Frugal Friday

[ecosophia]

Welcome back to Frugal Friday! This is a weekly forum post to encourage people to share tips on saving money, especially but not only by doing stuff yourself. A new post will be going up every Friday, and will remain active until the next one goes up. Contributions will be moderated, of course, and I have some simple rules to offer, which may change further as we proceed.

Rule #1:  this is a place for polite, friendly conversations about how to save money in difficult times. It's not a place to post news, views, rants, or emotional outbursts about the reasons why the times are difficult and saving money is necessary. Nor is it a place to use a money saving tip to smuggle in news, views, etc.  I have a delete button and I'm not afraid to use it.

Rule #2:  this is not a place for you to sell goods or services, period. Here again, I have a delete button and I'm not afraid to use it.

Rule #3:  please give your tip a heading that explains briefly what it's about.  Homemade Chicken Soup, Garden Containers, Cheap Attic Insulation, and Vinegar Cleans Windows are good examples of headings. That way people can find the things that are relevant for them. If you don't put a heading on your tip it will be deleted.

Rule #4: don't post anything that would amount to advocating criminal activity. Any such suggestions will not be put through.

With that said, have at it!

Comments

Hydroponic update

[ecosophia]

My experiment in small-scale home hydroponics continues. Seven of the twelve seeds I planted germinated nicely, popped up with seed leaves unfurled, and are putting out true leaves now. The other five didn't germinate -- I'll be replanting shortly. So far the best performers are green tatsoi (a Japanese salad vegetable) and Cimarron romaine lettuce, though the other two lettuce varieties and the dwarf kale are working hard to catch up.

For reasons tangled up in various corners of my insufficiently misspent youth, all this is giving me flashbacks to the 1973 eco-SF movie Silent Running -- though it doubtless helps that I scored an LP of the soundtrack (composed by Peter Schickele of P.D.Q. Bach fame in a more serious mood) at a thrift store a month ago.

Re: Hydroponic update

[mskrieger]

I missed the first installment of your hydroponics experiment—what are you using for nutrients in the water?

I’ve followed the bio nutrient food association for years now, and I’ve become convinced that the qualities of a soil’s mineral profile deeply influence the nutritional value of the vegetables grown on it. This has made me suspicious of hydroponics, though I’m sure it can be done well. Tell us about your experiment. How are you judging nutritional content?

—Ms. Krieger

Cleaning eye glasses?

[claire_58]

I have a question about cleaning eye glasses. I have never bought the eye glass cleaner products. I use a mild soap and clean my eye glasses the same way I would clean any other glass.
Lately I've noticed some deterioration of the surface of the glass. It's not very visible and so far it doesn't interfere with my vision but there are sort of rainbow spots similar to oil on the surface of a puddle on the glass.
Am I damaging the glass by not using the special cleaner? Is this just the glasses getting old? I don't renew them every two years because they still seem adequate for my vision. Is using the special cleaner important? How do all you frugalites clean your specs?

Re: Cleaning eye glasses?

[(Anonymous)]

I have always just used a smidge of dish detergent and warm water, applied with my fingers.

Re: Cleaning eye glasses?

[slclaire]

I know a little about this due to a research project I was involved in more than 30 years ago where I studied coatings on glass and plastic meant for optical applications, and because I too wear glasses.

Some years back, I bought a microfiber cloth marketed for cleaning glasses - this was before my optometrist included such a cloth in the eyeglass case that new eyeglasses come in. I only use the cloth on occasion, more to remove dust than facial oils. It seems to spread the facial oils onto the lenses in a uniform manner rather than remove them.

For the 60 years I have worn eyeglasses I have cleaned them with the same bar soap I use on my hands and dried them with facial tissues. When the lenses were made of plain glass with no coating, this cleaned them without damaging them. I never wore out glass lenses before my eyes changed enough to get a new pair or the frames got too loose or were damaged.

However, the plastic lenses with coatings that are used in most eyeglasses these days are more fragile, and the coatings do not last longer than a few years before they start developing defects. Facial tissues are not recommended for drying such lenses because a bit of grit in them could scratch the lenses, but that doesn't stop me from drying lenses with them, and I've only scratched a coating once. But I have noticed that the coating starts to delaminate (lift off the surface of the lenses) with time. The spots you are seeing are consistent with a hypothesis of delamination spots, as they would exhibit a rainbow effect. Soap doesn't cause them to appear; they appear on their own due to a mix of factors involved in the coating process.

I think most glass lenses these days are coated too, but I get plastic lenses because I am nearsighted enough to need a lot of correction. The plastic lenses are thinner and therefore lighter for the same degree of correction. I would expect delamination over time with the coatings on glass lenses as well.

You can't do anything about defects in the coating, and they will worsen over time. As long as the spots are small enough, you can't focus on them and so they don't affect how you see through the glasses. I wear my glasses until my eyesight has changed enough that I can tell that I need a new prescription. I just got a new pair of glasses two days ago, replacing the pair of glasses I had worn since 2019.

Re: Cleaning eye glasses?

[(Anonymous)]

I've never used cleaner of any kind, just the tried and true "fog the lens with your breath and rub clean on your shirt" process. I see my lenses get scratch marks over time and a lens might last 2-4 years before becoming uncomfortably scratched, but because breath is just water, I believe the scratches are far more likely to be natural wear rather than a lack of using a cleaner. Using an ultra soft microfiber cloth may help, but if my clean cotton shirt is enough to scratch the lenses over time, I'd just assume the lenses are just designed to be replaced rather than built to last.

Re: Cleaning eye glasses?

[(Anonymous)]

I´m just using water and if too much grease accumulated a very tiny tiny bit of soap, which I first apply to my finger, get foamy and then put a tiny bit of that on the glasses. If your glasses are ...what the word...demirrored?...then you have a special coat on your glass which might get hurt with dirct contact with and/or too much soap and or scratches. I use my glasses ususally 5+ years and mostly the frame gives out earlier than the glasses. Record was 10 years I think with a silhouette titan-flex where the titan flex broke on one side at the smallest point. It still sometimes serves as a backup glass.

Re: Cleaning eye glasses?

[teresa_from_hershey]

I use soap and PLENTY of water at the sink.

Use PLENTY of water because the water removes the grit and dust.
Always use a clean, dedicated towel to dry them.
Don't clean your glasses by breathing on them and using your shirt-tail. This is a guarantee to get scratches over time.

As for the life of the lens, it depends. I always use transitional lenses (photograys) where the lens darkens when exposed to sunlight. The formula that does this will -- NO MATTER WHAT YOU DO -- degrade into a pebbly mosaic of tiny lines.

It is possible your lenses are fine and you're developing cataracts.
That's what's happening to me. I didn't have them two years ago.
Now, I do.

Re: Cleaning eye glasses?

[(Anonymous)]

Do/did your glasses come with some kind of extra coating? "Anti-reflective" etc?
Are they actually glass, or polycarbonate?

See
https://www.consumerreports.org/health/what-you-need-to-know-about-eyeglass-lens-coatings-a4818329583/

If they are coated or polycarbonate, then yes the soap could be interacting with that. Polycarbonate is a kind of plastic.

- Cicada Grove

Re: Cleaning eye glasses?

[claire_58]

Thanks everyone for your replies.
I'm going with the delamination effect suggested by slclaire. I can tell from the range of cleaning practices that I haven't been doing damage. This was my main concern.
I should probably book an eye exam and see about replacing the pair that is in the worst shape.
Blessing and thanks,
EKC

Re: Cleaning eye glasses?

[randomactsofkarmasc]

The little glass-cleaning microfiber cloths are not all the same. Some are garbage; some work really really well with just a bit of foggy breath. I've got two really nice ones (one at my work desk, one at home) and all I use it that and breath.

When it is time to replace your glasses, there are online places that you can order prescription glasses from, if you know your prescription. You can even upload your picture and "try" the glasses on. My daughter has been getting her glasses that way for years. That is my plan, when my current ones need replacing.

PDQ Bach...

[kayr]

I remember the movie and Bruce Dern's character coming into a kitchen with an arm load of veggies from the spaceships grow room. I didn't remember that Peter Schickele was the composer. Loved the PDQ Bach stuff.

Fertile Turtle

[(Anonymous)]

Does anyone know if using turtle water, with all its poop stuff in it, in a veggie garden is safe? It seems like it would be good fertilizer to me. My wife got a turtle recently. She had a red eared slider when we first met... now all these years later, we have another one. Two of our kids works at the local animal shelter and this was a rescue. Anyway, it's been fun for my wife, who has taken this creature on. I enjoy it too. I just can't claim to much of the work required. The main thing I do is help haul the water away when its tank needs to be changed. We got her in the late fall, so I wasn't really thinking of putting it on the plants yet, though we were pouring it outside. Now that it has been so frozen here in the midwest, I didn't want to do that either, so have been using the utility sink. I thought, man, this stuff really smells like a creek or pond. Might be good for our garden... but wasn't sure. If nothing else I will be pouring it on our tree, shrubs, and flowers, if not in the herb and veggie patches. What do people think. Is turtle water with all its stuff safe to use as fertilizer on crops?

Justin Patrick Moore

Re: Fertile Turtle

[(Anonymous)]

Hi Justin Patrick,
The water will be good for most plants especially ornamentals, shrubs and trees. I would not use that water on salad greens r strawberries as turtles often have salmonella bacteria and you do not want that on food you are not planning to cook.

I hope your turtle has a long and happy life with you.
Maxine

Re: Fertile Turtle

[kallianeira]

JPM, I imagine it is more a question of whether there are toxic chemicals added to the tank.
(viz. last week's ebullient discussion of the usefulness of fish waste in aquaculture)

Sorry to be tangential but what do people do with wastewater that would otherwise go on the garden when the ground is frozen? If it is mucky does it have to be flushed?

Historical Investing Manuals

[(Anonymous)]

Does anyone know of any manuals on wealth building or investment that were written before the joint stock company came into vogue (say 1800 or thereabouts)? I'm looking for other perspectives than the usual "sign up to an online service and hope the numbers go up on your screen forever" that have fewer fees, require less infrastructure, have more tangible applicability, and have a philosophy other than infinite growth. I suppose this could also take the form of particularly useful memoirs from well known figures as well.

Re: Historical Investing Manuals

[teresa_from_hershey]

Pay yourself first.

That is, put a few pennies into savings and then pay your bills, while sticking to a strict budget.

IIRC, in 1849, Mr. Micawber of Dickens' "David Copperfield" said "Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty-pound ought and six, result misery."

The other advice you see is to have good relations with your community so you can get help when you need it.

There was an entire 19th century genre of thrift novels, whereby a new bride would learn the value of thrift and save her family from ruin. Look for David M. Tucker's scholarly book "The Decline of Thrift in America: Our Cultural Shift from Saving to Spending" (1990) for a list of titles.

You'll need to get Tucker's book via the Interlibrary loan. It had a small print run and is very expensive today.

There's not much else that I can remember.

Unless you were stunningly wealthy, everyone expected to work until they died. The poorhouse and workhouse awaited people with bad family relations and no money and no ability to work anymore.

Getting rid of the dishwasher

[teresa_from_hershey]

Our dishwasher died a number of years ago. This was the THIRD dishwasher since we'd bought the house. The original that came with the house, the replacement unit, and then the replacement for the replacement.

It turns out that modern dishwashers -- according to our stove repairman, another story -- last five to seven years. Once past the five year mark, you're on borrowed time and it doesn't matter how expensive the dishwasher was.

We're also looking at replacing our ancient, decades-old kitchen floor.

Thus, we're finally getting rid of the dishwasher and replacing it with a cabinet of drawers, providing us more usable storage space than we get with the dead dishwasher. We need to do this before we replace the floor.

This leads to the thought: what other appliances can be easily replaced?
As we slide down the long emergency into a harder, colder, future, why pay for an appliance that can be easily replaced by hand-washing dishes?

What appliances would you replace? The dishwasher is easy.

The dryer is a bit harder because when the weather's bad and so is your back, it's useful. The dryer can also be left, unused, for months at a time with no damage to delicate seals.

Any thoughts?

Re: Getting rid of the dishwasher

[claire_58]

I've always wanted "California Cooler Closet" it's a cold food storage system that could replace the fridge. It's essentially a super insulated cupboard on the cold side of the house, with a refrigerator door seal and vents to the outside at the top and bottom for air circulation. A thermometer set into the door allows you to monitor the temperature without opening the door and losing your cool.
I saw one in a house in Calgary once. It had those clear plastic vertical slats like you see in commercial refrigerators to help reduce temperature fluctuations when opening the door. Like most alternatives it needed a more active management approach than a plug in appliance. The homeowner said that in summer it was just a cooler for milk and butter but in winter the stuff on the lower shelves would freeze. Being Calgary she had to be prepared for sudden thaws.
Obviously whether this would be a useful technology or not would depend on where you live.

Re: Getting rid of the dishwasher

[(Anonymous)]

Hi Teresa,
I haven't used a dryer in almost 20 years. We have an outdoor double washing line for the fine weather and two wooden clothes racks for indoor drying in the winter. As we heat with a wood stove most of our wash is dry in a day.
Maxine

Re: Getting rid of the dishwasher

[(Anonymous)]

I did this years ago too -- and I am trying to tell my eldest to do this. They bought a house, and the dishwasher to them looks too worn out to use, and they dont have the cash right now. I know as you do about the poorly built new products, but the first argument I am using, as their kitchen is so small and she wants a microwave, is " since you arent going to use the old dishwasher, why not take it to the recycle center now and put in a couple shelves and you can set the microwave on one of them now, in the meantime " and then hope that the next year or two they will get used to liking the storage and used to hand washing dishes.

I dont see the need for a dishwasher, this is the easiest I think for people to replace.

I personally dont see the need for a clothes drier -- and yes I heat my house with wood, which drys out the air in the house. Except that many people I know all over the county also use drying racks indoors and they live down on the coast with damp air, fog, and heat in various ways, like electric space heaters or gas central heat. It may not get as cold there but the winters are a damp cold as there is no snow, I find colder places that snow to have drier outside air. I suppose no need to pre-emptively get rid of it, but I would not replace it when it breaks, as you say, any replacement will be poorly built and judging by the one my eldest bought, it will not dry the clothes well as it is energy efficient, meaning it doesnt realy dry the diapers and towels all the way.

I like to think the other way too, what do I think is most essential ? And that is having water and heat and being able to cook food. So I would actually recommend, in general, the addition of an appliance people might not already own, and that would be a good, energy efficient wood stove, or build in a homemade rocket stove. So take that money saved from not buying the new whatevers and apply it there, as well as all the insulation and weatherizing that I know Teresa already does alot of, but others need to get in there and do.

After that, my favorite things to prioritize and keep, in no particular order, are a way or a few ways to communicate, a way to keep food cool, so a refrigerator, and a washing machine. I realy like my refrigerator and washing machine, I think women used to realy wear themselves out with laundry in olden days. Obviously, best to not rely on either one forever, so learn alternatives, like dehydrating or canning foods, or at least how to cook with canned and dried foods that can be bought. So you see the last appliances I want to lose is a washing machine and the telephone. And I have done laundry without one, and for some things it is not too bad, soaking with modern detergents in cold water does alot, and I can agitate with my feet in the bathtub. It is the wringing out and the weight of wet towels, sheets and jeans that is what is hard for those of use not as young as we used to be.

Atmospheric River

Almost expired food

[randomactsofkarmasc]

Last year, my daughter traveled to visit a friend in London. They did splurge on one fancy meal (and they did go to a market that had lots of food trucks one day), but most of their meals were purchased via an app called "toogoodtogo". Businesses sign up and offer packages to be picked up during certain time slots (usually toward the end of the day) of food that cannot be saved to be sold the next day. No promises of what you'll get, just a promise of a certain value of food at a discount. It made it quite fun for them to go on excursions from their hotel room to pick up mystery bags of food for dinner.

She found out that the app has moved to our town. We are nowhere near as big as London, so obviously don't have the variety of options they have, but we have a nearby slightly-expensive grocery store with a very-proud-of-themselves deli. (And, I learned tonight, their prices are probably reasonable for the quality of food.) She reserved a deli bag for tonight and they promised $30 worth of food. (The bag cost $10.) We got two containers of smoked gouda pasta salad, a larger container of macaroni salad, a huge container of a cranberry-squash casserole, a container of chicken tenders, and a container of macaroni and cheese. Everything was 'sell by' today. Except for the chicken tenders (which had obviously been under a heat lamp for too long and were more chicken jerky), everything was exceptionally tasty. If we had paid full price based on the stickers, it would have been $37. It was enough for three adults to have a very pleasant meal.

Thrift shopping, special event clothes

[(Anonymous)]

Just a reminder that it is possible. I had a lucky score 2 weeks ago at a small independent local thrift store, all volunteer workers, proceeds to local women/children issues, so while it has a small stock, it is often nicer clothes. Where I used to live, there was an independent proceeds to cancer patients store I would go to. These days Goodwill Industries filters its donations so that alot of higher end items are sold online. These small local shops just sell what they are donated there at the store, and the proceeds stay local.

My middle child is getting married next fall, and it is going to be a very small, but evening and formal wedding. On the complete other side of the continent where the fiance is from ( Western Massachusetts). Lots of details to frugal out --

I figured I should start right away to either find a dress or if I would need to sew one, which would have been fun. So on my first stop in the local independent thrift store, I found a dress. I dont even need to hem it. I guess I dont have to sew a dress for this one and at $45 for a tags still on, formal, parent of wedding party dress, you cant even touch buying some of the fabric for that amount. I may tuck in a few spots up top, and will have to buy a foundation garment, which will cost more than the dress and will now have to figure out when to look for sales in that department.

The dinner I went along to in the city last month I was also in thrifted or found items -- so that I had spent $5 or so on the outfit altogether, as sometimes at our discount senior run thrift a vintage item or two slip thru, so I scored a vintage cashmere sweater and wool overcoat on fill the bag day. The rest of the bag filled with a few items to wirk on the garden in, and a few mens cotton shirts to use for fabric for re-use sewing projects.

Atmospheric River

Book preservation question

[(Anonymous)]

I recently received a user book which has some minor mold damage on the outside page surface, and a little on at least one internal page. It is otherwise pristine. My thought was to dab a little bleach based mold remover on, and then let it sit. This will cause slight degradation to the paper, but perhaps is better than leaving it as it is to continue to degrade via mold.

Does anyone have a better solution?

Re: Book preservation question

[(Anonymous)]

This web page gives some advice on various ways to clean old books

https://www.maids.com/blog/how-to-clean-books/

Is the mold still active? If it is, you might want to stick the book in the freezer for a while before cleaning. Keep the book separated from your other books until you're sure the mold is no longer active and won't spread to your other books.


JLfromNH/Jaundice Cynical Chicken

home-made stuffing

[(Anonymous)]

After a long hiatus I've begun baking my own bread again. It's been long enough so there's a bit of a learning curve to renegotiate. Several of my loaves have deflated and while they are still perfectly good for eating, they are of course not what I'm striving for. Fortunately, I've found a good use for imperfect loaves. The following link gives a YouTube video instruction on home-made stuffing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RGdypZDlSoI

The idea of using bread that's not stale is a good one. I made a few minor changes by cutting the bread pieces up smaller than he did and leaving out the carrots and egg. I also put in ground chicken liver as well as the cooking water from it. The results were excellent.

I've always used Bells Stuffing Mix in the past but that seems to be AWOL right now from the store shelves here (though I can still find the seasoning blend). The recipe I made is good enough so I will dispense with Bells even if it does finally reappear in the store.

JLfromNH/Jaundice Cynical Chicken

Re: home-made stuffing

[dabilahro]

I found this recipe helpful for sourdough https://www.culinaryexploration.eu/blog/old-faithful

Some uses for scraps I lean to, or imperfect loaves is breadcrumbs, croutons, and bread pudding. The breadcrumbs do require them to be extremely dry and even baked again and let to cool, but are very nice.

Bread making is one of my favorite frugal activities, I figure that each loaf costs maybe $2-3 and I make about 100+ a year for so little time and effort, just a bit of planning.

Hope you cross the learning curve soon!