**Bumped, 8/23/22 8:30pm ET**
My jaw came near the floor when I opened July’s electricity bill to find a notification of a 28% increase in electricity rates, effective immediately. An increase of 28%…. just like that. This month, August, even higher with less use.
After the initial shock wore off, I started thinking about what this means to the working-class people in my community.
Already struggling with a doubling of gas prices, massive food price increases at the grocery store and the pain of all costs for goods far outpacing any rate of wage increase, this type of uncontrollable increase in price of electricity is going to hit hard.
In the past we have used CTH threads to spotlight the smart thinking and resourcefulness of Treepers from all walks of life. A discussion thread where people can share tips, things that can actually be done, to help offset the financial pressures during severe economic times. I think we may all benefit from starting a series of post like that again.
Let us share our wisdom and experience again. There are many thousand who will benefit, as I have always done, from reading your smart tips and suggestions.
What ideas, tips and suggestions do you have to help people save money on ordinary life and living expenses?
These are painful economic times and the stress that is caused by financial worry is some of the most horrific family stress that people can face. Let us come together with tips as a community to help each other. No suggestion is too small. What advice do you have that can help people save money on monthly expenses?
During one of our previous discussions someone gave a tip about putting a clean dry towel in the clothes dryer as a way of cutting down drying time and energy used. I tried it and jumping ju-ju-bones it worked fantastically. Simply putting a dry towel into the dryer when you add the wet clothes from the washer reduces laundry drying time by around 25%. Not only does that save time, but it also saves money – and it was so simple.
So, what suggestions do you have? Tips about anything and everything that might lower the monthly cost of ordinary life. No tip is too small. No suggestion is too odd. Your advice can/will make a difference.
Please use the comments section to drop your advice.
Thanks again for being part of our fellowship.
Love to all.
The rise in electricity rates is worldwide. We are heading down the same path as Europe and Australia, and for the same reason – “renewable” energy. Wind farms and solar panels are ruining the grid, raising costs to consumers, and will NEVER deliver the power we need when we need it. There is not one single place on the planet where renewables work as advertised. NONE. Besides, there was never any good reason to build renewables to begin with. It was, and is, all political. As Thomas Sowell pointed out, we have replaced what worked with what sounded good.
Freeze gallon jugs of water and keep the freezer full. Transfer one to the refrigerator every other day. It keeps the fridge cold!
Use programmable thermostats, non Bluetooth. Drop/raise temp when gone by no more than three degrees.
Use ceiling fans-reverse them in winter.
Unplug all appliances after use!
Impossible to read 2100 comments, so if this is a repeat, so be it.
During cold months, Disconnect your dryer hose from blowing the hot air outside.
Put a nylon stocking over the dryer vent to catch lint and allow the hot air to blow into the house/apt.
Block the outside exhaust vent with an old towel to keep cold air from coming into your home.
It’s a simple hack.
That is a great idea. I haven’t been using my dryer in a while, but when bitter, rainy/snowy weather arrives, that is an idea I’ll have to remember.
I did that last winter at my Maine cottage. It helped to heat my basement.
Love this idea, thanks!
Is that safe to do with a gas dryer?
Good question. I have always used electric dryers.
I would turn to the professional installer/mfg with the question.
No
NO!!!!! NO!!!!! NO!!!!!
Gas dryers vent the carbon monoxide out through the same vent as the hot, moist air.
You would be venting that poisonous, invisible, odorless gas into your house.
And… the unvented hot air is going to have tons of moisture in it.
Doing this might warm your house but it might also KILL you and your pets (if you left the house and they were trapped in a basement or laundry room) and you might have mold problems (like in your gypsum walls) with all that moisture in the air for weeks or months.
Think about how wet your clothes were when you put them in the dryer and how many loads you do per week. All that moisture would now be put into the air inside you house. It’s be like turning on a hose and spraying your ceiling and walls.
There’s a REASON it’s vented to the outside!
Morning John, as I pointed out(in response val), ask your mfg if using gas.
Yes, gas would be dangerous with my suggestion.
As to moisture, dehumidifier can help.
In MN the problem in winter is too little humidity, not too much. Many people also run humidifiers, so this hack would actually kill two birds with one stone. No pun intended, don’t do it with a gas dryer!
yes, it is safe as w electric dryer.
IT WORKS! I’ve been doing that for years. In the winter it keeps the basement nice and warm.
Yes it works great, use electric dryer, adds some desired moisture to the very dry winter basement. Also a humidifier in the main house due to wood stove heat.
There is a better hack where you pipe the dryer exhaust through a 5 gallon bucket in winter. The only problem with your way is so much more dust. There is a better way but your way works as well. People can look on youtube for it.
Yes. Use the exhaust heat to heat something else that radiates that energy back into your house BUT not the moisture directly and definitely not a gas dryer’s exhaust (carbon monoxide).
Please be careful folks! Saving money one way could result in a expensive and dangerous consequences.
Do you realize how flammable dryer lint is? Why would you want that lint collecting inside your home?
Bad idea.
Your dryer has a filter inside.
Winter time, air is usually very dry. Moisture from dryer would help. Your basement usually is not air tight, there is an air exchange from the outside.
Simple, but it also raises the humidity level in the laundry room and surrounds. A wise action in winter, not so smart in summer, as AC works harder dehumidifying than it does lowering the temp of dry air.
My tips may not be practical if you only have electric home “infrastructure” but I live a pretty cushy existence with very low electricity bills: almost everything in my house uses natural gas, and when I bought it I paid a simple 1k to extend the gas lines to anywhere in the house they didn’t already exist.
Nat Gas runs:
my nat gas bills in January, in Upstate SC, never exceed $125~, March-Nov: no more than $23 bucks. Family of 4
my electricity bills max out at ~$425 a month here during June,July August when running AC to keep house at 72 all the time( and one does not have to keep it that cool, obviously)
in non AC months (late Sept -Feb) electricity maxes out at $120~\ month but that’s higher, it is usually more like $88
pertinent info:
long story , short= use only LED lighting, use natural gas which is much cheaper (it even was back years ago in NJ) wherever you can.
oh also, an AC tip that saves tons of run time: at night when it’s colder outside turn the thermostat lower than you want it, you will achieve that temp very quickly compared to the same during the day. In the morning, you will have a house full of cold air, and when you turn it back up to your actual desired temperature, it will take a long time before the system will need to kick on to cool, almost 3/4 the day. This has saved me tons in AC power use.
Around here natural gas prices are spiking to 14 yr highs
Our rates are fixed because our wise co- op bought a 10 year contract 4 years ago!
Duke Power will tell you that 40% off all power used in the US goes to lighting.
So use LED bulbs everywhere. Also during waking hours open the shades and let the sun in.
I was taught 3 things increase your electric bill….dryer, oven, and water heater.
I don’t use oven a lot….I line dry my clothes…and I keep the water heater off until I am ready to bathe.
Great Depression Cooking and The Hillbilly Kitchen on YouTube.
This was a fantastic Youtube channel — Great Depression Cooking, a proven system. Thanks for posting!
I like a flood light outside, but leaving it on all night adds to electricity costs, maybe not much but any bit helps. I bought and installed solar motion lights and have stopped using flood lights except on rare occasion.
Those Solar Motion lights are probably LEDs and use about as much power as a night light.
I checked the bulbs I used and a 50W equivalent LED Bulb draws 4 watts like a night light.
Buy rice buy beans and eat them. Live like nobody else does.
Buy cigarettes and half pint bottles of whiskey for barter
Harden your house, prepare to defend it.
Use a new, clean galvanized trash can to store large bags of rice and beans.
We like the large bags of jasmine rice best.
Also, try using a rice cooker. The instructions will give the exact measurements for rice/water. Ours turns out perfect every time.
When making a pot of pintos, add 1/2 cup of brown sugar (more for a large recipe) and any leftover roast beef.
We make fajitas by using Sadler’s Mesquite Smoked, sliced brisket ($25 for 2 pounds at Sam’s). Our family of 6 always has some of the meat leftover in the serving dish. So, that is the beef that I throw into a pot of beans.
There’s a bonus with rice cookers: The heavenly aroma that fills your house when you’re using one.
10 lb bags of beans also make excellent rifle rests at the range.
Rice and beans together make a complete meat replacing protein. With some peppers, tomatoes and a little meat, your mouth and stomach with both feel well fed.
When you finish a box of cereal or soup crackers, use the cereal box inner bag and empty soup cracker bag for things you would normally use a ziploc or saran wrap for.
I wash and reuse my ziplock bags, over and over. If I use them for raw meat, I store them separate and use only for raw meat each time, even though they are washed. I also fold and reuse aluminum foil as well.
Easier to clean if you turn them inside out. I then put them on a wine bottle to dry.
And enjoy the wine, while they dry! LOL.
If you have a vacuum sealer, they work great with that too.
If you don’t, you may be able to use a straw in a corner to take the air out and seal with a hair straightener(parchment or paper to insulate across the seal).
Straightener is good for occasional, budget, portable use. You can use it to seal/weatherproof documents, data drives, phones/beach, etc.
With bags you can seal(ziplock), it’s easier to put the straw in a corner, seal the rest. Depending on what you’re sealing, you can suck the air out or use a small attachment on a vacuum with a straw, and tape or block the rest of the opening. Not the best, but it will reduce ice crystals if freezing and oxidization on metals if storing. ymmv.
I double the plastic grocery bags and use them for kitchen trash,. Doing that, I made a box of 13 gal, 45 count, last 2+ years.
Sandwhich bags, by doing that…made a 100 count box, last well over 2 years as well.
Get tents, below freezing sleeping bags, and down comforters. Get silk long underwear for all family members and wool socks.
Close doors and vents in unused rooms.
Put the window plastic up on all windows. freshly calk and weather strip windows and doors.
Install a wood/pellet stove if possible.
Get fresh insulation in any crawl spaces.
The window plastic, yes! Forgot that we did that last winter, makes a world of difference.
Pellets may be harder to obtain than firewood, eventually.
Dried shelled corn kernels would probably work. In the late 70s they had corn kernel furnaces, about one bushel per day, back than bushel of corn costed $2,5 each. $75.00 per month for heating.
I thought that these were going to be huge, back in 2008. It looks like I was off by a crisis!
Speaking of which, while vegetable seeds are still plentiful, stock up on heirloom vegetable seeds! You can have a forever supply of the seeds, if you save them.
We have some. If we ever become internal refugees, I will have something useful to take with us (and enough to share).
It’s a bit complicated (there are 4 kinds of squash, and you need to only have one of each, for example, or the seeds don’t come out well), but worth the effort to figure out.
Always used window plastic.
It felt good to take it down in the Spring , but I couldn’t get thru the winter w/o it.
Indoor, plug-in swamp cooler.
Much cheaper to run than HVAC.
I’ve been using one all summer on the west coast.
Won’t cool off more than a room or so, but how many rooms do you need?
It’s my understanding swamp coolers don’t work as well in high humidity? Great in desert though.
That’s correct. Evaporating water requires lots of heat. So, swamp coolers only work where the air is dry.
Conversely, most of the energy that an air conditioner uses is to remove humidity. Air conditioners in the West don’t have to work very hard, compared to the Midwest, South, or East.
We moved from the Midwest to the West. We now run humidifiers year round. They make the air easier to breathe, and provide a bit of cooling as well (like a very small swamp cooler).
Wearing two pairs of thin socks is often better than one thick pair, when coupled with sensible shoes.
Trialled on many cold concrete floors.
Liner socks paired with a pair of wool socks, my go-to for years.
When you are out in freezing weather the combination of one pair of Compression socks with a pair of thermal socks works better than foot or hand warmers.
Two thin layers of ANY clothing work better than one single thick layer. I wore two or three shirt layers to bed on winter nights for years when we lived in a trailer. Don’t believe me? Compare how warm you feel wearing an undershirt plus a dress shirt, to wearing a polo / golf shirt alone.
Insulation. No matter where you live improving your insulation will pay for itself quickly
You can also make candles for light using Crisco.
Yes, Crisco.
YouTube will show how.
Gather all your candle scraps, all your dryer lint, and all the screw top tins that held air gun pellets,
Melt the candle ends in a double boiler. Fill the tins with the lint.
Pour melted wax in among the lint until full. Screw the top on when cool.
If you need an emergency fire even with wet wood, about 1/4 of a tin of the wax/lint lit with a match will lite just about any fire.
I make fire starters using cardboard egg cartons, wood chips (we have them for our animals but you could also use finely broken up twigs, sawdust or lint) and candle scraps.
I fill each depression till level with woodchips and then pour the melted wax from the candle scraps over it.
Once the wax sets up, close the lid and you have 12 firestarters.
Be sure to put something like newspaper or cardboard under the egg carton till the wax sets up so you won’t have to scrape 12 wax dots off the counter.
Makes 12 easy to tear apart firestarters. Great for camping too!
If you haven’t heard about ‘top down fire starting’, now would be a good time. Lights easily, heats the flue faster and produces much, much less smoke.
I’ll throw my .02 out here. In summer open the windows up if it’s cool at night, close them first thing in the morning.
Air fryer is probably the best kitchen gadget I’ve purchased in years, it’s essentially a countertop convection oven. No more turning the oven on to make two baked potatoes, etc.
Plant a garden, even if you only have a patio, or sunny windows. Plant what you like and will eat – lettuce, tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, etc. are easy to grow in containers. Packets of seeds will keep for years if properly stored.
For winter – flannel sheets and down comforters. Show Mike Lindell a little love, the flannel sheets are fantastic.
This is kinda off topic – My neighbor has one of those play trucks with a loud, rumbling exhaust. Very annoying, but I tolerate it. Recently the exhaust on my Honda minivan with 240k miles dropped and is really loud. When I go to work early in the morning, I have been goosing the minivan. One day as he was out for a walk, I really goosed it. My neighbor with the loud play truck has now been glaring at me. Funny how Democrats can’t take what they dish out.
HA! This sounds like a Jack Lemmon-Walter Mattheau skit on a tv show!
Get an infrared thermometer, the ‘pistol’ type, and find those cold air leaks around the house and seal them – caulk, tape, stuff them, etc. Obviously windows and doors, but I surprisingly found electric outlets on the exterior walls to be big air leakers – air blowing right in through the prong holes. I caulked the wire entrances inside the wiring box, but if you can’t do that safely, use those child safety caps to close up unused outlets. Check again on different days when the wind is blowing from a different direction. Check the baseboards at the floor joint too, that was another source in my house.
Using less water is a biggie in our place, local water is stupid high & hard to boot. Our coffeepot gets lots of use & we buy distilled water to keep it working for many years now. Saving some empty gallon jugs, we fill the jugs until tap is hot enough to wash dishes instead of running it down the drain. Those gallons hang out to be used for cleaning vegetables, pasta or veggie cooking, pets, plants & humidifier in winter. Use the de-humidifier tank to water plants in stickier months too. My depression era mother always laughed at the ‘new’ recycling ideas. Born in 1916 she was a reducer, reuser, & recycler from waaay back!
Keep commercial dill pickle juice. You can make fairly good pickles one extra time using it. Fill a pint jar with sliced cucumbers. Put the pickle juice in a stainless steel or enamel pot, add a tablespoon of vinegar and 1/4 teaspoon salt. Bring to a rolling boil and pour over the cucumbers. Put on a lid, let cool, and stick the jar in the refrigerator and voila, in a day or two you have more dill pickles.
Dill pickle juice will also kill any grass that tries to grow in cracks in your driveway. Make sure it drains toward the street because it contains salt. You can also use white vinegar to kill grass in a driveway. No Roundup needed.
Pickle juice makes a good chicken marinade if you water it down 50/50.
Or pork ribs . . .
Boil a dozen eggs; add to the leftover pickle juice (maybe add extra vinegar if you like it quite sour); makes great pickled eggs.
Remove the shells?
You are suppose to eat the shells before you pickle the eggs. I hope this helps.
Pickle juice is also good for leg cramps
As are those little packets of yellow mustard you get with a takeaway
http://www.peoplespharmacy.com
Lots of home remedies here
Cream of tartar on tip of butter knife + 8 oz water will calm bladder infection or irritable bladder almost instantly – cheaper than their expensive Rx! Great for post catheter (short term.)
Great to know. Thanks!
Belle that pickle juice thing is great. I also use it to put up beets, by mixing it with the juice from bread and butter pickles. It also works great in soup stocks, making them richer and more nutritious.
Do you ever make your own vinegar? I’ve decided this fall I’m going to do that, and also start making my own yeast.
I went into each room and unplugged everything that isn’t used regularly- lamps that I rarely use, my paper shredder, printer, battery chargers that aren’t being used, nightlights. I used to leave a lot plugged when it wasn’t used. It doesn’t save a ton, but it makes me more aware of how much useless power draining I had.
Especially your washing machine and dryer.
Unplug all the phone chargers and computer charges when not in use they use a ton of power.
Go to https://www.craigslist.org/about/sites and choose your location. (Your location might be “XYZ Area” instead of a city.) Then on the web page for that location, do a search on “free”, and click on it. In the web page that comes up, type your preferences in the left column (ex: number of miles from a zip code), then click the “apply” button.
Bookmark the URL that results, and check it every day. If you see something that you want, then on the web page for that item, click on the “reply” button. Arrange with the giver for you to meet the giver, and get the thing. Usually you go to their house, and they give it to you.
I’ve gotten a some good free things from Craigslist. Here are two tips:
1) Every day, bring up that URL of free things in your area, and check to see if you want anything. If you do, then contact the giver right away. Some things go fast.
2) People often give away more than one thing in the same listing. You should check to see if you want anything in the entire listing, not just the first picture. For example, one listing had two pictures. The first picture showed an un-interesting looking envelope. Fortunately I also looked at the second picture of that listing. That picture showed an expensive cleaner. I contacted the person, and they gave me the cleaner.
It’s happening everywhere.
Our bill went up to 2,600 TBH ( $72 USD ) and we have to keep the lights shut off during the day, close all the doors, close the shades and this time of year, we have 1 room ( my office ) that we have keep the air conditioning running all the time, not to cool the room, but the air conditioning eliminates the humidity from the air.
We own a house ( truly own with no property taxes ), but if you rent, the price of electricity is almost more than rent now.
In the mall last weekend and my wife said that people come to the mall and hang out because of the air conditioning. I said I thought you people here liked the heat and she said no one living here can stand the heat, that’s why they come to mall and just walk around.
Have a washer, but don’t use it that much. We pay a lady 500 TBH ( $14 USD ) a month to pick up most of the clothes and have her clean them. We have no dryer, almost no one does. The clothes we wash ourselves dry on a clothes line/rack just as fast as they would in a dryer anyways.
Have a huge tank in back that collects rain water, when it’s full, we shut the power off to the water pump. Cold showers every night, no hot water anywhere in the house except for the daughters bathroom.
But, at least the price of gasoline has dropped considerably.
Where do you live that you don’t pay property taxes?
I had to move to Thailand for family reasons, the DoS ( State Department ) would not issue my wife even a tourist visa, even though she more than met the requirements, Sr. nurse at the hospital here, has money, property, and is five years away from retirement with full pension and benefits.
When I lived in Texas, I did IT contract work so I’d work for 6 months, go see family for 6 months, and so on. With Covid, I had to make the move out here permanently due to the restrictions for International travel. It was bad before Covid and just got worse from there.
There’s no such thing as property taxes here, but we do have to pay .80 cents a year for the government to maintain the dead on the house.
I said a few days ago, you don’t realize how much you’re living in a quasi-dictatorship until you are away from it.
The other good thing, you can walk down the street, grab a beer and drink it pretty much anywhere you want, in front of the library, on the street, there are no public consumption of alcohol laws here either, among many other laws.
I have more personal freedom in country where military ousted the former governement and took over, than I ever did in the US.
And no, they’re not communist, they’re a true US ally and probably the only US ally left in SE Asia. The Thai people love America and love anything that’s still made there, Ford and Chevy trucks, yeah they’re not “made” in the USA, but they still love them, as well as anything with an American flag on it.
Thank you for the reply.
Very interesting.
The Phillipines would join your list of peoples loving the US
I came out to Manila 4 years ago choosing to leave the UK
In August of 22 I’m glad I did .. life is better here
Thank you Lord
Something I have done for years is raise the thermostat in summer and lower it in winter. I haven’t done it to save money, though it certainly does. I do it because I prefer to be outside and going from 80°F to 95″F isn’t that bad. This evening I was sitting under the pavillion at 95°F and felt fine. You can’t comfortably work at that temp, but cooking, eating, and sitting around chatting is no issue.
If I set my thermostat to 70°F like a bunch of my friends and almost all neighbors I would probably sit inside and watch TV all evening like they do too, it would feel too hot to go outside. Let your body acclimate, enjoy the outdoors with the family and save money to boot.
We keep ours set to 77 f and it feels like Alaska.
I just went outside on the patio to smoke ( because I can’t stand the smell of smoke in the house ), came back in and the hair on my arm stood up due to the variance in temperature.
It’s around 10:15 am here and I have to go run errands this morning. but it’s sunny with no clouds and the Monsoon’s came through last night so it’s soooooo freaking humid now ( Thailand ) and there is no wind blowing.
What I wouldn’t give for a 95 degree day right now.
.
Yes. The biggest electricity draws in the house are heating and cooling. We are so spoiled. Try to just acclimate. It’s probably healthier. It’s not unreasonable to keep the A/C 80-82 in summer, the heat 68-70 in the winter, and fresh air when the temperature outside is between that. Just dress accordingly. Turn the hot water heater down a few degrees. Yes keep the freezer full, even with just water. Yes don’t use the dryer or oven for small amounts. The lights and appliances are relatively minimal compared with anything that generates heating or cooling.
.
I agree. I have done the same for years, for the same reason.
Thanks Treepers for all the tips.
Bubble wrap on your windows. R value increases dramatically. Use a spray bottle with a bit of vinegar to apply it. It will stick a long time. Walls are in the 10 to 14 range of R values. Even triple pane with argon are under 4. Bubble wrap adds about 2R. You can get enormous rolls from shipping suppliers. I paid $30 for enough to cover all the windows I do not care about having a view from. They look close to bubble glass windows from the outside so screw the neighbors if they bitch.
insulation has a diminishing return. R20 vs R30 are just a few percent diff. R2 (Typical window) vs R3+ (Bubble wrapped) is a much bigger change in thermal loss vs. gain. It is close to a logarithmic curve.
Made a bigger change to out KW usage than getting a high efficiency heat pump.
Cheap. Easy. Will take you a few hours.
Bubble gum and baling wire engineering when you understand physics can be great.
Seal off your fireplace. A easily removable plug made of Styrofoam is a good. A lot of issues with heat loss are through chimneys but that is mostly in winter.
I did this for more privacy behind my sheers. It is lovely. So easy. I just used water.
Sundance, the photo is precious!
Soul pleasing
Drip dry clothes. If you can get a clothesline. We have one even though we live in city. It’s a simple line that hooks on patio wall and goes to a tree. Neighbors don’t care. We also have patio chairs that work well for hanging towels and jeans to dry. We’ve been doing this for 2 decades. Hang to dry. If towels or clothes are too rough after this, put them in dryer for a few minutes with wool dryer balls to soften.
Shop at Aldi. Buy flats of canned tomatoes, soups, nut butters.
I have used a retractable line for years. It is installed on a back porch post and goes to a link on the vinyl of house.
Great cause I don’t have to leave the porch. Don’t have to weed eat around poles either.
I love it.
If you dry the clothes inside, it acts as a humidifier as well.
Look around your area for a “United Grocery Outlet” store. They’re like the “railroad salvage” stores of the 1950s-1960s, handling short-dated / disco’d / unpopular / Brand-X foodstuffs at really low prices. The one near us, in Murphy NC, is an “in/out” operation, meaning what comes in today sells out and may never be replaced. So if you see something you need, don’t wait.
When using clothes dryer I put a dry towel in with wet clothes and they dry faster. Bonus is I use towels from my spare bathroom and it refreshes them for company.
I’m now planning my trips to the store(s) or other places and trying to resist impulse trips. Need a birthday card, put it on a list, instead of running out to the store. Run to the post office? Put it on a list. Choose one day and do all your buying groceries, gas, post office, pick-ups, banking, library, paying bills, ballet lessons for the daughter, church meetings, dentist, etc. If you are in a large city, do everything that goes one direction on the same day. Try to make every trip accomplish 3 or 4 errands.
Charge your phone in the car, while driving.
Done that for years – a consequence of living 15 miles of bad road away from town center!
Zeer Pot, Clay-Pot Refrigerator/Cooler: Two clay pots, one inside the other, with sand between the pots. Sand is kept wet, and evaporation cools the pots. Cover with wet cloth or paper towel.
https://thehomesteadinghippy.com/diy-zeer-pot/
Thank you! Great idea that resolves an issue perfectly for me, and that site has some very worthwhile sheep stories, and in particular on hair sheep. Always good to see.
Buy items from overseas. Thanks to ePacket, items ship from Asia via usps for pennies. Ebay is a good place to find foreign deals.
Get your prescription drugs through pharmstore.com out of Canada. Even cheaper is India Mart but make sure you order the brand name drugs. Big pharma sells overseas for pennies and rips off Americans who pay their r&d costs.
Wise.com is a cheap way to wire funds overseas using a credit card.
2 words: Flannel Sheets.
If you’re up North and don’t have them , get some. Pronto!
You will not believe how much warmer your bed is.
I find them to be cool in the summer, and warm in the winter.
Absolutely , Leavemygunsalone !
I like my flannel sheets all year round 😊
I guess it is just what you are used to 😀
My Pillow sells a variety of quality flannel sheets. I like to support the ‘good’ guys whenever I can.
There are a lot of great tips, dear Treepers. I read a great book on energy, a few years back. Starting up energy, cost more, than maintaining it. A thermostat that fluctuates when your home and away.
It’s like driving, you burn more gas to get going.
All energy runs this way.
Find a temperature you like and don’t move it. You’ll save money
Don’t use a clothes drier. Hang up wet clothes on a rack inside or a clothesline outside, like your ancestors used to do. This is key. If you’re willing to do this, you just might have a clue as to future life in FUSA, and as to how you will or will not succeed.
Drape a wet towel in front of a cooling fan (window-sized.) In a dry climate, this acts as a primitive swamp cooler. Refresh the towel’s wetness as needed.
Develop a schedule as seasons change, for when to close windows and lower window blinds. Seasons change. Your house’s accepting sunlight inside, needs to change with the seasonal movement of the sun. Keep out sunlight in summer, and let it in during winter. Do what you need to do. Buy pushpins and hang good wool blankets over windows as needed.
An electric light bulb should aid your life when you’re within the range of its help. When you move away, that light should be off. Learn to move within your house in the dark, as you go between one light switch to the next. That learning saves you from the having to backtrack to turn off the light in the place you just left.
A sign for me of resident trashiness, is an outside light left on during daylight hours. Yes. It is a sign of trashiness, whether homeowner or renter.
I live in a fine place, in a voting precinct where 43 people voted last Tuesday as Rs in the uniparty bird for US House Rep. Cheney got 6 votes, Hageman about 34 votes. That was just the R wing of the uniparty talking, there could have been some D voters in this precinct, one or two.
Back to The Electricity: I pay 0.093200 per kilowatt hour. Nine cents. Of course that juice comes from local coal, despite efforts from The Other People.
Insulate your water heater with an insulating blanket, also install a programmable thermostat on your A/C system.
Set cool temp to 80 deg. F and run fans. Many ways to build a low cost evaporative cooler. Check it out on line search.
my first year as a fck’n diver..
offshore.. I had a fck’n bed.. and ate like a king..
but back in my efficiency apt.. I was sleeping on the floor.. and didn’t even have a tv..
but I had a clock radio and phone though.. I was on call.. 24/7..
back on the beach.. I had my “one-meal-a-day” menu..
Grocery List: bargain brand rice.. bargain brand flour.. bargain brand cooking oil.. salt and pepper..
Recipe:
1. cook the rice..
2. now make gravy..
heat some oil in a pan.. add flour to desired thickness.. stir and brown it to desired color.. consistency.. and taste..
then – careful now – I would go outside on the balcony to do this part..
pour some water in it.. to desired consistency.. watch out though.. it’s gonna splatter and smoke profusely.. like a fck’n bubbling volcano pit..
then pour your “gravy” over the rice.. salt and pepper to taste..
and there you go.. dinner..
later on.. once you start making more money.. get a gallon of milk and bargain brand oreo cookies for dessert.. that was luxury man.. I’m tellin’ ya..
then go out on the balcony and watch the sun set..
..my first year as a fck’n diver..
This may already be in here but here goes.
I drive a 2003 Buick Le Sabre. The young engineers kindly call it a “Dad Car.”
It is huge 4 door luxury pig boat that has seen less shabby days, but it still starts stops and goes on command.
You can all look up Hypermiling, but of that I only recommend one trick, and here is how it works.
All Modern Fuel Injected cars work the same way.
They have a system of sensors that feed data to the computer and run the engine.
They are Temperature, manifold pressure, Air Flow volume, and throttle opening. You are given one piece of information if you have a tachometer and that is engine speed in Revolutions per minute (RPM). Most cars have Automatic Transmissions. This will allow the car to accelerate at a constant RPM.
The further open the throttle is, the more fuel the car gets. There are usually 5 ranges in the computer called the “fuel map.” The fuel injector ( a little needle valve) opens so much, for a varying amount of time in the first range. in the second it opens wider, and again scans the time range. And so on until wide open when the needle valve is held wide open for as long as your foot is on the floor. The way to use this is while in city traffic, never exceed 2000 rom, and no more than 2500 max. When you leave a light, you only allow the RPM to jump to 2500 to start, the fall to 2000 as you accelerate, then down to idle speed as you cruise.
My giant Buick is averaging 22 MPG in town driving this way.
On the interstate, stay in the right hand lane, never in the passing lane with all the speed demons, trucks towing boats and campers, and work trucks and trailers all going 80. You stay in the right land and go 70, In Cruise Control. The computer will control your driving the same as you do in town, but since its reaction time is much faster than yours (Speed of electrons verses your 2.5-3 seconds) it will keep you going without revving up the engine any faster than necessary.
On the 400 mile trip on weekends from my engineering project site to home the LeSabre gets 28.5 to 30.5 MPG ( yes 30 MPG!) and will make the trip using only 13.5-14 gallons from its 18.5 gallon tank. This means I drive home and can do all my weekend driving without filling up. Then Drive back and do 2 weeks of driving around the project town without filling up.
The main thing to do both ways is keep right, don’t speed, and use a light touch on the throttle. you can go the speed limit, you just don’t have to make taking off a drag race.
Try it and you will be amazed at how far your gas will go.
I tried it a weekend ago with my 4 wheel drive hunting truck and got 20 mpg on the highway with it. My kids have never been able to get better than 14 mpg and so won’t drive it because it cost too much to fill up.
Remember, keep right, take off slow, use only enough throttle to get to the speed lime and stay under 2000 RPM.
You won’t mind going to the gas station again.
Thank you for that information, With my Ford Escape SUV, try keeping the revs to around 1500. Have gotten 30 to 33 mpg. Not always, only if I am real good🤗😁, however the jack rabbit dead stop starts is not good.
Tire pressure being correct helps also.
23 is my wife’s favorite number. When we changed from an underpowered car to an overpowered car, I told her to keep the RPMs below 23 (which is how it shows on the tachometer gauge). I think it helped!
My brother’s humongous 1990s-era Town Car is similar. He averages about 25 to 27 mpg.
Living sleeping without air conditioning….. if it comes to it…. Most homes aren’t built/designed to take advantage of natural airflow… so sleeping with windows open will be required. Please get yourself some canopy / over the bed mosquito netting for the inevitable critters getting in your home, bad enough sleeping in hot weather, at least keep the skitters off you and the family . There are also Mosquito netting for whole rooms, start with ebay, Cheers, JB
Put fly screens on the windows.
And the best option for airflow is to make sure windows are open at opposite ends. If only one window is open, it doesn’t create the breeze.
And have a fan in the window blowing IN on one side of the house and a fan in the window on the opposite side of the house blowing OUT.
Sadly in my area there’s been PSA’s warning of the 2 legged critter vermin looking for those of us creating opportunity for them.
Didn’t read 2200 comments, sorry.
Have found that using an induction plate appears to save electricity. Just need a pot or pan that is magnetic, cast iron, stainless steel plate in non stick cook wear, even titanium camping cook wear.
Brand recommendation? (I never heard of this and saw many complaints on those I viewed – aluminum made, screws. on bottom prevents laying flat etc.)
Get online and google induction plate, pull up the amazon and walmart links and read the reviews or look for the 4 star and up products.
Those with flat glass cooktops instead of raised burners need to be careful with these. If the metal is not smooth to the touch, it can scratch the glass and ruin your stove. This is probably where paying more for a well made product is worthwhile.
“What ideas, tips and suggestions do you have to help people save money on ordinary life and living expenses?”
Stop the monsters who are destroying the world.
To the guys and even some of the ladies on here, convince your other half to invest in a motorcycle, sell it as a “green” alternative and you’re simply doing your part to save the planet. Most motorcycles will get 2 – 3 times the gas mileage as a car.
Wife and I both ride motorcycles for everything, she has a little 125 cc motorbike that will get her around town, I have a CBR Fireblade to get around town and to any town within 350 km.
We have am SUV but rarely use it, only for groceries or to pick up something big at the store. Otherwise we use the motorcycles and the trunks are the backpacks we wear.
Hmmm. I will have to look into that!
I live in a climate where I have to have enough heat in the house during the winter to keep the pipes from freezing. In order to be warm in bed I put one blanket under me (on top of the bottom sheet) and another blanket over me but under the top sheet… kind of a blanket sandwich of sorts. Then I have the regular blanket and quilts on top of the top sheet. This works like a charm, and I find it to be much more effective than flannel sheets since they are made of cotton.
Two minute showers. Turn water off while brushing your teeth. Keep lights turned off during the daytime. Unplug appliances that are not in use. Refill plastic bottles and freeze for later use. Do not shop for groceries while you are hungry! Don’t buy stuff you want, only stuff you need!
I grew up with an egg timer for showers because of my Dad being an Army guy – 3 min.
I do this..shower entire body with water…..turn off water and lather entire body …turn water on and rinse.
A few random thoughts:
1. My HVAC guy told me that more than a 5 degree temperature swing in terms of day to evening cooling/heating transition negates the savings in running the system at higher/lower temperatures because the system works harder (using more energy) to bring the differential down in a short period of time.
2. Don’t deviate more than 2 degrees between floors: ascend during the summer(lower floors should be set to two degrees cooler than each subsequent upper floor), descend during the winter.
3. Invest in home automation to manage lights and appliances. While there is an initial up front capital hit, the savings will accumulate over time.
My devalued .02
Chicken, duck, turkey, goose keepers, here’s a $$$ saving tip I use.
When using commercial feed/scratch/oyster shell, get a pail with a gamma lid and put in one and a half PINTS of feed for 20 birds, one PINT of scratch, and a double handful of oystershell. Mix dry ingredients well. Dampen and make sure abut an inch of water covers the mix. Cover and let stand outside in hot weather, inside in cold weather for up to 3 days. Currently, I make batches at 5A and feed them the next morning around 4:30A. The concoction is left outside in the shade. This is in Florida heat.
When it’s fermented, it’s ready to feed. I give my chickens one heaping handful per 4 hens. I put the feed in rubber horse feed pans and dispose of any leftovers every evening far from the henhouse. I wash the pans off in cold running water every evening and ready them for the next morning.
My hens are healthy and lay well and my feed costs and mouse issues have both plunged drastically. There is no feed residue on the henyard or in the henhouse.
A good down comforter is perfect for lowering your heating bill in the winter.
Sam’s Club Martha Stewart Down Comforter $59 (Queen) – 69 (King).
Also note that they have this same product listed more than once. If you see a higher price than the one above, keep looking at their website. There will be another Martha Stewart entry for the prices I have mentioned.
We have used their Martha Stewart and had great results.
Just remember that you cannot wash/dry a down comforter without
ruining the ability of the fabric to hold the down –without feathers/down poking through.
The fabric of the comforter will lose the coating that keeps the down from being able to poke through the fabric. It washes out.
The way to deal with this is by using a duvet. Wash the duvet and never use the comforter without the duvet.
Absolutely.
For those in ‘cold’ environments, and I know having been born in Wisconsin and lived in Michigan as a young child, as long as the body is warm, you’re warm.
I remember when I was young, Dad was in the Air Force, we lived in the country, my Mom, my brother and me would all camp out next to the fireplace and wood burning stove, listen to music, ( there was no cable TV back then ), and spend time together as a family.
When we went to bed, Mom would just throw layer after layer of down blankets on us.
Air was cold, but body was warm. Besides, cold air is good for the body, oxygen compresses the colder it gets and you breathe better.
Hay Box Cooker
Used in Rural Africa
https://www.instructables.com/hay-box-cooker/
———————–
https://www.ourtinyhomestead.com/haybox-cooking.html
Mre
https://www.woodland-ways.co.uk/blog/outdoor-cooking/making-and-using-a-hay-box-to-cook-in/
LED lightbulbs all over.
We only have a very few halogens… three over the range, one in the middle of the three over the kitchen island and four over the dining room table.
Every other light is an LED.
Also, don’t use tower computers… use laptops or micro form factor with external brick power supplies.
for those of you with full freezers you might want to invest in a pressure canner. Pressure canning your meat/veggies/low-acid foods will knock the cost of keeping the freezer cold off your electric bill and will ensure your access to these foods if/when they shut the grid down entirely unless you have solar powered generators to keep them running. Pressure canning is not difficult and there are many useful how-to videos on YouTube. Pro tip… you cannot safely can foods in a pressure cooker… you need a pressure canner… and there is a big difference
I’m not a greeny, just a cheap butt. If I don’t have to pay a power bill that is amazing. I can get solar without batteries to power my whole home during the day which will pay for itself in about 10 years, based on my average usage. Propane heats my home and on demands water heaters.
I’m in the south so we have loads of sun year round. But no one tells me the cons on things like this. And my low cost per kilowatt contract ends in November. Any reason not to install?
Depending on exactly how hot it gets where you are, it can reduce efficiency of the panel and it can burn up the panels. Also, when I investigated my electrician explained they wear out fast in the Florida sun and heat. So, people end up replacing expensive parts and/or paying two bills, electric bill AND solar bill. Lots of people swear by the panels. The batteries last only about 10 years and that is the most expensive part to replace. Best advice is do your own due diligence on the company installing, on the product being installed and on long term customer satisfaction. I think they work pretty well until you add in the AC load.
Thanks for the response. I have 3 neighbors with systems that range from 8 years old to brand new. The newest install was done by an engineer who did loads of research. None have complaints yet.
One thing I will do in the morning is, PRINT ALL of these comments to paper (as I have done with The Constitution & Declaration of Independence)!
There is a literal wealth of knowledge contained here, and I don’t want to risk losing any of it!
Thank you to all of my Beloved fellow Treepers for their wisdom, and generosity in sharing them!
Warmest Best,
Strength’N’Honor,
skipper
How to grow potatoes in a bag
https://www.bhg.com.au/how-to-grow-potatoes-in-a-bag?category=garden