Organic on a Budget

Let’s face it. As soon as you get over the excitement of having some time off to go to the beach in the middle of the week or getting to be one of those people sipping on coffee at Peet’s in the middle of the afternoon, being unemployed is stressful and terrifying. California’s unemployment rate rose to 12.2% in August in comparison to the national average of 9.6%. While all of this is reaffirming that I have made the correct decision in opening my job search to include Texas (8.2% in July) and New York (8.6% in July), it has also forced me to revisit my budget. According to my counselor at Lee Hecht Harrison, it is common for a job search to take 3 months. As unemployment will sadly not support me, I estimate that I have 60 days until I am painting fences on my dad’s farm.

Living in Los Angeles, I am definitely guilty of spending far too much of my salary on food and entertainment. How can one help it? Ask Irene Virbila—there are some amazing restaurants here! Even the happy hours reflect the extraordinary talents of our culinary geniuses. They don’t merely have pizza and nachos. They have bacon wrapped dates stuffed with blue cheese and shrimp po’boy sliders (my fave-The Den on Sunset). One simply can’t resist.

Unfortunately, now that I have no salary, I am going to have to make some changes. I read an article on MSN showing what families around the world eat in one week (http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/CollegeAndFamily/RaiseKids/what-the-world-eats.aspx). The Ayme family in Ecuador looks overjoyed and the entire family survives on a mere $35 per week. That makes my allocation of $50 per week seem not only exorbitant, but incredibly indulgent. To add to the challenge, I’ve decided to make everything organic. Thank goodness for Trader Joe’s!

I am definitely going to spend the next few months dreaming about having a four-star dinner at The Bazaar, but in the meantime, I’ll be de-stressing over a cup of green tea and cooking organic at home. This could be an adventure--I'll keep you posted!