simple pleasures
Mascara Surge: Save and Splurge
August 17th, 2010 | Comments
Tags: bargains, Beauty & Grooming, blinc, leather, mascara, Maybelline, Shopping, simple pleasures, Splurge, Vince
What exactly is a splurge?
It’s all relative. As we discussed in Einstein, Mascara and Chicken Wings, it all depends on the state of your particular checkbook or the state of your emotional deprivation, a splurge is a very personal matter. For example, if you’re absolutely drooling over a hot, new $700+ Vince leather jacket then a $24 blinc: Kiss Me Mascara is looking like a real bargain. But if you compare that price to what a perfectly good, $7.49 Maybelline Falsies mascara costs, then it’s a huge splurge.
 blinc: Kiss Me Mascara  Maybelline Falsies Whether it’s mascara or leather, we save to splurge. We’ll occasionally wear our ‘Falsies’ (that doesn’t sound right) to get to be kissed by our real favorite ‘blinc’.
We’ll save up for our leather jacket and wait it out through the season, watching and waiting to pounce at the first markdown. (After all, we know those gorgeous butter soft leather numbers aren’t going to be hanging around for the second markdown cycle.)
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” Purge the lust in your heart…”
August 16th, 2010 | Comments
Tags: Decorating, Happiness, simple pleasures, Travel & Entertainment
After spending the last few weeks doing the things we love best: cooking with friends, eating, bicycling, going to the beach, reading, learning to square dance (don’t get all nervous, we’re still our normal, not overly perky selves–but stepping out every now and then is a hoot) we were reminded of our own sage advice. Living a rich life is not expensive.
From the book Bitches on a Budget:
Free Your Mind Fill Your Wallet:
Purge the lust in your heart for all those meaningless, outsize status pieces you’ve been mindlessly pursuing and thinking indispensable to your happiness. You know the La Cornue stove, the Noguchi Freeform Sofa, the set of original Fornasetti wall plates–they won’t make you happy. Well, not that happy.
Share your prescription for happiness on a budget.
Pamper the Bitch. No, Not You! Your Pet
July 29th, 2010 | Comments
Tags: Beauty & Grooming, Dogs, pets, simple pleasures, Travel & Entertainment
 In the final chapter of our book we come to your very favorite bitch—no, not you! Your dog. Pamper the Bitch reminds you that sweet yapping Maxie still deserves some special treatment (even when your bankbook is whimpering). But you’ve gotta be smart. No overpriced doggie clothes or mani-pedis. We give you tips on affordable feeding, medical treatment, travel, entertainment. And if there’s no pet in your life, we outline the most economical, ethical ways to acquire one.
Don’t worry– we’ve got stuff for feline-lovers, too. We’re bitches after all, and know you like to pamper little pussy, too.
Here’s a sample:
Have fun like a dog. (Can you keep your mind clean for just one minute?) In these tight times dogs are the perfect companions. They remind us what’s important. They teach us to appreciate FREE things: friendship, play, the natural world. They require absolutely nothing but company, good nutrition, and exercise. So enjoy having Maxie. Get humble. Let her teach you a new way of being– this is a valuable lesson any time at all, but especially in a rough economy. Find pleasures in the little things. You know, snuggling, stroking, black leather collars…
Bitches on a Budget is published by the New American Library division of Penguin Books. Ask for it at your local bookshop or Amazon.
Bitches on a Budget Tongue Teasing Devil Brownies
July 16th, 2010 | Comments
Tags: brownie recipe, brownies, Food & Spirits, simple pleasures, Travel & Entertainment
Back by popular demand the best brownies you’ll ever make. Period.
Food fashions fade in and out like pouffy skirts. It’s kind of tricky to know when to bite. The latest seems to be a hot and sweet tongue teasing, and we’re here to reassure you that this trend is for real. Sophisticated hedonists have always known that stoking up contrasts arouses your sensory pleasure…
So you don’t feel left out of the latest foodie flavors, we’ll share our own recipe for brownies that’ll have them on their knees, weeping and begging you for more:
The Bitches’ Devil Brownies
Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees
5ozs unsweetened chocolate
1 ½ sticks unsalted butter
3 eggs
1 ¾ cups sugar
1 cup flour
1 tsp vanilla
½-1 tsp crushed hot pepper flakes (up to you how hot you like it)
Pinch of kosher salt
¾ cup walnuts (optional)
8” square buttered baking dish
Melt chocolate and butter in microwave for approximately two minutes. Stir to completely dissolve chocolate. Add sugar and mix until you can’t see granules. Beat eggs and vanilla with a fork, add to chocolate and sugar mixture, and stir until glossy and smooth. Mix in hot pepper flakes, salt, and walnuts. Stir in flour until everything is mixed evenly together. Pour into buttered baking dish. Bake approximately 25 minutes or until a toothpick comes out smooth. (Our advice is to slightly under-bake these, they taste even better).
So easy and you’ll look like a hip baking genius–you owe us big time.
P.S. This is our basic brownie recipe all tarted up. Skip the spice for the best brownies ever.
Stewed Blueberries
July 14th, 2010 | Comments
Tags: bargains, blueberries, budget, Food & Spirits, Health & Fitness, Shopping, simple pleasures
Blueberries are the best.
At this time of the summer blueberries are readily available and attractively priced. So attractively priced, in fact, that we often end buying more than we can bake, conserve, and munch in a timely manner. Our solution? We throw them in a pot with whatever leftover fruit we have around and make a quick simple stew. It’s great by itself or spooned over ice cream, yogurt, pancakes, waffles. And, for one of our favorite simple pleasures, try a huge serving of warm blueberry stew over slices of fresh cinnamon bubka or bread.
Blueberry Stew
1 pint blueberries
2-3 nectarines and/or peaches
3-4 tblsp brown sugar (or to taste)
a squeeze of lemon juice
Wash and put the berries in a pot. Slice up the peaches/nectarines into chunks (no need to peel) and add to pot with sugar. Turn heat to medium/low and cook until the berries and fruit soften.
Simple Syrup
July 7th, 2010 | Comments
Tags: Food & Spirits, heat, lemonade, simple pleasures
Where we live the heat is so brutal that it’s sapped, among other things, our healthy cooking drive. We’ve consumed gallons of water, laid around on the living room couch panting, and spent even more time than usual complaining. Never mind that it’s given us yet another excuse to put off to tomorrow our serious writing.
Hoping to break our heat-induced ennui, we’ve just mobilized to make fresh squeezed lemonade.  While having tart juicy lemons is the first key ingredient in our drink, equally important is having cold simple syrup to use as a sweetener. Thankfully, we have a jar already made in our fridge. Otherwise, the lemonade would not be happening – no stove in our house today. Besides, just squeezing the lemons is a major exertion.
Our experience is that some lemons are tarter or juicier or more flavorful than others. We’ll squeeze four or five and then judiciously add the simple syrup to taste. To finish our drink we add several sprigs of fresh spearmint.
Simple, Simple Syrup
1 cup sugar*
1 cup boiling water
Boil the water add sugar. Stir until dissolved. Cool and refrigerate in a glass jar (up to a month). Perfect for lemonades/limeades and all mixed drinks.
*corrected from an earlier heat-induced (what else could it be?) mistake.
This Summer Vacation Break the Mold
July 2nd, 2010 | Comments
Tags: bargain, budget, Food & Spirits, simple pleasures, staycation, Travel & Entertainment, vacation
With summer vacation on our door we’re thinking about ways to save during your week off and one way is to mix up when and what you eat:
Break the mold and eat fancy for lunch:
We can think of nothing more luxurious than dressing up and and dining with a friend, boyfriend, or partner at the fanciest restaurant in town at lunch. Order a crisp Sancerre or luscious Pinot Noir. Settle in. Take your time. Relax and take pleasure in a long, leisurely meal at the noon hour. Have your big meal at lunchtime for half of dinner pricing. A rich indulgence.
Stop Shopping, Try Swapping
June 19th, 2010 | Comments
Tags: budget, green, Shopping, simple pleasures
Sentimental B’s have cornucopias of junk. Plastic containers, bags, shoe boxes all overloaded with gadgets and gizmos of all shape and size. Belts, watches, candle holders, mirrors, bracelets, keychains, wing-dings, do-hickies, whatchamacallits.  And yet everyone invests in these same objects again and again. All the B’s on your street are buying the same stuff. Why not organize a swap? An overbought, underused objects of desire library?
The allure of a new treasure vanishes after a little while… give it a couple weeks, a month, and the glow of the buying rush fades; soon that cherished chia pet is growing dreadlocks in a corner. Share him! Make some other B’s day.
Invite trustworthy friends to join. Label objects. Rotate in and out monthly.
Swapping: It’s green, thrifty, and keeps life fresh.
B’s feeling the love…
April 2nd, 2010 | Comments
Tags: bargain, budget, savings, simple pleasures, Travel & Entertainment
The Sassy Minx  wrote about Bitches on a Budget:
“Seriously, I LOVE this book. It’s for minxes like us, who know what we want but don’t want to pay the earth for it. Author-girl, Roz Hoffman is officially my new recession era fashion guru, travel agent, grooming consultant, therapist, sommelier and life coach all rolled into one – come meet her, read about her awesomeness, then buy the book – in that order.”
The Fashionable Housewife
 wrote about Bitches on a Budget:
“I think this is a deliciously funny must-read book for today’s financially challenged woman. Not only is this a great read, but it’s wonderfully informative as well. I love that Rosalyn Hoffman includes recommendations for all “budget levels”. Being on a budget means something different to everyone and this book includes it all, whether you are shopping at Wal Mart or Nordstrom.”
Dish
 wrote about Bitches on a Budget:
“Peppered throughout this cleverly written little tome, are bitchin’ tips which explain the secrets of being “thrifty”, “splurge worthy” and even “green ”. Complete with some bitchin’ recipes for dinner, cocktails and treats for the dog, Ms. Hoffman has covered all the bases and then some making this book a bitch to put down and a real find I want to share with all my bitch friends.”
Skirt
 wrote about Bitches on a Budget:
“Fashion and frugality have never blended well, but that’s all about to change with Bitches on a Budget …” ”This guide to learning to live luxuriously without filing for bankruptcy includes tips on wallet-friendly dining, where to find the most fabulous apparel bargains and how to become your own manicurist/interior designer/hair stylist. You can still survive these trying times in style, and save a ton of cash in the process!”
We’re blushing and this is just the tip of the iceberg…
A Welcome Madness
March 18th, 2010 | 1 Comment
Tags: Health & Fitness, mamas, savings, simple pleasures, Travel & Entertainment
Sunshine! March Madness! Baseball! Fiddlehead Ferns! Asparagus! Evening walks! Yes, we’re entering the heady, glorious season of springtime. After the slog of winter comes fresh air, sandals, kites in the sky, little kids tucked in bed while it’s still light out. Happens every year, yet somehow this transformation never ceases to amaze us. Daylight Savings arrives and it’s like we’ve been bonked on the head with a hammer for three months and then, just like that, the hammering suddenly stops. Ahh. Mid-March rolls around with new light and earthy air, but we have no patience to finish the warm-up. Meaning we want to have fun. NOW.
And yet we’re B’s on a Budget, aren’t we? No willy-nilly trotting off to Italy, no open-air meals at the finest restaurants, no spontaneous shopping sprees for Miu-Miu sundresses and floppy hats. We want to celebrate this luminous season, but can’t spend too much.
In this spirit, we’ve composed a list of free/cheap spring activities that’ll make your blood pump, your soul wake up, your heart feel a little freer:
March Madness. OK, watching basketball is an indoor activity. But nothing captures the nutty, passionate, youthful antics of spring better than college basketball. Study the brackets. Throw a potluck party. Admire those lean, sweating, gorgeous players (men and women). Then go outside and shoot some hoops yourself. Yes, you: PLAY.
Buy a hula hoop. Five bucks. Amazing exercise. Do it in the front yard with the kiddos. Entertain the neighbors.
Forced blossoms. A branch of barely budding forsythia will spring into bloom on your kitchen table, reminding you what’s to come.
Creepy Crawlies. Buy (or make!) the little ones in your life a bug box, and hand them a good old-fashioned magnifying glass. They’ll spend hours collecting worms and caterpillars and who-knows-what. Time to turn their attention away from Nature Programming and into NATURE.
Finally, and best of all, school plays. Spring is the high season of middle/high school drama departments. Support local talent by attending shows in your area. OK, some of it might be funny (we recall having some, uh, bladder control problems during a recent off-key rendition of OKLAHOMA), but the charm-to-price ration has never been higher. Applaud for the awkward high school boy who sings like an angel…. gasp at the strangely sublime beauty of a hundred souls belting “Tomorrow, Tomorrow, I’ll Love Ya, Tomorrow”. Remember when that was you? Give them a standing ovation.
Get up. Get out. It’s time.
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