I'm looking for an online store that sells more than Doctor Who and Zombie t-shirts. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

All different types of clothing. As the internet begins to become more and more of a source for shopping, what stores do you use for online shopping?

This is my guide on how to succeed at living away from home, coming from someone who has attended boarding school and lived in a dorm since 14. As we get closer to the fall and the actual "holy hell, I'm actually gonna be in college soon," here's my advice on dorm essentials, roommates, bathrooms, life skills, and homesickness.
Dorm essentials:

• A mattress pad. I have never slept on a bed in an institution that was actually comfortable. Invest in a good one. It will save your back and also make coming home to sleep a lot nicer.
• Shower shoes and a shower caddy. Do I even need to explain this one?
• Room decor. It’s a lot less depressing to be in a shoebox of a room if you have decor. There isn’t a ton of space for things like throw pillows or beanbags, but having printed pictures and fairy lights can make your room a lot more cozy. A little rug is nice too.
• Wireless headphones/earbuds. Your roommate does not want to listen to your TV show or music as you putter about your room. Wireless headphones allow you to listen to whatever you want without disturbing your roommate. As a general rule of thumb, unless you are watching/listening to something socially or are alone, you should be using headphones.
• Extension cords with power strips are a must. I shit you not, I had a single outlet in my dorm room that I had to figure out how to run a fridge off of while also charging all my devices and running a diffuser, a fan, and a tea kettle.
• Living essentials. I’m talking about cleaning supplies, bedding, dishes, towels, first aid supplies, a water bottle, laundry stuff, etc. Your dorm room largely functions as a miniature house and as such, you will need the supplies to cook, clean, and generally take care of yourself.
• Appliances are tricky. I would look at dorm rules and what you can afford before investing. Also, coordinate with your roommate about who will buy what. As it stands, the essential dorm appliances are a fridge, microwave, and hot water pot. You can make all the essentials (tea and ramen) with those supplies. A Brita filter is nice if you can fit it in your fridge. If your dorm doesn’t have AC, get a standing fan. It will keep you alive during the hot and humid months.
• Hangers! Do not forget the hangers.
• Lock. You’ll want a locked drawer for ~reasons~, whether that be money, medication, important documents, whatever. There is some stuff you just can’t risk getting stolen.
• Storage bins will save you. Store food, school books, etc in them. Make sure they fit in the places you want them to before buying!
• Other stuff: clothes, shoes, jackets, toiletries, school supplies, bags, sports equipment. Basically anything you use on a day to day basis.

Side note: less is more. I made the mistake of bringing way too much stuff. It’s a pain in the ass to haul around during move-in and move-out and is generally just not worth it. People often overestimate the number of clothes and number of nostalgic items they need. I promise you, it’s so much nicer to just have the essentials of living with a few comfort/nostalgic/fancy things. You don’t need to bring your entire shoe or book collection.
Practical Skills & Important Things

• Laundry. Please know how to do laundry. Do not leave your items in a washedryer overnight or longer than the wash cycle. Someone might throw it on the ground, or worse, throw it out.
• Dishes. Moldy food is not only gross, but it will make your room smell like shit and your roommate want to defenestrate you. Nobody cleans up for you in a dorm.
• General tidiness. Most dorms are shoeboxes. What flies as “clean” in a larger room does not fly as “clean” in a dorm room because the space is so small. Have a place for everything and keep spaces like your desk surface clear. Hang up and fold your clothes. Take out the damn trash and make your bed! I promise you, making your bed each day makes a world of difference not only in your physical environment but also your mental headspace.
• Basic cooking. You don’t need to be able to whip up a Michelin star meal, but learn how to make simple meals in case you can’t get food from the college dining halls or order online. As a rule of thumb, it’s always good to have a couple packets of instant ramen and instant oatmeal lying around.
• Know who to call. If something goes wrong, you’re going to want to have the contact information of relevant people like your RA or security services. I recommend inputting those contacts once you have them into your phone.
• Medical issues. If you have a chronic illness, disability, or any type of condition mental or physical that needs to be managed by a doctor, you're going to need to get a practitioner set up near your college. Have your current doctor help find you one or use the college's resources (many keep a list of providers). Figure out your health insurance, the hospital you'll primarily seek care from, and pharmacies. Keep all the paperwork and documentation you'll need accessible. Get your school accommodations set up preemptively!
• Money management. The basic principles of financial health such as having a bank account, keeping a relative budget, and not living outside your means are crucial. Personally, I would recommend getting a credit/debit card set up before you leave home. Cash is not king, and it sometimes can be hard to find ATMs on campus. Having an emergency credit card attached to my parent's bank account is something that I have had all four years and is a contingency for me for medical or transportation emergencies. Have your own bank account and understand how to access it and not go into debt.
• Critical items. Having important documentation is really important. If you don't have a drivers license, you'll need a state ID or a passport. Memorize your SSN! It's likely you'll need it at some point. You should have your health insurance cards to use in case you need to seek emergency medical treatment. If you have chronic illnesses or disabilities, know where and how to access your diagnostic paperwork, along with things like vaccine records and medication lists. If you have a car, you'll need your car's registration and insurance. Once you have your student ID and key to your dorm, don't lose it. Keep all of this type of stuff either with you, digitally, or in a locked drawer in your dorm.
• Time management. Nobody will police you when you’re away from home. You need to figure out how to make a schedule and stick to it. Routine can be very beneficial during times of stress.
• Coping skills. Living away from home can be stressful in itself. There are lots of supports built in to an undergrad college, but knowing how to take care of yourself and your emotions is key. I have a list here.
• Self-care. A lot of people have the misconception that self-care is a fancy bubble bath or an expensive meal. Self-care is really about practicality and helping yourself succeed. Think of it as investing in your future self, whether that be legitimate self-improvement or just lessening the burdens your future self will have to carry. Whether that be going to the gym on a regular basis, setting boundaries with toxic friends, keeping a strict morning routine, or doing work when you don’t want to because you know it will bite you in the ass, self-care is key to keeping yourself not only functional, but happy. Of course there’s always room to treat yourself, but that should not be the focus. It’s hard to build up self-discipline which is key to self-care, but it’s really worth it.
• Seeking help. Living away from home is hard. Feeling like an adult for the first time is hard. Use the resources you are provided with to your best advantage. Student health services, counseling, disability accommodations, writing centers, career centers, etc. All these resources at your disposal can help you succeed. There’s no shame in asking for help. College is a time of transition between the teen years and the "real" adult years. The rug won't be pulled out from under you completely. There are still a lot of safeguards and people who can help.
• Responsibility. For some people, the first time they are away from home is the first time they face accountability. There is no parent to step in or soften the blow. Your actions, either positive or negative, have consequences. It’s okay to have fun, but don’t compromise your integrity or future.

Bathrooms:
I can’t believe I am dedicating a whole section to this, but I know communal bathrooms are a large source of fear for y’all. Side note, I only have the experience of living in a single-gender dorm, so I don’t know how coed bathrooms would work.

• I promise you, you are thinking a LOT more about yourself than others are thinking about you. Everyone minds their business in the bathroom.
• If you are uncomfortable changing in a bathroom (even behind a curtain), change in your room instead. Wear a robe to the bathroom along with shower shoes. Bring a shower caddy with all your toiletries and a towel. Then walk to the bathroom, pop in the shower, put on your robe again, and go back into your room to change into real clothes.
• Please clean up after yourself. Don’t spit on the mirror, leave puddles on the floors, or otherwise make the bathroom gross. It's disgusting and disrespectful.

Roommates:

• For many people, this will be the first time living with someone and sharing the same space. Dorm rooms are small, and you will become intimately acquainted with your roommate in many ways. Having a roommate can be an absolutely wonderful experience and how you make a best friend or it can be very challenging.
• Setting boundaries. The biggest source of bad roommate experiences is bad boundaries or total lack of them. When you first get a roommate and establish a rapport, make it clear what is acceptable to you and what isn’t. Then come up with a list that you both agree with or can make compromises on. Most colleges pair roommates up by living style questionnaires, but it can’t help to make clarifications. Some examples of questions to ask:
  • How can you be best contacted in an emergency?
  • What time do you go to bed on weeknights? Weekends?
  • Are people okay to sleep over in your room?
  • Are you okay with sharing food? If so, what?
  • Are guests allowed at any time or only with advance notice?
  • Can you share things like cleaning supplies, clothes, etc? If so, what items?
  • What alarm times/how many alarms in the morning is okay?
  • What time do you get up in the morning on weekdays? Weekends?
  • What time do you want to turn the lights off and on during the day?
  • Are you clean or messy?
  • What level of noise (phone calls, TV, etc) is acceptable?
• If you are in an unbearable or even highly uncomfortable living situation, it is okay to try and change roommates. For a lot of people, their dorm is their “safe space” and so it’s worth it to make an effort to get your experience to be as good as possible. Talk to your RA to resolve imminent conflicts and don’t be afraid to go to student life if something big needs to be changed.

Homesickness:

• This is not something I personally experienced to a large degree, mainly because of how I was raised. However, I know a lot of people who struggled with homesickness.
• As much as it is uncomfortable, the college experience is unique and valuable. When you go home, it may feel like you’ve outgrown your childhood home or life. Although wanting to go home may feel safer, you’ll grow a lot if you stick it out.
• Maintaining relationships with your family and close friends from home is essential. Maintaining long-distance relationships with friendships can be difficult, so I recommend regularly making time to FaceTime or text, or even meet up if your paths somehow intersect. Your parents will probably want to hear from you, so make sure you call them every so often, provided you want to and have a good relationship. They’ve likely been one of the biggest sources of comfort and support for you for your whole life, and now that you’ve moved out, that won’t go away. You're not going to lose your home life entirely.
• Build connections at school. Although it’s scary, the first few months of college are when people really start to build friendships and friendship groups. Joining clubs, participating in orientation stuff, getting involved with sport teams, talking to people in classes, and generally making an effort to be social will help you build your own community.
• If your homesickness is becoming overwhelming, or severely detrimental to your mental health, seek support through the student mental health office or the equivalent. It will eventually pass, or at least become more bearable, and seeking support can help make the burden easier.

I think that is about everything! If you have any questions, please feel free to ask. Moving away from home was simultaneously the scariest thing I’ve ever done but also the best. I learned so much about independence, responsibility, self-reliance, and self-advocacy. Really, I just learned how to make my way through life.
Per popular request, a full list of pretty much anything you could ever need to bring to college in no particular order and the Google Docs (ergo printable) version of this post.

Friends, the story I bring to you today is not a fallout, but a crescendo. How years of grassroots promotion and online influencer endorsements led to a once underground fashion brand's rise to power and entry into the hallowed halls of internet ridicule. Or, the time Supreme sold a brick for thirty dollars.
(this post contains a lot of context for what Supreme is and how it works, so if you only wanna know how and why they sold a brick, skip to the brick section)
What is Supreme?
Supreme is a skateboard and lifestyle brand founded by British-American fashion mogul James Jebbia. In an era where skate fashion was known for its eccentricity and garish presentation, Supreme stood out. It's iconic logo is made with stock typeface over a red box, which pushed the brand to the 2-billion dollar empire it is today. While the Box Logo (or the Bogo, as it's known among fans) has seen its share of ridicule (a lawsuit involving the logo could be its own entry) the brand's diehard fanbase, as well as myself, would argue the stripped-back, downright esoteric nature of Supremes' branding is exactly what pushed it to its heights.
But it's taken a long time getting here. Unless you lived in New York, you probably only heard of Supreme in the last couple of years. All in all, there are four stores in the continental United States, two on each coast. Two releases happen per year, spring/summer and fall/winter. Rather than release all merchandise at once, Supreme releases (Drops) happen one week at a time, slowly working through its seasonal inventory. This release model not only maintains interest in new releases all throughout it's season, it perpetuates interest in what will drop next, since not everything coming out is revealed at once, either. It's common to hear about cross-brand and artist collaborations mere days before they release.
All in all, everything Supreme does as a brand is on a need-to-know basis, meaning they've effectively mastered the art of FOMO. This means a diehard fanbase of skaters and fashion collectors. Half the reason a piece of Supreme clothing so cool to own is because only you and a couple hundred people (maybe a couple thousand, Supreme doesn't disclose inventory metrics either) have one. Naturally, a fandom would form.
How Supreme makes a fan.
On drop day, items generally cost what any other brand would charge, maybe a little more. Pieces are only available in store or online, both opening at 11am EST. What follows is a mad dash only Nike can claim to share. The online store operates on a first-come, first-serve basis, and the physical stores do the same, ala lining up for a game console. On a good day, you have maybe three minutes to cart your item and check out. The site does not save your cart so if you take too long, the piece you just added to your shopping cart might already be sold out by the time your payment is processed. If you've spent the past three months trying to buy a PS5, welcome to our world. We do this forty weeks a year.
You lose a lot (take an L). Seventy-percent of the things you want you will fail to get. But when you do finally check out and get your purchase at your door (take a W, a dub, recklessly spend money) the feeling is euphoric. You are now a part of a secret club because, guess what, that was the initiation process. Some people buy one item and never try again. They're few and far between. The majority of Supreme customers have been buying (copping) for years, amassing massive collections. Sooner or later, Supreme would release an item specifically for fans and nobody else. The problem is when they did.
Okay, that's cool, but why the **** did Supreme sell a thirty-dollar brick.
Good question. The best part is that there's several answers. Along with clothing and skateboard decks, Supreme sells a wide, constantly-circulating pools of accessories. These have been a mini bike, a Super Soaker, a pinball machine, a crowbar that at least one guy really wanted, and coming soon, apparently, a bob...sled? Supremes' accessory choice is as baffling as everything else they do. A common riff on the brand is that they could "put their logo on literally anything and it would sell out." These people are not wrong, but I'd argue their accessory choice is more nuanced than this. Their logo alone could sell all kinds of things, but its the things they do sell that begin to send a message. For example, a Supreme baseball bat is nothing profound, but next to a Supreme ski mask, a Supreme crowbar, a Supreme money gun, and a Supreme... brick, the street-smart, underground roots of the brand begin to take root. There's always been an underlying, illicit message to Supremes' aesthetics, coated in a minimalist exterior. This subtext what splits the speculators and the mega-fans.
Those mega-fans bring to life a second answer for why, in Fall 2016, supreme released a thirty-dollar clay brick with their logo etched in: one piece of Hypebeast lingo I've omitted until now is when an item Bricks. This is when any particular item either in-store or online sits in stock, with nobody buying it. No true-blue Supreme diehard would ever wear something anyone else could feasibly get for retail price or, god willing, below retail price. Bricks are poison to many an avid fan, which is why the brand might have thought it funny to sell to them an actual, literal brick. For thirty dollars. You get one brick. it sold out in seconds.
But where's the drama?
At the exact same time the brick was released to fans, two separate parties were growing aware of this once niche fashion label. Online influencers, and everyone else. Supreme was a mainstay among outsider artists, mainly underground New York hip-hop. The start of the 2010s saw the rise of Odd Future, whose alumni such as Earl Sweatshirt and Tyler, The Creator were outspoken fans of the brand. While endorsements like these got the word out somewhat, the boom began in late 2016. Online influencers, mainly YouTubers and Instagram stars whose follower counts ballooned as lifestyle vlogs took over online content, were growing quite interested in this exclusive and expensive brand so deeply tied to underground Hip-hop, skateboarding, and having something expensive that everyone else will be totally jealous of. Notably, YouTuber RiceGum, a man with a tendency to flaunt his spending, took an acute interest to the brand around this time, making videos between 2016-2018 where he went on massive Hypebeast spending sprees. Such content includes buying a Supreme hoodie that just dropped and wearing it while walking past people currently in line to buy their own, buying mystery boxes online that just happened to have Supreme in them every time, and giving bootleg Supreme merchandise to his friends. You'll have to forgive the lack of hyperlinks here. I do not have the stomach to watch his videos.
This behavior of course spawned similar in his contemporaries. This is why you started hearing the word Flex in regards to flaunting clothes and accessories around second-graders. Influencers from all spheres, who happened to all start taking off in late 2016, were wearing Supreme. this in turn led hundreds of thousands to trying their luck at the raffle. what followed was season upon season of the online stores crashing on drop day and lines outside the store snaking for miles taking an entire day to clear (this led to a new in-store ticketing system where you pre-register and are given a random slot in line, to mixed results).
Who was mad here? Speculators who couldn't get in on the clothes their favorite LA influencer-person wears, longtime fans who now had to grapple with this unmanageable influx of new customers, and the people who had no interest in these expensive hoodies and shirts or whatever who were free to clown on this stupid, stupid brand.
ThEy SolD a BrICk???
Once the unimpressed got wind of this stupid hype brand selling their customers a thirty-dollar brick, there was no going back. The image of a fashion titan so confident in their ability to sell their mindless followers a clay slab with no utility or value was irreversible for some. One Reddit user calculated the cost of building an entire house out of these bricks, others made memes, and while a lot of these were tongue-and-cheek jokes among fans, the derision online and in-person was inescapable. The image of a Supreme wearer being an in-the-know fashion trailblazer became one of a bandwagon-following consumerist idiot. After all, they bought a brick. Suckers, right?
So what's it like now?
Well, the site still sucks. Crashes are common, especially on days a bogo drops. Lines in-person are still a sweaty, multi-hour nightmare (though, morbidly, Covid restrictions made lines this season a little more manageable) and wearing Supreme isn't impressive to anyone anymore. Maybe a sign you'd spend two-hundred dollars on a hoodie, but nothing interesting to talk about. On my first day of college, my first roommate saw my Supreme tee and the first words he spoke to me were "did you buy the f\**ing brick?"*
Is the brick solely responsible for the attitude shift towards Supreme as a brand? Well, more of a framer for a larger shift in the zeitgeist. Is it a major symptom? Major might be a strong word. Is it funny? It's hilarious. Even the fandom of today laughs about the episode in hindsight. They may be crazy, they may thoughtlessly spend thousands of dollars a month on clothes, they may consider their own worth adjacent to the net worth of their closet, but they are the ones who bought a brick for thirty dollars. This sort of power is something to be commended. Ridiculed, scorned, and commended.

Well guys, I lost 90k today on SPY calls which was basically all of my account. I started in 2017 with like 30k of my own money and over the course of 3 years, spent probably a couple hundred hours learning about stocks, options, doing "research" etc. Today, I am down 8k since i started in 2017.
Proof: https://imgur.com/8zoihg7
(shows -60k but I was down -30k yesterday already on the calls)
That was money I planned on using for a downpayment on a house, and for paying my taxes on gains from last year. So once February comes around, the 20k I have left is basically going to taxes on gains from last year which are now gone. I am effectively broke :-)
Im not that upset because I have a decent paying job.. but god damn, I was literally just contacting real estate agents last week because I was planning on buying a house. I could still buy one, but it will probably take me years to get back to 100k in savings.
I should have just stuck to selling puts like I was doing for the past couple months. The gains aren't huge, but selling 100k worth of puts every week is enough to make you a couple G's every month with not a ton of risk. I could have made my future mortgage payments just selling puts.
I am trying to look on the bright side. Having 100k made me spend somewhat frivolously. Like eating out twice a day, buying clothes i didn't need, etc. Now I have to go back to scrimping and scraping, which is good I think. I was getting a little ridiculous.
Also, I have been finishing up my degree online but have had no motivation since I already have a decent job and decent money saved. Im feeling the pressure now to hurry up and finish my degree so I can get a better job (100k+ a year).
I went all in on $390 1/22 SPY calls yesterday. I did the math; if we would have had a 1.5% day today, I would have made about 500k.. but it was pretty flat so at open, I was already down a shit ton. Figuring there was no chance left, I pulled out what was left, about 47k. I saw ford was going up crazy and figured that was pretty much my only chance to get back to where I was. Basically bought calls expiring tomorrow at the top, started going down, I pushed out and sold. So now I have 20k.
I'm not super depressed about it or anything because I know ill be fine, but I already miss the coziness of having 100k stored away. Knowing that if I lost my job or something, id be okay. But like I said, Im looking on the bright side.
My goal at the moment is to just save as much money as possible, pay my taxes in February, and then start over. Not even gonna lie, if I didn't need the 20k to pay taxes on last years gains, Id probably yolo it into something crazy. It's better to feel like this than nothing at all. Kinda fucked but whatever man, life is just boring.
EDIT 1: Honestly guys, I could go all in GME shares but even if it goes up 100% this year, I will only be at 40k.. which is already far fetched. Do any of you seriously believe GME is going up 500% this year? Maybe. Maybe you're right.. Maybe I need to go all in shares, defer paying my taxes for as long as possible, and hope for the best. God you guys give me hope.
EDIT 2:
ALRIGHT, so im going all in shares on something and just holding long. Half of you faggies are saying GME, half are saying BB. Which fucking one is it? I can't risk any options plays at the moment.
**EDIT 3: *Went all in GME this morning, already up 50% to 30k. There is hope!**

**EDIT 4: **I was able to make all of my money back because of GME! Went all in with my remaining 20k and up 400% in under a week! Account is back up over 100k because of GME, Elon, and not least you glorious autists. I sold last week at around 350 because I cant afford to lose all that money again. I felt like I won the game. Like god had thrown me the "Reset" button and it was time to get out before something bad happened.

*Then Robinhood pulled their shit. *

The hedge fund freaks got on the news and started crying The media started painting us out to be the bad guys The hedge funds DOUBLED DOWN and reopened their shorts at current levels
And I got pissed. FURIOUS. They blatantly rigged the game, right in plain view, and they think they are going to get away with it. And if we don't fight them, they will.

So, as much as I would have liked to accept gods reset button, to take my money off the table and go back to a lower risk strategy, I had to jump back in. So I'm back in on GME with a small position which I can afford to lose. And I don't care if I lose that money. At this point, it's about the message, its about solidarity with my fellow autists. It's personal, and Im seeing it through to the end. I will diamond hand these shares until the fucking end with you guys, even if it goes to 0. I've been on this sub for years now, I love this sub, I love you fuckers, and I LIKE THE STOCK.

LETS FUCKING GO.

I'm in awe of the sheer number of people in a recent post who said it's cheaper and easier to be an omnivore than it is to be a vegetarian. While there are a select few instances of extreme conditions, such as being disabled in a food desert where you rely on meals prepared by others, the majority of people are able to eat for much cheaper if they eat vegetarian.
Living in developed countries has led to an abundance of meat products available, however, this is a luxury. Vegetables grow from sunlight, water, and soil. This is basically free. Animals need food, water, space, time, and fancy processing to not get you sick. This inherently makes it more expensive to grow meat compared to growing vegetables.
The universal stable diet is rice and beans/lentils. You can survive on this. You can survive on potatoes and butter. You can survive on a lot of things you wouldn't realize are enough. These things aren't glamorous, but they're just as glamarous and easy to prepare as meat containing dishes. You don't need refrigeration for beans or rice, and it has an extremely long shelf life, either dried or canned. Again, these are universally available and universally consumed by even the poorest.
If you want a cheap and easy vegetarian diet, you need to start with these staples. Meal prep, plan ahead, find a system that works for you. Do you need canned beans and a rice cooker? Go for it. Dried beans are honestly just as easy, but they do require an hour or two on the stove after soaking overnight. I have a pressure cooker and rarely use it because when you make beans as a staple of your diet, you can start soaking them at any time. It makes no difference if they won't be ready for tonight, because I'll just cook and eat them tomorrow.
Pressure cookers are also getting increasingly affordable, and things like instantpots can be used for tons of different things besides pressure cooking. There's a great market of secondhand kitchen appliances that are still perfectly good, so check Craigslist, check Facebook market place, check with relatives and friends who might have an old machine they are willing to sell. Also, they make non-electric pressure cookers that go right on the stove, so look for those too.
Also, remember that beans exist in many forms. Black beans, red lentils, black lentils, kidney beans, chickpeas, red beans, adzuki (sp?) beans, besan, and more. Hummus, refried beans, dessert bean paste, sambar, daal, dosa (which also contains rice), tofu, and soy milk are all made of beans. You don't always have to have them in their whole form.
Once you've gotten that down to a good system, you're set to build off it. Buy what's available and within your means to enhance the staples. The general rule is to prioritize nutrition and then focus on the flavor. Most of the time, just adding basic proteins and fats will naturally enhance the flavor.
The first add-in tier is eggs, dairy products (ignore if vegan). Eggs are easy and cheap, I add them to any meal for increased nutrients. Sour cream is cheap and tastey. Cheese is a vegetarian's closest cousin to meat if you miss the flavor. Cottage cheese, paneer, ricotta, and yogurt are also awesome and can be made at home just from milk and a one agent (either an acid for the first three or from existing yogurt for yogurt). Egg/dairy products can really enhance both flavor and nutrition (animal fats for healthy hormone production, B12 for energy and metabolism, and certain amino acids for general life functions), and are usually a quick add-in. The best part is they're still cheaper and easier than meat.
Next is vegan proteins like tofu and seitan. I don't recommend putting it this high in the priority if you are ovo-lacto, but I do recommend if you're vegan. Get tofu at an Asian market and it'll be dirt cheap, like $1.50 for a brick which is enough for at least two meals. Look online for the cheapest wheat gluten powder, mix with oil, water, and spices (especially soy sauce, besan/chickpea flour, mushroom powder, and nutritional yeast for the amino acids and B12) and MSG for that umami flavor, then boil or steam until cooked. It takes time, but it's so cheap and tasty.
I also strongly recommend building up an arsenal of spices. The first things I'd get are iodized salt, sugar, vinegar, oil, and MSG. These are cheap codes for your taste buds and are very cheap and shelf stable. Also, some sort of broth base or bullion. I use "better than bullion vegetable broth base" which is $5 for like 76 servings. It drastically elevates flavor for cheap.
After that look for spice blends you like. They're more expensive than the individual spices, but you can recreate it once you like it. Adobo, garam masala, curry powder, five spice powder, and a good chili powder are great starts. I recommend anything with little to no salt so you're just paying for flavor and not spiking your sodium intake.
The next thing to get is flour. It's cheap and can be made into infinite forms. Wheat flour can make tortillas, roti, bread, pasta, you name it. Make a roux and turn that into various sauces for dishes. Perfect for if you either get bored with rice or if you have extra time and want to make a meal special. Don't forget about other grains as well. Chickpea flour has good nutrition (and is dirt cheap at indian stores under the name besan), rice flour can be made into mochi, and there's plenty of others than may be cheap in your area. Even potato flakes are practically as cheap and easy to store as flour.
Next, get you some long term vegetables. These should be available everywhere without question and can keep for weeks. Onions, garlic, ginger, potatoes, sweet potatoes, carrots, cabbage, certain squashes, dried peppers (learn how to use them, ask me if you want to know more). These can add cheap nutrition and bulk. They can also serve as the basis for many homemade sauces and soups.
The next level is canned and frozen vegetables. This is a fast easy way to add nutrition that's available everywhere and will keep a long time. One great meal is a stir fry with all frozen vegetables, a stir fry sauce, and tofu. Get the stir fry sauce and tofu from the nearest Asian market to cut costs, then sprinkle in MSG for authentic flavor. Serve with rice or noodles for a super quick and cheap meal that will be on the table faster and cheaper than ordering takeout.
I'm also a huge fan of pickling my own vegetables. 1 cup boiling water, 1/2 cup vinegar (white or apple cider), 1 tablespoon sugar, and 1 teaspoon of salt. This is the pickling liquid recipe I use, then just toss in chopped vegetables that are close to going bad. Cabbage, carrots, peppers, cauliflower, and onions are some of my favorites. Add a few whole mustard seed and whole black peppercorns for even more flavor.
The next tier is cheap sauces. Salsas of all different kinds, tomato sauces, stir-fry sauces, ketchup, mustard, simmer sauces/curries/gravies. Look for things in a can, as they can be cheaper but still really tastey. These are all enhancers and don't add a ton of necessary nutrition. However, they tend to last a long time and can transform the flavor of these same old foundational items. Once you start to like a certain sauce, learn how to make it at home for cheap.
The next tier of add-ins are the mid-tier stable vegetables. Peppers are in a league of their own, and are almost necessary for flavor. Tomatoes are as well. Then there's virtually anything in stock and on sale at your local market. Learn how to prepare things and remember the recipes from year to year when that vegetable is in season. I'm hesitant to put this so far down the list, as you should probably try to get a least one of these each time you go shopping, but it's technically not necessary.
The next tier is short term items, strictly for flavor, like fresh herbs. Cilantro, green onion/scallion, parsley, basil, mint, etc. Buy these only if you have an immediate use because they'll go bad faster than a cop with a complex given some power and immunity. I personally but cilantro every week and green onion every other week. It costs like $0.50 or $1.00 each at most, but I also cook almost everything fresh because I have the time, and these really transform a dish.
The penultimate tier is meat substitutes. These are an expensive luxury, but they're fast and tastey. Add to a dish to really elevate it. Tbh, I rarely buy these (except a pack of frozen veggie burgers once a month for a really quick meal) because once you learn how to cook with spices, these no longer taste that good.
The last tier is supplements. If you're not getting enough of something from your diet, get a supplement. They're not usually as good as getting it from food, and you should try to change your diet to increase the amount of that nutrient you're getting. For example, use cast iron pans to get more iron or just eat more beans and lentils (I know it's obvious, but look into the specifics for whatever nutrient you need). Protein powders/bars can also be a very cheap source of protein, so don't think they're just for body builders!
In a separate category are fruits and nuts. These are optional, but are great for added nutrition. I'm blessed to have some good money, so I eat dried fruit and nuts with yogurt everyday for breakfast. There are cheaper options like bananas and apples with peanut butter. Some other options are mixing peanut butter, hoisin sauce, and sriracha in equal parts for a delicious asian peanut sauce, mixing peanut butter with milk (dairy or non-dairy substitute) to make a dessert peanut sauce, or grinding cashews into paste and adding it to sauces to make them creamier.
For fruits, frozen fruit can be a good way to introduce otherwise expensive fruit into your diet for cheaper. They can go in smoothies, be turned into sauces, or even just eaten. Frozen fruit doesn't go bad quickly (unless you keep thawing it), and it's usually fully prepared. I personally love making mango lassi with yogurt, milk, frozen mangos, and green cardamom or cinnamon as a cheaper alternative.
Fresh fruit can also be very cheap when in season if you're in a place that offers this. It's not a necessary part of your diet, but it introduces variety and some good antioxidants. You can even freeze your own for cheaper than pre frozen if you find a good deal.
I could go on about this forever, and I may even release a meal plan and shopping list (although be warned, I cook everything from scratch and a lot a ton of time because I love it).
My point is that it's far cheaper to eat vegetarian if you're eating a vegetarian diet. Don't eat a substituted meat eater's diet. It's like buying clothes at a big and tall shop and tailoring them down to your size. Of course it's going to be harder and more work. You may live in an area with 90% big and tall stores, but you need to take a little bit of time to find the other 10% of store that you may not be familiar with that do have clothes in your size.
Look for Indian markets, Chinese/Eastern Asian markets, Latino markets. These tend to have lots of foods based around vegetarian diets, and they have them cheap. You'll quickly find shortcuts like gingegarlic paste and premade spice mixes at Indian markets. Suddenly, it's super cheap and quick to make things like chana masala, stir fry, lentil soup, and other dietary staples from other countries right at home.
As a follow up, I'll say to not try to eat the exact diet of these other countries. Sure, you just found cheap lentils, but don't think you can suddenly just make fully meals with fancy chutneys and dosa for pennies. Use these stores to find what's cheap, and easy and then add just that item. Fusion meals are your new lifestyle.
Unfortunately, there's not a shortcut, and it will take a full day to go shopping, learn a new recipe, and cook. However, there are tons of resources online like this sub and /eatcheapandhealthy, with people going through this also. Learn from their hardwork, and within a few months, you'll be an expert.
Finally, you can have this lifestyle at home and still enjoy eating with your friends. Don't stress if a couple meals a week are just side dishes at a restaurant or at a friend's house. Not every single meal needs to be a fully sustainable complete amino acid source blah blah blah. Just make up for it the next meal, and you'll live.
TL;DR - if you think being vegetarian is classist and a privilege, you're doing it completely wrong

I have an overweight friend (24 F) who isn't really experienced at dating. She is a really sweet girl with great personality but also very shy and has low self-esteem because of her weight.
Few months ago she started dating a guy (37 M) she met online. She described him as the nicest guy ever and that she'd never felt better and more confident with anyone before. He tells her everyday she's the most beautiful girl he ever met. I was really happy for her until I learned more.
She used to tell me about her dates with him, how he would take her to expensive restaurants, café's and hotels and picked the most delicious meals and desserts without looking at the price. Taking her to cinema and buying her large coke, 3 kinds of popcorn and nachos with all sauces, so he would be sure she experienced it all and had a great time. Or just watching Netflix with takeway pizza, chips and beer and after she finished it, he brought candies and chocolate, so she would always had something to snack on.
I probably don't have to mention she gained a lot of weight dating him, to the point I was concerned about her health. I looked up this guy on socials, he had a lot of photos with overweight girls on his profiles, assuming they were his ex girlfriends.
I could understand they would be his type or that he would pick girls like that being overweight himself, but he was actually very skinny and didn't eat junk food at all. Still he would take girls on dates where they would binge on huge amounts of food.
I had this suspicion of him being a feeder but I didn't say anything until last week. My friend had a breakdown at clothing store, because none of the clothes were her size. She called herself a "disgusting pig" and that she should stop eating or she will repulse her boyfriend, the only person who thinks she's beautiful.
I tried to tell her none of this is her fault and if her boyfriend wouldn't want her to get this big, he wouldn't treat her with food and food only. She didn't understand what I was trying to say, so I explained my theory.
I didn't expected her to get mad at me. I meant well after all. But she claimed he's the best thing that ever happened to her and I must be just jealous of someone loving her exactly the way she is. She said for the first time in her life she's not ashamed of herself in a relationship for her apettite.
Maybe I crossed the line. After all I have no proof he's a feeder (although it looks like it, to me). Even if he wasn't, she seemed more unhappy with her body than I've ever seen her before and I felt like I should say something.
What do you think?

Ballpark numbers for the manufacturer Kenji manages. In mid-2018, he began subcontracting the majority of his sharpening and polishing labor and changed his product line to use more prefabricated steels. 2020 saw major business interruptions due to the COVID19 crisis. 

(Sheesh, that got long-winded. tl;dr -- I liked the book on my 2nd reading. No regrets. I think many here would appreciate it.)
At the turn of the year, I decided to rekindle my frugal mindset. While currently blessed with a decent income (yay for working IT from home) and well-optimized finances (yay YNAB), I've noticed lifestyle creep getting the better of me these past couple of years.
I decided to revisit 2 books that helped me and my young family a great deal in the early 00s: The Complete Tightwad Gazette by Amy Dacyczyn and The Encyclopedia of Country Living, 50th Anniversary Edition by Carla Emery.
Once they arrived, I put down the new Xbox controller and set a goal to read 100 pages of the Gazette per day as my after-work "fun" routine. After 2 weeks, I managed to read the 900-page book in its entirety. After a couple more weeks of rumination, I thought I'd post a review of sorts and some of my thoughts.
The context: From 1990 to 1996, a small home business based in Maine published a printed a newsletter which collated and shared frugal ideas and strategies to an ever-growing fan base. After quickly gaining success due to organic popularity and being featured on national shows and publications, anthologies were published in book form (each comprised of 2 years worth of the newsletter's run). Finally, one large book was released in 1998 that included the 3 smaller books and some stray newsletters and closing thoughts. Amy had achieved her financial independence, so after a frenetic decade of publishing, media and book tours, she retired to finish raising her family in her huge Maine farmhouse (with attached barn) in peace.
Frugal subject matter aside, the book is a time capsule of life in the 90s, filled with reminders of the times: competing long distance carriers, CF bulbs, mail-order CD clubs (remember BGM and Columbia House?), and high interest rates on savings accounts and mortgages we'll likely never see again. A lot has changed in the 30 years since the Gazette began circulation: instant person-to-person communication that fits in one's pocket, near perfect supply-and-demand optimizations done by tech giants and retailers, infiltration of targeted advertising into every aspect of our lives, and advancements in our knowledge of health and nutrition. Food and consumer goods have arguably gotten cheaper (complete with 2-day shipping) while things like education, home prices, and health care have exploded in cost.
As such, a lot of advice has waned in relevance. From things like how to reduce postage and long distance charges, to opinions on nutrition (i.e., Amy's recurring stance on reducing fat/cholesterol and a horrible suggestion for baby formula -- evaporated milk, Karo syrup, water, and vitamin drops?!?), to mailing self-addressed-stamped-envelopes to companies and consumegovernment bodies to get information, so many of the specific tips are now useless.
But the heart of the publication is still inspiring, the methodologies still valid. The desire to spend less on certain things in order to advance other goals is an evergreen part of the frugal mindset. The reduce/reuse/recycle mantra is a common theme. Things like shopping at thrift stores, washing/repurposing ziploc bags and sour cream tubs, and cutting up well-worn t-shirts for kitchen rags may seem like Frugal 101 to many, but the acceptance and praise for these in print was no doubt inspiring to those in the 90s who were on the fence. I quickly skimmed much of the content dedicated to raising kids (mine have been on their own for years now), but things like trying to reduce junk food, hand-me-down clothes, and even packing school lunches are just as useful today.
Some high-level concepts that I was first introduced to in this book that I feel are still valuable to me today:

• Monetary savings is tax free. To buy something for $1 means you may need to earn $1.50 for that spending power after income and sales taxes.
• Calculating one's hourly wage for tasks done resulting in savings.
• Money == time. We're all familiar with that magical date of each year where everything we've earned thus far has gone to just paying taxes. But what about the 4 hours of your Monday work day that was blown on a delivered pizza for family of 4 vs the 1 hour worked to pay for making your own at home?
• More stuff doesn't equate to more happiness or fulfillment. Amy's points on limiting gift quantities for kids and the gift-giving "truce" between friends/families/co-workers are an offshoot of that.
• Reducing consumption (in aggregate for large populations) reduces our impact on the environment.
• Using a price book to track the best deals on stuff you buy regularly.

Amy does say a few things that probably rustled some jimmies back then, and could potentially raise some ire today:

• Strong emphasis on breast feeding as being the most affordable and most healthy option over formula.
• The attitude that just about anyone can own a home if they roll up their sleeves, sacrifice, save, and put in the work.
• Evaluating the opportunity costs of the 2nd household job, particularly if there are young kids in the family. After costs of daycare, a 2nd car, work attire, etc.., having a lower earner working a job may net a loss in the household budget vs being a dedicated homemaker (a role her retired husband took on).
• Putting your foot down regarding your kids' wants vs their needs. Amy must have received lots of hate mail about how "cruel" it was to give kids homemade gifts, limit birthday/holiday present count, and rarely buying new clothes.
• Her "clean your plate" philosophy at the dinner table. She dedicated a section at the end of the book to respond to reader comments.

Is this dated book worth the twenty-something price tag on Amazon? Personally, I think so. While I learned nothing new, it has inspired me to step up my frugal game. I've reduced my frequency of ordering food in favor of having cheaper store-bought convenience food squirreled away for times of weakness. I make more deliberate choices to reduce laundry costs (dabbling in homemade cleaning products, using more conservative dryer run times, etc.). I've tried to spend more time reading vs feeding my video game habit. Small things, sure, but I feel that frugal muscle gaining strength again. I've got ambitious savings goals, so I'm anxious to put away even more.
If you can read it using frugal methods (library, loaner from a friend, or used), all the better. I'm glad I took the time to revisit this old friend from my early 30s. Since reading it, I've watched a lot of videos and read a lot of blog posts, and I'm often left wanting for a nebulous "more". There's something satisfying about reading ideas (or at least this particular book) in dead-tree format. There's truly little to none that you will find in The Complete Tightwad Gazette that can't be found online, whether that's here in /frugal or elsewhere, but I think many (particularly Gen-X folk like myself) will appreciate the historical context of the book as much as format and tips themselves.

Hello everyone, for the last few months I have been creating long form write-ups on a variety of unsolved cases. If you are interested in other lengthy write ups you can find them on my profile- https://www.reddit.com/useQuirky-Moto.
Months ago, I was asked to cover the inexplicable case of Judy Smith, a woman who went missing from Philadelphia or perhaps Massachusetts, only for her body to be found in North Carolina months later. The case was famously covered on the show Unsolved Mysteries, and it is strange enough to warrant a long, hard look at the case and a comprehensive timeline. I hope you are able to learn something new about this semi well-known case.
Background
Judy Smith was born Judith Eldridge in Massachusetts in 1946. Right out of high school Judy married for the first time. Her husband and she had been married very shortly when in an attemot to avoid the draft, he fled to Sweden. Judy went in search of her young husband but soon returned to the states empty handed and filed for divorce. Years later, Judy married Charles Bradford a man who worked in the racehorse industry. They had two children together, Craig and Amy, but unfortunately the marriage did not last and soon Judy found herself jobless and raising two children by herself. Rather than fret, Judy got a job and enrolled in nursing school. Judy was known to study in all of her free time and soon became a successful home health care nurse. In 1986 at age 40, Judy was caring for a man who was recovering from throat surgery when she met her patient’s son, a well to do lawyer named Jeffrey Smith. Jeffrey said he was impressed by how Judy cared for his father and asked her on a date. Judy and Jeff had several things in common, both had been divorced single parents who raised children alone, and Jeffrey worked in healthcare as well, except he was a lawyer. The couple both enjoyed going to plays and Celtics basketball games. After seven years together, Jeff and Judy moved in together and three years later the couple married in Nov., 1996.
According to friends and family, Judy was a rather assertive and independent person. She was no stranger to travelling alone. Judy had been to Europe on her own a few times, and when her children were pre-teens, she took them to Europe for a backpacking adventure. Judy also independently traveled to Thailand where she went hiking and visited friends. While Judy wasn’t the epitome of fitness, she was an active person who enjoyed walking, hiking, and sightseeing. She was also known to be a go-getter who once helped an AIDS patient who was having a medical crisis on a plane. So, while Judy was kindhearted and considerate, she wasn’t thought to be naive and was able to take care of herself in a variety of different situations.
The disappearance
Five months into her new marriage on April 9th 1997, Jeffrey prepared to attend a conference in Philadelphia that was taking place from Wednesday April 9th-Friday April 11th at the Double Tree hotel in downtown Philadelphia. Judy decided to accompany her husband to Philadelphia and planned to do some sightseeing in the area. Afterwards, the Smiths were going to New Jersey to spend the weekend with some friends before flying back home.
On April 9th in the morning, Judy accompanied her husband to Logan International Airport to fly to Philadelphia, but discovered at the gate that she could not board as she did not have her photo ID. Judy encouraged Jeffrey to take the 1:30 pm flight and assured him that she would take a flight later that day and meet him in Philadelphia. According to relatives, the Smiths took public transport to the airport and Judy apparently took the bus back home and retrieved her ID. Jeffrey flew to the conference while Judy returned home and booked a flight for later that day. Judy boarded a 7:30 pm flight and arrived at the hotel in Philadelphia at approximately 9:30 pm.
Once at the hotel, the couple purchased some snacks and went to bed. The next morning Jeffrey awoke and ate breakfast at the complimentary buffet downstairs while his wife was still asleep. When he returned to the room Judy was in the shower. The two talked about several things, and Judy explained that she planned on taking the PHLASH bus in order to see the famous sights such as the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall. The Smiths planned on meeting up at the hotel in the evening to attend the conference’s 6 pm cocktail party together. With that squared away, Jeffrey attended the conference. Sometime in between 9 and 10 am a hotel concierge recalled seeing a woman matching Judy’s description ask how to get to the PHLASH bus stop. The woman was in her 50s, with shortish hair, wearing a dark colored coat, blue jeans, and white tennis shoes, carrying a bright red backpack. (Picture of the Judy wearing the backpack here).
At approximately 5:30 pm Jeffrey who was done with the day’s sessions returned to the hotel room expecting to find Judy waiting for him. Judy wasn’t there, so Jeffrey attended the cocktail hour in the hopes his wife was already visiting at the party, but she wasn’t there either. For the next 45 minutes, Jeffrey floated between the room and the party hoping to find Judy. At approximately 6:15 pm Jeffrey told the concierges that his wife had not returned from sightseeing and the hotel staff began calling local hospitals. At 6:30 pm, Jeffrey hopped in a taxi and instructed the driver to take the PHLASH bus route slowly so he could look for his wife. In one interview Jeffrey recalled that he made the driver go so slow it angered those stuck behind him. After a few hours without any sign of Judy, Smith called the police to report his wife missing. Shockingly, the PPD told Jeffrey that he couldn’t file a report until it had been twenty-four hours since the last final sighting of Judy. After lodging some complaints with some high-ranking officials within the city, a missing person’s report was taken for Judy Smith on the morning of April 11th, 1997 (Lewis, 1997).
Jeffrey called his step children and asked them to check the house in case Judy had gone home, and he also asked that they would check the answering machine, but there were no messages of note and the house was empty.
A check of the hotel room showed that Judy had left with her signature red backpack, her wallet, the jewelry she normally wore including a diamond engagement band and a simple silver wedding ring, and the clothes on her back. Jeffrey estimated that she had approximately $200 dollars with her at the time.
According to later interviews with Philadelphia investigators, Judy, or someone with her name did in fact buy a USair ticket on the 7:30 pm flight into Philadelphia. Her ticket was used to make the flight and her seat was occupied on the flight into Philadelphia (Justiceforjudy.org). At the time of the Smiths’ trip, regulations that required photo identification to board a plane had only been in effect for 18 months and Judy had flown only one other time during that time frame. Additionally, police have a luggage tag from Judy’s suitcase that showed that she took the 7:30 pm flight, and that her bag did not travel to Philadelphia with Jeffrey earlier in the day (AP, Oct 4th, 1997).
Sightings
As news of Judy’s disappearance spread, many people called the police station to report various sightings of Judy.
One PHLASH driver remembered picking up Judy in the early afternoon at Front and South streets, a stop near the Double Tree.
There was also a reported sighting of Judy entering the Greyhound bus station at 11th and Filbert sometime in the early afternoon. This station is a common place for tourists to use the bathroom and is only a 10-minute walk to the DoubleTree hotel. One report claims Judy was seen entering and then exiting the station but most reports mention only entering the station. This area was close to Philadelphia’s Chinatown and Jeffrey speculated that Judy may have gone to Chinatown for lunch as she loved both Chinese and Thai food, but no restaurant owners remembered seeing Judy that day.
There was yet another sighting of a woman who looked like Judy at around 3 pm near the hotel; witnesses claimed this woman seemed disoriented.
A number of sightings were reported over the next few days in the waterfront area of the city called Penn’s Landing. A variety of people claimed to have seen Judy. Some witnesses said she seemed confused or dazed. Judy’s two children, her son in law Jay, and Jeffrey looked into these sightings and discovered that there was a homeless woman in the area who looked strikingly similar to Judy and it is believed that many witnesses saw this woman rather than Judy Smith. This local resident looked so similar to Judy that at one point Judy’s son Craig crossed the street thinking he had discovered his mother, only for it to be the other woman. Police officers and volunteers stopped this woman a number of times as well.
One transient in the area, a man named David, was insistent that he saw Judy, not the other woman, on the night of April 10th in the Penn’s landing area, either resting or sleeping on the bench. He was insistent it was Judy, and not the other woman as he knew the other woman from the neighborhood. Judy’s son believes this story is credible as David was coherent and very willing to be interviewed, even though there was nothing to be gained from his testimony and he was simply happy to help the family. He also identifed Judy from a collection of photos, something many other witnesses were unable to do.
On April 11th an employee at a Macy’s department store in Deptford, New Jersey believed that she interacted with Judy Smith in the morning on that day. She described the clothes Judy wore, right down to the old red backpack. This shopper told the employee, that she was buying some dresses for her daughter but laughed because her daughter often disliked the pieces that she purchased for her. Judy’s family confirmed that this was acurate and affirmed that Judy sometimes shopped at Macy’s. The customer appeared to be slightly disoriented as she asked a young woman in the store to leave with her, thinking that the other customer was her daughter or a someone else she knew. One report says that Judy asked another customer in the store about menopause, a very odd subject to talk about, especially with someone you don’t know in a department store.
This mall complex was in Deptford, New Jersey, a bus ride away from Philadelphia, across the Delaware River. According to newspaper reports, NJ Transit Buses had routes which traveled from downtown Philly to Deptford hourly, and the stop was very close to the mall the sighting took place at, meaning it was possible for Judy to have boarded the bus and ended up in Deptford quite easily. Unfortunately, the Macy’s didn’t have security footage which showed this customer and the woman paid for her purchases in cash.
After a second story ran in the newspaper on April 14th, a variety of other witnesses came forward with stories. The most famous report came from a Society Hill hotel employee who explained that a woman who matched Judy’s description stayed in the hotel from April 13th-15th. The woman appeared to have psychiatric problems and did a variety of strange things during her stay such as touch herself very noticeably in front of the window (it’s unknown if this was in her room or in the lobby), speak in tongues, and finally claimed that “the emperor” would help her pay for her stay at the hotel. This wacky guest was remembered by several employees including the hotel manager, a woman named Abby Gainer, who alerted the police. The strange guest told the employees that she wanted to stay at the hotel for another night but didn’t have the funds to do so. She later said she would get the money via a Western Union wire transfer from “the emperor” (Altman, 1997).
The nearby Best Western Hotel had a similar situation with a similar woman. Concierge Tyrone Taylor remembered that on the 15th, a woman matching this description entered the hotel to use the telephone in the late afternoon. The woman was speaking loudly and said that “the emperor of China” was going to pay for her stay as she did not have the cash to pay for a night at the hotel. Taylor reported that the woman was well dressed and did not appear to be a transient. Both hotel employees reported that the woman was a heavyset blonde in her 50s, wearing heavy dark makeup, eye glasses with tape on the side, and nicer clothes. Gainer reported the woman was sporting an expensive looking scarf with camels and roses on it. The woman, who signed in as "H. K. Rich/Collins," did not have any luggage with her and was wearing very different clothes than Judy was last seen in. When Taylor called the police to report his sighting, he gave the strange guest a call (she must have left a telephone number) and told her she could have a free night at the hotel. She arrived at the Best Western but police decided that the woman was not Judy Smith (Altman, 1997). The hotel sightings were nothing more than a red herring. Over the next few months various sightings were reported but none seemed to pan out. Many of the sightings were believed to be other people who looked like Judy. After all history has shown that false eyewitness sightings are incredibly common in cases of missing persons.
Philadelphia PD’s investigation
Philadelphia PD launched an inquiry into the disappearance of Judy Smith on April 11th, 1997. Jeffrey tried to report Judy as missing in the late evening hours of April 10th, but the police told him to wait 24 hours. Smith, however, was a well-connected man and after a few complaints to both a Pennsylvania state representative and the mayor (both men were attorneys and knew Jeffrey from previous work functions), Jeffrey was able to file a report in the early morning hours of the 11th. The Smith family made and hung flyers in the area. Judy’s children joined the search and followed up on sightings around the tourist areas of Philly. Police interviewed Jeffrey, Judy’s children, and others in order to retrace Judy’s last steps. Judy left behind her passport at her home in Massachusetts meaning she could not have easily left the county. The Smith’s two landline records were checked but nothing out of the ordinary was found.
After interviews and searches of the area, Philadelphia PD announced that they believed Judy had never made it to Pennsylvania at all and speculated that Judy went missing from the Boston area. This speculation was based on a couple of things.
First, investigators did not believe Jeffrey’s story that Judy couldn’t catch the flight due to a lack of photo ID. Police thought that this story was odd and did not believe a seasoned traveler like Judy would forget her license at home before heading to the airport.
Later investigation showed that someone named Judith Smith took a 7:30pm flight into Philadelphia and flight manifest showed that the ticket was used to make the flight that evening, however, the entire incident is still odd to many amateur sleuths and professional investigators.
Another detective thought it was odd that while Judy had clothes and belongings in the hotel room, she didn’t have any cosmetics with her. Further, detectives noticed that there were few soiled items of clothing in the room meaning that if Judy was in Philadelphia on the 10th, she wore the same jeans and coat that she was wearing the night before. Judy’s children reported that this wasn’t uncommon for their mother as she wasn’t a frilly person. They also said that their mother only wore makeup on occasion and not while traveling so these things didn’t seem out of the ordinary to them. (Personally, I have also wondered if Judy did have some makeup, but it was in her backpack at time. I know plenty of women who don’t wear much makeup, but if you looked in their purse or bag you might find some lip stick or powder.)
Investigators went on to say that no one but Jeffrey could place Judy in Philadelphia during this time frame. This announcement resulted in several eyewitnesses who claimed that they had seen Judy at the hotel. One receptionist from the hotel claimed that on April 9th in between 9-10 pm, she saw Judy arrive at the hotel and greet her husband in the lobby. She said that Jeffrey gave Judy flowers and the two appeared to be apologizing to each other. (Jeffrey said this was the case except Judy gave him the flowers). One concierge remembered a woman in her 50s with a coat and old red backpack ask him how to get to the PHLASH bus stop at around 10 am on April 10th. He knew it was after 9 am because that is when his shift started. Finally, a conference goer named Carmen Catazone, who was sitting in the lobby also recalled the flower incident from the night before. The woman did not know Jeffrey personally, but recognized him from the conference. Jeffrey was a moderator for a variety of sessions and was very overweight so he was easily recognizable. These witness’ accounts seem to line up with Jeffrey’s story. As far as I can tell the flower story had not been released to the press at this point.
Finally, Philadelphia PD divulged that Jeffrey wasn’t fully cooperative, as he wouldn’t submit to a polygraph. Jeffrey denies this and said that as a lawyer he knew that polygraphs are fallible. Further, he claims that he was willing to take a lie detector if it was given by an outside agency such as the FBI, but Philadelphia police declined this scenario. These are the four reasons investigators used in order to prop up their theory that Judy wasn’t in Philadelphia at all. Despite witness sightings, this theory is a popular on online to this day.
Aftermath and Discovery
After several weeks Jeffrey returned to the Boston area and tried to resume his normal life. He drastically cut back his hours at the office reporting that he could not focus on his work. Smith attempted to keep his wife’s case in the spotlight doing interviews whenever he could and eventually landing a spot on the show Unsolved Mysteries. On the show, one friend of the couple called the marriage “tenuous” but modern articles on the case mention that the police could find no one who reported concerns like these about the couples’ relationship. In independent interviews Judy’s adult children denied witnessing any warning signs in their mother’s new marriage. Eventually, Jeffrey hired three private investigators to look for Judy. The PIs faxed over 9,000 missing posters to police departments and hospitals all over the country hoping that someone would recognize Judy.
Five months after her disappearance in September 1997, a man and his son were hunting in the Pisgah National Forest near Candler, North Carolina, a short drive from the city of Asheville. On a steep incline one-quarter mile from a picnic area, which itself was a mile from hike from the nearest parking area, the duo found what appeared to be a human bone. They alerted the police who responded to the scene. Over an area approximately 300 feet in diameter, investigators found most of a human skeleton which had been wrapped in a blue blanket and buried in a very shallow grave. Scavenging animals had dug up the skeleton and a few bones had been carried away. The skeleton was determined to be female. The woman was dressed in thermal underwear under her jeans, hiking boots, socks, a t-shirt, a bra and a jacket. Nearby in two different holes, a blue vinyl backpack and a men’s shirt had been buried. The backpack contained some winter clothing and 80 dollars. The shirt contained a pair of $110 Bolle brand sunglasses, as well an additional $87. A paperback mystery novel was also found nearby. She carried no ID. The slope where the body was discovered was near some hiking trails, but the hill itself was steep and at an elevation of 4,000 feet, the search was difficult. The incline was so severe that one investigator crushed his sciatic nerve attempting to search the area, an injury which required major surgery.
Early coverage of the body’s discovery in the Asheville Citizen Times, initially reported that the police found a body belonging to a woman who they believed to be in her 20s dressed in hiking clothes (Ball, 1997). Several days later, the medical examiner assessed the bones and concluded that the skeleton was that of white woman in her 40s or 50s, who was about 5’3” tall with shortish light brown hair. There were cut marks in the woman’s bra and t-shirt which indicated that she had been stabbed in the chest area, however, no cause of death could be determined. Some reports mention that there was trauma to the woman’s ribs. The decedent also had a severely arthritic right knee (some reports say it was her left knee), extensive fillings and dental work in her molars, and some animal hair on her shirt, which may have been horse hair. The woman did not seem to be a transient due to her nice clothes and dental work. The death was ruled a homicide as the woman had been wrapped in a blanket post mortem and buried. The ME determined that the body had been there for 1-2 years prior. For several weeks the skeleton remained nameless in the ME’s office.
On September 9th, a small blurb about the unidentified body ran in an Asheville, North Carolina paper. 65 miles away in Franklin, NC, an ER physician named Parker Davis was looking at missing poster which had been faxed to the hospital he worked at when he noticed that the woman on the poster had a severely arthritic knee. He remembered the story of the skeleton from the paper who had a similar knee problem. On a whim he called the police who were able to get a copy of Judy’s missing poster. After a preliminary check, the ME contacted Jeffrey in order to obtain a copy of Judy’s dental records. The records were a match, and by the end of September 1997, Judy had her name back. Friends and family were also able to identify Judy’s diamond engagement band with a pear-shaped stone and wedding ring which had been found on or near the body. Some early reports say that the woman had no jewelry and that Judy’s wedding ring was missing, but later reports say that it was found near the body. The area of the burial was searched on at least three occasions so it is possible the rings were not found until later. Missing was Judy’s wallet, red backpack, and some jewelry that she typically wore (it’s unclear what jewelry this is referring to). The coat she was last seen wearing was nowhere to be found and the clothes she was dressed in, as well as those in the backpack were unable to be identified by family or friends. The shirt buried nearby was a men’s shirt and was believed to belong to the killer, not Judy. Furthermore, the sunglasses did not appear to be Judy’s as Judy’s kids said she wasn’t the type to spend over $100 on sunglasses. The sunglasses are an athletic style and to me look like men’s or unisex sport sunglasses.
Buncombe County Investigation
Buncombe County Sheriff’s Department took over the case from the PPD after Judy’s identification. Once it was determined that Judy was the woman in the woods, several residents in and around Asheville reported that they had seen Judy or had interacted with her in the April shortly after she was last seen in Philadelphia. For example, one woman thought Judy had stayed at her hotel from April 10th-12th, one woman who worked at a souvenir shop near the Biltmore house (a tourist attraction near Asheville) thought that she spoke to Judy who said she was from Boston and that her husband was a lawyer. Another woman who worked in a store recalled that Judy with her red backpack. She claims that Judy bought a toy truck and approximately $30 worth of sandwiches. There were two other sightings of a person resembling Judy in the area in a gray sedan. One person claimed to have seen Judy near the Pisgah National Forest in a gray sedan chock full of stuff. This witness said that the woman was looking for a place to camp. Another person saw a woman in a gray sedan in the same area. All sightings occurred in the week or so after Judy was last seen in Philadelphia. Of course, it goes without saying that, eyewitness testimony can be unreliable and the human mind is susceptible to suggestion.
North Carolina investigators traveled to Philadelphia to retrace Judy’s steps. They have said that they don’t believe that PPD did a poor job but simply wanted to cover their bases. Two detectives flew to Philadelphia and determined that Judy probably been there at least briefly before traveling to the Pisgah National Forest. They reported that there was no indication that Judy had been abducted or otherwise forced to travel south. It appeared she at least started the journey of her own volition. In all the sightings of Judy in North Carolina, she was alone.
Buncombe county deputies were able to rule out Jeffrey as a suspect rather quickly, although they concede that anything is possible and Jeffrey could be involved however unlikely it seems. Jeffrey was ruled out based on his size and health. Jeffrey was a morbidly obese man who investigators noted began huffing and puffing when walking quickly or climbing stairs. Because of this they did not believe Jeffrey could have disposed of his wife’s body especially in such an inaccessible area of the forest. Furthermore, they could find no evidence that Jeffrey rented a car in Philadelphia adding to the logistical problems with Jeffrey being a suspect. On top of his lack of car, Jeffrey had less than 12 hours to dispose of Judy’s body as he was seen in the lobby of the hotel at 9:30 pm, and then was moderating a session of the conference at 9:30 am. Driving to the Pisgah National Forest from Philadelphia takes approximately nine hours one way meaning he did not have time to kill and dispose of his wife. One podcast on the case mentions that police could find no large withdrawals of money from the Smith’s accounts which could have indicated the hiring of a hit man or a paid accomplice. (I could find no other corroboration of this claim so take this with a grain of salt.) Jeffrey also kept his wife’s case in the spotlight and suffered many hardships in the wake of his wife’s disappearance. Besides the one woman who was interviewed on Unsolved Mysteries, no other friends or family reported that there were issues in marriage that they were aware of.
Philadelphia police also struggled with Jeffrey’s size as carrying and disposing of a dead body is quite taxing and it is doubtful that Jeffrey could have done this on his own. However, they say that Jeffrey is still as suspect as he could have killed his wife in Boston or had an accomplice.
With the most obvious suspect cleared, investigators moved on to other lines of inquiry. They searched the surrounding areas hoping to find people who had seen Judy which is how the discovery of the woman in the gray car was made. Police also searched a nearby horse farm as Judy was known to like horses and had what could have been horse hair on her body, but nothing definitive was found.
Other information

• Philadelphia investigators looked at the Smith’s phone records and determined that there was no unusual activity on either of their phone lines that would indicate that either of the Smiths were having affairs. Neither Jeffrey or Judy had cell phones. If Judy was having an affair at the time, none of her friends could provide any insight or speculate as to who it was. There was a computer in the house which was searched, but it is unknown if the computer was connected to the internet.
• When Judy went missing Jeffrey believed that she had approximately $200 on her person. About $500 dollars in cash was found among Judy’s things in the hotel room. Judy also disappeared with her ID, her credit card, and her phone card. To this day, there has been no activity on either card.
• Judy’s description varies from source to source. Some sources report that she was “heavy set” or “top heavy”. Others say she was 130 or 140 lbs., which is more average size for a 5’2” woman. In some pictures Judy looks to be of a larger build, but in some photos, she appears smaller. Whether these weights were a misprint or Judy was someone whose weight fluctuated regularly is unclear. It is not a very important detail but it is a discrepancy I wanted to point out.
• Judy had been to North Carolina only once and had no connection to the area. She had once been to Raleigh to visit Jeffrey who was at a weight loss clinic. Jeffrey said that he loved the area and thought about moving, but the couple never returned to the state. Family also said that Judy had once traveled to Tennessee or another nearby state with a former patient but that had been years earlier.
• Judy Smith is also the name of a famous "Crisis Manager." This Judy Smith was the inspiration for the hit show "Scandal" with actress Kerry Washington. This woman is not the same Judy Smith who went missing in 1997.

Suspects
Gary Michael Hilton, sometimes called the national park killer, is a suspect in Judy's disappearance. In 2008 Hilton was arrested for a murder in a national forest and was later linked to three other murders, all of which took place between 2005 and 2008. Hilton, who was in his 50s and 60s at the time, killed hikers in Florida, Georgia, and North Carolina and he is considered a suspect in many other murders in surrounding states such as Arkansas, South Carolina, and Tennessee. Hilton, who loved the outdoors, would often stalk hiking trails, camp sites, and other areas known for outdoor recreation to find victims to terrorize. His crimes were tended to be opportunistic and his motive most often was monetary. Hilton held down a series of jobs from 1997 to 2007 but did not work full time. He was also a drifter who moved from place to place. Hilton usually assaulted and robbed his victims of their wallets, atm cards, cash, and valuables. His victims were male and female, young and old. He seemed to prefer victims who were isolated and alone did not try to find a specific type of person otherwise. One thing that is interesting about Hilton as an offender is that it appears that he did not commit any violent crimes before he was 58 or 59 years old. Hilton has a very long rap sheet but most of his crimes were relatively minor such as possession of marijuana, carrying a pistol without a license, soliciting false donations for charity, carrying a police baton, and DUI. Once arrested several violent incidents that Hilton had been a part of came to light but he had never been convicted of them in the past. Most people agree someone with does not start a life of violent crime in their 60s. Many believe the Gary Michael Hilton has more victims then are currently known.
John and Irene Bryant, an eclectic couple in their 80s, were hiking in the Pisgah National Forest in 2007 when they were attacked by Hilton. Hilton killed Irene, and then kidnapped her husband in order to use their ATM cards and withdraw money before killing John as well. Irene's body was left only miles from where Judy's body was found 10 years earlier. This is one of the most convincing pieces of evidence that Hilton may have been involved in Judy's murder as well. However, it is important to note that Judy was not robbed and Hilton did not bury any of his known victims. Judy's murder also took place 10 years before any Hilton's other murders. Some blogs or more unofficial sources on the case mentioned that Hilton was believed to be in Georgia at the time of Judy's disappearance, but this isn't known for sure. If you are interested in learning more about the crimes of Gary Michael Hilton this reddit post is a really good place to start. This post did a good job of putting it all in one place so thank you u/lisagreenhouse.
Another offender who was in the Asheville area at the time of Judy's disappearance was a young man named Lewis Kyle Wilson. In the early 2000s Wilson was arrested after assaulting and robbing a sex worker he had brought home to his property. There's not a lot of information on Wilson online, but he was living in Asheville and would have been 19 at the time of Judy's disappearance. I cannot find any evidence that Wilson actually killed anyone but he does have a history of violence towards women and was in the area at the time so he is sometimes mentioned online as a possible suspect. One sex worker Wilson was known to frequent was the victim of an unsolved homicide that happened in 2006; Wilson is the prime suspect in that crime.
In 2016, only a couple of miles from Judy's burial site in the Pisgah National Forest, a lone hiker in her 60s was attacked, raped, and left tied to a tree. Thankfully, the woman was found alive and taken to the hospital. Some have wondered if this crime was connected to the Judy Smith homicide but there is no hard evidence of this and the rapist remains unknown.
Theories
Amnesia is one possible explanation for Judy’s disappearance. The family believes that Judy was injured or otherwise suffered a bout of dissociative amnesia which caused her to become confused or forget her identity. This is supported by the sightings of a confused or disoriented Judy in Philadelphia. The family believes this explains why Judy traveled to the Pisgah National Forest apparently of her own free will.
One theory is that Judy and Jeffrey had an argument that spurred an angry Judy to leave the area, whether she left from Boston or Philadelphia. After she left the area and traveled south to North Carolina, she met with foul play.
In a similar vein, some believed Judy willingly traveled to North Carolina to meet up with someone, perhaps a friend or a secret boyfriend. The ID incident at the airport was simply a cover so Judy could converse with this person who she wanted to meet. Once in North Carolina she met with foul play perhaps at the hand of the person she went to meet.
One theory Jeffrey explored was that Judy was suffering from mental illness and had a psychotic break. Being a lawyer, Jeffrey was able with some legal maneuvering to obtain all of Judy’s medical records from her adult life, including a physical she had had only months before hand. There was no indication that Judy had ever had any mental health concerns. Neither she or her doctors ever mentioned anything that would have pointed to any mental health problems, even minor ones such as anxiety. According to Jeffrey, Judy’s newest physical reported that Judy was in good mental and physical health (Lewis, 1997 and Trace Evidence Podcast).
Other sleuths have speculated that Judy traveled to North Carolina because she was questioning her sexuality. Asheville at the time was known for having an LGBT community. This theory is pushed forward by one interview on the Unsolved Mysteries segment as Judy’s friend says, “If you are looking for a mystery man, there wasn’t one.” Some have said that this implied that Judy had met a mystery woman, not a man. However, this theory is full of holes. No friends or family ever had any indication that Judy was questioning her sexuality. Judy had been married to men on three occasions and had other boyfriends as well. This explanation fails to explain why this realization would cause Judy to unexpectedly travel hundreds of miles and cease contact with her children. It also fails to explain who killed Judy.
Others have speculated that Judy was tricked into going to North Carolina. Perhaps she met someone while sightseeing who offered her a ride and that person abducted her or drove her to North Carolina for some reason.
Personally, I have always wondered if Judy was suffering from early onset dementia or Alzheimer’s disease. This would be a similar theory to the psychotic break theory; however, I believe this explains why Judy was described as both disoriented and acting normal in different sightings. I am by no means an expert, but if I understand correctly, patients with these conditions can get very confused and agitated but can also have times of acting completely lucid. I think this theory can explain why Judy forgot her license at home before flying, and can also explain her disappearance. I think it is possible Judy got on the wrong bus and ended up first at the Deptford mall and then eventually North Carolina, simply getting more and more lost each day. Of course, this hypothesis does not solve Judy’s murder, it simply gives an explanation for her travels.
A final theory that is prevalent online is the idea that the doe found in Pisgah National Forest was not Judy at all and was instead misidentified. While this is always possible and something I have entertained from time to time, Judy was matched via dental records, her arthritic knee, and her distinct engagement ring with a pear-shaped stone. If the doe was not Judy, then the mystery becomes even stranger, and now includes the identity and murder of yet another woman. While the odds of a similarly aged woman, with a bad knee, similar dental work, and a plain silver wedding band accompanied with a fancy diamond engagement ring, who was not Judy being murdered in the forest is possible, I believe that it is not very likely. Proponents of this theory point to the ME’s report that the doe had been in the forest for over a year, while Judy had been missing only five months at the time of her discovery.
TO BE CONTINUED...
Full list of sources are in part two- https://unsolved.com/gallery/judy-smith/
link to part 2 https://www.reddit.com/UnresolvedMysteries/comments/kky2l2/when_a_body_is_found_600_miles_away_extensive_two/

Edited to remove the tables because when I obsessively checked this post on my phone I couldn't read them?? Also I tried to, but was prevented from, editing the title. I know it looks sanctimonious but that's just one small part of my personality I swear. D:
❤️ Section 1: Assets and Debt
Total Net Worth: $30,875 - all equity.
Retirement Balance: $0 for me; $20,500 for my husband in the state pension program for teachers. (My partner, L, has been paying into the state teachers' pension system for 5 years. For most of my 20s, I either worked at very low-paying jobs, or supported myself and others on a teacher’s salary, so no retirement for me. My current job does not have a retirement program, but one of my goals for this year is to either start a Roth IRA or get a new job with a 401k match… or maybe both?)
Savings Account Balance: $23,733 We’re moving this summer to a city closer to our families, and are saving all we can for a down payment on a dreamy spot. After we move, some amount of what’s left over will go into a retirement fund, and the rest will stay in this HYSA as our emergency fund. For us, three months of expenses, including childcare, is about $18,000.
Checking Account Balance: $455
Credit Card Debt: n/a, pay off each month
Student Loan Debt: $80,000 for L’s undergrad and MAT. $18,000 for my undergrad and (unfinished) MAT. (My undergrad degrees were mostly covered by the Pell Grant, scholarships, and a $10,000 529 from my parents. L was a nontraditional student - didn’t start undergrad until he was 24 - so none of his was covered. Most of my debt is for a MAT program I dropped out of after one year. I was trying to find any way out of teaching at the time (it is demanding, all-consuming, and carceral at once) and thought a PhD would be my only route. When I got my current job I promptly left the program and any dreams of a PhD behind.)
Equity: $83,875 (This number is from an online equity calculator, and is for our house in a very popular neighborhood in a very popular city. Our outstanding debt on the house is $295,000. We put our whole savings down in 2019, which was $9,000 at the time.)
❤️ Section 2: Income
Monthly Take Home: My base pay is $65,000, and L’s is $45,000. I worked a side gig last year that totaled about $10k in additional compensation; all of it went to savings so we don't budget for it. My take home is $4096/month for my full time job, and my current side gig income (grant writing) is variable, between $300 and $600 a month. L’s take home is $2262/month. My health insurance is paid in full by work. L’s insurance and B’s come out of L’s paycheck, as does L’s retirement contribution.
Income Progression: I’ve been working since I was 15 years old, moved out for college at 18, and paid my own bills starting that year. I won’t include that money here though (it was like $12,000 a year as a college student, for reference). Income below starts when I graduated with two BAs that had nothing to do with teaching.
Year 1: $15,600 (part time ABA therapist, full time baby anarchist)
Year 2: $32,000 (year 1 teacher salary: I accepted a spot in Teach for America for this giant salary even though I thought it was an obnoxious neoliberal org. Yes, I was also obnoxious at the time.)
Year 3: $33,000 (teacher, step increase)
Year 4: $34,000 (teacher, step increase)
Year 5: $35,000 (teacher, step increase)
Year 6: $15,000 (community organizer; at the time this felt like a dream job)
Year 7: $20,000 (community organizer & cafe worker)
Year 8: $40,000 (back to teaching, felt rich; this includes a side hustle writing grants on the side for $50 an hour)
Year 9: $45,000 (left teaching for my current job, quit the grants side hustle)
Year 10: $55,000 (got a raise, got pregnant)
Year 11: $65,000 (got a raise and promotion, had a baby)
Year 12: $75,000 (was promoted again in January but waiting on the pay increase to hit, hopefully with backdating. This money diary doesn’t reflect this salary as it hasn’t been reflected in my check yet)
❤️ Section 3: Expenses
Mortgage/PMI/Insurance: $2,110
Retirement Contribution: n/a (L’s retirement is pulled out of his check before he receives it: it’s $169 a month. Right now, I don’t have a retirement contribution)
Savings Contribution: $1000 to main savings, $400 to sinking fund (This is a super aggressive goal for us and is only possible because our childcare costs are covered by work)
Debt Payments: n/a right now (We have student loans to the tune of $100k but haven’t been paying a dime since they were paused due to COVID. But then the other day I checked and saw they've gained interest? Should we be paying them then? WWJD? I legit don’t know.)
Electric: $130
Internet: $100
Cellphone: $65 (For L & I both. We are on a bigass family plan with 40 gajillion other people.)
Subscriptions: $45 ($10 Spotify; $10 Youtube music; $2.99 Apple data (Why?!); $22 NYT (for newspaper and cooking app); also have a split subscription to the New Yorker with bestie F but we paid for a yearly deal.)
Car Payment and Insurance: $150 for a car payment; $202 for insurance (Insurance covers both of our used cars and my dad’s used handicap van. Our car payment is for our used Honda. We only owe $6,850 on the car and I’m back and forth on whether to pay it off with savings)
Medical/Therapy: $0 (My therapist is $140 a session, and I just started seeing her again once a month, but this is reimbursed by work. I also get an inhaler at least twice a month - that’s reimbursed too, costs $60 total.)
Misfits Market: $120 (For a weekly box, which really helps us cut down on overall grocery cost)
Gym membership: $30 (For my intense local yoga studio’s app which is so great in the winter. We also run and bike a lot, as long as it’s warm enough)
Donations: $100 (We give monthly to our local Democratic Socialists of America; the Working Families Party; and a small, local org. I’m also on an organizing committee for that org. We’ll give them one big gift of at least $250 this year, probably in May. I support a couple organizations with grant writing and grant-finding support as much as I can, which usually amounts to a few hours a month.)
Childcare: $0 B goes to a very precious Montessori preschool, and we can walk him there. It’s pricey af ($1300/month). The other $200 is to account for some babysitting from my little sister when L or I have to work weird hours. For now, work reimburses this full amount as a COVID perk; if that changes, we will have to cut costs significantly.
House cleaner: $160 (They come twice a month and charge $80 each time.)
❤️ Section 4: Money Diary
NOTE: We are masked and afraid everywhere we go.
✨DAY 1: THURSDAY✨
4:20 am: Good morning world! I shuffle into the kitchen in my panties and my slippers to fill up the gooseneck kettle. I recently got into pour over coffee even though it’s quite a commitment. With a toddler, a full-time job, and a Libra sun, I don’t really have time for meditative morning routines. This lengthy, half-naked coffee regimen is my closest attempt. As soon as I get the coffee brewing, our 18 month old, B, starts making noise. I open the door and see he’s got his pacifier in his mouth and his pillow in his arms. He wants to lay with Dada. I help him get in the bed with my husband, L, as quietly as possible. Last week L was super sick and we thought for sure he had picked up COVID. Blessedly all of our tests came back negative, but on the heels of that, he started having major tooth pain and had to have an emergency tooth extraction, AND he got an ear infection as he was coming down from whatever virus he had. I hate it :(
I get dressed and do some chores while they snooze to ease L's morning. I start the diaper laundry (usually his job - we use cloth), put away the dishes, start the Eufy vacuum, and get B and L’s breakfasts together: sunbutter and a little bit of syrup on some banana pancakes I prepped earlier this week.
6:30 am: B and L are up! The hour before we take B to preschool is kind of a marathon. L eats with B (and supervises his syrup consumption) as I clean out some more dirty diapers, brush my teeth, make another cup of coffee, strip our sheets, spray my hair with water to refresh the curl, return a few group texts, and wash some breakfast dishes. Somewhere in here I also eat two boiled eggs with Everything But the Bagel seasoning, and a bunch of grapes.
I help L get B loaded up in the car, and just as they pull off, my parents Facetime me. They’re calling to see B but are polite enough to talk to me for a few minutes. They live a few hours away, and are divorced, but cohabitating. The full story is long and spiritual for me so I’ll spare you. Anyway, my mom and I talk for a while about this couch she thinks I should buy from one of her friends, but it’s two hours away and we’d have to rent a U-Haul, so I think we’ll pass. I do hate our current couch though. Please drop comfy toddler- and dog-friendly recommendations in the comments!
8:15 am: I set out to walk the dog and listen to the Daily’s recent update on the coronavirus. Donald G. McNeill, Jr., says we’re in this through the summer, which is a bummer on the personal and global front, but I suppose it could be worse??? Maybe?? As soon as they finish talking I switch over to You’re Wrong About. I’m deep in the Jessica Simpson series and highly recommend this pod for any other nerdy, lefty, kinda burnt out millennials, especially those of you that are queer or queer-adjacent. Once home, I take my whole operation onto the front porch to work, since the cleaner will be here soon and I don’t want to crowd her in this time of COVID. I LOVE a clean house and I love paying someone else to do the big stuff, which is a recent luxury for us.
11:00 am: I’ve been working steadily in my email and google docs for a couple hours now, and it’s COLD out here. The cleaner leaves and I am grateful to go back into the heat. I Venmo her $80 for the cleaning (included in monthly expenses). I take a break from work and check out the job boards. My current job is the best, and highest-paying, gig I’ve ever had, but I’m planning to leave some time this year for several reasons. The premier reason: I recently learned that I’m qualified for several positions that pay over $100k at similar organizations. With that kind of money we could pay off our student loans, help our families out more, make sizable donations, and L could explore a career outside of teaching without freaking about a slight cut in his pay for a few years as he finds his niche. Or - maybe he’ll get into Edtech somehow and we’ll join Resource Generation. Who knows.
12:30 pm: I have a quick break and pull together lunch: half a cheese quesadilla, a big bowl of Smitten Kitchen’s roasted tomato soup, and a LimonCello LaCroix. L is on his planning period and asks me to edit his most recent job application, and I oblige. Since we’re both job hunting, I ask him if I can buy a resume template and guide on Etsy. I have sworn off online shopping for the year to curb my impulse spending, but he says we’ll just count this one as his purchase. Great news because I hate the formatting of my resume from 2016 and don’t want to fix it myself! $9.95
3:30 pm: My Zooms are over, my inbox is at 0, and I put up my out of office message because I’m taking the day off tomorrow to work on my resume and do some things to prep our house for sale. My high-functioning anxiety created an ambitious backwards timeline for this process back in December, and that timeline currently runs my life. I work for a few more minutes to tie up loose ends, and then walk O to a nearby shop to buy my favorite candle, curbside-style. When I get there the owner gives me some percentage off because it’s slightly discolored from the sun. Huzzah! $27.25, marked down from $40
4:45 pm: My angel of a baby sister, J, who lives just a few blocks away and is in a pod with us, comes to hang out with B for an hour so L can rest. I head to my good friend D’s place for my investment overalls appointment. She's going to alter their awkward wide leg into more of a tapered, mom jean shape. I have a capsule wardrobe which means I’ll wear these babies at least once a week, and plus I get to pay my friend, so I’m fine with the extra expense. When I arrive, she and her partner have the fire pit going, and we drink a couple glasses of wine together, yet more than 6 feet apart. I learn they are planning to move to the same new city as us in the next couple of years and legit cry happy tears.
Afterwards, I head out to pick up dinner for tonight. We are getting burgers from L’s favorite place as a treat. On my way, the WOLF MOON appears over the water and my stomach does triple flips. Then I pick up our dinner: a veggie burger with eggplant jam and kale for me; a real-meat burger with mushrooms, bacon, swiss, carmelized onion, and horseradish mayo for L; and an appetizer plate with pretzels, pimento cheese, onion jam, pickles, and chips for B. Delicious and unhealthy. The total is $34.54.
6:30: Home and eating dinner. B loves his meal, especially the “chokes.” He calls pretzels “chokes” because when L first started feeding them to him, I worried aloud that he would choke every time. I just couldn’t stop thinking about how a pretzel almost took out George W. Bush. Turns out our toddler is better at chewing than George W. Bush.
After dinner, L gives B a bubble bath while I do my own, very minimal, bedtime routine. Then L and I lay down with B to put him to sleep. He has a floor bed, which is a Montessori thing I learned about on mom blogs. L is a very hot and talented woodworker, so he took my floor bed dream to the next level by building a lovely house-shaped frame. The top beam is wrapped in twinkle lights and fake ivy. It’s a nice place to sleep, and we pass out here all the time.
10:30 pm: L wakes me up and we wander to our own bed.
🌿 DAILY TOTAL: 71.74
✨ DAY 2: FRIDAY✨
4:15 am: Wake up and go look at the clock. Decide this is a silly time to get up on a day off, drink some water, and go lay back down. But once in bed all I can think about is how much I want to read the news, organize my resume, and update this money diary. This is the problem with falling asleep at toddler time. So I get up again at 4:45, make my coffee, read a New Yorker article about Biden’s pandemic response on my phone, and sit down to work on this diary.
6:00 am: L wakes up! He works on breakfast for himself and B and I start meal planning for the month. This is one of my best and most recent life hacks. I found that if I chart out our cooking, weekly takeout, and leftovers at the start of the month, we save lots of money and are so much less stressed about the labor that goes into feeding ourselves. I pull out Smitten Kitchen Every Day and use it to inspire the month’s meals. So quaint to cook from an actual BOOK.
6:45 am: B walks out of our room and announces that he drank my water off the side table. He’s so proud! And so ready to eat. While he eats breakfast, I snack on some grapes and, at B’s request, blast 7 Days A Week by They Might Be Giants. This is the consummate children’s song for any household that dreams of a self-determined world. Over the next hour I take B to school; make myself a real breakfast (a soy chorizo and egg taco); and browse TikTok. Eventually I find a series about this Gamestop situation by a smart Irish woman and L and I watch it together. When it’s over we feel like shrewd stock brokers ready to win money, and L gets to work teaching virtually.
I spend the morning painting our front door and our kitchen wall to prep our house to sell, and talking to my (other) little sister on the phone. She’s an HR person with a job that’s taken her far away from our family, and we don’t talk that often. It is so good to catch up on her life. After that I have a fun, day-off Zoom call with longtime bestie and coworker K. We drink coffee and talk about The Future.
12:30 pm: I make lunch (tomato soup with goat cheese on top, and a savory scone on the side) and get a text from another bestie, M, who offers me a little grant writing contract work this week. Yay! I love them and love working with them. Next, I order our groceries for the week. I get baking powder, eggs, cremini mushrooms, vegan sausage patties, oat milk, ginger root, shredded cheddar cheese, plantains, black beans, doggy bags, broccoli, vegan chicken strips, artichoke hearts, roasted red peppers, capers, ciabatta bread, grits, bananas, avocados, greek yogurt, and on impulse, a pineapple on sale (?!). Maybe B will love it. The total comes to $94.08.
1:15 pm: I do a brief power vinyasa class in B’s room and take a shower. It takes me approximately two Drake songs to shower and dry off, as I don’t have to wash my hair today and I never shave. I work on my resume until L and I leave to pick up B. On the way home we stop at the park to play, and then we all get in the car to pick up groceries.
6:30 pm: We get home later than planned and eat together: leftover tofu ramen for us and veggie lasagna for B, who is so sleepy that he hardly touches his lasagna. L gets him in the bath around 7:15 and I run through my evening routine. There’s a lot going on in the house - preschool lunch and clothes to put up, a mountain of laundry in our room, all of the groceries for the week waiting to be put away, and dinner dishes are languishing in the sink. L starts on chores while I get B dressed.
As I’m dressing B, my mom Facetimes and B shows her several of his board books. While we’re talking my dad texts me a heart emoji - he overheard B and my mom talking from his room. He lives with a disability and a painful illness, so he goes to bed very early. We hang up with my mom and record a video of B making “P” sounds and saying “I love you” to my dad, and send it over. This is the first time B’s ever said “I love you!” Huge news. We read books and fall asleep next to B.
9 pm: I wake up and nudge L but he wants to keep sleeping. I go clean the dinner dishes, put away the food and reorganize the cabinets and fridge, and mop the kitchen floor while I listen to The Daily’s latest reporting on QAnon believers who are at once totally bananagrams and also remind me very much of my aunt. L wakes up at 9:30 because he and Y, my sister’s boyfriend, are gonna game. Cute! He finishes the laundry and I fold a few diapers to help out. Then we lay in bed together until game time, when I fall asleep.
🌿 DAILY TOTAL: 94.08
✨DAY 3: SATURDAY✨
5:40 am: Wake up at a ~*~weekend hour~*~!! Start my kettle, clean and moisturize my face, pull out the ingredients for waffles, and pick up around the house while I wait for it to boil. I try to read some, but get bored a few pages in. I’m currently reading How to Do Nothing and it’s good enough, but I think I need to chill on the nonfiction and read, like, saucy romance novels with hot bisexual leads. Send me your recs please!
Waffle time! This recipe is my go-to. I recommend whipping the egg whites first. B wakes up around 7:15 and helps me cook which is cute and very messy. He eats his waffle with honey, peanut butter, and grapes. L wakes up after him - he had a late night gaming!
8 am: I open yesterday’s mail and find an anti-abortion DVD from L’s grandma. It’s Abby Johnson’s “memoir.” Abby Johnson is an opportunistic right winger and documented liar who once moonlighted as a Planned Parenthood clinic manager. L is a preacher’s kid, so we’re not surprised to receive this from his grandma. For example: 10 years ago, when L and I were a couple years into our relationship, her Christmas gift to me was a book about how one can recover from being a slut by getting married and finding Jesus. This particular package really sends me over the edge, though. I decide to write them a short note later that states my own experience with abortion and sets a clear boundary on this kind of propaganda, and includes an article about Abby Johnson’s bullshit life. It’s unlikely this will change their minds - they are septuagenarian Southern Baptists, after all - but at least I’ll be in my integrity.
In the meantime, I group text L’s siblings, and they commiserate with us. His one sibling who is transitioning shares that grandma recently sent them a book about how to tell your gay friends they’re sinning. We agree that’s hilariously dense (and fucking rude) of her, and talk about how everyone under forty is a gay slut living their best life, so really it’s grandma’s loss. During this time I clean the kitchen, finish the waffles, and freeze them for B’s weekday breakfasts.
9:30 am: B asks to use the potty and does a great job peeing on his own! He’s geeked about it and is especially excited to have my parents on Facetime cheering him on. After that we head out on our morning walk. L takes B to the playground and I take O to the dog park nearby. She gets tired pretty quick and we all head to the thrift store. We need chairs for our hand-me-down kitchen table. The ones that came with it are awkwardly wide. L spots two sturdy ones that are just $5 each. Score! $10
11:30 am: B and L are both wiped out once we get home. They eat lunch and go to sleep. I clean up the kitchen, repot one of my plants, water our porch plants, and eat some leftover ramen for lunch. The Marie Antoinette episode of You’re Wrong About keeps me company all the while. 10/10 would recommend.
2 pm: B wakes up and eats some lunch. We watercolor together for a while (he on his big paper, I in my bullet journal), then walk down the street to the local high school while L preps potatoes for our fondue. The high school grounds are open on the weekends, and there’s an amphitheatre on site. B loves the echo in there.
4:30 pm: L joins us in the amphitheatre and together we drag B two blocks back home. I prep the fondue: brie, gouda, and more gouda with white wine. It ends up being a little clumpy but so delicious. My sister, J, and her boyfriend, Y arrive while I’m cooking. Y brings yummy baguettes from his bakery job for the dipping and we prep broccoli, green beans, and tempeh too. We sit down in our new chairs to eat and for the zillionth time I am so thankful we’ve been able to make a pod together this year. Fondue would be a terrifying proposition with anyone else, really.
While we eat, Y tells us he put in his two weeks at the bakery because their COVID protocols aren’t so tight and his coworkers are continuing to go to bars and out to eat. His plan for now is to get back on unemployment and find a virtual job sometime soon. Both he and my sister have worked food service their whole adult lives so the pandemic has been tough on them. Besides the fact that they’re delightful and perfect, this is one key reason we’re planning to move with them to our new city this summer: L and I will be able to easily afford the majority of the rent, deposits, and utilities on a pretty big, and centrally located, house. Living together will allow us to grow our savings and take our time looking for a Forever Home, and will allow J and Y to pay really low rent as my sister goes back to school full time and Y looks for a full-time job. I’m really looking forward to living with them and know it’ll be good for B, too. They leave around 7 pm and we put B to bed, this time without falling asleep ourselves!
8:30 pm: Turn on How I Met Your Mother in bed and the episodes are baaaaad bad. One entire episode casts sex workers as a punch line. Ick. L and I agree to find a new show, and fall asleep around 10.
11 pm - 2 am: B is up and between our two beds. Wahhhh.
🌿 DAILY TOTAL: 10
✨DAY 4: SUNDAY✨
6 am: Up and at ‘em! Discover I’m out of my fancy coffee and don’t want to emphasize the flavor of our grocery store beans with a slow pour, so make a french press instead. B wakes up too early so we watch toddlers together on TikTok while I drink my coffee, then read books while L makes us all eggs for breakfast. We head out for our morning walk around 9 am and stop at a coffee shop a few blocks away. I pick up Counter Culture’s Iridescent beans, buy an espresso brownie on a whim, and tip the cashier because she’s so sweet and tipping is good. The total is 23.03. L takes B to the playground and I drop my purchases and O back at the house before I head out for a run.
9:45 am: It’s 65 degrees and my run is glorious. I run to the water and pause Lil Yachty for a minute to take it all in. Once home I shower and put on a black LA Apparel catsuit and a marled black and white cocoon sweater from AA of the past (I like what I like!). We feed B lunch and then L puts him down while I clean up.
Around 11:30, J comes over after to watch B while we remove the storm windows from our whole house and clean the windows underneath as part of our work to prep the house for sale. We’re a solid team: L removes the storm windows and caulks all the gaps in the wood while I follow behind him and wash the windows inside and out. Our sweet neighbor catches us cleaning and offers to let us use her power washer for free next weekend to clean up the front of the house. I resolve to bake them some cookies.
2:30 pm: We are done with the window operation and it’s time for me to water all 57 plants in the house. Along the way, discover that I overwatered B’s hoya last week and it’s rotting. Noooo! I unpot it on the porch to dry the roots, but it’s raining so this might not work. There’s only one surefire solution: buy a replacement plant! I try to convince L we should go to the nursery, but he’s not so into it. I walk around dejectedly with a towel to clean up all the water I spilled, and Zelle J $70 for babysitting even though she insists she would do it for free. Next B, L, and I share a snack: crackers with goat cheese and harissa. Mmm. B skips the harissa but loves the goat cheese. Meanwhile I begin to stress about making dinner. We’d planned goddess bowls but L and I just aren’t feeling it after our marathon of house work. L requests Chinese and is suddenly more amenable to visiting the nursery, which is near our favorite Chinese takeout spot. Score!
5:00 pm: We leave the plant shop with a heartleaf philodendron for B’s room and a giant, lovely, perfect monstera deliciosa just because. The total comes to $53.24. Then we pick up our food: $33.08 including the tip. L ordered a large veggie lo mein to share with B and General Tso’s chicken, and I got family style tofu and vegetables. We start B’s bedtime routine at 6:30 and he’s out by 7:00 - early for him!
After he’s down, L preps his breakfast sandwiches for the week and I do some dishes. Then we take mutual advantage of the extra hour we have together. Even after 12 years it’s always so good with L. I fall asleep around 10 pm feeling blessed.
🌿 Daily total: 179.32
✨DAY 5: MONDAY✨
5 am: I make my pour over and get started on work first thing. I have a couple of deadlines this week and the side gig to balance so I’m already feeling pressed for time! I wrap up an entire grant report before 6 am and feel very accomplished. Then I pause work to start our breakfast, which is all pre-prepped, hallelujah. While L and B eat breakfast, I get dressed in a black turtleneck minidress, busted old tights, black ankle socks, and my Doc Martens.
I help L load up the car with B and all his gear, and tell L to be careful. Today is L’s first day back teaching in person since December, and we’re both nervous since COVID is still running wild in our red state. On the way to work he fills up his car for $18.33.
2:30 pm: After another grant report, seventy gajillion emails, forty Slack messages, and several hours of Zoom calls, I’m ready for a break. I finish eating the quinoa salad I prepped during Zoom call #2 and then eat a pear too. I see our Misfits box has been delivered. It’s $30 a week, and is included in our monthly expenses. I unpack it, clean the counters, wipe down the bathroom sinks, take O for a walk, and sit down to work on my side gig grant report, which is due Wednesday. I set a 30 minute timer because I don’t want to be too late picking up B.
4:25 pm: Worked longer than I meant to! Pack some snacks and pick up B. On the way home we get a giant bag of potting soil so I can repot those plants. It’s $18.52. Come home and engage in B’s favorite winter activity: pressing all the buttons in the turned-off car. Meanwhile, in another car across town, L picks up a big bag of Purina One, butter, maple syrup, and applesauce. That total is $28.64.
5:30 pm: The whole family is home and we kick it inside until it starts to get dark. L and I gather all the things and take the creatures out for a walk even though there’s a light, but very cold, rain happening. B is cranky and so are we, so the walk is quick.
We eat leftover Chinese food around 7 and start B’s bedtime routine. B falls asleep at 8 and I update this diary for a while, then go watch Ted Lasso in bed with L til about 9:30. It’s much better than How I Met Your Mother, for the record.
🌿 DAILY TOTAL: 65.51
✨Day 6: TUESDAY✨
3 am: B wakes up and needs a diaper change. I have the hardest time falling back asleep after: I can’t stop thinking about how I left B’s hoya out in the cold with its roots exposed most of the day yesterday and into tonight. But it’s too cold for me to get up again and pull it inside! So instead I toss and turn and hope it’s not dead yet.
6 am: L’s alarm wakes me up! No early morning reading and writing time for me. I get right up, make a giant pour over, and get breakfast together while L wakes up B. Then I actually sit down with them to eat: B and I both eat boiled eggs with everything but the bagel seasoning and some coconut milk yogurt, and L sips his coffee while his breakfast sandwich heats in the oven. I get dressed in my workout gear and walk the dog while L gets B ready for school. They leave, and I finally bring the hoya in, and start work, around 7:30. L buys coffee and snacks from the gas station on his way to work: $6.88.
9:30 am: I grab some crackers and peanut butter from the kitchen and notice a DMV bill on the fridge I’ve been meaning to pay, but don’t totally understand. I call them up and respond to emails while I sit on hold. Turns out I owe the DMV $10 for paying my Dad’s van insurance late. With the “processing fee” it comes to $11.17.
1:30 pm: Been on Zoom calls all morning, and decide to switch over to the side gig work for a bit. Meanwhile I eat that quinoa salad I prepped yesterday. At 2 pm, my longtime bestie and neighbor F comes over and we take O for a walk in the park together and have such a good conversation. While the context is (very) different, I’m reminded of the Toni Morrison quote when I think of F: “She’s a friend of my mind.” Such a gem, and such a smartie. At 3:30 I start a HIIT yoga class and it kicks my butt even though it’s only 20 minutes long. Afterwards, I shower and pick up B.
5:00 pm: L arrives home while B and I are playing, and we get in the car once more to check out a cute couch L scoped out on Facebook marketplace. It’s a sweet vintage brown velvet actually-for-real midcentury situation. Unfortunately we discover it’s also small and very uncomfortable. $200 not spent. Once home, my family goes for a walk and I make dinner - this grits and beans recipe from NYT cooking. It’s blessedly quick to pull together. Meanwhile D texts me and says my overalls are ready! YAY! She’s gonna drop them off in a couple of days. She says the total is $30. I include a tip and Venmo her $40.
7:00 pm: At bedtime, B cannot get enough of his books and we read All The World several times. He finally falls asleep around 8:20 and L and I eat dinner on the couch, with Ted Lasso. I drink a glass of red wine, which is a mistake: my anxiety spikes right after, my stomach hurts, and I can’t sleep. This is very upsetting as I want very much to be a wine mom. Does this happen to anyone else?
🌿 DAILY TOTAL: 58.05
✨DAY 7: WEDNESDAY✨
5:45 am: Wake up with B cuddled into my back - L moved him to our bed in the middle of the night after his second wake up. Get my coffee and breakfast together and sit down at my computer to work on the side gig grant while everyone's asleep. Then L and I manage the morning rush together. I eat sourdough toast, two scrambled eggs, and some pineapple along the way.
7:30 am: Take O out for a walk and on a whim decide to listen to one of my favorite easy-listening pods: A Beautiful Mess. Normally the two sisters and co-hosts, Elsie and Emma, chat about things like home decor or craft making or how to balance kids and work. This episode is about the host’s evangelical upbringing, though, and is a real raw and honest tear jerker. Pair it with this, one of my top reads of 2020: “What Does the White Evangelical Want?” It gets me thinking about L’s upbringing in the church. He and all his siblings are all agnostic now.
Finally sit down at my desk and debate taking Adderall. I used it regularly in college and for a few years after in order to Do All The Things. I try to stay away from it now - I’m not trying to live an impossible life any more - but I also really want to pick B up earlier than normal today, and that means I need to meet all my deadlines and make it through two Zoom calls with my direct reports by 3 pm. I decide to take 4 mg. Right after I take it, three different friends text me at once and then, suddenly, I’ve spent an hour catching up via text. Get to work for real around 9 am.
3:00 pm: Wrapped all my calls, answered all my emails, washed all the dishes, ate some lunch, and finished the side gig work! OK Adderall, you beautiful bitch. Spend a few more minutes tying up loose ends and then gather my things to pick B up from school. The plan today is to go “play basketball” in the park near his school because he is OBSESSED with balls, and I’m trying to do more magical things every day with him. It’s cold but I’m ready to brave it on his precious, curly-headed behalf.
At 4 pm J calls and asks to go pick him up with me. Hooray, things just got even more magical! We head to a different-than-usual park together and run around until B sits in, and then drinks from, a puddle. We panic and J googles “What happens if my baby drinks from a puddle?” The search returns lots of stories of babies eating muddy rocks and surviving, so we decide it’s ok.
5:00 pm Head home and L is back from work! We take the smols on a walk and I tell L that I think nighttime screentime is making me anxious. I’m a sensitive creature and I really don’t want to blame the wine. He’s very perfect so he helps me think through an alternate plan for this evening: hot tea and book reading in bed, and maybe sex, too! Fun.
Next, I head home with O to pot the plants we bought the other day, and L takes B to the playground. They get back around 6:30 and I am very excited to reveal my new plant placements. Everyone feigns interest except O. Then we eat leftovers together and B gets in bed around 7:30. L and I promptly fall asleep next to him and don’t wake up again til 11 pm. Guess our new nighttime routine will have to wait til tomorrow!
🌿 DAILY TOTAL: 0
❤️ Section 5: TOTALS
Total Expenses: $478.71
Food & Drink: $220.25
Fun & Entertainment: $0
Home & Health: $109.01
Clothes & Beauty: $40
Transport: $29.50
Other: $79.95
❤️ Section 6: REFLECTION
This week reflects a new normal for us, I think! We just set the goal of saving up for another down payment in December, and that’s when I swore off online shopping both to save money and to stop lining the pockets of evil billionaires like Bezos (no shade to anyone who uses Amazon, this is purely a personal goal & I’m not sure I can meet it). This self-imposed rule is helping me reign in my discretionary spending overall. L and I have only been living a two-income, middle class life for a few years, and my lifestyle creep was a little out of control in 2020. That said, I can and do still regularly justify spending money on things that make life more luxurious and beautiful - like a $40 candle or a totally unnecessary but very lovely plant.
There are a couple of things not reflected in this diary that we regularly spend on: gifts (my achilles heel - for example, we spent three! thousand! dollars! on Christmas gifts in December), and medical bills. Both B and I had to visit the emergency room in 2020 and we are still getting random bills in the mail as our insurance company and the hospital duke it out. As I was editing this diary on Thursday, I received one for $787. Wahhhh. I think I’m gonna get on a payment plan, but even so that it will be over $200 a month.
Last thought: this process got me thinking in some detail about the contradiction of organizing for the fall of capitalism (and the rise of a more gentle and just economic system), yet believing everyone - including ourselves and our own families - deserve to live full and abundant lives. This means I compromise my own anti-capitalist values and beliefs every day, in big and small ways. Discuss?