I know we have already touched on dating on the cheap. We’ve come to terms with the fact that if someone expects you to spend a sh*t load on some fancy dinner, then they probably are not worth your time.
But alas, I happen to be a single lady in the big city and I’ve come to realize that it is not that we gals’ want you to spend a whole lot of money on a date, we just merely want you to be creative and put some thought into it.
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Tonight, Frugal Fashion Week launches in Toronto. I had the chance to chat with Gillian Downes, the FFW producer to discuss the event and all things stylish and inexpensive.
Check it out!
Visit the Frugal Fashion Week website for more event info and the Windfall site to learn more about the charity supported by the event.
Special thanks to Lucas for being my cameraman!
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Bummed-out cause you can’t afford a vacation this summer? Don’t fret my pet. I ended up at a local theme park this weekend and will totally vouch for the fact that I got JUST as “out of my element” and had JUST as many laughs as I would have had on any given weekend excursion! All for under 50 bucks!
Check out a tidbit of our adventures at Canada’s Wonderland! face-paint mustaches and bungee jumping included!
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Recessionistas are the new black.
The recession has bruised the world of couture but that hasn’t stopped the fashion industry from using the economic downturn to its advantage. Malls are riddled with recession sales, high fashion designers are coming out with cheaper lines for big box stores like Target, and Fashion Week has adopted a frugal little sister.
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Since the recession began, we’ve heard a lot of experts jibbing and jabbering about what it’s going to take for us to dig ourselves out of this hole. The consensus is that we as individuals are going to have to possess three key attributes to beat this damn thing: Resiliency, fearlessness, and a bold, innovative mentality.
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That all sounds great on paper, but out here in the real world it’s becoming conspicuous that what we really need to beat this recession is a good solid moustache. Hear me out, people, because I know your initial reaction is to dismiss the moustache as a thing of the past, a relic with no use in our modern era.
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However, the three integral attributes that will be necessary to emerge from this economic downturn - Resiliency, fearlessness, and innovativeness - are all encapsulated in the moustache.
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A man sporting a moustache is the epitome of resiliency, with facial hair that goes against all current social trends. This non-conformist attitude is a bold proclamation of fearlessness that does not go unnoticed by those around him. The moustache can be shaven into different shapes and patterns whenever the moustache wearer sees fit. In essence, the moustache is the ultimate forum for exhibiting your innovative spirit to everyone you meet.
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I know it is much safer to go clean-shaven. Or if you do grow some facial hair, you can grow a big beard that tells everyone, “I’m too lazy to shave so I have a beard.” Or you can grow one of those little scruffy beards that aren’t beards at all. In this case, you’re saying, “Hey look, I copied that 5 o’clock shadow look that every Hollywood superstar and CK model has been doing for ten years.”
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Those are great options if you like to go unnoticed, melting into the walls like an old Pilate song. But that line of thinking isn’t going to help us right now. There’s no hiding behind a moustache. The primary message the moustache conveys is “Yes, I took the time and effort to shave this moustache, and I stand behind my work.”
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People envy this audacity. They sometimes even fear it, and their fear will manifest itself in the form of ridiculing you. But make no mistake about it, people respect you.
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Abraham Lincoln, Tom Selleck, Friedrich Nietzsche, Carl Winslow, Albert Einstein, Hulk Hogan – all these proud and illustrious men sported moustaches. They also represent bygone eras. Who has stepped up to fill the moustache void today, when the world so desperately needs it?
Nobody. And it’s time for a revolution.
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Listen, I know this sounds crazy. You’re afraid to shave your facial hair into a moustache. I was also afraid at first. Then I tried it once. I even cheated and played it off as an ironic moustache. But now I’ve been sporting a moustache for a full week - with no disclaimer and no apologies - and my life has improved dramatically. Flowers smell better, music sounds better, and I can often find food leftovers in my whiskers two to three hours after a meal. I never go hungry.
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We can revolutionize the way we consume energy, the cars we drive, the way we structure our businesses, and the way we interact with other nations. But it’s all going to have to start with the moustache.Â
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I don’t expect the Moustache Revolution to reach its tipping point overnight. We must ease into this until, slowly but surely, the moustache has become ubiquitous among the youth of Canada. That’s why the last Friday of every month will be Mandatory Moustache Friday around these parts.Â
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Start growing your beards now. On Friday June 26th, we will shave our way out of this recession, one moustache at a time.
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Godspeed.
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PS: Ladies, I am fully aware I have egregiously excluded you in this movement. If you are a hairy woman, feel free to join. Otherwise, send me an email at demersdj@gmail.com and let me know how you ladies can knock a couple teeth out of the recession.
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Alright listen up, people. You know the situation. We’re knee deep in a recession. We’re halfway down shit creek with a broken paddle, a couple of Lakers and a fishing rod with cigarette butts for bait. We’ve got economic stimulus packages to mend the mistakes that we still don’t have completely figured out. Something happened with the CDO’s or one of the other ABS’s, and the folks at NBC and CNN keep talking about how the CEO’s and CFO’s at HSBC and AIG are giving our canoe a nice kick.
The next little while? Oh, it’s not going to be pretty, and it is certainly no time for us to engage in the trivial frivolities of life. Fun is the new 80’s. It’s gone. Oh sure we can talk about fun in a similar fashion to how we reflect on the 80’s with nostalgic whimsy. Much like we say, “Hey, let’s listen to Boy George! He was popular in the 80’s!” we will now say, “Hey, remember when we used to throw frisbees! Those were fun!”
But such conversations will be the extent of our contact with fun, as a spiraling fragment of a dream vanishing into the recesses of our memory. For the era in which we find ourselves is a dark and winding path, and we know not what lies before us. I’m D.J. Demers, and I will lead us into the night.
Whoa. I have no idea what just happened there. I was watching “Puff the Magic Dragon”, then I started writing this article, and next thing I know, I’m talking like Hunter S. Thompson on an opiate trip.
Let’s clarify. I will not lead us into the night. I will definitely get lost. That much is certain. To be honest, I may not even have a concrete plan on where we’re going exactly. But I do know that we are going to have fun the whole way. I’ve had jobs that were no fun before. This ain’t gonna be one of them.
When I was chosen as the Summer Intern, Mandi and Jeremy actually put a clause in my contract that states, in their words, “if you don’t bring that funny stuff every day, you’re ass is grass.” I corrected Jeremy and told him that it should have been spelled “your” and not “you’re”. He promptly slapped me in the mouth. That’s when I realized they mean business. Fun must be had.
Sure, I’ll give you some money saving tips (guys: never buy drinks for girls at the bar) and some tips on how you can afford to go out and party (ladies: always get guys to buy your drinks), but we’ll also really take it to the recession by just forgetting about it.
So whaddaya say to hanging out with me for the next couple of months? Pull up a comfy chair and let’s play some guitar, pass our “Puff the Magic Dragon” Special Edition DVD between each other, and make it a summer to remember.
SCREW YOU RECESSION!
Your friend and comrade,
DJ
Sorry, one more thing. The last Friday of every month is mandatory moustache day. This is not a joke.
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The results are in and Waterloo’s D.J. Demers is the official Screw You Recession! Summer Intern. After having his video hand-picked as one of Richard Branson’s Fave Five and meeting with us live and in person, Demers is ready to jump head first into the Screw You Recession! world of blogs, cash-crunching, tip-gathering, and web-combing for the best recession news and cash-saving advice.
Stay tuned as D.J. starts making magic on Screw You Recession! starting next Monday morning.
But there’s more goodness. We were so pumped to see the skills, talent, hotness, and amazing creativity from some of our Summer Intern candidates that we decided we couldn’t let them go. That’s why we decided to build the Screw You Recession! Blog Army.
These guys are kickin ass and takin names. Joining D.J. in the crusade are some of your other favourite Summer Interns: George Panayotou, Thaddeus Bolton, Romi Levine, Lucas Meyer, Andrea Guernsey and Trevor McManus round out our gang of recession revolutionaries. They’ll be taking over the net with video blogs, recession tips, general money-saving craziness, and whatever other random goodness we fee like throwing your way.
Stay tuned. And if you’re the recession… take cover. Our first bombs drop next week.
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The first response I get from people when I ask how to get the best bang for your buck on a date is to hit up a buffet. In good concious, I can’t recommend this solution as I’m quite weary of the qaulity of food used in buffets and you should be to. There are far better options than stuffing yourself with the lowest grade of food possible. Plus, buffets are bloating and date killers.
As a generation, we have a habit of bringing back the old and making it new so my first suggestion is that we should start calling this the Summer of the Picnic. Picnics are a nostalgic throwback to earlier times when people enjoyed nature more and weren’t overburdened by a plehtora of fast food options. The picnic, more importantly, is a great way to save some serious money while not giving the impression that’s your main intention. I don’t have to tell you how much cheaper it is to buy you’re own food but if you need hard evidence, use the nifty calculator to the right to see how much you’d save over just a month if you started packing food from home whether its your daily meal or the many picnics you’re going to be having.
Of course, packing your own food or going on a picnic is not always possible so we need to tackle ‘going out’ solutions. The first piece of advice I’m going to give you isn’t that sexy but I assure you that its solid: research. The absolute worst question you can ask someone is “where do you want to eat?” Doing this makes you vulnerable to variables you cannot forsee and will almost always have you saying ” I’m not that hungry, this basket of bread is all I need”. So to avoid this unfortunate situation, use one of the many research tools online (e.g. Yelp, Urban Spoon, etc.) that will help you find a place that best suits your budget. Not only will this lead you to some great affordable options, but it will also give you some talking points after reading the review. The best date is often the smart date.
Finally, if you don’t have time to plan, steer the situation in your favor by suggesting that you play a game. The name of the game isn’t important but the general idea should be “let’s set a max spend for our date and see if we can make it under”. At first you might sound cheap but if you position it as “we’re so fun that we don’t really need to spend money to enjoy our time together”, you’ll be golden. Everyone likes a challenge and you’ll find yourselves uncovering new ways to have fun and eat out that you may have never considered before. All of a sudden, ordering water makes you more of a teamster than a cheap-o.
I’ve framed this piece for the dating crowd but any of these ideas will work with your friends. Naturally, having a picnic with a bunch of your dudes might feel odd but include a frisbee and you’ll put the ‘man’ back in ‘romantic’.
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A few weeks ago, I made the analogy that seeing a sporting event live is just not the same as watching it on TV and I immediately realized that it had been a while since I’d seen any sport live. I’m not alone, however, with attendance to sporting events declining by 40% during the recession. That’s a lot of un-eaten hot dogs (although, given the inputs to a hot dog, that’s probably a good thing). But therein lies part of the problem – when you factor in ticket prices, exorbitant concession prices and additional auxiliary charges like parking or foam fingers, a sporting event could run you some serious dime. It’s really a shame because there’s nothing quite like being intoxicated by the energy of an enthusiastic crowd and having a good laugh watching awkward couples kiss and dance for the cameras.
Kiss-cams aside, you’ll likely get plenty of excitement if you start looking at the minor league teams in your area. Sure it won’t be as skilled an affair but minor league players are essentially playing for their professional livelihood so there’s always a sense of urgency in their game. This always seems to overcome a lack of skill. What I also really enjoy about minor league sports is that you don’t need to spend much time lamenting about how much the players are earning. That might sound petty but seeing a guy strike out three times and get paid more than your annual salary to do it can really sting at a time like this. For the record, Alex Rodriguez makes $37,145.65 per at bat. Nuff Said.
Speaking of baseball, if you happen to be living near the Big Smoke, the Blue Jays are back and are providing a highly entertaining brand of baseball. Going to a Jays game has those expensive concession issues, but you can get tickets for as low as 12.00 and enjoy the day sitting in the sun sipping on your flask. Okay, so I’m not encouraging you to bring a flask because it’s not allowed but for the sake of painting a vision, let’s roll with that.  Addressing a more national audience, the CFL will be back soon and from what I found, it’s a good and cheap time. As I write this, it’s dawned on me that it would be really helpful is someone created a site that aggregated cheap sporting events (any takers?).
If spending money is entirely out of the question, the next best option is to do it yourself. There’ s nothing more free and probably gratifying than throwing the Frisbee or ball around with your friends at the park or making new friends by checking out sport networking sites like Sportaholik. With gym memberships on the decline, you’ll be surprised to find that many people are hungry for free opportunities to be active and social at the same time.
Speaking of hungry, I’m getting there but this toonie in my pocket isn’t going to get me very far….or will it? I think I have my idea for next week, see you all then.
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We’ve posted about Nic Vargas before, but over at The Whitworthian this juniour English major is writing some completely hilarious stuff. It’s like written sunshine.
Click here to check out “Recession Is Just A Fancy Word For Recess”, but for now here’s a little taste where Vargas, after applying for a scholarship that wasn’t really a scholarship, wonders about all the things he could afford if he wasn’t paying for school. It made me pee a little.
At the top, I’ve also included a picture of a woman eating a computer. Haven’t we all felt like that some days… particularly right before lunch time?
“When I found out that I probably wouldn’t win the scholarship, in no small part due to the fact that it didn’t exist, I started to wonder what I could buy if I didn’t attend Whitworth next year…
- Every 1st edition Pokemon card: Oh come on, don’t tell me you wouldn’t. Unless you wouldn’t. In which case I wouldn’t either, because that’s totally lame.Â
- One front-row ticket to a Demi Lovato concert: Have I heard her music? No. Would I like any of it if I did? Of course not. Why then would I pay to go to her concert? The answer is simple, really: life is fleeting but Disney Channel Pop Divas are forever. And what if she looked right at me?!Â
- A pool filled with hamsters: Honestly, close your eyes and imagine a warm fuzzy pool of living organisms. Most people only want to jump in a pool filled with Jell-O. That’s cool too.Â
- A Jetpack: At one point in your life you’re going to have to ask yourself another important question: “What is more durable in an economic crisis: a Jetpack or a diploma?” The answer is simple: Jetpacks are made out of metal.”
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