She's sick of using her noodle

I'm so sick of noodles I could scream. Ramen noodles. Generic chicken noodle soup (a voodoo priestess waves a chicken over a bowl of hot water and throws in one noodle). Macaroni noodles.

When this depression/recession/frustration is over, I'm stocking my freezer with nothing but red meat and I'm not eating another noodle until they find some way to make it taste like a T-bone.

Like everybody else, hubby and I are facing some income and other financial setbacks, so we're doing what we can to pinch pennies. One of those sacrificial victims has been the grocery list, which means I'm having to do the shopping. My husband, bless his heart, thinks you economize by buying store brand ice cream instead of Breyer's. It simply doesn't occur to him that ice cream is not a necessity.

He has tunnel vision when it comes to the meat department, too. The man's eyes simply do not see hamburger. Pork tenderloin, sure. Beef roast, absolutely. But good old plebeian hamburger, which may not be cheap but doesn't require a second mortgage, simply does not make a blip on his radar screen.

We compromise on chicken -- leg quarters, anyway. I'm also blackballing chicken when that lottery ticket comes through for me, unless they can find a way to make it taste like a T-bone.

Those who aren't feeling the hard times simply don't have a clue. Every time my 10-year-old brings home something from school, I wince because I know it's something that's going to cost me money. The latest scam -- I mean fundraising project -- is where they take my son's art, frame it, then sell it to me for $30. Excuse me?

To quote my favorite columnist -- I am not making this up.

I could even go for this if the school got all the money, but the school only gets 20 percent. I'll just send them the $6 and let my husband frame Buzz's artwork.

Tight budgets are more than frustrating -- they wear down your spirit. You feel exhausted and heartbroken and hopeless and exhausted ... but then again, that could just be the noodle diet.

So I've come up with some more budget-crunchers to get us over the economic hump slump.

My 16-year-old is now limited to only two showers a day instead of his usual four (Must keep the HAIR pretty!) and he can only spend 5 minutes in there instead of his usual 22. I know it's 22 minutes he usually spends because that's exactly how long it takes the hot water to run out and I get the shower after he does.

The 10-year-old must now use his crayons more than once before breaking them, losing them, eating them, or melting them in the microwave.

The husband must recognize mac and cheese as a viable entree, not just a side dish.

The wife now only buys her books at That Bookstore, where she can get three paperbacks for about the same price as one new one. By the way, That Bookstore fans, if any of you have finished the 14th Stephanie Plum book ...

I would just go to the library but I'm kind of a Scrooge when it comes to books. I don't like giving them up once I get my greedy little paws on them.

We've thought about more drastic measures, too.

We could convert the oldest son's 1973 VW microbus to rental property. It's got more space than my first dorm room did. (Unless anybody wants to buy it ...)

We could move in with Grandpa. (This option is only available when they pry my cold, stiff fingers off my own door knob and cart me away. I love my father-in-law, but ... I could live with the waking at dawn and the dogs and chickens and bees -- but no cable TV?)

We could pick up aluminum cans for money. Hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha! I can't even get my bunch to pick up socks.

My husband suggested surrogate childbearing, at which point I and my on-the-verge-of-the-change body just snickered and said, "You go ahead."

Because it's illegal to sell body parts on eBay, that wiped out a whole other list of ideas, and I still haven't gotten any bids on my husband's wine cork collection.

Of course, the one decision we had to make was to quit smoking. I've got the last pack in my car as I speak and from here on out, it's a tobacco-free life. I'm sure my coworkers will be thrilled to hear this, because our editor, John Philleo, is also quitting. Won't the newsroom be fun for a while? I could almost feel sorry for them, but I'm sure, as the nicotine withdrawal kicks in, I'll be feeling much sorrier for myself.

Maybe the home office ought to take what little money there is in petty cash and buy the poor non-smokers flak jackets and a survival training seminar.

We figured out how much money we would save by quitting and I'm thrilled.

It's almost enough to pay for that T-bone.

­-- Mary Reeves is a staff writer for the Times-Gazette. She can be reached by e-mail at mreeves@t-g.com.