Last night I was watching a show on Extreme Couponing and I was completely enthralled.
These people were able to walk up to the check out lanes with over $1000 worth of groceries and walk away spending somewhere around $.06 or less.
Much like with food and weight gain, anytime I walk into a grocery store, I'm pretty sure they charge me $100 immediately just for LOOKING at the food. The idea of couponing seems like a great idea, but I question how great of an idea it would be for ME- especially since, when I saw the extreme couponers (ECs, if you will) walking around with briefcases full of coupons, my immediate thought was, “Ooo, and I could get a pink one! Maybe Coach makes one I could buy with all my savings!”
Yeah, wouldn't work for me.
Its a lot like how I am with dieting. I lose 3 pounds and I think to myself, “Awesome! Now I can eat that whole cheesecake!” Or worse, I go walking for a half an hour, don't even weigh myself, and think, “Ya know, I should reward myself for my effort.” And off I go to buy a pint of Ben and Jerry's.
I'd really like the benefit of using coupons, but I'm just not that dedicated to the cause. Every time I heard one of the ECs say how long they would spend clipping coupons and getting ready to go on their shopping trips, all I could think of was, “I'm tired just from listening to this- I need a break”, and off I would go to make a cup of coffee and relax.
Shouldn't I get brownie points for WANTING to save money?
I know I sound naïve, shallow, what have you, but I'm not. The idea of being able to spend -$50 on 10 carts of groceries sounds amazing, but it also sounds exhausting because at the end of the day, I would have to do that shopping trip with a 10 year old, a 4 year old, and a 4 month old. While trying to figure out how many tubes of toothpaste I have to buy to save $7, I would end up hearing why my 10 year old wants one he saw on TV and my 4 year old wants the one with Thomas the Train on it- neither of which, I'm sure, would give me bonus bucks or whatever. While trying to get the necessary amounts of Gatorade to save $1000, I would have to listen to my 10 year old tell me that he doesn't like Gatorade, he likes Powerade, and my 4 year old would be asking me for Twizzlers... because he saw them as we shopped in the candy aisle when I went to buy the 1000 packs of gum to save $2000 off my purchase, but I wouldn't buy them for him because it might cause my shopping trip to equal out to $.05 when I didn't bring a nickel with me...
I'm getting tired just writing this.
In the end, couponing to save money for MY family wouldn't work BECAUSE of MY family.
Or maybe I'm against it because I'm lazy.
Yeah, there's always that.
