Happy New Year: Diary of a Cheapskate

Happy Cheap, er, New Year.

Actually, as I write this, 2008 is still a few days off. But you know us frugal types. We like to plan ahead and save. In fact, I’ve been holding this New Year’s wish in reserve since 1998.

I’ve also gotten a head-start on my resolutions. There are only three, because I firmly believe that anything more would just cheapen (you should pardon the term) the seriousness of the undertaking.

Resolved:

1. I will never again try to buy a pizza oven.

2. I will never again prematurely brag all over the Internet about my plans for an “All-Cash Christmas.”

3. If I ever accidentally screw up and commit No. 2 again, I will not screw up and commit No. 1 again. And vice-versa.

Loyal readers will recall how I gloated here last month about my fiendishly brilliant holiday spending scheme. Actually, it was more like a non-spending scheme. In any event, to save time (and to spare anyone the trauma of trying to type “Vejnoska” into the search field), allow me to summarize:

“I’m so smart and you’re not. The last yam has barely slid down Grandpa’s windpipe at Thanksgiving and the whole world is off, credit cards in hand, to spend money they don’t actually have on holiday gifts nobody really needs so the mail will bring them whopping bills they can’t possibly pay. But not me! This year I’m going to pay cash-as-I-go for everything, thereby avoiding all unpleasant post-holiday surprises, and, by the way, revolutionizing life as we know it. Did I mention that I’m so smart and you’re not?”

Or something like that. The exact words don’t matter as much as the end result, which … well, that doesn’t really matter either.

Groan, I know. I sound like some sleazy hairsplitting politician. Speaking of which, my platform is that there is something deeply, deeply wrong with this country. Starting with the fact that some of my efforts to pay good old American greenbacks this month were as well received as if Fidel Castro had bought the Statue of Liberty and replaced the torch with a hand rolled Cuban cigar.