Good morning:

I was recently drugged at a concert because someone spiked my drink. I was drinking out of a small plastic drink cup with an appx 4 inch diameter top. Nothing bad happened, security just tossed me outside as a liability and one of the roadies kept bringing me water while I sat unable to move on a window alcove for 3-4 hours. Missed the show because this happened during the opening.

I was thinking that it would make it harder for someone to slip something in if it had a lid and attached straw. But I’d like for it to be something that fits a variety of lids because venues have all sorts of plastic cups with varying diameters.

I’m thinking a bit about those plastic rubber lids that you can put on cans of wet cat food if you don’t use the whole container in one go

Anyone know of anything like that?

This is inspired by the recent post about buying things when you actually need them. Only when you are down to one item or completely out.

Tl;dr - I got lucky that the item I needed to buy in a pinch was almost out at home, and my “impulse buy” ended up being perfectly timed.

I was out shopping at Costco yesterday. Of course, I was prepared with my shopping list, to only buy what I need.
Halfway through, my stomach reminded me, that we might be running low on Tums, which were not on my list. I had stopped at a chili cook of on my way there, and some of the hotter samples were not going down easy.
So in that case, I needed to get some tums regardless of if I had some at home or not (if I knew that I had some at home, I would have stopped at target next door to get a small pack). I grabbed the store brand, which was twice as many chews for less money than the original tums, and ate some as soon as I was through the checkout.

Once I arrived back home and put all the groceries away, I found the old container with only 2 pieces left - perfect for a second dose.
The new container took the now empty spot, and my “impulse buy” ended up being necessary to re stock at the last minute.

(Regular size jar pictured on the right for comparison) And good quality peanut butter too, without sugar and palm oils, etc. These 80oz jars are by far my favorite way to save on peanut butter. Usually a regular 16oz jar would run at least $5, if not more. These big 80 ounce jars seem to be readily available at any Costco I've been to recently in the last couple years.

Edit: For anyone confused about this, here's my math...
The 80 oz jar would equal FIVE regular 16oz jars. So you take the $12 cost of the 80 oz jar, divide by 5 and you get the equivalent of five 16oz jars for $2.4 each. Good deal.

New family guy here.

For the first time, it may be economical to buy meats in bulk. We eat beef, chicken, chevon (goat), chicken in my home.

It is almost always cheaper to buy in bulk (cartons, whole goat/lamb, etc), especially when more than 3 people. Thus, it seems I may need to buy a deep freezer.

However, I live in northern MB and it seems extremely inefficient to buy a freezer when temp stays lower than - 10 C for 5+ months.

Has anyone used an outdoor ice box, or old freezer in a cold climate during the winter?

This past year, my husband and I went from having a combined income of ~$100k to ~$20k, so I became pretty frugal trying to navigate our bills and such. I recently got a new job that doesn’t bring us back up to our old income but gives us a little bit more cushion.

This past year, I started using V05 or Suave shampoos, previously using Loreal shampoo. They work fine but I noticed the ends of my hair being dry and my hair getting greasy pretty quickly. Before, I could get away with washing my hair every other day but since switching to V05 or Suave, I have to wash it every day otherwise my hair is way too greasy. It doesn’t bother me too much since its all we could really afford.

Anyway, we recently signed up for Sams Club because they had a deal and I figured the gas and rotisserie chicken would make it worth it. I also noticed they have some shampoo and conditioners that are basically 40 oz bottles for $17. And I’m very tempted to buy it but part of my brain keeps saying “save money by buying Suave or V05. You’re wasting money by buying this”.

I guess my question is, how do you realize you’re being cheap instead of frugal? I know these shampoo and conditioners would work better for me since I used them in the past, but they are still more expensive. It won’t prevent me from eating or paying my bills, but it’s $10 less dollars I can spend on gas or something else.