I’m not calling you an idiot if you coupon. I do it myself. (I also remember the day when “coupon” was a noun, not a verb. Ditto “journal” and “parent.”)
What I’m doing is promoting this week’s giveaway, “The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Couponing.”
coupons
Up for grabs: All You magazine plus cookbook.
This week’s giveaway is a six-month subscription to All You magazine, which thrifty types love for its numerous coupons and its life hacks.
Oh, and its recipes. Can’t forget those, which is why I’m throwing in a copy of All You’s new “Eat Well, Save Big” cookbook.
And if you’re not the winner? You can take advantage of a $6 subscription deal.
Up for grabs: Two subscriptions to All You.
If you’re a couponer and/or in the market for inexpensive recipes and easy-to-achieve life hacks, then All You magazine can help.
This week, you get a chance not just for a one-year subscription but also a second subscription for a friend.
Beating the high cost of groceries.
Kelly Hancock, who blogs at Faithful Provisions, has a new book out — and a shopping bag to match. This week you have a chance to win both.
How to kick your Diet Coke addiction.
I can remember my grandfather grousing about the price of cigarettes. He swore he would quit when it went up past 35 cents a pack.
It did, and he did.
Now I know how he felt, although my particular vice is brown and fizzy and gives me reward points. At an Anchorage supermarket I was shocked to find Diet Coke selling for $8.19 per 12-pack. Thank goodness there’s no sales tax here.
That works out to 68 cents a can. It won’t break the bank. But really? More than eight dollars for a 12-pack? For something that I can’t even get drunk off of?
Weighing in on ‘Extreme Couponing.’
A lot of people have strong feelings about the TLC reality series “Extreme Couponing.” My own impression of the show is secondhand, since I don’t own a television.
Technically I could see the next two episodes because the TLC publicist kindly gave me online access. Ultimately I decided not to watch. Based on what I’ve read and also on what my daughter told me and wrote about the show, I would just wind up depressed.
The “Coupon Mom” book winner. Also: Emergency prep on a shoestring.
The random number generator loved Sheryl the best this week. Sheryl: Please respond to my e-mail with your address and the book will wing its way to you.
In other news:
“Time to plan an egg-based meal,” my weekly post at MSN Money’s Smart Spending blog, was chosen for the Festival of Frugality at Stupid Cents.
“Emergency preparedness on a budget,” my latest work at Get Rich Slowly, is an Editor’s Pick in the Carnival of Personal Finance at Funny About Money (even though the post contains the word “poop”).
The article is about meeting basic needs in an emergency. Such as:
Don’t hate the payer, hate the game.
I’m the grocery store customer who challenges the scanner. Yes, it slows things up a little. But I’m not going to pay $2.89 a pound just because someone forgot to tell the computer that hams are on sale this week.
That’s me. And you? You might be the person behind me, grinding her teeth in frustration because I won’t accept anything other than the advertised price.
My apologies if your checkout is delayed by 60 seconds. But that $1.90-per-pound savings times eight pounds represents almost $16. My budget won’t let me back down.
I glean cracker wrappers.
Want to be considered weird, embarrassing or just plain cheap? Be frugal among people who aren’t. Even the folks who say they love you may criticize your 10-year-old car or your thrift store habit.
And if you want to send strangers over the edge, just flash a manufacturer’s coupon in the checkout line. It’s like waving a red cape in front of a rabid bull. Indeed, the noise that some shoppers make is positively bovine: Mooaawwwww…another one of those coupon queens! Groan, sigh, mumble, JEEEZZZZ….
(Wonder if any of them have ever held up a line an extra 30 seconds while searching pockets or purses for debit cards or exact change?)
Therapeutic massage: Rubbed the right way.
I had three massages in eight days. The circumstances were unusual and will likely never be repeated. But for a while I knew how the super-rich must feel: Really relaxed.
One of the three was my first-ever hot stone massage. I’d told my daughter that there should be Cold Stone massage, i.e., being rubbed with ice cream. She suggested that eating ice cream during a massage would combine the best of two very nice worlds.
The 60-minute sessions at Dynamic Chiropractic and The Vital Energy Center cost $35 apiece thanks to the magic of social buying. The other was slightly discounted ($97 for 90 minutes) because I bought a five-session package at New Seattle Massage.
Usually I try for an appointment every four weeks or so, but sometimes go for months without being rubbed the right way. However, the two social-buy deals were due to expire in early summer and I have to leave in a few weeks for a housesitting job in Alaska. And like my mom, I believe that waste is a sin.