unemployment by boxcarkids | 5 comments

When you have a small and sporadic income, budgeting isn’t easy.  To be honest, even when I was employed fulltime I was never the poster child for budgeting.  You know how we’re told by all the personal finance gurus that you need to have 6 months worth of living expenses saved in case of an emergency or lay-off?  At best I managed 3 or 4 months.  Periodically I got hooked on some new financial management software or gimmick and, as with exercise programs, followed it religiously for a few months before reverting to old habits.    Money management wasn’t really part of my education – it was one of those subjects that wasn’t discussed much at home and in school the only part of the curriculum that came close was learning to balance a checkbook in home economics class.

Nevertheless I was relatively responsible in how I handled my money – tucking some away in savings, never coming close to the extravagant credit limit on my cards, and paying my bills on time.  I did enjoy browsing through stores and sometimes indulged in a little ‘shopping therapy’ when blue or to mark special occasions in my life.  I had a laid back attitude about money because I had a healthy and regular income.

To say that’s changed is an understatement.  These days financial issues are my biggest stressor.  Nothing keeps me awake late into the night, or makes me as anxious and irritable as wondering about whether I’ll be able to pay the bills.  With over 20 million Americans out of work, I figured others are probably having the same concerns so I went looking for tips and advice.

The blog, Living ‘Poor’ and Loving It, caught my attention by virtue of the title alone as we are living poor and I’m not loving it!  Unfortunately the blog’s author’s three rules consist of 1) Have Very Little Money; 2) Live on it; and 3) Rule 2 will change your life if you let it.  These are rules for people who have some money but live as though they have more.  People who run up their credit cards buying things they don’t need but think they want.  People who need to pare down their expenses by not eating out, buying sporting tickets, and going on vacation.  The author says “My most important money-management tool hasn’t been figuring out how to get more but rather discovering how little I really need and how much I already have.”

Been there, done that. We passed this phase of living poor during the first year after I was laid off.  Thanks to unemployment benefits we were able to ease into being poor (although it didn’t seem like it at the time) and as I detailed in several early blog posts we learned to live with much less – in possessions, space and income.   We gave up eating out, going to movies, subscribing to cable TV.  We clipped coupons, shopped at thrift stores, and ate a lot of beans and rice. If we were careful we could afford small luxuries like buying yearbooks for the kids or eating out on a birthday night.  We made do.  It wasn’t easy but it was bearable.

Now we have entered (sunk to) a new level – with no guaranteed income, some fixed expenses, some variable expenses and the occasional emergency.  We very much live hand to mouth.  My income (mostly from writing and editing jobs and the odd sale of a cat bed) is uncertain, frequently comes in very small amounts and goes as quickly as it comes.  When someone pays you $30 and you have a quarter tank of gas in your car you don’t worry about trying to save – you just head to the gas station.

When I have a slightly larger payment or a windfall I always put aside money for rent, stock up on necessities and use part of it to pay forward on whatever bills I can (after getting caught up on whichever bills I’m behind).  I find that paying two months of internet service, or car insurance, for example, relieves some of my anxiety and a less anxious mom is definitely a good thing for the family!  But sometimes I’m too eager to get caught up and paid forward and am then caught short-handed when, as happened last week, the car battery dies and needs to be replaced or the computer crashes and needs expert care.  Then, with no credit or borrowing power, I need to borrow from the rent money, hoping that another job comes along in time for me to replace it.

I believe we are on the edge of moving from living poor, to survival living.  It’s a scary place to be – I don’t like the view from here.

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