It's our most popular episode and we're digging it up out of the archives! Check it out to see where we started 2 years and get back to the basics!
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here to remind us of the days when we couldn’t actually choose what we watched. Before the days of netflix and hulu there was “basic cable” - come come, gather round the fire while I tell you about ancient days when a television (these were like phones, tablets, and laptops only with large protrusions off the back filled with stuff that can never be thrown away)...a television... had access to approximately 3 ‘channels’ with 1 show playing non-stop. The likelihood of seeing the same episode of the same show more than once was 2,000%. Oh it was fun and it was awful all at once, but we didn’t know any different - we called them reruns - and we ate our hot dogs and mac and cheese in blissful ignorance while the 5th airing of Family Matters ‘good cop, bad cop’ episode played. Reruns - it’s what’s about to happen to you, so grab a hot dog and settle in.Reruns:
Notable Notes:
1: 4 Pillars - Categories to anticipate with Frugal Friends podcast episodes
What Jen and Jill have to say:
What Jen and Jill have to say:
4: BILL OF THE WEEK
5: Tenets of Frugality
Wrap-Up:
Thanks so much for listening! Keep leaving us reviews on iTunes or Stitcher, and sending the screenshot to frugalfriendspodcast@gmail.com. AND share our most recent episode on social for a chance to win a $10 Amazon gift card!
Thanks for listening! See you next week!
Episode one oh six is episode one Frugality one oh one. Welcome to the Frugal Friends podcast, where you'll learn to save money, embrace simplicity rights, and live with your life. Here your host Jen and Jill. Mm hmmmmmmmm, Welcome to the Frugal Friends podcast. My name is Jen, my name is Jill, and this has been something we've been wanting to do for a really long time. Two years. Yeah, and so we have a lot of really good episodes in the archives. Everyone says, nobody listens to your first episode, nobody watches your first video. But for us, consistently, our number one listen to episode is our first episode, which is kind of unfortunate, kind of sad. Yeah, Frugality one oh one. So we are re airing it today, um to give all of our new listeners the essence of what Frugal Friends is. We have not changed that at all. We feel even more strongly about the things we said in that episode. But we are re recording the intro and outro because it's a new day hashtag relevant. Yeah, we have new sponsors. I wonder if it will seem like we've changed a lot our voices or well, we have better mikes. We have better mikes, So if you hear a different quality, it's because we've gotten richer. That's funny. That's funny. It's really funny, especially I was about to read our fake sponsor, also brought to you by reruns. Here to remind us of the days when we couldn't actually choose what we watched. Before the days of Netflix and Hulu, there was basic cable. Come, come gather around the fire while I tell you about ancient days when a television these were like phones, tablets, and laptops, only with large protrusions on the back, filled with stuff that can't ever be thrown away. A television had access to approximately three channels, with one show playing NonStop. The likelihood of seeing the same episode of the same show more than once was two thousand percent. Oh, it was fun and it was awful all at once, but we didn't know any different. We called them reruns, and we ate our hot dogs and mac and cheese and blissful ignorance. While the fifth airing of Family Matters, Good Cop, Bad Cop episode played reruns. So what's about to happen to you? So grab a hot dog and settle in. I can tell you that those fake sponsors have gotten much more intricate. That was story tell Yeah, elder millennial happening over here. Yes, so yeah, we're super excited. We hope that you will buckle up and grab your hot dog and get ready for GMAC and Reality one and one? Did you catch up canned green Beans? Hey guys, I'm Jen and I'm Jill, and we are so excited to welcome you to the inaugural Frugal Friends podcast and Frugal Friends Friday because alliterations. So we're so excited to finally be sharing this. How are you feeling, Jill, I'm feeling really excited because we've been doing this for a couple of months now, and so to finally get to share it with other people is just so exciting. Yes, Um, I am super stoked to share with you what Jill and I have been like talking about and dreaming about for the Frugal Friends podcast, and you're going to get a lot of that in this first episode. We're going to go through what we believe frugality is. We're going to go through what are different segments will be and introduce you to those and then also introduce you to us because you can't have friends if you don't know them and don't know who they are. Good point, Jen, Thank you, Thank you. I'll be sharing more wisdom and insight like that for the rest of the duration of the podcast. I look forward to that. Cool. Um. Jill and I got started on this journey because we are friends who met and bonded over frugality. And it was a funny story how we met, Jill, would you like to tell it? Yeah? Sure, Eric and I were living in our motor home at the time because that was one of the frugal decisions that we've made in our lifetime. And we went on a road trip and Eric put out when we were in the St. Pete area on Facebook, like anybody in the St. Pete are you want to hang out tonight? And you Jen went out on a limb and happened to say, yeah, we are going to watch the sunset at this bar on the beach. Come hang out. Um. And you had met Eric like years ago through band stuff, and uh, neither one of you really remembered who each other was, but you were Facebook friends. That's kind of how that goes. Um. Then we were both like, sure, we'll be in a public space so if anything happens, you know that's weird, we can just leave. Yeah. Um, But turns out we shared French fries and conversation and yeah, and really bonded a lot over like our desire to be debt free and to live a more simplified life, um and and other things. Obviously, we just like each other. I like you at least, and I like your husband also. Yeah, I like both of you. Uh. Yeah. I had met Eric one time, maybe eight years ago, and I was not sure how I met him. I knew it was in San Diego, but I could not tell you how we met and to this day. But but you were friends on Facebook. Yeah, we were run on Facebook. So I'm glad I went out on a limb because this has such been This has been such a great like friendship. And I feel like I tell people when I'm talking about like you and Eric, that you guys are like our soul couple, were like soul mates couple. So yeah, we're just interested in so many of the same things, um, including recording this podcast. But yeah, like we went out to yard sales and thrift stores and hung out at all kinds of free places, and it's just blossomed blossomed from there. Yeah. So then when you guys like moved back to Pennsylvania and out of your RV, we visited you guys, and seriously, a podcast was not on my radar at all. I am a writer and definitely not a public speaker. But Eric was just adamant that we should start a podcast about frugality and saving money. So we kind of just like went with it, and we've we've really come up with something that I think will be really useful to people, not just fun for us, which we do have a lot of fun like just hanging out and talking and Google hangouts, but we think that it's really going to be useful to a lot of people. There's not really a podcast out there that is about just different areas where you can save money on or just optimize you're spending and being more conscious consumer. So we feel like it's unique in that sense. Yeah, which is one of the things, Jen, that you and I had talked about when we were like conceptualizing what this podcast was going to be like. And so I went on this whole like podcast tour. I am not one to listen to many podcasts, but I get it. Um, I get the draw for people. So I started to engage more in specifically financial podcasts. And first of all, I found that there are not many female lead podcasts just across the board, and if they if there are, there about like celebrities and like what was on TV the night before, like and nails and makeup, and that's just not my cup of tea. But the ones that were about um, like financial independence and that kind of a thing, I liked it and I felt like I could learn from it. But at the same time, I also found that so it was almost like they were talking to that specific audience of financial bloggers, those who are in the financial realm who understand everything about the stock market and this and that, and I'm and while I enjoyed it and I could learn from it, I'm like I felt like an outsider listening in. They would use all this different kind of lingo, like talking about finn Con and and all these other things that I'm like, Okay, this is cool, but I'm not your audience, Like you're not speaking to me. I'm just kind of like listening in on your little club that you have going on. And so what I thought was neat about what you and I want to do, jen is is make this something that's attainable for everybody. That like, frugality is something that we can all enter into at different levels to reach various financial goals, and that you and I bring different things to the table to help people at the and points in their journey and to hear from others that in the places that we don't know yet or haven't attained yet. Um. So that that's part of what I'm excited about what this podcast. Yeah, and we want to be a place where people can learn together. We Jill and I are very frugal and we are considered I would consider us kind of like experts in frugality, but it doesn't mean that we know everything and far be it. And we feel like the hive mind is definitely more powerful because you're talking about making your life run more efficiently, and everybody's life is so different, and so we want to hear from other people how they are being frugal and how it's working for them and what's not working for them. That's another thing that we want to talk about is the things that you hear on the internet and you read. We want to know and we want to share what is fluff and what can just be like read past, and there's a lot of frugal guilt when people want to be frugal, but they also want to like not uh have to unplug their appliances or they want to buy another car, And so I have personally felt that. So we want to just like wade through that and we wanna get to a place where we're like living in confident frugality. Yeah, And speaking of getting people involved and hearing from others, that's something that I'm really excited about what this podcast. All the different ways that people can get plugged into what we're doing and have that um hive mind mentality where we are sharing, but we're also creating a platform for other people to share and learn together. So, Jen, You've come up with some like really creative ways that I'm just excited to see what comes out of it. But that includes having like a Facebook group where we can all be sharing as we go on a variety of topics. Um. One of my favorites that I'm looking forward to is our ninety day Frugalizer, So like a challenge that people can get involved with and frugalize their lives and like step by step ninety day kind of plan um and just other resources that can help us be more intentional consumers, help us to live the frugal lifestyle, live more simply. Um. So there'll be a lot of really tangible resources and challenges as well as just creating a place where we can talk about this topic and learn from one another and put them into practice and share our triumphs and our failures. Oh yeah, we have a lot of trams and we have a lot of failures and they're funny though, So just get ready. But we're going to cover a lot of different topics and hopefully the podcast will go on for a long enough amount of time where we can cover every single topic in the world and make it frugalized. So every topic in the world pretty much. That's my plans. I don't know if we discussed that. We didn't, but I'm along for the ride. Awesome. But we're starting out with kind of what we're referring to is the four pillars, uh, like clothing and shopping, your home, your bills, and your transportation, so like the things that are that you cannot do without. So those are the things that we want to help you save money with and then we'll just kind of, you know, spider out from there. I don't know if that's the correct term, but we'll just go out from there and kind of get smaller areas, but we want them to be as relevant as possible and so that you can pick and choose which episode you want to listen to depending on what you need, the time you need it. Uh, if you are jumping into this podcast in one or two years and you're listening to this episode now, that you could. We hope that you can go to any episode and it is a standalone episode. You don't have to go you don't have to start here and go all the way through. So that's a that's our hope for this, and we're our first few episodes are going to be kind of like a bird's eye view of those four pillars, and then from there we'll just get more specific, more and more detailed. Yeah, and and weed through what questions people are asking too about these different topics, so that it's really relevant to what people want to know, what you're curious about. Mm hmm. Yeah, that's another part of that. Like Facebook group and crowdsourcing, the more involvement we get, the more specific we can be with the information that we are giving nice well, Jen, I imagine people want to know who is talking to them. Tell us a little bit about yourself. How old are you, where are you from? Give us just you know, a brief life history, as you like to call it. I'll give you my brief life history. I was born in nineteen nine in St. Petersburg, Florida, so that currently makes me almost twenty nine, uh, and I still live in St. Petersburg, Florida, because why would you ever leave a place that is always sunny and warm. It's it's beautiful. I can't lie. I love it here. But yeah, So my husband Travis and I live in St. Pete And I am a writer uh for The Penny Hoarder, which is a personal finance website, and I also have my own personal finance blog. It's called Saving with Spunk and I started that when Travis and I were paying off our student loans. So we got engaged in two thousand fifteen, and we had a combined um over eighty thousand dollars of debt um and then by the time we got married, we had just under seventy eight thousand. So we spent the first two years of our marriage paying all that off, and we did it, and we have been debt free for gosh a few months now. That was so exciting. Uh. So I was a like a frugal convert. I've been frugal most of my life, but what I thought was, uh, what I would call frugality back then, now I would call just being cheap. I well, that is a distinction that I definitely want to make and go over that more later. But I always thought I was broke, and so I always lived in the mindset that I was broke, and so I was cheap, and I wasn't budgeting or any of the things that you do when you're being a conscious consumer. And so it wasn't until we paid off our debt that I learned how to value my purchases and see opportunity costs and all these things that happen when you pay attention to your finances. So I was definitely reluctant to pay off our debt at first, but once I got on board, it was just like a runaway train. And we paid off seventy eight thousand dollars in twenty three months and we've never looked back. And so now we really value the frugal lessons that we learned during those twenty three months, and so I wanted to continue to share them and learn and grow. And this podcast is a great way to keep me accountable. Nice Uh, Jill, I'd like to ask the same question to you. Tell me about yourself and give me a brief life history. Yeah, so I am also twenty eight was a fantastic year for the frugal friends. Very good. Um. Not so great for our moms who were laboring us. Um. But yeah so. And I live outside of Philly for those who aren't from the area. For those who are from the area, they're gonna be like, you're nowhere near Philly. But and my frugal journey, let's see, it's a combination of frugality running in my veins and frugality born out of necessity, which in some ways may have intersected with being cheap at some points in my life. Um. My husband Eric and I have been married for six years and we own our own business together. It's like a construction general general construction business. We primarily do remodeling UM and one of the things that we focus on is just helping people update their homes rather than needing to do a total gut of a room, we try to come in and work with what's existing and and bring that frugal mentality like to our customers as well. Um. And then I am also a social worker, so I am this week getting my Masters in social work graduated, which feels great. Um. And also no, no post graduate debt um for for that at least I got undergraduate debt. But that's another story. Um. And so my background is understanding the difficulty in budgeting, especially when you own your own business and not necessarily being able to know how much money you have coming in and living on a social work salary. So like, that struggle is real and I can bring that perspective and help all of you who are just like, yeah, no, I get budgeting, but like, what do you do when you only make ten dollars a week? Um? And I got you, I got your back. Um. So yeah, I'm excited because I can learn more. But also I'm excited about Jen like you and I the different perspectives that we bring to the table, Like you are very good at being creative, being um, determined and just working hard with your research and knowing what's out there. And ways to save money. And I'm more of like a d I wire um thrift store shopper and and I bring my frugality in that way. So I love that. And yeah, the last time we went to a thrift store together, you were all over the place and found all these great fines and I I walked around for five minutes and then sat down at the magazines and just like read magazines. And I'm waiting for you and Travis mostly. Yes, So I understand Travis's like need to just dig through everything, um, because yeah, there's buried treasure there. But that's what's so cool about this is that if you're not a digger and you feel like everything at the thrift stores junk, that's okay because Jen's on your side. Yeah, I just I can't find the treasures. I know that there are treasures there because Travis finds them and I can't. So frugality is for everyone, not just the people that stop on the side of the road to pick up free furniture. Um, there's more than one path. Yes, there's more than one path to frugality and uh so, but when people are looking for frugality and ways to save money, we know that the first place that you go is the Internet. And so one of our our main recurring segment that we want to do on the podcast is to go to Google and see what the Internet has to say about the topics that we're covering, because we want to see, you know, what the first few things are up there, what people are going to be getting when they go, and we want to cover that, Like we don't need to reinvent the wheel. We just need to wade through what's already out there to glean the diamonds and just sweep off all of the whatever else is out there that say, yeah, take the meat, spit out the bones. That's exactly what I'm trying to say. I'm a vegetarian, so right, you wouldn't know what that's like. That's why I couldn't word it. Okay, chop off the heads of the broccoli and throw away the stem although there could be some nutrients in the stems, so you should keep the stems. To chop off the stems and also cook those. That's a trail anyways, So why not start it right now? Um, since we're just talking about frugality. One oh one, I wanted to see what the Internet had to say about frugality, and I came upon two articles that I absolutely love and we always will link to these articles in our show notes. They'll be accessible in the Apple Podcast show notes and on our website Frugal Friends podcast dot com. So don't worry if you're driving, you'll always be able to access them, just at the touch of your finger on your smartphone, assuming you have a smartphone, unless you've made a frugal decision to not have a smartphone. That's so true, although you can have a smartphone and be frugal. Let's be honest, we both have good full disclosure. Uh So. The first one is from um mother frugal herself, Liz over at frugal Woods dot com. And you might hear me reference her uh many times in the future on this podcast. She's fantastic. I got to meet her and sit down with her for gosh over an hour and just pick her brain and she is lovely. I forgot you did that, yes, and so I love her. She is like the mother of frugality in my eyes, even though that could be debatable to the larger public. I was wondering, like, are you naming her mother frugal or did she name herself that? Okay, that's better because she named herself that, I'd be like, maybe maybe that's a fault. Maybe I think we'll link it in our show notes. But you can decide for yourself. So the article that comes up first when you google frugality is her nineteen reasons why Frugality is the best thing That's ever happened to Me. And she has a new book out, uh new at the time of this recording, called Meet the Frugal Woods. And you can kind of get this article on steroids if you buy her book or take it out from the library, which I did. Uh It's it's really good. So out of the nineteen, we won't go through all nineteen of them, but we want to share our favorites or what we don't like about each and then kind of let you decide for yourself on the rest. So my ultimate favorite and something that I will refer to like a lot in the future, is number one. And that's that frugality helps you identify your true priorities. And uh, I always think of it like the when you're having an allergic reaction to a food and your doctor takes you off all of these foods that are prone to allergens and then you add them back gradually. And that is what uh Liz and her family did. They took away everything UH and just lived off of as little as possible. Like they didn't even count transportation and utilities as like fixed costs. They just did everything to avoid spending money that they could and so, and she calls it the uber Frugal Month challenge she offers out to her readers, And it's what they did. So it really allowed them to discover what their true priorities were by stripping off everything else that they considered priorities, but after giving them up, discovered they weren't. And I find that a lot of my frivolous spending. While it gives me pleasure in the moment, I forget about it like hours later. And so can I really count that as something that's a priority or something that gives me joy? And so I always like to put it through that filter. How about you, Jill? Yeah, Number four on this one stood out to me where she talks about frugality ensuring that you'll never be bored. Uh. This is an unexpected one, I think for most people. But when you're thinking frugal and considering the opportunity costs of your choice is whether that's time and energy or money, whatever it is. Um yeah, it's speaking to this idea of like problem solving and finding creative ways of getting the things that you need or that you want. Um So, whether that's maybe doing a project yourself, that's that that's doable, not like oh, you're you're teaching yourself to become an electrician or something. But Okay, I want shelves, but what if I could build the shelves out of this thing that I have on the side over here, or or I mean just everything's on YouTube these days, like you don't have to take something to a specialist or a professional. It can mean you learning something new or problem solving something out um and and filling your time that way rather than I don't know, sitting in front of the computer or watching TV or something like that. Um. I think it does. It gets us more active, and then it also like expands our wheelhouse of things we know things were capable of, which then builds confidence. And there's just like a plethora of um secondary things that come along with it that that are just really great mm hmm. Yeah. And there was there's full disclosure. Nothing on this article that I don't like. I think all nineteen are just very well thought out and carefully written, like yeah so um. Another one that I really liked was the um Fruit Galley builds community and I think it's definitely relevant two right now with our very social media oriented community. And some people will complain about that, but there it makes like things like buying nothing groups and buying between from like person to person makes it a lot easier. Like my friends where I work out, they said they were selling their couch on Facebook marketplace and this couple came over to buy it and they were like, you guys just seem really cool and like literally the next day they were hanging out. So and that would have never happened if that couple had just gone to American Signature Furniture and bought a house. Uh So in one way, in that way, it really like Foster's community, and then in the other way, like its strengthens relationships you already have when you're going to your friends to borrow something before buying it. Um not to like impose, like our friends have a double kayak and there's a really great kayaking spot um near our house. And so on a weekday that my friend and I had off for some holiday but they were working, we asked to borrow the kayak instead of renting one and just doing stuff like that. And then we were able to share, like you know what we did with their kayak and and all the stuff it and and then now they can like borrow something from us if they want it. Just it fosters this community that um that we're losing in some manner. Uh So, yeah, I love that. I agree, and Eric and I have talked about this quite a bit. I Mean, the thing that comes to my mind is just with tools. It's so funny to me to be driving through a small neighborhood and see every single person owning a leafblower and a lawnmower and of this and of that, when it's like you're literally right next to each other. Like what would that be like if you know a couple of people went in on owning a lawnmower together, or that one tool that you're only going to need one time, Like you do not need to go out and buy it, but you can go across the street and ask so and so, or ask your friend who lives down the road to use that thing rather than spending money on something that you're only going to use a couple of times. And I realized, like for some people, that's like going out on a limb and you're afraid you're going to break it, and and am I imposing on them? But I think you know, when that door is opened, there is a given it take, so like for people that we have offered, you know, for them to borrow things of ours like then vice versa, Like there's a little bit more of like this shared sense of things and and then that community, that interaction that you're going to have because of it, and you save money along the way. Yeah you do, Jill, did you have any other favorites you wanted to cover? Um? Like you said, I think that there's a lot of good reasons in this article to pursue a frugal lifestyle, but I think gratitude and joy. She talks about a lot, like there's a lot of themes through it and how frugality can lead to that, like when you are more intentional about what you're buying on the things that you're buying bring you joy or have function to them for your life, like there's a lot more gratitude to that thing that you're using. Like, yes, I spent hard earned money on this thing because I knew I liked it, I knew I was going to use it, and I'm still thankful for that thing. Wow, what a good purchase this was. Like I don't know, it can sound a little bit hippie dippy, but like there is a reality to like I'm living more simply therefore, like I'm also more aware of what I have and how I use it, which then I'm grateful for. And I'm also really grateful for the time and energy and resource that fruality frees up for me. Like there's just a lot there's a lot more emotional space, just hands down in this kind of lifestyle. So I would agree with her on that. Yeah, And one more thing about emotional space there. I always think about decision fatigue and how I personally get decision fatigue very easily, and frugality almost eliminates decision fatigue by either only giving you choices that are used or that are on Craigslist or Facebook, marketplace at the time, um or you know, for various other reasons. So Yeah, and there's there's always something to be grateful for with frugality. It's wonderful, good word. So yeah, definitely check out Mrs frugal Wood's article and if you love it, then you can read your book. It's just this article on steroids. As I've said before, and hopefully, uh, we'll be doing some book of a ways in the future. Um, and I would love for this to be one of those books. So h stay tuned with us. Um all right, moving on, one more article that I really love is from Millennial money dot com. And you may have heard of Grant Sabatier from uh one of the news syndications or he's just everywhere, but um, he's been C and C, NBC, NPR, and uh he built up this empire. I don't even know how. He's just a go getter and uh just from day one built up this empire. And he was a millionaire. He was able to retire early and at one point he had spent over two hundred thousand dollars in one year. And so he went from this frugal guy who had massed a million dollars to just flippantly spending over two hundred thousand. And the premise of the articles that it didn't make him feel better. Um, Like he felt worse and he wanted to like spend more wisely by the end of it. M m um, Yeah, I just feel like there's such a tangible life lessons in here, Like it almost feels like the adult version of some kids cartoon that's like money doesn't make you happy, Like, oh my word, we still need to learn that. Um. Yeah, it was so I really I didn't. I didn't necessarily enjoy that he had this experience, but to some degree, I was very glad to see that somebody else has been there and now they're reporting back, like hey, guys, like I went to the other side and here's what it's like, and and now we can all learn from from that. Um. But I think, yeah, what's key to that is like he forgot how he amassed his money, which was by frugal living, so it was really like an abandonment of himself and and the things that he valued. And then yeah, clearly that's not gonna bring you satisfaction. Um. Although he did say that more expensive wine, he did notice the difference, which was interesting to read because I don't know, we'll see, we'll see about that one. But I'm happy to live an ignorant bliss on that one because I drink a lot of wine. And on the other side, you don't want to know how a hundred bottle of wine days and I don't want to know if I like it. Yeah, but that you know. One of the things that stood out to me was nothing was a treat anymore because he's so indulging himself now on just every single thing that looks pleasing to his eye. Nothing was a treat. So there wasn't that gratitude anymore. There wasn't that simple living. It was just like I'm going to say yes to everything and get fat off and then and then he just felt bloated and disgusting and like what am I even doing? This isn't me. However, another good life lesson from this was his ability to course correct and I love that he stopped and was like, wait a second, what's happening here? This is not what I want? Like, this isn't how I want to be spending money, This isn't how I want to advise others to spend their money, And and that reality of we can always be checking in with ourselves and it's like, okay, yeah, I made a stupid purchase, like I just shouldn't have bought that thing. I wasted way too much money and move on, Like you don't have to beat yourself up over like that stupid thing that you did. Like he paused, he said, this is not how I want to be living my life and course corrected. So there, there's just yeah, a lot of good things in this article for us to learn from. And that's like, hey, if you've gone way far over the other the other end, and you are so far in debt, there's still time. Yeah. And I love that Grant shared his story because his story is probably more exact graduated then what most of us will experience. But I think that course correction is the key. It's even if you have a season or a year or a few years where you have forgotten frugality, it's there's always time to come back. It's never too late. You've never let lifestyle inflation creep in too far to start being frugal or to return to frugality, like granted and so yeah, I think it's just it's a necessary reminder that this is a journey and it's not a destination. You don't like unlock frugality and achieve it like a like a video game, and then you always have it. It's a journey that we're all going down and hopefully we'll be going down it together now. Yeah, and even if you are a millionaire, there's there's frugal decisions that you can make then, um, to spend your money wisely, to spend on the things that matter, that kind of a thing. So, yeah, this is a lifestyle that isn't just for the poor like this is. Yeah, and I would say it's it's definitely frugality cannot it cannot cure like poverty. It's not going to We don't think it's a solution to that, and we wouldn't say that it is, um, but it can help solve a lot of surface problems. And sometimes when problems on the surface are solved, it makes dealing with deeper issues easier. So uh, like we do think that frugality is for everyone. No matter what your income is, you can always be um more conscious of what you're spending your money on. Yeah, because the frugality is not being cheap. And I know we're gonna up on that a lot, but oh my gosh, before we do that, I want to hype you up for what's happening. Our next segment will happen here on out. It's up Billa the week. That's right, it's time for the best minute of your entire week. Maybe a baby was born and his name is William. Maybe you paid off your mortgage, Maybe your car died and you're happy to not have to pay that bill anymore. That's bills, Buffalo bills, Bill Clinton. This is the bill of the week, the bill of the week. Get hyped because every week from now on you're going to get to hear your bill of the week. You're going to get to be on this podcast. Yeah. All you have to do is call our Google voicemail and leave us a what's the number? Chen, Jill, I was unprepared for this. I've got it. You keep talking about it. You just have to call the number and tell us what your favorite bill is. Is it a dollar bill you found on the side of the road. Is it your cell phone bill that you got lowered with a phone call. Is it a man named bill that help you change your tire when you got a flat? Is it a duck bill? Couldn't even be a duck bell or running with a duck Bell bill. There are no rules on this segment, and which makes it a little bit confusing, but you're gonna love it. Yeah, the more vague the better. That's our rule. So you know it's not involve a bill some kind of bill. So, yeah, Jill, what's what's our Google voicemail number? Here? It is five seven zero nine nine five one five four zero. And again, just for all of you driving five seven zero zero, definitely pull over and save it in your contact Save it in your contacts, because you are gonna wanna give us a call the second you realize what your favorite bill is. B O t W everyone, b O t W. Save it in your phone. Call us often. Yeah, so we already have a few segments taped, and if you're nervous, you can just wait for the next few weeks and see what our first bill of the week sound like. And uh, yeah, give us a call. We want to on it. Yeah, we're all I can explain it is is that we are hyped so excited and it's not going to be antichomatic at all. Don't worry about it. And the music isn't like annoying whatsoever. It's not obnoxious. It's not. You know, it's not going to get stuck in your head all day. It's it's nothing like that. You're not gonna hate us at all. It's gonna be fine. So that's the bill of the week. It's coming to you starting next week. We just wanted to announce it so that you can be ready. So if you already have a favorite bill, just call uh. We're also going to include the number in the show notes, obviously for people that can't remember those numbers. So yeah, I mean excited me too. I think it's a good segment. I think it's one of the best things we've come up with. And it might have been Eric's idea, but that's okay. This is a collaboration, crowdsource, that's what they're calling it these days. All right, So two finish off this episode of Frugality one oh one. We wanted to define our tenets of frugality, what we believe about frugality just use as a lens going forward. And so if you agree with it, you can hit the subscribe button. If you don't agree with it, then you can move on. That's totally fine, but we still hit the subscribe button. But still hit subscribe. Just don't listen or comment or leave a review, just um, yeah, but still call in with your bill of the week and subscribe and then and and then become a fan. Yeah. Anyways, we uh, we have just a few things that we believe about frugality that we wanted to share with you. So the first one I'll cover, it's a it's called the law of diminishing returns, and most people will be familiar with it because it's, uh, it's a rule in economics and gosh, I don't know what the actual rule says on paper, but in my mind I view frugality through the law of diminishing returns all the time. So what I think is that there is a difference between being frugal and cheap, and so the law of diminishing returns is what defines that. And you can do somebody who is like super frugal or super cheap. You can do all of these like great things to opt miz you're spending and be a more conscious consumer. And then it gets to the point where you've done all these things and if you go further, anything else will just be a suck of your time and energy. Like there there are things that are really good for you, and then you kind of get to the top of that bell curve and then everything else is just kind of superfluous um filler. In these articles, people are writing for websites just so that they can have a hundred and one ways to save money when you don't need a hundred and one ways you need. Yeah, you needed five of them and they're going to be different for everyone, and gosh, that's why we have long lists. But you don't need a hundred and one ways to save money. Yeah. Actually, you really hit the nail on the head with that law of diminishing returns. While you were saying it, I googled it and um, your spot on, Thank you, thank you. Do you want to read the next one? Yah? Yeah? Yes. The next tenant is talking about how frugality allows you to discover what you really value. That means that if you are really spending on the things that you want to be buying, like things that matter to you, things that bring you joy, things that are functional, um, then you'll realize what you're true priorities are and where you want to be spending your money. Yeah. And if like quote unquote, frugality is keeping you from what you love. It's not frugality, it's it's cheapness. It's being cheap, so um. Our next tenant is frugality is good for the environment. And while we don't explicitly do it for the environment, you can't buy your way to green. And the more you consumed, whether it's used or recycled or not, it's the more you're perpetuating the production of goods. So the more you consume overall and like you can consume smarter. But knowing that regardless, the more you consume UM, the more you're perpetuating that cycle. So the more conscious you can be in the more frugal um is better for the environment. Mm hmm. Yeah. Another tenant is that frugality refines your taste in style. You'll start to see what you like what you don't like. Um, you can have better things, even buying used or saving your money for that thing that you really want, and eventually stop buying all your souvenir t shirts and key chains unless that's what you love, unless that is your refined taste and style. UM, but you know, really having that like one jacket that works that you know is functional and beautiful rather than ten and they for various reasons don't work and have rips in them. And I might be speaking from personal experience. We don't have jackets in Florida, so I know, I don't know why I don't live there. That would actually help me in my frugal lifestyle not need to have like ten different seasons worth of clothing. Mm hmmm. Uh. Frugality also allows you more time to increase your income. So I've always said the best way to not spend money is to spend time making it. Yeah, so we also believe in, uh, increasing your wealth. It's not just about like spending less. While spending less does allow you to work less. Uh, that's a great thing. And yeah, who I mean, who wouldn't want to work less? And you can you are more capable of taking your dream job if you're spending Like, if your monthly spending is lower, you can afford to take a job that you love that pays less. Um. But if you're not going out to events that cost money, if you're not going out and like waiting for a table at a restaurant, you'll find that a lot of time freese up and the resourcefulness that you'll gain through being frugal can also lead to ideas that can help you make money. So that's another thing that we love, um because Jill and I are both entrepreneurs at heart, and so we think that that really ties in nicely with frugality. And our final tenant is that frugality will not make you rich. Want sorry. Uh. While you can be rich like you you might become rich because you make a lot of money. Good for you, um, but that's not the end game here. Frugality is about living some making wiser decisions with your money, with your time, um, spending money on things that are important to you, prioritizing all of those things. UM. But it's not about being rich and buying bottles of wine. You can do that, that's on you. Um, but that's not but like, don't we're going to touch yourself with that because we buy We saw what happens when you're used for regality to get rich just so you can spend it all. It's not a good ending. You guys, just keep buying your wine at all day and you can buy a lot more of it. We also can't buy wine at all. They in Pennsylvania. Again, I don't know why we live here. We can do that Florida. I'm so sorry. Yeah, I know, I know. You borrow kayaks in Florida. You don't need jackets in Florida. You never have to deal with cold weather, and you can buy wine there. Meanwhile, I'm up here in it's April and it's snowing, and I need multiple jackets, and I don't live near a lake where I can kayak, and um, I can't buy wine. So this is the only fun I have right now is recording a podcast where I'm talking to someone who's in Florida doing the fun things that I wish I could be doing. This is the highlight of my week. Oh my gosh. And Jill is going to have some famous Jill rants. I can tell you that in advance. Jill's rants will delight you. I have a lot of opinions, and we're going to record those things, and we're going to make other people listen to it. Yeah, and hopefully hopefully they will rant along and not unsubscribed. But if you want to follow along, we would love it if you would hit the subscribe button. We are available on Apple podcast, Stitcher, Google Play, and eventually will be available on Spotify one day. Who knows so hit the subscribe button and UH, you can visit our website Frugal Friends podcast dot com to become part of our Facebook group. And please, please please uh if you love the podcast, if you tolerated the podcast, or if you're just listening to this and you are apathetic, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. Uh. And it is the best way to let other people know about it, and hopefully they'll be able to glean some wisdom um between Bill of the Week and Jill rants and yeah, and we'll be able to help more people and bring more people into the fold. So those are the ways that you can get involved. Uh. To wrap it up, we hope you have a great week, Jill anything else hashtag frugal not cheap, frugal not cheap. Did I steal your thunder? Absolutely not. I don't have a thunder, but you have a lightning. Oh, I don't know what that means. I made another Thanks so much for listening to that first episode that it could have been a cringe worthy, but everyone seems to enjoy it, and we're super thankful. If you didn't enjoy it, we don't want to hear it. It's in the archives. It's also late over here. It's getting late. Yeah, So thank you for all of the reviews that have come from that episode. It really was a spark that ignited a flame that none of us could have anticipated. And so we just every week we read these really kind reviews that you leave us because we really do deeply appreciate the serious um like this one from Liz elb says perfect motivation during debt free journey. It's five stars, and she says Frugal Friends is the ideal blend of practical tips, discussions about the wise of frugality, and just fun, lighthearted conversation. My why eliminate financial stress and give my husband and myself more freedom to look after our health. We both have chronic health issues and I can't work. Rather than us both having to work to be able to make ends meet, Thank you, and we're super stoked to be able to to help you live that life be important why. I mean, gosh, that's amazing. I'm so glad to be here in a community that's helping you in that journey. Amazing. We also want to thank our friends who share these episodes on social media. So when you tag the latest episode on Facebook, or Instagram. We add you to our monthly drawing. For every five tags and reviews that we get each month, we give away a ten dollar Amazon gift card. Yes, so there's so many opportunities for ten dollars ten dollar try try it, so keep leaving us those reviews, tagging at Frugal Friends podcasts on Instagram and Facebook and try try ten dollars. We'll see try it, try it on? How you like it better than five dollars? By Frugal Friends is produced, edited and mixed by Eric Syria. What kinds of reruns did you used to watch? Friends? Dawson's Creek Mm hmm, what about when you didn't have a choice? Though? Remember that you remember when you didn't have a choice? Law and Order VU Mariska somehow reruns of Jeopardy. Yeah, I shouldn't know how to pronounce Mariska Hargitay his name. Oh that's impressive, because my parents runs Yeah, Hashagree runs SPU reruns. Reruns are not a thing anymore. I realized that when we were doing this smokes, it's like a whole generation. We're only going to do them every seven episodes, so we figure every other month it gets us through our top five episodes from our first year, and then we'll do it again next year with our top five from from second year. Yeah, so that's kind of how we want to do it because we have such great interviews and like discussions and those get lost in the archives and we're bringing them back. It's also neat to see what was top, you know, you don't realized that until the year is over, to see what what people were most interested in. So yeah, even if you're interested to know who who's listened to what episodes the most, you'll get to see what our top episodes are. What's the favorite? Was it your favorite? It wasn't, don't tell us. Thank you for listening. We'll see you next week with a fresh app. Bye.