A Quote to Start Things Off

""I'd love to go to Santa Fe at some point, Emmett said, but for the time being, I need to go to New York. The panhandler stopped laughing and adopted a more serious expression. Well. that's life in a nutshell, aint it. Lovin' to go to one place and havin' to go to another. Amor Towles in the Lincoln Highway.

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Pictures of Memories I

Pictures of Memories I
Snow kidding! These "kids" now range from 17 to 23

Thursday, March 17, 2011

Frugal Fragmental Fridays






It has been a long long long time since I posted at Frugal Fridays. There are many reasons for this. The main one being, I haven't had anything especially frugal to share. But since this is not only Frugal Friday at Life As Mom it is also Friday Fragments at Half Past Kissing Time. I thought I could get my lead fragment to be frugal. Let's see how I do.

Fragment 1: Is Groupon for the truly Frugal?

About a year ago I joined Groupon. I remember it was mid April we were visiting Amy's brothers in Madison and Spider Droid had just come back from a hike listening to the spring peepers. Spring Peepers are frogs before I start getting angry comments. I borrowed my BIL's computer and I signed up for group-on.

Since then I have been receiving regular e-mail from them about various deals. It wasn't until today that I actually used one of them. Either the deals are not something Aim (I sometimes call my wife Aim, deal with it.) and I are interested in like a wine tasting or they are not really good deals or and this is generally it we'd have to spend money we normally wouldn't to save money.

The deal I got today is a good case in point. I got an e-mail to get a ticket to a movie called The Lincoln Lawyer which opens tomorrow for $6.00. They said the ticket was a $13.00 value and yes there are movie theatres near us that have tickets in the double digits. But thanks to our local theatre having $6.50 tickets for general admission and going to the early bird shows when we do go to a different theatre we have seldom had to pay so much. The truth is that The Lincoln Lawyer is showing at our theatre this weekend and we can get early bird tickets for $4.50. Even better we have been incrementally increasing the amount of time we have been letting our oldest watch the other 2 and we should be able to go sometime during the day and give her her first 2 hour babysitting gig.

So why did I buy tickets for $6.00 for a show I can see for $4.50? Good question. The answer is I didn't. I had a $5.00 off coupon so I bought 1 ticket for $1.00. Our total movie experience will be probably less than $20.00. A dollar for the movie for me, $4.50 for Aims ticket. Another $4.50 for a kids combo (you don't have to be a kid to get it) which is popcorn and a drink with 3 refills. That puts the total at 10. We will probably give Puppy $5 for the baby sitting so the whole thing will run 15.

This brings up my point: Is groupon worth it for the frugal? Does it help you do things you would normally not do? Or does it tempt you to spend money that you normally would not? Leave a comment and let me know.

All of you visiting from Frugal Friday can go home to Mom now. Unless you want to stay for further fragment. Actually now that I think about it. Fragment 2 has a financial application as well. SO STICK AROUND!

Fragment #2: Giving it up for Lent

This is the second of my Lenten Observations segments. Have you ever lent somebody something and not gotten it back? Have you ever lent somebody something and forgot who you gave it to? Have you ever not gotten something returned and have had difficulty getting over it? I hope so, I would hate to think it was just me.

I have learned very few things wholly by other's examples or advice. Many times I have had to learn through my own experience or mistakes. When I was a teenager a friend of mine lent a friend of his (an acquaintance of mine) a sizable amount of money. He then watched week after week his friend spend money on non essentials while she kept the debt to Him unpaid. This was very frustrating for my friend. He learned an important principle any money he lent out he would consider gone for good. In fact he would not even call it lending he would just give it away if he could. I have followed his principle for almost 30 years now. I have given co-workers money and weeks later (generally when I needed it most) they would pay be back. To me it was found money.

I have found the lesson a lot harder to emulate with things. I gladly give away anything to any one who wants it. Especially my books music or movies. However if it is not returned. I don't forget about it as I do with money. Money comes and goes. But things have a kind of permanency to them. If I front $10.00 to another home school parent for a field trip, I can use a different $10.00 if the need comes up. If the parent forgets to pay me back, I can easily make do without it. I mean I can literally forget about it. But if I lend a DVD about dinosaurs to someone and then forget who. The next time I want to watch it, I can't because I no longer have it. For whatever reason I have a habit of lending things to people that are no longer readily available for purchase or now out of my price range.


Over the past few years I have been convicted to try to let go of this feeling of loss when it comes to unreturned possessions. Strangely enough I know some people who are exactly the opposite of me. They can give away possessions without any problems whatsoever but have a real hard time with unpaid debt. I have decided that this Lenten Season I would "give up" any thing I have not ever received back as lent. Yes it's a bad pun, but a good philosophy. It is more of an internal task to stop trying to remember who I gave things to and just be content with what I have. I have a few things out to people right now. Hopefully with God's help I will not think of these things as my possessions again until when and if I again possess them.







Fragment #3 Am I the only one out there who loves Detroit 1-8-7?




One of my favorite television related websites is the cancel/renew index. Each week it goes through t.v. shows by network and prognosticates what will stay and what will go. generally the shows I like the most are the ones without the staying power. When Detroit 1-8-7 came out this Fall, I thought I found a show that would be around for a long long time. A smart, funny, well filmed procedural with some excellent acting and storytelling. Yet every week, I see at the cancel/renew index that it has little to no chance of a second season. I love watching it on Hulu each week and wondered if there was anyone else who liked it.

Well those are my fragments frugal and otherwise for this Friday. For more Fragments click here.

5 comments:

Kristin - The Goat said...

I have never heard of Detroit 1-8-7 and I watch a lot of TV. Hmmm, I'll have to check it out.

I don't loan money, I give it to them. It's too painful to wait for it's return if it, as you said. I don't seem to loan out things.

Kay said...

i can't loan out money, hubby would be rather unhappy with me if i did ;-) but resenting the loss of something given away is a very good thing to deal with. great thought there!

Brandi. said...

I try not to "borrow" money too much, but end up doing it more times than I'd like {mostly from my mom}. I tend to loan her money in return. It bothers me when my FIL asks for money, though. He is a single guy, making as much as Hubby is, and gambles it all away instead of paying his bills... So frustrating...

But, anyway...

Hope you have a great weekend!

Dave Roller said...

Follow up on groupon. In my haste to purchase a ticket got $1.oo I failed to realize that the theatre we usually attend does not participate in the program. So I would end up spending more money than tickets at our local theatre cost. Plus if we ended up going to the other theatre we would have to emply a different baby sitter as the participating theatre is too far out of our neigborhood for us to consider letting bunny girl watch the others.
That is okay though because it turns out that this does not seem like a movie Amy would be interested in, so I will probably go by myself and only end up spending the dollar I have already paid.

doreen said...

I really have not found much on groupon either. I am trying not to purchase anything I would not normally buy.
I never lend money; only give...
You are so right though I really do stress about the stuff...I am going to have to work on that.
Have a great week; I hope the movie was good.

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