Not That Great
Once, when a student, i had no money for food and one jar of Dolmio Sauce and drank the jar for that days dinner, and it came out the same day at the same consistency out my arse.

Burn.
(sirhiss, Tue 12 Oct 2004, 23:50, Reply)

Brown paper bag
At school when I had no cash I... 1. Got a paper round and therefore had cash, and 2. Rented out a load of porn vids I found in the paper recycling bins where I dumped the papers I didn't deliver. I rented the vids for 50p a night...that used to be BIG money in the school canteen.

Edit: Also... I stole plastic coins from school as a nipper, the 20p ones just happened to work in the vending machines outside my local spa shop, which with I bought chewing gum and stuff. meheh.
(Peet, Tue 12 Oct 2004, 22:11, Reply)

Tesco's
own brand beer. The strongest variety. And huge bags of wholesale pasta. And nothing else.

For three whole f*cking weeks.

I actually wept with joy when my parents deposited £30 into my account.
(New Lassic; new danger, Tue 12 Oct 2004, 20:32, Reply)

Peanut butter
When the beer money starts getting chewed up by food money I spend a night or two doing nothing; not eating, not socialising, not moving, nothing. I take one slice of (20p for a loaf, only 500 artificial additives in it) white bread and crumble a copius amount of resin into it (I buy a few ounches at the start of term to hold me to the next student cheque). Then a big dollop of the cheapest nastiest peanut butter (50p for that shite own brand stuff) to hide the taste. Half an hour later the room is moving, by an hour you're dead to the world for hours.
It hits ya too quick for you to get the munchies, and when you're sleeping you can't be spending money.
(greenycrimson I stole the from pyschotherapist, Tue 12 Oct 2004, 18:14, Reply)

Cafeteria at school* (* read as "prison")
Simply go to the cafeteria and say the vending machine ate your money. £2 coins a treat beause it realy does eat the smeggers.
(G.Eusebio ...Fentruk from the long past..., Tue 12 Oct 2004, 17:21, Reply)

I'd spent all my money on the stuff 16 year olds spend all their money on, and ended up without any way of getting home
now, this was serious, as I live out in the sticks, and I was up by the Snowdome in Milton Keynes (huge can of baked beans in the ground) having fun....the way 16 yeart olds do.
Anyway to cut a long story short, me and my friends slept rough by some 5 foot heaters and pretended to be tramps. Hell we pulled it off too well though. To shed some light, I never used to take off my Fear Factory hoodie come rain or shine, rip or tear, you get the point.

Anyway, woke up and some random guy brought us over a bucket of KFC at 3 in the morning! Fabtastic! We shared it with some tramps and they shared...what tramps like to share (no, not soddomy). So I lay there, mashed, full with chicken, and hugging a very fit girl! Having no money can be good some times!
( Grundlebiscuit, Tue 12 Oct 2004, 17:05, Reply)

three coins in the fountain
Me and my mate were on the dole when they drained the fountains outside the civic centre to clean them. We went down in the evening and picked up enough coins out of the crap on the bottom for a packet of fags and a pint each.
( finnbar has officially retired, Tue 12 Oct 2004, 17:01, Reply)

No money no problems
Wiping my ass with manila envelope remains, remains my abiding memory of brokeness
(sentinel, Tue 12 Oct 2004, 16:56, Reply)

Skintism
At uni, surprisingly enough, ran out of money entirely, went to the doctor claiming depression, got prescribed prozac (free) then sold them on as ekkies for a fiver each.

At school I used to steal cd's from the younger years, take them into Woolworths or whatever cd shop I'd not rinsed recently, do the old "I got this for my birthday and |I've already got it" line, get record tokens and then sell them on at less than the marked value.

I'm now a lawyer!
(Mong-the-Merciful, Tue 12 Oct 2004, 15:26, Reply)

Not as exciting as some of yours
but a few summers ago, I lived off McDonald's hamburgers and cheeseburgers. You see, they were having this promotion (this was back when the american economy was good), in which they were charging retro prices. So, I could afford 10 cheeseburgers for $3.90, which fed my mum and I sufficiently until the next promotion.

Firstest post! Apologies for length/idiocy
(dr3wrocks, Tue 12 Oct 2004, 15:16, Reply)

I...
...masturbated instead of getting a whore.
(Rabid_Weasle, Tue 12 Oct 2004, 15:04, Reply)

asda's own
after spurging all my money on cd's and nights out, i managed to survive on asda's own (not so super) noodles for a month (8p per pack!). Now i no longer have and taste buds, but i do have a rather good cd collection.

i know its not really being that hard up, but when it came down to food shopping there were always more important things todo
( useless_rocker twitter.com/phillipteague, Tue 12 Oct 2004, 14:10, Reply)

The wonders of public transport
You've not been that skint till you take to hanging round the bus station first thing in the morning to scrounge as many copies of Metro (free newspaper for those who don't know) as you can because you've run out of anal sanitary products (bog paper!). Makes good extra insulation on cold winter nights as well. Assuming you haven't used it first of course.
(NihilisticPenguin, Tue 12 Oct 2004, 12:02, Reply)

Kleeneze.
I was one of those pissed off looking people pottering about with my little blue bags picking up soggy, dog eaten catalogues from people's doorsteps for fuck all money and looking eternally grateful when someone ordered an extendable window washer at £10 from which I got £2.10.

That did not last long.
(Log of the Bar, Tue 12 Oct 2004, 11:39, Reply)

Oh, the joys of being a student ...
In Baltimore: McFoodpoisoning had a promotion going one time and were selling cheesburgers for 20 cents. My ex's flat mate bought something like 100 of them. When she got home, she carefully disassembled them into their component elements, bun, burger, etc. and individually froze them all. For months she'd whip them out, toast the bun and microwave the middle ... eww.

In New York City: All I had left was peanut butter and carrots and about 2 bucks with weeks to go before the next injection of parental life blood. Thank God for NYC bagels. I hardly ever eat peanut butter anymore, though. I also never had my hair cut in the NYC years 'cause I couldn't afford it.

In Wellington: Our cupboards looked full, but when assessing actual nutritional content of said cupboards we discovered: The last food we had was instant pudding, which kept us going for a couple of days. After that, we had every spice and condiment known to man, but nothing to put them on. ... Also recall flatmate's brilliant chilli con carne with 3 kinds of chilli sauce, and chillis and black pepper and the last can of ... I think it was nut loaf. He and I were the only one's who could swallow it.
( Ebay_is_"be"_in_Pig_Latin, Tue 12 Oct 2004, 11:38, Reply)

Ever been to Iceland?
I mean the country not the shop. It's so expensive there (£8 a pint!) we just couldn't afford to do anything. So every morning when we went down for the free hotel breakfast we would stuff our pockets full of food and make it last the rest of the day. Fine until one day I had a lapse of memory and rode an Icelandic pony over the lavafields with a cheese sandwich and a boiled egg in my back pockets.
(robzilla666, Tue 12 Oct 2004, 8:40, Reply)

Beer
I know I guy whos a poor alco (no correlation there). Pretty much every Friday night everyone is at his house drinking and hanging out. Once everyone has gone home he goes around the house and collects all the half drunk beers, puts them in the fridge then goes to bed.
First thing Saturday morn he's off to buy a couple of bottles of beer. Tops up each of the leftover flat beers with the fresh fizzy beers and drinks them for as long as he can stretch them...
His record is 27 of these sad beers!
I'd be lying if I said I hadnt done this too once or twice in my poorer days. Try it - it works!
(flash, Tue 12 Oct 2004, 3:25, Reply)

After buying a digital camera, on credit (I don't even have the money to pay for it...) I know need to wear shoes with 4 inch holes in them... my toes will fall off this winter.
(Timmy (Esq), Tue 12 Oct 2004, 0:38, Reply)

maybe apocryphical
but worth considering if one is broke.
Guy walks into bank, sets himself up an account using some dodgy ID. He gives his name as LLoyd Banks.
Week later his personalised paying in slips are delivered to his squat. He photocopies them en masse.
Walks back to bank. Removes their generic paying in slips and replaces them with his personalised ones.
Three days later he withdraws £170,000 and is never seen again.
Not bad for three days' work.
(CerberaSpeedTwelve, Mon 11 Oct 2004, 23:47, Reply)

How desparate have I got?
A Long, Long Time ago I once was that desparate (working in the oldest profession) that I once had sex with a punter for a tray of pasties. (a pasty is .... www.ginsters.com/ )

I also learnt (thanks to the realy good chinese supermarket two streets away in Plymouth) how to survive on Noodles for £2.79 a week (this is circa 1998 - can do it now for £3.29)

Can anybody beat that? (I havn't eaten a pasty ever since - my fellow cornishmen would be ashamed for me!)
(TIMBIonline available for any passing drunk sailor, Mon 11 Oct 2004, 22:00, Reply)

Just remembered !
One Christmas i was very low on funds, & i brought my parents a terry's chocolate orange to share. The look i got when they opened it will stay with me forever. Memories.

I used to flog my old text books to the kids in the years below me. They weren't even mine to sell (being school property and all), and were usually vandalised beyond recognition.
(spookyfish, Mon 11 Oct 2004, 21:30, Reply)

resident seagul
noooooo *SCRAAAAAAAAAW*
(iheartyourmum, Mon 11 Oct 2004, 20:55, Reply)

I was so poor once...
...that I had to shop in Marks and Spencer instead of Harrods.
(Skellers, Mon 11 Oct 2004, 20:07, Reply)

Kwik Save Robbery
I was so skint as a student I used to walk into my local Kwik Save with a puffa jacket on and fill the sleeves with various items. Bacon, milk, bread, cheese, etc. You would be surprised at how much shopping you can fit in a puffa jacket sleeve.

I was also so hungry one night that all I had was teabags and toothpaste. I actually considered spreading toothpaste on a teabag and eating it like Hors D'oevres. luckily sanity took over and i just cried myself to sleep.
(manny fagnet, Mon 11 Oct 2004, 18:18, Reply)

couldn't be arsed to get a job
so had 11 children to 4 different men and claim off the child benefit.

shut up you little cunts! go out and buy me some fags!


/social comment
(sunny chiba, Mon 11 Oct 2004, 18:16, Reply)

a bit pikey but.....
scrounged around my mum's garage and loft for old tat cluttering up the place and did a car boot sale. amazing what crap people will buy if it is cheap enough. made £80.!!!!
bloody fantastic! i reccomend standing around in a field for half your sunday. more interesting than going to church and most lucrative. also if you turn up with a car full of stuff to a sale you have never been too b4 the regulars spot the newbie right away and ambush you as you try to unpack your car. you can sell most of the stuff without even getting it out of your boot. it sells itself!! fantastic!!!
sorry but it impressed me (mainly b'cause i am most lazy and unpacking all the shite after i had just packed it in there was a pain in the arse).
helped me eat for a while longer.

i have also been so poor my sister brought me a food and grocery hamper once from her church!! well they were to help the needy. i felt like a right turd taking it off her tho

/gets coat

Edit: i kno i mentioned church twice but im not a religious nutter or anything (and my sister is a methodist minister so its her place of work really) >^..^<
( catswhiskers the cats mother, Mon 11 Oct 2004, 17:57, Reply)

In my chaotic and directionless life,
I have been unemployed and/or homeless on a number of occasions - manageable in good weather, when young and in decent mental health.

In London, while living in a shed in the garden of a derelict house in Hackney in the late 80's, I used to keep a decent outfit clean in several layers of bin-bags and would wear it to visit every art gallery opening I could get to for free wine and food. In Los Angeles, where I stranded myself for three months between the end of a contract and my pre-paid, unchangeable return flight, I ate my fill of fruit (avocados, endless citrus, figs, prickly pear - all grown for display, so not really stealing) from the gardens of the moderately wealthy, and did even more galleries - generally slept on or near the beach, and a few nights in the drunk tank when pulled by the polis (not allowed to sleep on the beach, you see - not quite sure why).

Mostly, an adjustment of expectations allows an adequate diet on very little money - no meat, limited alcohol/narcotics, lots of pulses and cheap carbs. Scavenging in markets is a good way to pick up discarded fruit and veg that is perfectly edible when washed and trimmed. I used to get the newsagent to put a card in his window (will do any odd job for cash), and take messages for me - painted a lot of walls and did shopping for housebound old people for 25p a time. Eventually, someone was kind enought to let me use their postal address, so I could get a normal job and rejoin the mainstream. I am not sure that I feel any happier, but I do have more things.

Reading back, this isn't funny and doesn't fit with the "poor student, ketchup sarnie" nature of the responses, but sod it, I don't have access to image manipulation software this week, so this my only reasonable means of self-expression.
( godstar, Mon 11 Oct 2004, 17:50, Reply)

How many times can I fall off a roundabout without being sick after consuming a whole watermelon?
6 and 3 stitches. Gained £60.
(iheartyourmum, Mon 11 Oct 2004, 17:32, Reply)

Lidl
is fucking brilliant if you're brassic, I went in there a month ago with £1.29 and came out with 20 fish fingers, 2 packs of noodles and 2 tins of mushy peas

all of which tasted foul

but that's not the point
(he who walks, Mon 11 Oct 2004, 17:11, Reply)

teenager knowing no better...
Many years ago, sprinting along various London roads doing on-the-run half-inching of beggars' hats & tins that were sitting unproitected on the ground and spending the resultant riches (as much as 20 english squids for a few hundred yards running) at McDonalds and in Tower Records. Result!!

Hell? Room for one, please...
(monkeyboys like monkeygirls, Mon 11 Oct 2004, 16:33, Reply)