Mindful Consumerism: Weeks 2 and 3 Update #ShopSmallLiveBig
Yes, I’m a week and a day late on posting the updates. I'm sorry about that and I will be more diligent about getting them up on time in the future. No, I haven’t given up on my principles yet... for the most part.
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Week 2 Update
This week, I made several large-and-small-scale purchases including groceries and a truck. If any of you know my personal struggle, you know that I have not owned a car in almost 3 years. I bought a $400 truck the other day that does not run well yet but after another $200 or so it should make a good daily driver for me. Stay tuned to see how I handle the insurance situation after I get on the road. I bought it used from a guy here in town and it doesn’t get much more small-scale than that.
I also drove an hour away with a friend this weekend to take care of some personal business and while we were there she took me to a little grocery store in Kentland, Indiana, called Murphy’s Food King. This is a very small, locally-owned grocery store that serves this community well. I was more than pleased with the selection of both fresh food and dry staples. I stocked up on both. I ended up getting about two weeks of food for about $80. I have found that because I have these new dietary restrictions, coupled with the fact that I am doing this experiment, not only does it cost less to feed me over all but I’ve actually lost weight because I’m not convenience-snacking.
I have bought some small things like meals from restaurants and some daily necessities from local convenience stores in addition candies other two major purchases but they are hardly worth mentioning.
The only thing that I did that could be considered cheating was buying five dollars worth of gas at a franchised gas station in the middle of rural Indiana when we ran out of gas. I see that an unavoidable expenditure and we only got enough fuel to get us to the next family-owned gas station. I was feeling pretty guilty about it at first, but I checked with the parent company and found that it is the only store owned by a local family in that community and even though I said I wouldn’t support franchised locations, it helps to soften the blow.
Week 3 Update
This week has seen a lot of restaurant expenses. I have been working a ton of hours and had some health issues which both result in my unwillingness to cook my own food. I've got some recent dietary restrictions I'm having to work around so I've eaten a lot of Mexican, Chinese, and Japanese food. There is one American restaurant in the area that is a locally owned chain unique to Indiana that I have decided to allow which caters to a wide variety of dietary restrictions. They were a life-saver one night and I am really excited to have found a place to eat that doesn't require me to consume huge amounts of rice.
In other news, I found a locally-owned natural foods store called Sun Spot near where I work. They have a wide variety of unusual "health" foods, many of which are non-GMO and/or are locally-produced. It is a little bit on the expensive side but I plan to add them to the rotation when I can't get to other retailers that are a bit easier on my wallet. I hope to get a Small-Business Showcase video going for them sooner rather than later.
[Image from pexels.com - CC0 Public Domain]