Grocery Bills

[Cairnhill]

Recycling is a joke and a fraud.  Only idiots believe that recycling is saving the environment.

It depends on what you're recycling, and how developed is the recycling infrastructure.

Recycling newspaper, aluminum, and glass has long been an economically sound practice. Recycling more expensive metals like copper, nickel and steel are even more cost effective.

Plastic is probably break-even with a well developed infrastructure, but the cost of developing that infrastructure is either out of reach or not cost-effective for underdeveloped countries or very small ones.

I agree. It really depends on what you are recycling and how you are conserving energy. There are cheap ways of recycling and there are "fancy" ways of recycling.

For me, I use electricity when its necessary. I have friends who turn on every air-con at home, including rooms that nobody are inside. I have also seen friends (including my maid!) who turn on the air-con and the fan, both at the same time. Seriously, Singapore maybe humid, but I don't think you need to adjust the temperature to be 10degrees right?

Other miscellenous stuff includes
- turning off power points that I don't use, i.e. hair-dryer, speakers, microwave, coffee-maker, etc
- use fancy looking glass bottles to store water
- washing my clothes only when there is a full load (instead of everyday with a half load)
etc

[From "Now come on"]

"After our maid left our grocery bills also dropped..." How could this happen? Didn't your maid show receipts after she shopped?? How was she paying? I have a rough idea of how much the shopping will cost, give my maid slightly more than that in case I've forgotten something - she returns with the receipt and change. There's no way the grocery bill would differ by that much if she left!

Yes, it could happen. We usually asked the maid what is running short and what to buy. Seems like foodstuff and washing powder are being used up in a hurry. What happens is that the maid would be passing the foodstuff, daily necessities to other maids, or sell them cheap to foreign construction workers nearby.

Well, I'm amazed that anyone could allow this to happen in their home. I know what's in the fridge, what the maid buys and how it's used. I can't believe people's claims!  I would notice straight away. If you as someone said "can't be arsed" then more fool you!

[SAE]

"use fancy looking glass bottles to store water"


and this helps the environment!! How? 

BTW I get the glass bottles I just loved the 'fancy looking' part.

[have to say.....]

I was wondering why the bottles had to be fancy looking too 

[Cairnhill]

I was wondering why the bottles had to be fancy looking too 

Well, my bf drinks only sparkling water and I don't still water (or boiled water). Most sparkling water comes in fancy looking bottles and I just keep them to store my boiled water. Simple as that.

No need to buy a separate jug to store my water.

[lippter]

For my fiance and me it comes to a little over 200 a week not including alcohol... add another 150 if it includes wine and/or beer; we eat breakfast at home almost every day, lunch out, and dinner at home about 3 times a week. I can totally see the bills coming up to a minimum of 700 a week if we had kids and a helper, especially since it means that kids would eat at home a lot more, and we'd probably have dinner at home most days a week if we had kids.

[jalanperak]

PS:  must use butter.  Margarine is the pure trans-fat and a fast-track to coronary heart disease.

Ahh - something Kubes and I agree on!

When I was splitting my time between the US and Singapore and living in serviced apartments, the first thing I'd do upon arrival (culinarily, that is), is clarify 1/2 kilo of butter. That would last me the month, as long as I didn't make buffalo wings more than once or twice :-)

[buginbugis]

just me and the maid and she does most of the shopping.  i give her 100 day and let her deal with it.  i hategrocery shoppig... the prices drive me nuts - it's 7-eleven for me if i ever need to supplement what she buys.