1. I LIVE BY ONE RULE: BE THE CHANGE YOU WANT TO SEE IN THE WORLD.
I used to be somewhat of a different person, but after working customer service and managing an absentee owner's business, slowly becoming away of how abusive he was due to what I believe are sexist and racist traits, I learned that, no, the customer is not always right (nor is the boss), But the customer is always a human, walking a path you don't know, and maybe a smile and a kind word is something that will change their day, even if just for a moment, That is who I try to be. I'll go out of my way to do random acts of kindness.. I, alone, cannot change the world, but I can do my part by being the change I want to see. And hope it inspires others,
02. DO NOT FEAR THE $1.25 store! (I call Dollar Tree that, as dislike their false advertising, as they tacked $0.25 on to everything, but I can be that way. But I love the store. WHY? Oh... let me count the ways... as long as you do not go on weekends and hit what I call "the sweet spot" -- when you won't be in line for an hour, you can find essentials for $1.25. And many things have multiple purposes if you are open to out of the box solutions – for example, they sell plain white poster board, which I need for sublimation printing, for $0.50 per sheet -- Staples charges $5.95 for five sheets of the exact same thing.
I keep a spreadsheet of the least expensive stores to buy every single thing on earth that we need here, and can help you with that, as well.
03. GOODRX IS NOT A SCAM. YOUR INSURANCE MIGHT BE.
GoodRX took one single prescription from $120/month co-pay at CVS with insurance to $16/month with GoodRX..
Navigating our healthcare is quite a burden, and one I have come to understand. Our providers rely on us to not read statements, or forget something -- I go back to a female friend who spent three years battling a mis-coded charge by her doctor that her insurance (and while I generally have issues with how stubborn insurance companies can be) refused to pay - because they billed her for a prostate exam which is impossible to do on a biological womam, but the office would not admit to their mistake, and kept billing her, her insurance kept saying "we won't pay this" -- even though they very well knew it was mis-coded.
It was absurd. And I have seen far worse.
04. YOUR AESTHETIC IS YOUR AESTHETIC. I respect that. I wanted to share before and after photos, but I don't do that at client's homes. Since moving into the house where I live, I have learned many of my more "handyman" like skills, A lot can be done on a small budget. (Are you sensing a trend here? Saving money?) I wanted to use photos, but we have a unique, shared aesthetic. To give our kitchen depth, I spent many hours outlining brown cabinets that had no paint damage with leopard print duct tape (we both like it). Since the bathroom was the same brown, I re-painted everything blue, added blue rugs, and incorporated pink, all based off me re-purposing a shawl I had as a curtain -- which is a galaxy with those two predominant colors -- and then working from there. I organized a pantry with all products front-facing, organized cleaning supplies the same way, made small closets suddenly 3x larger. I make things work
Tell me your needs, I will find a way, And often, I will shock you, since I am used to living on a shoestring budget, with "okay that comes from Five Below, no problem...." or “wait - you need ten binders? Put down your phone, no Amazon, no Staples - I am going to the $1.25 store on Thursday and that will get you ten different colors, just like the one I am using right here, for the same price as one.”
I adapt to you, and while I always try to work with the least expensive options (that are not shoddy garbage), I do not force anything on you, since I work for you, and as I said, I am highly adaptable.
I have many more little tricks and “life hacks,” but I'm not giving away my secrets for free. Would you?
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