This is a post about something that sucks. It sucks, I hate it, and everyone else hates it too. But I care about you guys, so I am going to use tough love, and tell you something you know is true, but really don't wanna hear:

When money is tight, give up your vices.

It's so obvious, and I don't know a lot of people with the self-control to do it, but you should do it. If something is expensive and unnecessary and also totally bad for your body, then cut it out of your budget. If something you love is illegal, subject to sin taxes, or has "partially hydrogenated anything among it's ingredients, just let it the fuck go. Seriously, it's that simple, and that difficult.

Don't let this be you

Home Made Gifts Part 1: The Mixtape.

I love mixtapes.

I love that they are totally cliché and 80's and and that it's impossible to give somebody one without seeming like a totally dorky seventh grader. I love how the good ones take forever to make and how evident it is when one has been carefully crafted and is completely heartfelt. And, most importantly, I firmly believe that there is nothing that will win over an arty, nerdy girl quicker than a good mixtape.

However, there are rules, you guys. None of this Put-Your-iTunes-On-Shuffle-And-Call-It-Good bullshit. The following is a list of guidelines, carefully collected during my teen years from snobby music friends, High Fidelity, Naomi and Ely's No Kiss List and personal experience

Clementine's Mixtape Code of Conduct

• Be careful of the tracklist. Start with a great song, one to engage the listener, and then top it. 
• While presentation is important, but a mixtape need not be on an actual tape. 
• Be careful with two songs back to back that are of different genres, make sure they compliment each other. 
• A good title is a must. 
• No two songs from the same band 
• Liner notes are not a must, but their omission is frowned upon 
• There should be a theme, or a driving point. If the mixtape is an attempt to woo, the relationship between you and the person you are trying to woo is an acceptable theme. 
• A good mix is like a letter, it requires drafts

PRICE: about 20 cents for a blank CD

Two things: Yesterday, on my way to work it started hailing, which is not at all conducive to biking down hill safely. Long story short my bike's fender is dented and my glasses snapped completely in half.
 On a much happier note, Hank Green of the vlogbrothers is doing a show tonight here in Portland, and I am so freakin stoked  I’ma let him do the blog thing today:

Wasn’t that helpful? Now go get yourself some cool frames so you can look as good as this kid:

RIP Hipster Ray-Bans, you will be missed.

A Message To Loved Ones:

My little sister came up to visit me today, and brought with her enough dry and canned food to fully stock a Cold War-era fallout shelter. The provisions were a gift from my mother, who is very sweet and apparently very worried that I'm going to starve.

Mom, I know I have a blog about living cheaply, but I swear I'm ok!

A Lesson I Must Repeat To Myself Over And Over…

Dear Clementine,

If you have limited money to spend on food, DO NOT spend it on chocolate sweets that have literally no nutritional value.

Love,
Clementine

Seriously, how many times must I go over this with me?

I want you, I want you so ba-a-a-a-ad.

I can go six months without a cheeseburger, but I crave sugar and butterfat on the freakin’ daily. When my resolve weakens, I try to go with something cheap and small, and in the brief time my stash lasts, I am totally happy and satiated. Then as soon as it’s gone my eyes gleam red and I'm like: "WHO FINISHED THIS? IF THIS BAG IS NOT REPLENISHED IMEDIATELY HEADS WILL ROLL!” 

My new fix is candy that I can in bulk that I can ration out over the course of a week. My favorite is dark-chocolate covered almonds from New Seasons, which cost $5.99 a pound ($1.00 for the almonds, $4.99 for how liberal and bourgeois you feel shopping at New Seasons)

PRICE: $4.99-$7.99 a pound, depending on what you get.

For those of you that don’t know, I’m putting myself through school working as a canvasser. So if you’ve ever slammed the door on some too-perky, crunchy 20-something who was standing on your porch and asking if you had a minute for the environment or gay rights or whatever, that might’ve been me! It’s cool though, I forgive you. I know we’re annoying but I swear we matter. Canvassing is one of the most expensive ways to campaign, groups wouldn’t do it if it wasn’t effective.

Anyways, despite the fact that I spent 5 hours a day outside all winter, I love my job. I love going to work knowing that 3 or 4 times that day, I’ll get to talk to really awesome, selfless people who are passionate about their beliefs.

There are a lot of great ways to support causes that don’t involve money, but money definitely helps. Think of how much it costs to keep you going for a month, and then guess how much it would cost to give an entire office of people the recourses to work full time fighting for what they believe in. Expensive, right? See what I mean?

Take the Human Rights Campaign, for example, because they’re my favorite.

HRC is the nation’s largest gay and lesbian civil rights group. Currently they’re working to repeal DOMA, the Defense of Marriage Act, and working to make gay marriage legal at the federal level. Like most groups, the best way to support HRC is through their monthly giving program, which starts at $5 a month. It takes 5 minutes to sign up on their website for an automatic transfer every month from a checking or credit card account.

The monthly giving program is so rad, you guys. Not only does it make it easier to contribute when you live month to month, like most young people do, but you’re also giving your ongoing support not just to fighting DOMA, but the other badass stuff they do too, like ending work place discrimination (Did you know it’s legal in 38 states to fire someone soley for being transgendered? How fucked is that!?)

Baller Gay Messenger Bag

Also, members get sent this baller gay messenger bag. And on that note if you’re into Cool Gay Swag, their website has a whole CGS section, where 100% of the proceeds go to the cause. Hey-O!

Ok, my soap box and I are done here. As you were.

Price: monthly giving starts at $5 a month
Where: http://www.hrc.org/

My biography

Top 5 Reasons Why A Bike Is A Viable Alternative To A Car
5. Faster: Depending on how far you have to go, a bike can actually be faster, especially in Portland, where "we ride bikes, or double-decker bikes!"
4. Fun: Two days a week I get up at 6AM to go to class, and I freaking hate it. I wake like the Kraken and spend a few minutes lying in bed, debating the relative merits of flunking out of school so I could sleep for another hour. My morning is seriously improved by going down hills really fast on my bike. Simple pleasures, man.
3. Environment: I'm a college student who makes a living fundraising for non-profits, so obviously I am a totally eco-friendly gaywad. Cars are the primary cause of air pollution, and little changes like biking to and from work can really help decrease your carbon footprint.
2. Health: Biking is a great way to work exercise into your daily life. Or in my case, justify having a brownie with lunch. That makes me sound like a Cathy cartoon, Ack! Whatever, it’s true.
1. Cost: Let’s not forget the point of this blog. A bike is cheaper than a car, you don’t pay insurance on a bike, and you don't put gas in it.

Cute too, right?

Price: $300

Where: http://www.raleighusa.com/

I swear to God I will write about real, basic things soon, like budgeting and groceries and alleviating The Crushing Debt I Will Be Under When I Finish School, but right now, whatever, I’m not in the mood.

I want to talk about shoes.

In high school the only shoes I ever wore were cheap, insanely beat-up pumps with 5-inch heels that I never paid more than $20 for. Now I have a job where I spend 5 hours a day outside walking, so I have to wear rainboots and Uggs and other mad expensive shoes that are totally hit-and-miss in terms of quality, but that’s a whole other post.

I still really, really love dirt cheap stilettos, and I fully rock them on my days off. Today I am wearing black Lollipop Slingback Heels that I bought on sale at Forever 21. Completely gratuitous and absurd to wear during the day? Absolutely. But I feel so fancy!

Thing is, pumps under $20 are constructed of manmade materials with narrow toe boxes that can leave you with those gross jellyfish-shaped blisters on your feet and crazy sore ankles.

I get all weird and hardcore when it comes to high heels, but I know they’re not for everyone. If you want the height without all of the pain and you can spare a little more time and money, you can opt for more expensive brands with more comfort and support. Places like Ross Dress for Less and TJ Maxx can be varied and unreliable, but I can usually find kick-ass sparkly Nine West or Jessica Simpson shoes knocked down from $150 to about $40, and those  not only last longer but are super fun and flirty and make me feel like a cool, cinematized, Manic Pixie Dream Girl version of myself.

Mcfuck yeah

Price: $9.99 for the slingbacks at www.forever21.com
Good for: Short girls, girls who like shiny stuff.

When I lived in a dorm, my roommate decorated her walls with a totally awesome collection of foreign movie posters. My favorite was a giant pink ad for Lars and the Real Girl in Danish that hung on our closet. From my bed, it was the first thing I saw when I woke up in the morning (a fun if super weird way to start my day).

I thought her idea was so cool and original it must have been really expensive too, but no! Turns out ladyface bought them on amazon.com for like, no dollars. For my new place I just bought a french Amelie windowcard and a Magritte print and even with shipping it was less than $10. I feel so freaking savvy, you guys.

Good for: Anyone with walls.

Price/Location:Preview

Books!

I'm a reader. My mother is an editor, my Dad is a musician, and they raised nerdy, sensitive daughters who buy hardbacks and like comic books. Luckily, Portland is a book lover's dream: Lots of drizzly, Bronte-esque weather, independent coffee shops, and of course, Powell's.

Powell's literally takes up an entire city block in the Southwest. It's huge, and whenever I go in there I feel like Augustus Gloop in the Chocolate River. It's the largest independent bookstore in the world too, so you get to feel all cool and local when you frequent it.

Almost every classic book is in the public domain, which means you can almost always buy a used paperback copy for super cheap, I bought a really pretty edition of Shakespeare's sonnets there for 95 cents, and this copy of Anna Karenina was also hella reasonable for being like 8,000 pages long.

Price: $3 for Anna Karenina, rarely more than $5 for a used paperback.

Good for: Yourself, the nerd or student in your life.

Location: http://www.powells.com/ or any of the stores in the Portland area, but especially the flagship store.

Bringing Your Own Lunch

My senior year of high school I had a black lunch box decoupaged with pictures of Broadway star Chita Rivera  (I know, I know, I super lame in high school. If possible possible I'm even lamer now) as well as a Campbell's soup thermos. I basically had them because I felt so quaint and adorable with my little lunch box, and it totally rocked until tragically I left it at a bus stop one day, never to be seen again.

ANYWAYS...

At my work it is pretty near impossible to eat out for lunch and not spend like $12 on coffee and a sandwich, which is obvs. not in my budget. So remembering my ChitaBox, I went to House of Vintage and bought these:

It's a freaking Wonder Woman lunch box and matching thermos, you guys. How adorable is that?
This cost $25 dollars, but if you are a reasonable person who is not obsessed with the hipster cachet of being a grownup with a little kid lunch box, you can buy a plain one for less money anywhere.

Since I am not a together enough person to set aside 20 minutes to make my lunch every day, I make a week's worth of pasta or rice Monday mornings,
mix that with frozen vegetables and whatever meat is on sale that week to stretch it out and make it more filling. That, some sliced carrots, an apple and a thermos full of tea and I am not only super full but I have only spent like, $4 on that entire meal. Ace.

Price: $35-$10 depending on what you want.
You save: about $40 a week by not eating out all the time.

An Introduction!

Hello You Guys,

Although technically their are no guys (or gals, or guy/gals)  reading this, I have faith that it will grow and this will be useful in retrospective.

I'm a student in Portland, Oregon paying the cost of living as well as tuition with the money make at my part-time job. Money is hella tight. That said, I'm also 19 and a romantic, and spend a lot of time trying to live out indie romantic comedy fantasies where my cool vintage self is sitting in a coffee shop and Jesse Eisenberg walks past and falls in love with my charm.

THAT SAID, While I am on a budget, In this weird gray area between when I am a kid and i have to start behaving like a Responsible Adult, I want to have a blasty blast but still, like, be able to pay rent and utilities every month. What little disposable income I have, I want to stretch. And I'm definitely not alone.

So I started a blog.

Love,
Clementine