My wife and I tried to do this recently on $1.70 per person per day. We didn't last our intended 28 days. A few observations we found:
Meat and organic food was too expensive.
Fruit is crazy expensive so we bought OJ from concentrate with no additives as a cheap source of Vitamin C.
Eggs were are very expensive, but we needed the protein and nutrients, so rationed ourselves to 3 each per week.
We had to remove all sugar to save on cost and sugar crashed badly.
We decided that Costco was cheating due to the $70 membership fee and so we alternated between Safeway and Walmart.
You quickly learn the difference between broccoli florets and stems. [Stems are cheaper]
Baking your own bread is incredibly cheap and if you're using a sourdough starter you just need flour, salt and water. It's a great staple and adds taste to the meal. I scraped the unused flour off the work bench and dumped it back in the sourdough starter to save on cost.
Lentils are the most complete non-meat protein source.
Combining beans and rice give you a complete protein.
Cheese is too expensive and you can't make cheese from regular organic off-the-shelf homogenized ultra-pasteurized milk. It just doesn't set when you add the rennet.
You can buy coffee for $1 for a months worth of ground coffee at walmart. It's called Master Chef and it tastes like a used catbox.
Before we did our experiment we found a few "living on a dollar a day" blogs, but every single one bought in bulk and then calculated the cost of each scoop they took out of the bin. They also didn't care about nutritional completeness and basically starved themselves for the period.
After trying to do this on $1.70 and failing, I think Mike's budget of $3 is probably a realistic per person budget if you're going to stay healthy.
This diet is pretty much the standard in many poor parts of the world - rice, beans, and fresh vegetables (in season). Billions of people across the planet have figured out that it's cheap and nutritious. Glad he could figure it out on his own too.
Many people in poor parts of the world get their daily B12 from fecal contamination in the water supply. It's actually an issue because cleaning up the water supply makes them deficient.
I can't find the original article unfortunately, but I can provide a bunch of information that supports that claim:
* Well, meat is no a large (or any) part of the diet of people in many of the poorer parts of the world.
* Animal sources, are the only real sources of vitamin B12 (though yeast is an animal source, so this doesn't necessarily mean 'mammals' or 'fish').
* Feces contains B12[1][2]
* B12 is water soluble.
* In parts of the world where the water is 'untreated,' it is contaminated with feces to some amount. Obviously, the more people and animals that use the water source, the more this is true.
Vitamin B12 is not found in vegetables: it is available,
however, from faecally contaminated water, and this source
is important in the poorest vegetarian societies.
So if you went to such a society and decontaminated their water supply, you would end up with a population suffering from B12 deficiency.
I'm surprised you found eggs to be expensive. Where I'm at (Eugene, OR), you can find eggs for $7 for 5 dozen -- an incredible deal per nutrient dollar, even on your extreme budget. (This is at the Red Apple, if any Eugene locals are curious.)
Are cheap those eggs laid by anaemic, malnourished battery hens who are given growth steroids/antibiotics though? I realise that it is possible to find good deals direct from farmers but those prices sound insane!
Personally eggs and meat are things I will pay the extra for the animals to be free range and fed a natural diet, and I eat a lot less of them. With a diet such as the one in the post such things can become an occasional treat and their true value is appreciated.
A non-trivial part of the problems facing the human race is related to the growing expectation of a never ending, abundance of cheap meat.
When I was in the UK recently, I saw some exposes on supposedly "free-range" farms. The reporters used hidden cameras to record the atrocious conditions showing many sick and dead birds on excrement-covered floors that had obviously never been cleaned. Dead birds are supposed to be picked up every few hours, but it was clear some of the dead birds had been lying there for days.
Of course, the eggs laid by these sick, overcrowded birds were still sold at a premium, as was their meat. After the expose, the farms were closed down due to health violations, but it makes you wonder how many more such supposedly "free-range" farms are getting away with this sort of thing just because they haven't been unlucky enough to have been the targets of an undercover news story.
The rules in the US are similar. You merely have to have a door that the (often sick) chickens could theoretically leave through.
I'm fortunate enough to live in the Midwest and I know all my farmers personally. I know what I'm getting, but I understand this isn't possible for everyone. However, it wasn't long ago when people raised chickens and pigs in New York City.
If you want the best nutritional value for your buck, it's best to grow your own. For less than $50, I'll have 60 to 70 percent of my caloric intake grown this year.
My grocery budget for a family of 3 comes out to less than $50/week in the winter and around $20/week in the summer.
IIRC in the US (or maybe in Canada) the requirements to claim that your chickens are 'free range' is that they get 15 minutes of time outside of their cages per day.
When I was still eating eggs, I remember a few brands labeling themselves as 'cage free' instead. Though they still do things like burn the beaks off of the chickens so that they don't peck each other in the crowded conditions.
The short answer: Eat in season; grow your own; buy in bulk; plan better; reduce waste.
The long answer:
1. Learn to cook well. Not like a few dishes well, which is what many people say you should do, but learn the basics of food science. My mother was a chef and my grandmother a restaurant owner, so a lot of this comes naturally for me, but knowing how to turn an egg into hundreds of possible dishes is an asset. The basics (flour, eggs, salt, butter, milk, sugar) can be purchased cheaply and become a lot of things. I never ate ramen in college. When most people say they "have nothing to eat" in their kitchens, they mean "we have no idea to make due with what we have right now." The modern kitchen is a series of boxes and canned goods with limited applications. I avoid that stuff.
Basically, we try to move up the chain. As food moves further away from its natural state, it becomes more expensive per calorie because each producer makes their money on the value-add. Why buy old pasta or bread when I already have flour, salt and eggs and can make it fresh at a fraction of the cost or, at least, at the same cost for comparable quality?
For example: A whole chicken costs me about $6 from my farmer, but I have to break it down. At the grocer here, you'd pay about the same price for a couple of sickly looking breasts. That chicken becomes several meals, stock and dog treats.
Have a plan for what you're going to eat. I know exactly what I will have in my house at any given time and will have a meal plan set out for the week, often with ingredients playing off one another to maximize their usefulness. Rarely do we stumble outside of our budget because we know exactly what we need.
I'm also comfortable enough in the kitchen to make changes on the fly if we have unexpected company or forgot some necessary ingredient.
2. Gardening and canning. My wife does most of this, which she picked up from her father, a master gardener. We're fortunate enough to have plenty of land in a region with wonderful soil, but you can easily cut down on food costs by growing much of your own food. What we don't eat immediately, we save--and make sure to use. I really despise waste. Anyway, seed costs pennies per calorie and if you're able to save seed, the costs decrease over time, but you have to pay for it in hard work. Some people don't want to invest the time. It's a hobby we enjoy.
3. Forage. This is ridiculous to most people, but when I walk through a park I see dozens of edible things and sometimes I eat them. I grew up spending a lot of time in the woods, so this is another thing that's second nature to me, but I never pay for expensive things that can easily be had for free (like mushrooms and berries like gooseberries, elderberries or raspberries grow wild all around me, along with all sorts of wild greens). I go so far as tapping maple trees. But then again, I'm an adventurous eater.
4. Hunt. Many people don't have the stomach for this sort of thing, but a deer can feed me and my family through a winter and a couple of rabbits can feed us for week. I know this is another ridiculous to people outside the Midwest, but for me it's more about survival a personal connection to food/nature than it is a hobby or a sport. I don't take a lot of pride in killing an animal, but it beats cognitive dissonance.
5. Cut back on meat. Neither I nor my wife are vegetarians (obviously), nor do we want to be, but meat is a luxury generally saved for special occasions or times when there is an abundance of meat, like in the fall when my beef rancher slaughters his cattle and hunting season begins. I honestly don't know if we save money here, since when we do eat meat, we tend to buy more expensive cuts. The price/nutritional value isn't cost effective for us. We eat meats 2 or 3 meals a week, on average. The same way we move up the supply chain for food, we move up the food chain itself. Micheal Pollan once wrote something along the lines of "Eat food, mostly vegetables." That about sums us up.
6. Cut back on calories. I feast a few times a year like most people, but normally our meals are very simple and hit our caloric needs fairly precisely. We're not ones to fret over indulgence, but we do have weight and exercise goals. Everything is measured. Related to #1, we rarely eat second helpings and we rarely have leftovers. I wish I could say we had a methodology here but its really something learned over time.
7. Know your farmers, buy in bulk. This one is harder for a lot of people in cities to do, but I know exactly who's making many of the things in my freezer that I didn't make. I buy organic angus beef from the same man, a quarter at a time, and pay about 2.00 a pound for beef he normally sells for $6/lb in the store. Again, if you're not sure of the basics of food science, this can bite you in the ass because you'll have no idea what to do with all the food. You have to have a plan or you'll end up wasting.
Also, a the kid at the grocery store will look baffled if you try to negotiate prices, a farmer will not, especially if you've known him or her personally for years.
You should look into things like joining CSA, which will force you to eat in season (in turn forcing you to learn to cook strange and new things) and are usually comparable prices to most markets. You can also negotiate on their bumper crops so you can store it.
8. You'll notice a pattern here that I'm kind of forced to eat with the seasons and eat pretty locally (this is what my family's been doing for generations, long before these things became recent trends). This is both good and bad for various reasons. I love ratatouille, but by end of summer I can't stand zucchini. Eating with the seasons, even if you're only shopping at the grocer, means you'll get the food at the best prices.
Winters are toughest here because we don't have fresh produce.
All that said, I like pineapple and citrus and that obviously doesn't grow here in the Midwest. But, I try to buy it in peak season, can and store the flavors into the next season as much as possible.
Most of my food budget comes from buying fresh produce in the dead of winter because I can't stand to eat another canned tomato dish, even though "fresh" tomatoes in winter are terrible. There are also things we just can't get freely or grow here. I could raise chickens, but that's a difficult investment, so I buy eggs from a local market who gets them from a local farmer. I can't use eggs purchased in bulk, so it is hard to beat the price. Milk is the same way. Same with meats that aren't raised locally, like lamb and, annoyingly, pork. Same with things like beans and rice.
Ultimately, I could probably bring those costs down even further, but then I'd be depriving myself and as an epicurean eater, I just can't justify it.
The trade off, or course, is time. I'm super sensitive about time. I can always make more money; I can't make more time. However, I find time savings elsewhere in my life (living closer to my job, don't watch much television, etc.).
It's easy to just pop a frozen pizza into an oven. It takes time to make food from scratch. I'm willing to spend the time in this area because it pays off and beats reading Techcrunch. (Honestly, because we plan and keep it simple, most prep happens on Sundays for the week; 15-20 minute dinners are the norm.)
You could write a best-selling cookbook on this stuff.
Format the book to cater to people that can only buy their supplies, with separate sections on more self-sufficient things (like growing vegatables, knowing farmers, etc.) and link to/create a web directory of farmers' markets and farmers directly.
Yeah, I'd have to wonder about the conditions of the chickens with eggs that cheap too. These don't advertise as cage-free or anything like that.
Unfortunately, "very cheap" and "humanely, sustainably raised" seem to be in conflict. Terrible factory farming is efficient.
:-/
I get a lot of my eggs from my friends mother, who has something like six chickens running around on her farm. It's a great feeling to know exactly where your food is coming from (and fresh eggs are mucho-delicious).
Very cheap eggs and humanely, sustainably raised chickens are possible. You can buy baby chicks for about $2 a piece and they'll produce eggs for years, but you need favorable local laws, time and expertise.
Also, totally agree on fresh eggs. They actually look and taste so much better.
Unfortunately this doesn't scale well because in most places where you can keep chickens within city limits, roosters are forbidden. If you're only buying female chicks, then you're supporting the practice of just dumping all of the male chicks into wood chippers or just suffocating them by dumping hundreds of them into tied-up trash bags. (Note: Those are both 'industry-standard' practices. Some animal activist group tried to sue a farmer over those practices a while back and the judge ruled that he did nothing wrong because he was following the industry standards.)
$7 per 60 eggs (5 dozen) is approx. $2.33 per daily caloric budget, (per this, http://caloriecount.about.com/calories-egg-whole-i1130 assuming you do omelet) which is not incredible, but maybe acceptable deal, given this extreme budgetary constraints.
I, personally, consider eggs reasonably cheap, healthy and fast food, but I did not try to live on $3/$1 per day. (still havent' figured if I should worry about cholesterol)
Why did you set your target that low? (50 dollars / month)
The expected standard here in Uruguay is 100 dollars / month in food (and that with a 150 dollar minimum monthly wage)
I probably spend about 300 dollars per month in food (I do buy and/or eat out half the time), with a salary of 1200 dollars / month after tax. I'm pretty sure you make at least twice that.
On a budget, and for people trying to limit their saturated fat, cheese works best as a flavor-enhancer rather than a major source of nutrients. IE don't bother with pizza or macaroni & cheese dinners, but sprinkling some parmesan on your meal can make it taste a lot better without really adding a calories or costing that much. (If your goal is ridiculously low, like $1.70/day, it's probably still too expensive, but since the upper average is probably closer to $15-30/day there's plenty of wiggle room)
Sugar crash is a good sign. If you stop constantly pumping sugar into your body, your body will eventually starting maintaining your blood sugar on its own -- which is how it's supposed to work.
Starving writers have been known to buy horse meat at pet stores. I wonder if that's still legal? Also, I wonder if organ meats are cheap, since they're so unpopular in the U.S.? They can be very nutrient-rich.
Lentils and rice are incredibly cheap when bought in quantity. Asian grocery stores have great deals, though you might have to look a little harder there to find brown rice. I've heard textured vegetable protein can be a cheap protein source if you can overlook its aesthetic shortcomings (honestly, vegetarianism or extreme frugality are the only reasons to eat it) but the only way I've seen it sold is in a little bag at Whole Foods, which probably isn't that cheap.
Secreting insulin is the mechanism that keeps blood sugar down, which is only half the job of homeostasis. The other half is keeping blood sugar up when you haven't eaten a bunch of carbs recently, and it seems (anecdotally) that if people don't exercise that second half -- i.e., if they keep their blood sugar up by eating constantly -- that their body's ability to keep blood sugar up on its own atrophies.
When your body's blood sugar regulation is working properly, you can skip one or two meals without any dire consequences(+). You have a bunch of glycogen in your muscles and liver, for one thing, and your body just has to release that energy into your bloodstream as glucose. It's really that simple, but the impression I get from a lot of people is that their blood sugar regulation is only half-working. They take it for granted that if they miss lunch, they're going to be a wreck in the afternoon. They become tired and irritable, and they may even have headaches. That shouldn't be considered normal. A sugar crash isn't a normal reaction to a brief interruption of a healthy diet; it's a warning sign that your diet before the crash was not healthy.
(+) I won't swear this holds true if you exercise intensely, since I haven't tried it, but the paleo lifestyle guys say they have no problem exercising on their "lean" days.
I won't swear this holds true if you exercise intensely, since I haven't tried it, but the paleo lifestyle guys say they have no problem exercising on their "lean" days.
I don't have any problems having a rather intensive strenght training session after about 16 hours without food, and my performance does not seem to suffer. I didn't try anything more extreme than that (yet).
That depends on where you live. In some more urban areas, huge Walmarts and Wegmans are nowhere to be found. I find Safeway and Giant to be the bargin places when comparing to Harris Teeter or Whole Foods in my area. (Arlington, VA)
if you want to save on coffee, buy green beans and roast. I pay around $30 for 5lbs of green beans that are extremely high quality. you can do far cheaper than that though.
It definitely is cheaper, but pan roasting coffee on a stove can take quite a bit of time, is a fire-hazard, and causes quite a bit of irritating smoke and fumes for a few days. It sure tastes good though.
It's certainly cheaper than an official bean roaster. I'll have to buy one and see what a popcorn machine is, because I don't think I've ever seen one, and I assume you aren't talking about the ones at movie theaters.
You should be able to get $4-5/lb of green beans fairly easily. The lower quality roasted beans typically go for $6/lb. I roast my own beans for taste though, it truly is superior if you do a good roast.
If you live in the bay area, you can probably just drive to sweet maria's. The coffee capital of western hemisphere is supposedly in east bay where all the coffee comes in.
The taste of coffee is directly proportional to the length of time sitting on the shelf after roasting. Even the worst-grade green beans taste great after a fresh roast. I roast my beans in a $9 popcorn machine I bought at Walgreens.
no problem. the cheapest (and still good quality) can be found in many middle eastern shops. they wont sell them by the canvas sack, but you can usually get a pound or two for a couple of bucks and its going to be better than walmart brand.
I save money on coffee by not buying it. ;-) Instead, I found Jet Alert 200mg caffeine tablets. They're about $3.70 for 90 tablets. Each tablet is equivalent to two cups of coffee, which really means one cup of coffee, the way we tend to serve it. I usually take one around 10am, and another around 3pm.
The good: no, uh, 'intestinal distress', whiter teeth, better breath, no buzzy feeling like I get with coffee, and I feel like I'm alert for longer and more consistently. Also, I generally feel mellower than when I'm drinking coffee, and I have no explanation as to why.
The bad: I still crave the taste and ritual of coffee once in awhile. I have one or two cups per week, skipping the caffeine pill, of course.
Please do not do this. I am sure you don't have the equipment to measure an appropriate dose of caffeine (because scales accurate to 100 milligrams are not very cheap for household use...), and it is not safe to 'eyeball' it. You will start to notice unpleasant effects (restlessness, etc) around 200-500mg, and then above that (say 600-1000mg) you may start to get into what could be called toxic effects (palpitations/arrhythmias, GI bleeding, potential for seizures). Caffeine has a half life of 5-8 hours and so by the time you go for your next dose you probably haven't cleared the first one, so you can definitely build up serum concentration.
Your body can develop a dependency on caffeine and you'll get splitting headaches when you aren't taking it. I also had a friend in college who developed a light but unpleasant allergic reaction to caffeine after (ab)using caffeine pills.
It is not easy to die from caffeine toxicity, but it is definitely possible when you have powder on hand. One or two spoonfuls will do it, so if you have children in the house I recommend even more strongly against having this powder around.
Oh, and the stuff is BITTER. Really, really unpalatable.
EDIT: Oh, and don't base the amount you take on the size of a caffeine pill. Tablets, capsules, etc. are formulated with binders, preservatives, and inert ingredients that often take up much, much more space than the active compound. (I'm a pharmacist).
> I am sure you don't have the equipment to measure an appropriate dose of caffeine (because scales accurate to 100 milligrams are not very cheap for household use...)
The powder can be used by volume; it's not hard to be precise down to a quarter teaspoon or less...
> it is not safe to 'eyeball' it.
Huh? It's perfectly safe to eyeball it if you are not utterly incompetent at sizing up volume; it's a fairly bulky powder and I divided mine up over 3000 pills so I know each pill has less than 130mg. You can find studies that use up to a gram. The LD50 for my bodymass is somewhere upwards of 43 grams, as opposed to the 200mg or so that I use. As a heavy tea drinker, I have plenty of tolerance (http://www.caffeinedependence.org/caffeine_dependence.html indicates at 40mg per 6oz, and each mug around 12oz, I'm easily getting 2-300mg a day).
> You will start to notice unpleasant effects (restlessness, etc) around 200-500mg, and then above that (say 600-1000mg) you may start to get into what could be called toxic effects (palpitations/arrhythmias, GI bleeding, potential for seizures)
Where are these figures coming from, and why on earth are you presenting them without qualification as if they apply to either me or the comment I was replying to? I'm guessing from how these are lowball numbers that they are meant, if at all, for people who do not consume caffeine regularly or at all. I've used ~600mg to see what happens, and I didn't see your toxic effects as one would expect from tolerance; even 300mg doesn't cause the slightest shaking if combined with l-theanine.
And even if I had noticed such negative effects, it wouldn't bother me because I would have to error by 3x the usual amount of powder. A quarter-teaspoon doesn't even hold that much in the first place!
> Caffeine has a half life of 5-8 hours and so by the time you go for your next dose you probably haven't cleared the first one, so you can definitely build up serum concentration.
I am well-aware of this, and don't use any after 5 PM or so; with a Zeo sleep tracker it's easy for me to see the effect of night caffeine use. (I can't speak to whether the original commenter is also responsible. But this is an aspect of caffeine that is not a problem with half-sensible use.)
> Your body can develop a dependency on caffeine and you'll get splitting headaches when you aren't taking it.
As with every other one of your claims, one's mileage will vary... Every few weeks I do quit all substances. I get a mild headache for a day, and that's about it. I think the guy I was replying to (a regular user of caffeine pills, remember?) also knows how withdrawal affects him and whether it is a problem or not.
> It is not easy to die from caffeine toxicity, but it is definitely possible when you have powder on hand.
I also have enough water on hand to kill myself.
> the stuff is BITTER. Really, really unpalatable.
It's not nearly as bad as some other things like piracetam. Not that it matters at all.
> Tablets, capsules, etc. are formulated with binders, preservatives, and inert ingredients that often take up much, much more space than the active compound.
Hence the earlier point about powders coming with a volume->dose specification which makes measuring much easier.
> I'm a pharmacist
Ah, so that explains the well-intentioned - yet over-generalized and somewhat alarmist - advice.
While we're at it, I'd point out that caffeine comes with a whole laundry list of long-term effects - both positive and negative: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_effects_of_caffeine#Over... Given the ambiguity, it's not worth worrying about long-term effects unless you are highly risk-averse.
I've heard of that. Besides the obvious dose management, I wonder how quickly it's absorbed by your body versus the tablet. As I mentioned, I feel like the tablet gives me a more consistent, less spiky boost than coffee does.
I find it amusing that the guy who has two double-shot lattes a day just likes coffee, but the guy who takes the same amount of caffeine in pill form has 'quite an addiction' when they are both consuming the same amount of the drug in question.
> you should find yourself a delicious decaffeinated coffee.
Decaf coffee is universally worse than caffeinated. It's impossible to remove the caffeine from coffee beans without also removing a good deal of the chemicals that contribute to the flavor: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decaffeinated_coffee
Amusing, yes, but not illogical. If I'm away for work chances are I'll be at a starbucks 4 times a day, sometimes same at home. I love it. But I've never had a caffeine pill, and if I don't drink coffee I don't notice any difference. (Exception being that if I'm massively underslept one morning a coffee does have a really good impact on getting me to feel less shit.)
>I find it amusing that the guy who has two double-shot lattes a day just likes coffee,
I find it amusing that you say that, since I never implied any such thing. My father drinks coffee every morning and is a grump without it. He's just as much of an addict as someone who takes coffee pills. Trust me, I'm not one to use the "addiction" word as a scare word or to pass judgement. Though I do find it funny how often HN is anti-drug about things that are less dangerous and addictive than some recreational drugs.
>I find it amusing that you say that, since I never implied any such thing.
really? because four servings of coffee a day doesn't seem that much over the median dose, at least among people I know, if you adjust for body size. When I'm on, I consume more caffeine than that. So, to me, suggesting that someone has a problem when the dosage is that close to the median suggests that you are criticizing the delivery method more than the dosage.
While technically speaking many people (myself included) are 'addicted' to caffeine, I think comparing coffee dependence to something like alcohol dependence does not make a lot of sense; If I started every morning with a nice glass of scotch and finished a fifth every time I had real work to do, I'd likely be dead at this point. If I stop drinking caffeine, I sleep a lot and have a hard time getting work done. Some people get headaches. Withdrawal from long-term Alcohol abuse, on the other hand, often comes with hallucinations and sometimes death. Caffeine dependency isn't in the same class at all. In fact, while I agree that caffeine can be addictive, I'm not at all convinced that caffeine dependency is a bad thing.
I'm not criticizing the medium at all. In terms of health benefits, eating a caffeine pill is healthier than consuming the equivalent amount of coffee. No doubt alcohol withdrawl is worse, but if we're performing comparative metrics, I can vaporize cannabis for two months straight and stop all of the sudden without so much as a thought. I drank a twelve pack of coke across 4 days and had headaches for that Friday and Saturday.
I just don't know what you want me to say. It's not an addiction? Okay. Do you feel better? It's a chemical stimulant that you notice when you stop consuming it. You consume it so that you stay functional.
You can sugar coat it or say that it's not like being addicted to alcohol, but it doesn't change the fact that if you cut it out for a few weeks, you'd be more productive without the cost, dependency or negative side effects of coffee. The fact that you KNOW that, and continue to drink it, quite frankly supports the notion that it's an addiction.
People don't consume it just to stay functional, there are positives associated with caffeine that may outweigh the negatives. In particular, if you have any dementia in the family, it is one of the only known effective ways to reduce that risk.
That's absolutely fair and I was slightly familiar with the idea of benefits of caffeine. Do I think that we were discussing these benefits? Not really. Like I said, I don't have a problem with people supplementing with caffeine. As I've mentioned, I do it occasionally, I just don't make it part of my daily routine.
>I can vaporize cannabis for two months straight and stop all of the sudden without so much as a thought.
Now, I have little personal experience, and I'm not an expert; but I /have/ seen people lose their jobs due to their performance being diminished because of habitual marijuana use. I've never seen anyone lose a job because of caffeine.
I mean, I know plenty of people who use marijuana occasionally on the weekends and seem no worse for wear; from my understanding, it's not as bad as alcohol, and you may be right that it's not addictive, but it's certainly more harmful than Caffeine.
>but it doesn't change the fact that if you cut it out for a few weeks, you'd be more productive without the cost, dependency or negative side effects of coffee.
This is not true for me. Personally, I tend to ramp up my caffeine use slowly over a number of months, because I do develop a resistance. During these months, I am /significantly/ more effective than without caffeine, even if I quit for months.
Now, I do build up a resistance, so every few months I quit for a while, as I do eventually get to the point where I have diminishing returns. For me, this doesn't result in headaches, just a few days of more sleep than usual and reduced performance. Assuming I get my 12 hours a day of sleep, the reduced performance is still much better than, say, a hangover. I'm up to baseline performance within a week. (my baseline performance is /significantly/ lower than my caffeinated performance.)
I'd love to see that claim backed up by one iota of science. Considering it takes less to overdose on caffeine, caffeine has actual chemical withdrawl symptoms, that cannabis has numerous anti-cancer properties that are acknowledged by everyone (including the governmental organizations tasked with analyzing it, etc) except the US government, etc.
You're still missing the point anyway. You continue to discuss all the merits of caffeine and how you use it that specifically DEPICT how it is a habit forming drug and support all of my points. That's my only point, and you and this other guy keep repeating yourselves about how you're "good people" or something and defending yourselves from attacks that I'm not making.
Thanks for the immediate downvote too. :) Cheers!
tl;dr: I point out that caffeine is a habit forming stimulant, fellow HNer takes offense at the categorization, goes on downvoting spree and defends himself against attacks that I'm not making.
Cool. Love to see that commenting continues to improve here.
wait, what? first, I didn't downvote you. Even if I could, I would not; and I can't. the downvote button doesn't exist for posts that are responses to mine. Next, I'm not arguing that caffeine is not a habit forming drug. It obviously is habit forming. What I'm trying to say is that because the side effects are so mild, it's not that big of a deal that it is habit forming. Next, I'm not saying people who use a certain drug are 'bad people' - just that some drugs carry higher levels of risk than others, and I believe that caffeine has a very low risk of causing serious problems, even though it is habit forming.
Now, you seemed to think that the guy ought to kick his caffeine habit, which would suggest that you think there are some dangers or other serious downsides to caffeine dependency, which is why I'm addressing that. If you do have evidence for serious side effects to caffeine use, please do cite references. As far as I can tell, caffeine just isn't a very dangerous drug when consumed in anything like the usual quantities, and the side effects are fairly mild for most people.
You seemed to suggest that marijuana is better than Caffeine because it is less habit forming. My point was that marijuana has some major risks associated with it; even if it's not habit forming at all, and my observations (that heavy users of marijuana tend to have significant and long-term loss of productivity) are mere coincidence and the stuff is completely safe from a pharmaceutical standpoint, there are very serious legal dangers associated with obtaining and using marijuana.
Now, maybe we are just talking past oneanother, but I'm not seeing how you are going from what I'm saying to "I'm a good person"
You're defending caffeine use. Please show me one place where I suggested he should stop or sad that using caffeine was bad. In fact, I've gone out of my way half a dozen times to suggest the opposite.
All I did was ask why, rather than replace coffee with caffeine, he didn't simply kick caffeine all together.
Heh, legal dangers aren't probably as severe a concern as dangers during acquisition. I would suggest that anyone using cannabis at work is as dumb as anyone drinking at work. If you want to light up after work, I don't really see how that affects your performance at work. You don't get a hangover from cannabis use.
Maybe my tone conveyed otherwise, but I was really just curious as to why it was easier for the (parent, parent, parent) comment to keep using caffeine in a different form if he didn't enjoy drinking coffee.
I guess I'm still surprised at the ease of which people can ween themselves off of what I would call large doses of it. But that skepticism really isn't fair of me, especially considering peoples' default opinion of cannabis use and how much all of my experiences and friends' experiences differ from the typical stoner stereotype.
I am curious now though, when you say "heavy users tend to have long-term loss of productivity", is that even when at work, not high? Is that even after they've stopped smoking for long periods of time? Because even anecdotally, I've never really heard of that. I mean, I ditched a friend because he was addicted to pot. He was addicted to cigarettes and drinking and attention and designer glasses and he used people to get his way so I don't really think cannabis was the root issue, but I'm surprised to hear of people in the tech industry experiencing people that suffer as a result of use.
Oh well, I'm way off topic. tl;dr, I think we were talking past each other, more just making different points. Sorry for any attitude I had earlier. It's no excuse but it's been a long day, had some major presentations going on.
>You're defending caffeine use. Please show me one place where I suggested he should stop or sad that using caffeine was bad
At the beginning of this thread, you wrote:
>That's quite an addiction you have. Have you considered kicking it?
Which I interpreted to mean that you thought this caffeine addiction was a bad thing, and that he should try to kick it. Of course, it's possible that you were asking if he had withdrawal symptoms when he stopped or perhaps something else entirely, but that's why I was defending caffeine use.
>I am curious now though, when you say "heavy users tend to have long-term loss of productivity", is that even when at work, not high? Is that even after they've stopped smoking for long periods of time?
Honestly, I don't know if the people I've known with those problems were high at the time or not; Either there was some sort of lasting effect, or the people in question chose to continue using when it was clear that they were damaging their career.
I mean, like I said, I know far more people who use every now and then and seem to be fine with it, but for some people, it can be (or, at least contribute to) a problem.
Please do explain how taking 400mg of caffeine per day constitutes an addiction.
I also take a daily multivitamin that contains ginseng, and a 'super' vitamin B pill. The latter makes the biggest difference in energy levels. I guess I'm 'addicted' to vitamin B, as well.
Please do explain how taking 400mg of caffeine per day constitutes an addiction.
I also take a daily multivitamin that contains ginseng, and a 'super' vitamin B pill. The latter makes the biggest difference in energy levels. I guess I'm 'addicted' to vitamin B, as well.
I would say the difference between addiction and supplementation is not in what you take, but rather what happens if you do not take it.
I'm supplementing with Vitamin D but I often forget to take it, sometimes for days.
Now would you be able to forget your caffeine? If yes, I'd say there's no addiction. If you'd start feeling cravings in a few hours, that's a different story ...
Are you kidding? You're taking a stimulant to get through the day and when one form of it is taken away, you supplement with another form.
How is that different than a junkie getting their fix to stave off withdrawl? You don't need to get defensive about it, but if you're taking a concentrated form of a drug to get through your day... and you notice when you don't take it... that's the definition of an addiction.
when one form of it is taken away, you supplement with another form.
Again, what? I decided to try caffeine in a pill form and found that I mostly prefer it to the coffee form. Nothing was taken away.
How is that different than a junkie getting their fix to stave off withdrawl
For starters, because I don't experience any withdrawl.
You don't need to get defensive about it.
I'm not the least bit defensive about it. Rather, I find it bizarre that you make so many assumptions, and view taking a legal, safe stimulant as an inherent addiction.
if you're taking a concentrated form of a drug to get through your day
Again, where did I say anything about 'getting through the day'? Where did I imply that I 'need' caffeine? I should not benefit from a chemical, which seems to have no downside for my body, simply because it offends your arbitrary principles? How is it a "concentrated form of a drug" when a single cup of coffee contains 150mg of caffeine, in what seems to be a more rapidly absorbed liquid form? (Incidentally, a Starbucks Tall drip has 240mg, while a Grande has 320mg)
I hope you see that you're projecting a lot onto my statements.
and you notice when you don't take it... that's the definition of an addiction.
I can't get over the amount of defending people do here of DOSING caffeine. Your first comment was specifically talking about the psychological effects that you're getting from the chemical stimulant caffeine. You find that going to the pure, drug-only, form of it is better for you. You clearly consume it for the stimulant effects, or why else would you take it.
> someone who is physiologically dependent on a substance; abrupt deprivation of the substance produces withdrawal symptoms
If you can quit caffeine when you're taking 400mg and NOT experience any side effects, go see a doctor because you're a modern miracle. It's a stimulant, you take it regularly. If it's not an addiction... it's certainly a habit that you seem to be unwilling to give up.
Note that NO where did I say it was a bad thing. I mean, it costs money, but I'm sure it's not a lot. I was merely curious if you'd actually tried to stop consuming caffeine. The response taking offense at me calling it precisely what it is... is telling in my armchair-psychiatrist opinion.
I can't get over the amount of defending people do here of DOSING caffeine.
Since I don't want to keep going in circles, I'm just going to say this: replace, "dosing caffeine" with the less inflammatory, "drinking coffee." Now, consider what the difference is.
Regarding your claim that you didn't say it was a bad thing, I will remind you that you wrote, "How is that different than a junkie getting their fix to stave off withdrawl." If that's not passing judgment on someone, I don't know what is.
You're not drinking coffee though, you're, I'm laughing here because I keep having to reiterate this...
You're not consuming coffee because you like coffee. That's obvious. You like the buzz. You like the stimulant effect of the drug caffeine. I am comparing in the motions of a junkie... I know caffeine addicts that are bigger caffeine junkies than some hard drug users I know. It's neither here nor there, but I could care less if you shoot heroin, let alone drink coffee or take caffeine pills. If it helps you do your job and it doesn't ruin your life, fine. Lord knows I'm sick this week during a week that I simply can not be sick, I'm using Aleve and Mountain Dew like they're going out of style.
I just wanted to point out that plenty of people are very productive without caffeine. Seeing as caffeine doesn't give you abnormal abilities... it seems to be that it would be better to not be dependent on it, or not use it as a crutch, or whatever it is that you're using it for.
> we found a few "living on a dollar a day" blogs, but every single one bought in bulk and then calculated the cost of each scoop they took out of the bin.
What's wrong with that? It's by far the cheapest way to cook. Bulk makes buying organic cheap too, as long as you don't shop at supermarkets. They have a habit of avoiding organic brands that are price-competitive with existing products.
You have to store those products somewhere. 25lb - 50lb bags or buckets of flour, rice, beans and/or other dry goods are not small. Buying produce in bulk may save you money, but you must use the produce before it goes bad which can start to happen within a few days or a week.
My biggest issue is with wastage. My budget is certainly not a few dollars/day - we eat out a lot and our schedule changes (last minute invites, etc) so it's hard to buy fresh things in advance without losing a fair bit along the way.
My idea is for a guide and cookbook that focuses on:
- ingredients that can be stored for a long time (tins of coconut milk, rice, etc)
- things that can be cooked and then frozen/saved for long periods
- shortcuts that aren't awful (frozen vegetables aren't always the devil)
- things you can make with fading vegetables (soups, stock, etc)
Have always wondered if it would be worth doing. Not a glamorous cookbook concept (like most that sell here as gifts), but might appeal to some?
I would buy that... would be very useful for my lack of schedule.
I've collected a fairly eclectic list of throw together recipes in my head than can be made from long life ingredients without being terrible for you.
I bet there's lots of tips to be found - stuff like freezing rice, freezing fresh herbs, other things alot of people dont know about.
For what it is worth 50Lbs of grain (in my case 2-row barley) fit neatly in two 5-gallon home depot buckets. And is enough base grain for five 5-gallon batches of beer.
I guess it's not a train smash, but most people don't buy flour by the bin. The main problem I had with their approach was not eating a balanced diet and it being unsustainable.
why do you need additional vitamin C from orange juice?
IIRC the RDA for vitamin C is easily achieved by eating plenty of vegetables, which you must have been doing since you shod meat.
Cheese is too expensive and you can't make cheese from regular organic off-the-shelf homogenized ultra-pasteurized milk. It just doesn't set when you add the rennet
Use a mixture of skim milk and cream. Or take a trip into the country and buy 5 gallons from a dairy farmer before it's homogenized.
Won't you spend as much on gas driving to wherever you decide to bulk shop (Bay area isn't tiny) compared to your neighbourhood supermarket, as you'd save by bulk shopping?
It really depends on what you are buying and the nature of the 'market'. It's not only bulk buying either; if you buy in a different way, you can save money depending on the market.
An example I am involved in is with wine. It is cheapest to buy wine by the case, en primeur (basically buying in advance). Yet many wine lovers don't want a whole case. So consortia are set up on wine forums to buy several cases and split them across tens of people. They are often setup when one member of the forum spies a 'parcel' of wine going for a good price at a reputable retailer. This can typically save around 40-50% and given these wines are generally £15/bottle, and in some cases a LOT more, the savings are pretty good. Normally delivery is arranged to go to one person in a given area, who then distributes to others or waits for the others to pick-up.
Meat and organic food was too expensive.
Fruit is crazy expensive so we bought OJ from concentrate with no additives as a cheap source of Vitamin C.
Eggs were are very expensive, but we needed the protein and nutrients, so rationed ourselves to 3 each per week.
We had to remove all sugar to save on cost and sugar crashed badly.
We decided that Costco was cheating due to the $70 membership fee and so we alternated between Safeway and Walmart.
You quickly learn the difference between broccoli florets and stems. [Stems are cheaper]
Baking your own bread is incredibly cheap and if you're using a sourdough starter you just need flour, salt and water. It's a great staple and adds taste to the meal. I scraped the unused flour off the work bench and dumped it back in the sourdough starter to save on cost.
Lentils are the most complete non-meat protein source.
Combining beans and rice give you a complete protein.
Cheese is too expensive and you can't make cheese from regular organic off-the-shelf homogenized ultra-pasteurized milk. It just doesn't set when you add the rennet.
You can buy coffee for $1 for a months worth of ground coffee at walmart. It's called Master Chef and it tastes like a used catbox.
Before we did our experiment we found a few "living on a dollar a day" blogs, but every single one bought in bulk and then calculated the cost of each scoop they took out of the bin. They also didn't care about nutritional completeness and basically starved themselves for the period.
After trying to do this on $1.70 and failing, I think Mike's budget of $3 is probably a realistic per person budget if you're going to stay healthy.