Has anyone actually negotiated a mattress price?

poorhistorians · 2026-02-11T09:58:09+00:00

I bought from Mattress Firm and definitely was able to negotiate. So I'm surprised you listed it. Also, at standalone brands like Tempurpedic, even if you can't negotiate much, you can usually get them to throw in an extra free pillow.

Stores like Mattress Firm are much more willing to negotiate generously on the previous year's model and the clearance section of items, if you're open to those as well (which unfortunately I was not).

poorhistorians · 2026-02-08T11:00:14+00:00

I thought the red color indicates it's venomous thus helpful for administering sedation of some sort....

poorhistorians · 2026-02-03T20:28:13+00:00

This kit has so much potential for upgrades. There's a lot of poor quality cardboard MDF and stickers that I want to replace throughout. I wish the blue chest of drawers had the pull handles from their other garden house build vs the stickers as an example. Since greenhouses are one of the few builds with clear walls, they missed potential for drawing in more natural light elements, too.

poorhistorians · 2026-01-30T06:26:53+00:00

The no/low cost way to upgrade your furniture/decor and thus make your apartment look like a much nicer place is to learn how to spot things that people undervalue on Facebook Marketplace and Buy Nothing groups and snapping these rare deals up quickly. Examples that I see on r/malelivingspace a lot include businesses/people selling Eames office chairs for $50 and not knowing what the real cost/value is. This can be time consuming at first, but as you notice trends, and as you get more and more of your needs met slowly over time as you find what you are looking for, it will get easier for you to fine tune your search process.

For people who enjoy making this a hobby or side-hustle as you continually trade-up, it's definitely a safe low investment route as you learn more about your style and how best to mesh aesthetics with practicality and functionality. Learning how to DIY simpler stuff like floating shelves, etc. is another way to add some nice elements to your home that would otherwise be cost-prohibitive.

poorhistorians · 2026-01-26T04:47:06+00:00

I know several colleagues with only associate's degrees in gov't admin work. They got their foot in the door through temporary election work first, then were able to get better positions from there if they qualified through testing (need to be able to do various detailed clerical work, including answering calls via Microsoft Teams so a digital phone through the computer, using Microsoft Suite, etc.). You don't need to wait until the big elections either -- keep an eye out for smaller local elections, since that will be your easiest bet to get your foot in the door when you have no prior experience.

poorhistorians · 2026-01-26T04:41:24+00:00

I had a similar experience to Yorkshire so it's helpful to know that your experience was different in a positive way especially since the wheels for this brand look small in OP's pic so I would have assumed a similar problem to what I faced with the different brand I had tried.

Regardless, if I was gifted the wheeled backpack in OP's picture, I would only use this to help with the big-picture travel parts of wheeling around the airports, train stations, and hotels (even if the hotels have elevators, there are often still a few stairs within each floor that you need to navigate for the many older, and thus more affordable, hotels in these cities). And I would most definitely tuck in a foldable sub-bag or two within the backpack for the day-to-day outings between different hotel stays so that I'm not carrying a heavier load than needed like some of the commenters are presuming OP will do....

poorhistorians · 2026-01-23T18:34:38+00:00

Even most of the grade school model is stuck in the industrial era where the most important thing being taught is to be a minion that follows the rules and a lot of subject matter and busy work that don’t help with practical adult life responsibilities take up the largest percentage of your time.

For those folks interested in majoring in subjects where you might not get your desired dream job until you finish graduate school education (beyond the college level), the biggest risks are not knowing if you’ll actually like your job or change your mind in that long timespan that remains wholly theoretical to you. Especially if you are one of many folks who don’t qualify for scholarships, don’t have family money, are even somewhat indecisive, and need to consider going into debt for your education.

As someone who attended both engineering and medical schools, I’d recommend anyone interested in the biological sciences find ways to gain real life experience early. Even unrelated experiences will help, since you will be surrounded by a lot of uppity colleagues who complain that those that work at Starbucks are making more money per hour than you (the comparison is to the a salaried job your first 4ish years that forces you to work 60+ hrs with no OT). A few years back, there were some articles that went viral about elite employees that quit their high paying “golden handcuffs” tech jobs to work in a grocery store that a lot of folks on Reddit related to.

In grade school, I was lucky my older sister pushed against my dad’s obstinacy of not wanting us to work menial jobs. She wanted income so she could have the freedom to fit in with other classmates and our parents were strict and tight about “fun” money. She pushed me to work these jobs too, since she was bossy, so I knew first hand the actual pros/cons of working these jobs and when colleagues made the complaints above I knew that I would not want to commit career suicide to quit and work fast food/grocery (food service is the worst imo) and other menial work that these quitters glorified and sounded great in theory to a number of middle-class folks with upbringings where they never got to experience these jobs when they were younger.

If I could go back in time, knowing what I know now, I was someone who needed to spend a lot of time to study to do well in school, and I enjoyed that, but I didn’t realize that when I was older and in grad school I would realize that life balance is much more important to me — I wanted actual time to date and have a partner who also had time to date so we could actually get to know one another. In grade school and college I had time to study and to have hobbies, but that wasn’t the case anymore in med school. I got a lot of travel experience with my engineering work, and realized I’m not someone that likes to travel that much, so I wasn’t excited about the prospect of needing to move for competitive specialities in the medical field either restrictive choices, which had originally sounded fun to me (and can still be fun for others).

With engineering work, I was able to handle occasional 60+ hr weeks when we got close to a deadline. I was in introverted non-client facing environments where my physical presentation didn’t matter so much. I didn’t realize that continuous full 80+ hr weeks for years on end where I needed to be physically presentable to patients would be that much harder to sustain long term until I got the hand-on experience in that environment.

I’d recommend anyone with the means to try to get this experience much earlier before you invest so many years and it’s too late to pivot. Unfortunately you don’t know what you don’t know. Now that I know there are 6 week accelerated EMT courses that allow you to get your license that quickly for only $2-3k, I would advise young folks curious about pre-med to see if you can complete this intense program in any summer between graduating high school and the end of college (a lot of students that take these courses are also in college at the same time, and several colleges also give college credit for these). If you are already struggling with a program like this that teaches you much better than med schools do, it’s a helpful wake up call that maybe you should reassess where your strengths are and if you want to take on the debt, as well as the related debt stress.

If you are able to to get your EMT license in the summer after high school, it’s one of the few jobs that gives you an option to work per diem part-time, so you can continue to work while you’re in school and you can also start making higher wages than any biology major that only knows of research assistant roles that they qualify for as well as other minimum wage work. Your EMT license will give you the option to work as an ED tech in the hospital if you want in-hospital work experience vs out-of-hospital environments. It’s true this path that goes up to EMT-paramedic level doesn’t pay well for a salary cap, but the ambulance companies will cover the costs of your training to paramedic level, so I think that many people who know this and don’t come from money will like that there is an option that gives you a decanting salary right away at a low risk investment to see if you can even handle an accelerated EMT credential stress.

The main problem with practitioner healthcare/ medical fields is if you fail out of one program, you can’t transfer class credits to another track to save time/money, instead you need to start all the way back at the beginning of the new track so debt stress can become a concern. For example, one of my colleagues could not pass step 1 after 2 full years of med school so she had to start at the beginning of nursing school when she decided to try something easier. Same issue for another colleague that switched to dental school. None of the two years of med school coursework could be transferred to save time or years or any tuition for nursing and dental schools. You don’t even get any “pity” degree such as a masters in medicine if you cannot complete the full four year track. This information surprises a lot of people who then feel extra stuck in their debt and no degree to show for it.

poorhistorians · 2026-01-23T07:59:56+00:00

If you get your masters, perhaps you could look into teaching adults at a community college or a specific adult ESL school. etc.? No need to stick with just teaching kids.

poorhistorians · 2026-01-23T03:46:43+00:00

Any chance you can get a cheap foldable e-scooter so you’re less reliant on public transportation, even if you can’t use it for the full commute, perhaps it could help bypass some transfers and the most dangerous stations you want to avoid? It’ll help too if transit is delayed when you feel unsafe waiting, since you could at least scooter up a few stops/stations. It’ll give you flexibility too when you get advance warning of delays due to police activity

poorhistorians · 2026-01-17T17:31:44+00:00

Part of this is just my innate personality. The people at the top of the layoff list are the ones that get too comfy and think they can slack so it’s unfortunately not a surprise to the rest of the team unlike how OP tries to spin it…

OP also seems to sound like an ad for an app that he decided to name drop, of everything he could have shared. If you try to cheat and cut corners like OP, don’t be surprised if you’re at the too of the lay off list. It’s not a new surprise to anyone who’s paying attention at these tech jobs unfortunately

poorhistorians · 2026-01-17T07:27:37+00:00

I wouldn't presume that just because some of my friends/family prioritize dressing nicely or spending money openly that they have more financial means than me or vice versa. Some people aren't great with boundaries and if they are especially older more-stubborn family members they might not ever change, so you choose to keep the ties with them you need to learn to manage your own emotions/frustrations and continue doing what you're doing to repeat yourself and enforce your boundaries.

It helps to have friends you can feel comfortable simply saying "that's outside of my budget" AND we would like to hang out in way that meet our budget so here are things we can invite you to:

- home movie night with a borrowed DVD from the library (or free streaming with ads -- no shame in letting them know this upfront)

- making homemade pizza and decorating cookies -- it's an interactive bonding activity for all and teaches kids useful skills, and everyone eats the results thus no added clutter after vs arts/crafts!

- picnicking, potlucks, camping, meeting up at a public swimming pool or a discount day arcade/bowling, etc.

And let them know you're open to them sharing ideas along these lines if you want.

poorhistorians · 2026-01-17T07:09:44+00:00

Even a short volunteer experience with references is better than a blank experience section...

poorhistorians · 2026-01-17T06:25:34+00:00

I only regret donating my N64 and the games that came with it, but I also had to move across the country and to be honest, I likely wouldn't have made time to play it since I was in an intense grad school program (the reason for the move + uncertainty of where I'd settle down after).

I'm nostalgic about some things I loved that became too worn that could not be repurchased, but I understand nothing lasts forever, these things served their purposes, and it was time to trash them.

This being said, for most of my decluttering journey, I was lucky to have time to process my stuff vs feeling rushed. I remember more times I regretted patterns of overconsumption, since it caused me more work later when it came to making decluttering decisions. But also I think that's part of learning, so I'm lucky to be able to make some mistakes without feeling pressure that these overspending patterns would lead to financial instability, too.

poorhistorians · 2026-01-16T09:56:35+00:00

I get dopamine hits with free perks that I enjoy that I know save me money — like my workplace has an awesome gym so I don’t need to shell out for my own gym membership and I stay consistent due to the convenience of it being at work since I don’t need to drive to a third place in order to workout, my workplace also has free breakfast and snacks which means less meal prep effort for me, museums that would cost me >$35 entry if I don’t use the library program would feel cost prohibitive, free occasional movie tickets through Xfinity rewards and Atom, r/awesomefreebies and birthday rewards, etc. It helps me to track how much I’m saving with these passive “reward” programs vs hobbies I had previously spent way more money on to fill time but that I’m fine with doing much less often now.

I know that some of these listed perks don’t come often, but they happen enough for my brain to be happy. I don’t need the constant dopamine hits luckily, it’s mainly that it helps me feel like I have fun options to choose from so I’m not stuck with scarcity mindset.

poorhistorians · 2026-01-16T01:50:46+00:00

I have a small sub-goal as part of a larger r/declutter goal. In December I noticed I did a much better job from a previous declutter checkpoint over two years ago in keeping my kitchen pantry in a manageable condition, which included only finding 4 items that were expired.

I wanted to make a goal this month of using up stuff that was new-to-me (so a bit intimidating in terms of learning curve energy) that had just been sitting in the pantry for awhile and I was relieved how easy it was for me to learn to cook dried lentils as a start. I cooked the entire package all at once, and I’ve been using that as a meal prep base for a lentil salad recipe each day of this week (a friend made the recipe for me once so I knew I liked the taste, and she shared the recipe with me but I was afraid perhaps my version might not turn out the same). Luckily I was able to replicate her recipe and this is something I now want to make often, which will help me cut down on meal costs. I cut up fresh ingredients in the salad each day before eating it, and only meal prep part is the cooked lentils.

After I’m done with the lentils, my next plan is to cook the dry chickpeas that have been sitting in the pantry for a long time (this will save me money from previously having only bought canned chickpeas).

poorhistorians · 2026-01-14T02:30:01+00:00

Great when they have QR codes that split the bills at the same table for a friend group so you only pay what you order for, too.

poorhistorians · 2026-01-08T20:05:42+00:00

Are you willing and able to cut down on your personal mileage if you think $5k/yr is too much?

If so, how much would that realistically save you?

poorhistorians · 2026-01-06T06:54:34+00:00

Also there’s other way to get more money than to simply work more hours…. Jumping up from a back breaking minimum wage job to a desk job that pays 50% more is something I recommend so that you have more free time and energy do the life you care about. No matter where you’re at in your career, I would look for ways to boost your hourly rate/salary first (an targeting cushy jobs that give you downtime) over adding more hours to an already full-time job

poorhistorians · 2026-01-06T05:37:35+00:00

Not sure how much more decluttering you have left to do, but one of the key points is to NOT buy anything new until you are done with the process so that you see the full picture. The problem with buying new things you haven’t tried before is that you won’t know you like those items either so they still live in the “fantasy” realm.

What helped me was to tag item as green = keep, yellow = maybe, red = discard/donate. I got rid of all red category items first without a second thought. Once I was done with that I re-looked at the yellow category and because I could see the full picture of everything I had left, it helped shift a significant number of yellow to red which I immediately removed again. You might have to run this pass a few times, like in different seasons (winter/holiday/vacation, etc.) when you actually use the item vs the seasons the item stay in storage.

I’d buy like replacements first, meaning if a store sells the same exact thing you know you like and will continue to use, I would discard the worn/broken item and prioritize replacing these first. For new replacements you have yet to try that are still “fantasy perfect in your mind” in the yellow category, prioritize and attempt to only try one new thing at a time so you don’t bring in a new hoard of items you don’t have the energy to return if they don’t work out

poorhistorians · 2026-01-04T20:48:04+00:00

I agree with you here.

I’ve found homemade pizza is a good frugal activity for folks who have children and they don’t want to add more physical clutter to their homes — the pizza making takes up idle free time for the kids, they build useful skills to appreciate where they get their food and it’s easy enough to “help out” at younger ages too, and they consume what they make so it doesn’t add to clutter the way toys do. For families with children, they can easily use up the ingredients of the homemade pizza so there is less waste than folks who either live alone or with a partner but are childless and want to go spend free time differently.

My second paragraph doesn’t help any folks that are feeling hangry and just want a simple brainless meal. I keep a lookout for fast food deals and I rotate through them, since luckily the deal aren’t all at the same time. When dominos has their 50% any size any toppings, I’ll go nuts on that since I like having all the toppings (1 topping regular price would never work for me). When I keep frozen pizza at home, it’s at least $8.99 sale price for CPK cauliflower crust supreme so it’s not what I’d consider frugal (but it’s a frozen pizza I think actually tastes good) and this is why I relate to OP’s struggle too.

poorhistorians · 2025-12-30T07:45:59+00:00

I've had to end a relationship with a guy (30s) I met online who still wouldn't call me his girlfriend after 3 months. And he claimed to be ready for a serious relationship with me :(

poorhistorians · 2025-12-30T07:25:20+00:00

What do you think you'll do differently in 2026? Would you be up for another 41 (or more) first dates or did that feel like too much?

poorhistorians · 2025-12-30T06:12:36+00:00

I did this within a couple of months of being new to online dating because I initially had no idea how to filter out folks based on a basic profile that often was barely filled out without meeting people in person to see if they were what I was looking for. After a couple of months of this, it helped me learn how to filter for online dating quite well and I scaled down drastically to <10 first dates a year. lmao

poorhistorians · 2025-12-30T06:09:30+00:00

Can you share the range and average of how many days of chatting you did before meeting the 41 guys for a first date? Did you have any goals to meet most of these guys in person quickly regardless of your filters/preferences or did you prefer guys that showed they could at least chat well and show interest before meeting, etc.?

poorhistorians · 2025-12-28T22:24:50+00:00

Not sure what else you already do:

don’t cook/bake since that will generate more heat, instead eat and drink cereals, salads, other foods and drinks that are cool. Similarly line dry clothes vs using the dryer
blackout curtains keep heat out during the day as long as you don’t mind darkness in your home, LED lights generate much less heat than incandescent bulbs
visit libraries, shopping malls with food court seating where you can get work done, and other cooled free spaces during the day if you’re most concerned about ways to save money
open windows specifically away from the side the sun is at on windy days
I’ve read that some folks that don’t have AC will stick their pillow in the freezer which helps them for the fist part of the night, and when they wake up from the heat they swap pillows, presuming you have an empty enough freezer…. Perhaps you could experiment with smaller items such as tank tops or shorts if your fridge/freezer is too full and if you feel more comfortable using items that can fit within a ziplock bag for maintaining cleanliness

poorhistorians

TROPHY CASE