Your cheapest moment

Surely we've all done things where we've looked/acted cheap. Let's hear them. Here's mine (this came up as conversation among friends recently):

At a bar for my friend Jennie's 21st. I open my wallet for a $4 shot I just ordered for Jennie...and find $3. So, while the bartender has her back to me, I take a $1.50 tip someone left and suddenly I have $4, plus a 50 cent tip.

I guess I could call that a Creed Bratton moment.

 

I used to go to a lot of record release parties. Some rep from the label would wander the room distributing drink tickets. But never enough. They'd give you five at a time. A soda would cost you one ticket; a beer two; and anything with liquor was three. Solution: I went to a party supply store and bought a roll of red, blue, and green tickets. Cost me about $12.00 and I had all the free drinks I wanted at those parties for years.

 

Well, when I was in college I switched a price tag for a pair of jeans at the Salvation Army thrift store. They cost 2.99, I got them for 99 cents.

My cheapest, and least proud moment. I'm sure that two bucks went for beer though, so it was worth it.

BEAT THAT!!!!!

 

Went to a friend's bachelor party and ended up at a strip club. I only had $50 or $60 on me, so I wasn't trying to do anything more than hang out with the fellas and have fun. I sat down next to some of our people who were at the stage, and a stripper crawls over and shakes her tits in my face. I didn't have and $1 bills, and that sure as hell wasn't worth a fiver. So I just throw up a sheepish grin and shrug my shoulders, and she crawls on to the next guy.

 

That's your cheapest moment? When I was in college, doing that was practically a right of passage.

My cheapest moment turned out to change my life. I took future Mrs. Bubbler on a date when I was in college. I think I had perhaps $15 in my bank account, but I felt the need to take her out, so I "swanked out" and took her to the four-star Sizzler franchise in Muncie. I let her order whatever she wanted and I got a salad or something to economize.

When I got the bill, I realized there was no way I could leave a tip. No wanting to look like the asshole I clearly was, I left the waitress a note profusely apologizing for not being able to leave a tip. Somehow, future Mrs. Bubbler saw it, and I was embarassed.

Turns out she was touched and thought it said a lot about me as a person (little did she know).

It's all been uphill from Sizzler since.

 

Gave copyrunner a handful of loonies, quarters and dimes to pay for my dinner one night at the Sun.

It's all I had! Damn Sun pays like shit and I was living paycheque to paycheque in a major metro area. What did they expect?

I kind of felt bad for the kid, though ... I got yelled at by a higher-up, who said 'you know, you people make a helluva lot more money than he does.'

I almost choked on my water when he said that. If I was making a 'helluva lot more' than the copyrunner was ... shoot ... that poor bastard.

 

At a GAP outlet store, there was a really nice sweater on sale for something like 9.99. I took a price tag off something nearby and made it 2.99. It was a really nice sweater, and they didn't have a clue. Makes up for some of the overpriced stuff I've bought from them regularly.

 

Oh shoot, yeah, I've switched boxes at the Shoe Warehouse a couple of times, too.

 

Until I met my wife, every towel I owned was swiped from a hotel...

 

I went out with a girl three times.

Her cost of going out with me: Zero.

My cost: about $200.

After the third date, it was clear she was just using me to have fun out on the town. I called her on it and sent her a PayPal invoice for half.

 

Wow... That's pretty bad... Dating was the one place where I was never, ever cheap.