Buy nothing but food for a month: Could you do it?

This month's "Outside" magazine has an article, written as numbered sections, about simplifying your life, essentially to limit stress. One of the challenges is to not buy anything for a month, other than food (including alcohol). No clothes. No movie tickets. No gear. (The piece openly acknowledges that the magazine's M.O. is peddling gear porn to the equivalent of crack addicts.) No tickets.

It's interesting to think about. Could you do it? Have you done it? Maybe I will do it, although I already might be. It'd be hard not to spend any money on entertainment for a month, though. I go stir crazy pretty quickly.

 

I do it about 10 months out of the year. Don't have the time or money for a different approach right now. Never been much of a materialist, so it's not like I had to adapt much.

 

It's not the materials that would get me. I'm not a materialist at all, either. And I'm becoming less of one the older I get. I honestly have nearly everything I could ever need right now. Bike. Couple guitars. Couple tents. Grill. Enough booze and beer to last a couple years, if need be. And I could live in a studio apartment and it'd be fine. (I have, in fact.) I could live in a tent.

It's going to things. My kid and I are going to the Notre Dame-Florida State game tomorrow night, for example. I would have trouble staying at home four weekends in a row watching as a Lego tsunami took over every square inch of floor space.

 

So does that include the monthly cable/internet bill?
I could probably do a month easy with TV, internet and the video games and movies I have laying around the house. Plus, if you can buy food you can spend a lot of time cooking and (with a loose definition) eating out to keep yourself entertained. If I've got to sit there and stare at the wall in a quiet, empty house it'd be tough. That's not simplifying your life, that's just being miserable for no good reason.

 

I don't think so. I think it means on top of recurring bills. I don't think you would be expected to go cancel everything already in place.

 

This is how I spent the first six years of my journalism career.

 

Weekend family outings consist of repeated trips to Sonic. Trips to the playground will be thrown into the mix when it warms up again.

 

I canceled cable for a year about a decade ago. A little experiment in self-abnegation. Wasn't terrible. Actually probably the most productive I've ever been with my writing.

 

I think in the summer I could get by with no entertainment purchases for a month, when it's nice outside.

 

I did it, too, out of necessity when living in said studio. It was fine. Didn't have an Internet connection at home, either. Lived in a studio apartment in my hometown, by myself.

 

I'm sure more oppportunities to do things will arise as my kids get older, but it's not the typical situation. I would love to go to an occasional sporting event, but my son is not wired for such passive activities. I'm content to "do nothing" for the time being.

 

I could do it, with one exception, haircuts. Uncle Sam wouldn't like my look after a month with no haircut.