What’s the craziest thing you have ever done to save money

While I have been made fun of many times about it, my cheapness is something that I am not embarrassed about whatsoever.  So in honor of the Frugal Dad and his list of the five cheapest things he has done to save money, I presents a similar list of what I feel are the five craziest things I have done to save money:

5.) Track rebates like a hawk
I really couldn’t think of a good number five but my rebate tracking has been very in-depth.  While I actually have not had to send any rebates in as of late, I used a portion of a notebook dedicated to rebates.  I made photocopies, wrote down date sent, date received, and kept very good details regarding the rebates.  Yes, this was probably going too far.  I am unaware of ever having not received a rebate but thought I would put the full court press on this matter in case I did.

4.) Have not paid for a haircut in eight years
I cannot say the last time that I received an actual professional haircut was but it was earlier in college.  After having shaved my head for basketball as a senior in high school, I came to realize that the money spent on a haircut was too much.  I found people who either could cut hair or just shaved it myself over time.  Since graduating from college five years ago this month, I have been doing the haircuts myself.  I just put one blade on the clippers and cut it every few months.  My wife really wanted me to get it professionally done before our wedding in the fall but why ruin a good thing?

3.) Made my own Valentine’s Card
So a two years back, I waited to purchase a Valentine’s Day card until it was way too late.  On the day of, I went to the grocery store looking for something.  While this may not come as a surprise, the selection was terrible and the cards cost around $5.00.  My decision to drive to Big Lots across the street and purchase construction paper (For $2) may be considered cheap by some, but for me, I wanted to do something more personal and make my own card.  I think my wife actually liked the home made card more, although she knew that the real reason that I did it was financially driven.

2.) Always mentioned Wal-Mart
When my current wife and I first moved in before we got married, money was tight as we both had recently finished college.  We would go through the grocery ads every week and then go to the stores to pickup what we needed.  Whenever there was something that was not on our list, my wife would want to but it there.  I always mentioned that we could get it cheaper at Wal-Mart and that led us to fight the rest of that evening.  Let me stress how brutal it is to shop when two people are extremely mad at one another.  It is about the worst situation ever.

1.) Didn’t eat lunch in high school
In high school, my mom would give me a certain amount of money everyday to eat lunch (It was probably around $3).  I would instead buy a candy bar and a pop to save money.  I really do not recall how hungry I was at the time but I definitely should have been eating lunch.  The reason that I was saving the money was so that I could buy myself a computer.  I had an allowance and a paper route but computers were more expensive in the mid 90s than they are now.  This is the craziest thing I have done regarding money to be able to save up for something.  And while I didn’t help myself at the time with that eating, I did eventually get a job in computers.  So it was a win-win, right?