Blog: Pam's Pennypinching With STYLE

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Friday, January 16, 2009

Just been commenting on other blogs here at myfrugallife - it's fun to commune with others who are on the same thrifty wavelength as I am.  For so long it was really taboo and I had to be a closet pennypincher!

Sent off for free theatre tix which come from my Emeritus theatre class  - They are for the Geffen Theater here - really top notch drama and pricey! I do miss going to the theatre and other cultural events - but the tix are so expensive - so I comb the net looking for freebie events and free tix and discounts.  And we do manage to get out.  The Geffen is on the W. Side - which makes it a schlepp for us - but every few months it is worth it! 

I miss my trips to NYC when I would go to the TKTS booth in Duffy Sq. and get discount tix for the dramas I like - which are ALWAYS on sale (unlike the musicals).  If you are in NYC - remember to bring enough CASH for the tix - and if you like musicals on the last trip we found we could get cheaper tix at the box office - because only premium tix were at TKTS.

Getting freebies - today a full size natural deodorant sent via UPS??? And yesterday several of my free mags.

Oh, read about young people burdened by student loans who are moonlighting at second jobs.  But the young woman they profiled had a $300 per month car payment!  If she is strapped, why in tarnation is she forking out $300/mo for a car when she could save some $ and get a good used one?? Doesn't make sense to me.  Wonder if other young people I know will end up working their a**es off because they remain willfully ignorant of thrift???

Signed up for a FREE Mikimato pearl even in Beverly Hills because a Hollywood costume person is going to a presentation about the use of pearls in classic costumes.  Turns out they are giving us champagne and a gift certificate! (Not that I could afford those pearls, even with a certificate - but who knows?)

Just feel like a night out.  Maybe the reception in Santa Monica for the new President of my old college, Barnard, will give me a fix.  It's being held in the house of one of the wealthier alumnae - so we get a glimpse of how the other half - or is it 5%? - live.  I am such a voyeur!

Listened to a very interesting interview online at KCRW's site with Matt Miller about his new book THE TYRANNY OF DEAD IDEAS.  Miller agrees with me that in this time of rapid social change, we just have to give up some of out assumptions that just don't WORK anymore.  (One of his is employee-based healthcare.)  It's probably my study of sociology - but I think that we all have to keep our eyes on the ball and distinguish what's really going out there as opposed to what conventional wisdom is telling us.  (Like the stockmarket isn't risky!)

History helps a lot here - To back to the BBC program on PBS The Ascent of Money - the econometrics geniuses who crashed a few years ago had only used FIVE YEARS of data to base their formulas on - 5 years?  That doesn't even go back to the Vietnam War - not to mention WW II & maybe just barely the invasion of Iraq!  It's building a tower of numbers on SAND! Yet they received a Nobel prize before everything went south, which just goes to show  common sense is always a good thing!

I was urged to invest some of my money with Merrill Lyncha few years back  - boy, am I glad I didn't do THAT!

And so it is for many common kneejerk ideas.  Friends thought I was nuts to hold onto this apartment and pay rent while I was away - but coming from NYC I knew the value of a rent-controlled place - and my reasonable rent relfects that today (plus the benefits of some city oversight!)  And I knew it was cheaper to re-paint and refurbish this place than move - Why should I pay twice as much for a very similar apartment with new paint when I could paint it myself?  I got even got some mney from the old landlord - (the new corporate one wouldn't have done that...)

I also elected to refurbish the vintage stove in the apartment and claim it as MINE ( I had seen others just toss the same stoves out on the street) because I knew that those stoves were built like battleships and the gas technology hasn't changed that much - and celebrities were paying top dollar for similar refurbished stoves!  So we got a MUCH nicer stove than a gimcrack new one for about the same $. (At the same time we got a very nice frig from the same folks - works great...There is such a trade in used frigs, etc. in L.A. that I don't know that ever buying a new one would be totally worth it.) I could go on - but you get the idea - Think for yourself and reason things out for yourself - It pays.

Wish I had someplace to go for the inauguration - The events near me are all bars - and as my hubby had been sober for years, I dunno....Maybe we will watch it at home on TV.

Oh - applied to have a nut houseparty - (go to www.houseparty.com) - they will give us nuts, etc.  Think it's a good excuse to entertain our friends - either in the city or at the beach....There is also a charity houseparty deal on the net (for Nepalese children)- and if I get the nuts, maybe I could combine the two.

That's it - have to get my outfit together for Saturday - How you all doing???

 

 

 

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pamphyila

Saving is fun & savings for fun!

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pamphyila
L.A., CA USA
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