How low can you go – week two
Friday – nothing
Saturday – rubbermaid tub (bought used for starting a worm composter) – $2.50; 4 books for $9 (The Almanac of Rural Living – 3; Rodale’s Garden Problem Solutions – 3; The Foxfire Book – 2; Last of the Curlews – 1)
Sunday – nothing
Monday – air mattress – $41 (the old one broke, and this is a necessity for nights when I can’t sleep and need to be in the living room)
Tuesday – nothing
Wednesday – packing tape – $4 (needed to pack up box to return old computer to manufacturer for a replacement)
Thursday – 4 books for $11 (The Lacuna – 4, How the Farm Pays – 3; The Trade – 1; a Terry Pratchett for The Boy – 2)
So, this was more or less a week of somewhat unexpected but necessary expenses. More in the sense that the mattress, as noted, is necessary to my sleep and sanity sometimes, so $41 was well worth it, I think (I got a reasonable quality one this time that I hope will last longer and not lose quite as much air and require so much maintenance). My computer’s being replaced under warranty, but has to be packaged up in a particular way to ship back, and so I needed to get a roll of packing tape.
The books? Oops is all I really have here. I love books, but I very much need to be better about what I buy. I’m not too bothered by more books on gardening, farming, and sustainable living – they will get used, and I appreciate having them on hand. The almanac is especially fantastic, based on my intial readings of it, and How the Farm Pays looks great too, especially since it’s a reprint of an 1884 manual and uses older techniques. The other fiction books, though, are not really so necessary in the strictest of senses. Kingsolver I love and would have bought new, but held off on until it showed up used (which took somewhere close to a year, as I recall). The Road is dark, but post-apocalyptic survivalist fiction, which I find helps get me in gear. The Last of the Curlews…well, that just feeds into my love of reading naturalist fiction, The Trade looked interesting from a Canadian history and wilderness perspective, and I pick up the odd book every now and again for The Boy to read (although I like Pratchett just as much as he does, I think).
The grand total? $67.50.
I’m not in love with the number, but $41 of that was a new mattress, so I suppose it’s not really all that bad. And, out of the books, I spent only $8 on non-reference materials (and half of that was on a book that I’ve been waiting quite some time for). I’m also not sure I’m thrilled with the amount of things – it looks like a lot of stuff when it’s all typed out, especially for one week. A rubbermaid tub, packing tape, a mattress, and 8 books in just one week is not really that sustainable in this space. Really, I think that I could be better about spending money, but also about bringing more stuff home, so that’s something to look out for for next week, I think – being mindful of money and of space.
