Silly Frugality?

[Cayman]

Exactly. In my state, pop cans have a 10 cent deposit on them. When I get a weird look for picking one up (someone’s litter), I ask if there was a dime laying there, would you pass it by? I’m chuckling out loud at this thread, as I am “guilty” of so many of them. Old habits die hard, I guess.

As I read through these posts I'm reminded that being frugal with $ often has additional benefits.

Coalduck is cleaning our streets and recycling too.

 

[coalduck]

But finding a redeemable bottle is not quite the same as finding a dime. For me, it is a PITA to store the bottle, then to bring it to a store to redeem it. Most of the time, the bottle machines are either full, out of service, or in use by people with ~100 bottles to redeem. I either have to keep the bottles around for a while, until the next time I go to the store and hope I don't encounter the same obstacles, or, if I don't have too many bottles, go to the customer service desk and redeem them. If I find a dime, it is mine, immediately, without effort.

Agreed, however, at least in my state with a steep can and bottle deposit (steepest in US, I believe) everyone has a bag (or lots more) of can and bottles to return sitting around their house or garage. Not like Any of us would make a special trip to the store to redeem that one can. And.....as an aside, today, after my OP, I left a restaurant to retrieve my forgotten wallet, and there lying on the blacktop parking lot.....a nice, shiny DIME. You bet I picked it up!

 

[RobbieB]

We have curbside recycle here but I used to save cans and return them for dough. I had a crusher screwed to the wall and I crushed each one reducing it's size and then stored them in a trash can in the garage until it was full. Then I would dump them into a big leaf bag and go to the recycle place and get my $20 maybe twice a year.

Gave it up, now just give the cans to the city. Time to crush each can, guncky, sticky crusher, trips to the garage, trips to the recycle place and most of all wasted space in garage not worth $30/year.

Another silly frugality for me eliminated.

 

[scrabbler1]

Agreed, however, at least in my state with a steep can and bottle deposit (steepest in US, I believe) everyone has a bag (or lots more) of can and bottles to return sitting around their house or garage. Not like Any of us would make a special trip to the store to redeem that one can. And.....as an aside, today, after my OP, I left a restaurant to retrieve my forgotten wallet, and there lying on the blacktop parking lot.....a nice, shiny DIME. You bet I picked it up!

...and remember how many of us learned about Michigan's 10-cent bottle deposit?

 

[coalduck]

After living frugally for all of our lives, me and the wife have recently decided that we can now throw the micro thin soap slivers away. Since we are retired and living below our our conservative withdrawal rate, we have decided is our new single nod to "extravagance."

Put the soap slivers inside a mesh onion bag and tie the top. Works well for soaping up your washcloth.

 

[coalduck]

I find golf balls on the course when walking my dog in the mornings and run them through the ball washer. Most are good as new. Old one's and off brands I hit into the practice range. Can't remember the last time I purchased a golf ball. Am I frugal or what?

My definition of a good day of golf is finding more balls than I lose.

 

[YVRRocketSurgery]

There are so many people out collecting containers for the deposit in Vancouver I do not feel bad not recycling a container if I'm out and about.
That said, we'll still save up our cans/bottles at home for a semi-annual trip to the recycling depot.

Also as an extra whammy, in BC, we have a non-refundable environmental fee on top of the deposit to help cover the cost of recycling the container.

 

[Amethyst]

My Mother (a Great Depression survivor) actually boiled soap slivers in a tiny pot on the stove with some water to make "jelly soap." She used it to wash her panty hose (I think). During my 20's, I pared the figurative cheese very close indeed to save $$...but I never went so far as rendering soap slivers.

Put the soap slivers inside a mesh onion badge and tie the top. Works well for soaping up your washcloth.

 

[Winemaker]

I'd also consider the labor involved in peeling and thinly slicing fresh ginger. Probably took 15 minutes, right? In Amethyst numbers, that's $12.50** So you spent $5.00 on sake to preserve $13.00 worth of ginger and labor.

**($50/hour is the arbitrary "price" I put on my time spent doing DIY things - if it would "cost" me more than a contractor charges, I'll hire out the job).

Yes, but fresh ginger is so good! We always get a pound at the farmers market when in Hawaii.

While I don't believe in wasting anything, I have gone full Monty on recycling, just for the political correctness. Organic waste goes to compost pile, paper products to the church bins, glass, metal, plastic to the monthly recycle bin where it gets picked up curbside. It used to be free, but now I have to pay. WTF? Recycled items are so plentiful that it's a pain for them to take. The cost now is usually in storage costs, because they can get rid of the stuff. I recycled because it made sense, but when they mandate it, fine you if you don't, make you buy their containers, I recycle EVERYTHING. There is only one little bag that goes to the curb on trash day, and yeah, I have to pay for that, too. And fuel surcharges. In my suburban neighborhood of 350 homes, $6.00 in fuel charges from every house each quarter, pays for one hell of amount of diesel fuel. Sorry for rant.

I feel better though.