Have you ever seen the TLC show, Extreme Couponing? Well, I'm not that "extreme", but I am couponing!
A few days ago, I was watching TLC, because, honestly, who doesn't love those crazy shows...but, anyways, an Extreme Couponing marathon was on, and I decided to watch one episode. ONE episode.
At first I thought it was preposterous, cutting up zillions of coupons and then doing math...(ewwww math) to figure out how to get things for free, and to get things half off. It just seemed so time consuming. The episode I was watching was about a girl named Jamie. She talked all about her family, and about how much toilet paper they go through, and things like that. Then it showed her in her "couponing" room, which was filled with file cabinets everywhere. After that, she went to the grocery store. She shopped around, and for everything she had a coupon for, she snatched up as much as possible. Then, she raced over to the overly nice cashier, handed her over 1,000 coupons, had a little problem, but then it was resolved by the manager being called. After all of that, the cashier says, "Your total comes to $1,902.63 without coupons..." then takes a dramatic pause, and continues.."and after coupons it come to, $103.72."
WHAAAAT?!?!??
How in God's name does that happen...?!? Saving over $1,000 on groceries, seriously?!? That doesn't even sound possible. Who even buys over $1,000 worth of groceries!
After all the congratulating, and the (seeming effortless) putting away of the groceries, they show her huge stock pile and show how they have enough mustard to last them a million life times. It is a seriously crazy show.
Well, I am not writing to tell you that I saved over $1,000 on groceries, or that I have enough mustard to last me until the end of time. I am writing to tell you that I was an extreme couponer.
This morning I woke up because, got the coupons from the back of the news paper that usually end up in the trash, and started cutting them out. I felt inspired! First I started cutting every single coupon out, thinking "Hey! Let's just get it!", then realising my mom probably wouldn't let me save $1.00 of blue hair dye. So, then I started reading the coupons and thinking, reasonably, if it was worth it.
After several cuttings later, I had all the coupons cut out and ready to go. I have never wanted to go grocery shopping this bad before.
My mom and I got camera ready (just in case we did save big! That way we were already ready for the camera crews) Duuuuhhhh. Then, we head out for our journey. Every aisle we entered we would grab a coupon, grab the item, and then high-five.
After all the coupon cutting, and all the high-fiving, we ended up saving a little over $80.00 on groceries! It was insane!
Saving $80.00 on groceries is not as good as $1,000, but I am just an Extreme Couponer in training.
