Stop Spending Time Report

A couple of weeks ago, I decided not to buy anything while Mr. Roy was off on a business trip.  How did it turn out?  Great, as a matter of fact.  I bought a few work lunches because that couldn’t be avoided and I bought one gallon of milk early on but other than that, I didn’t spend any money.  I didn’t even spend any cyber money.  For some reason, buying something online doesn’t seem like real spending to me.  Anyway, I digress.  I went the entire two weeks without buying anything and I ate really good and had plenty left to eat.  I didn’t run out of toilet paper, which was a concern.  I did have to wash my dishes by hand because I ran out of dishwasher soap but that was really not a problem. 

I even managed to do a little cooking ahead while I was working my way through what was on-hand.  I had some buttermilk so I made a batch of buttermilk waffles and put them in the freezer.  I was inspired by an article in Reader’s Digest that said Eggo’s were going to be scarce for a while because of mechanical problems at both Eggo factories.  Mr. Roy says that is food industry pig latin for “we have a bacteria problem and we are having to break down all the equipment and sanitize it.”  Just for the record, I don’t buy Eggo’s even when their factory is working but I like waffles so I made some.

Was I tempted to break my self-imposed restrictions?  Actually, yes.  There were a few times when I considered stopping at the Sav-A-Lot and getting a frozen pizza or running through the drive-thru for a quick breakfast biscuit.  Mindless food consumption is just so . . . . mindless. 

Mrs. Roy’s sister came across an article that talks about a similar challenge taken by a blogger up in Tennessee recently - http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2009/nov/12/week-long-challenge-to-keep-grocery-costs-low/

She came to the same conclusion as me - it’s good for us to step back and examine our spending occasionally.  And it doesn’t hurt even a little bit to be more intentional about the way we spend our time, talents and money.