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Thrift stores nice alternative for furniture BY JULIA KNETZER THE GAMECOCK Tuition is up. Jobs are increas ingly hard to find. The typical col lege student isn't rolling in mon ey. For that reason, many students ' find thrift stores to be useful in outfitting themselves and their on or off-campus dwellings. “Things are cheaper there,” said tfiird-year experimental psy chology student Andy Su. For instance, a typical T-shirt at Goodwill on St. Andrews Road is $2.99 or two for $3.99, said Goodwill manager Chris Heringhaus. “Pretty much everything is al ready used,” Heringhaus said. But some stores like Belk and Target donate unsold, unused merchan dise to Goodwill. Before items are placed on the floor to be sold, they are inspect ed. Items that are tom or damaged are sold in bulk, Goodwill regional manager Missy Burkhardt said. Second-year physics and clas sics student Grant Robertson said he often shops at thrift stores where he generally looks for suits that fit and are in good condition. “I think that you don’t have to spend a great deal of money to look nice,” Grant said. “And there’s no reason why someone should have to spend $80 on a pair of ripped pants in order to be accepted.” Grant calls the thrift store suits he wears “an anti-fashion state ment.” “It’s a sort of ‘kiss my ass’ to the' current preppy fashions,” he said. “But thrift store type clothes are increasingly creeping into modern fashion, and it kind of bothers me when I see a ringer T shirt in one of my sister’s Urban Outfitter’s catalogues for $50.” Su said most college students need cheaper options than they can find at conventional stores “because the school keeps taking more of our money.” “And sometimes we are forced to live at a lower standard, so we don’t mind going for the low cost alternative; i.e. Mac ‘n’ Cheese and Goodwill,” he said. “My neighbor from Bates West had all the money he needed,” Su said. “Most of us aren’t that gift ed.” Heringhaus, who is planning to go back to college, said he will def initely furnish his place with thrift store finds like couches and coffee tables. “People have parties, some thing’s going to get broken. It’s so much nicer to get something bro ken that cost $3,” he said. “It’s not going to be something your mom’s going to buy.” Third-year finance and ac counting student Kelly Lenihan said thrift store furniture is “good for a dorm room, especially if you need a cheap couch and don’t plan on taking it back home with you, just need it for the year, or any bulky stuff for that matter. ” “College students have a natu ral affinity for couches.” Su said. “They are useful for a variety of dorm room activities.” “Couches make good dining ta bles when the table is covered with pizza boxes. I used ours as a ham per for my clothes. And it was no toriously uncomfortable to sleep on,” said Su of the Bates West dorm-provided couch. “So if I had a way to transport a $25 Goodwill couch to my room, I probably would have done it.” Thrift stores have unique finds for everyone. Aside from clothing and furniture, Grant has found such items as a 40-year-old electric organ, a “nice” $20 Bach trumpet (which he doesn’t yet know how to play), and some video games. Grant, who frequents thrift stores, said he noticed that some bigger ones are more expensive than others. Thrift Avenue on Highway 378 is one of the more expensive stores. He said: “They charge quite a bit for things, but they have a good cause. They give most, if not all, of their money to helping stray animals.” Thrift Avenue’s charity is Pets Inc. Similarly, Sunshine Thrift Store benefits the Palmetto Health Foundation Children’s Miracle Network. Comments on this story? E-mail gamecockmixeditor@hotmail.com PHOTO BY JULIA KNETZER/THE GAMECOCK Couches are one popular Item students buy at thrift stores. No better time than now to learn how to live lean and smart DAVID AXE GAMECOCKMIXEDITOR@HOTMAIL.COM Bypass the conventions and lower your morals to make life financially feasable in college. BY DAVID AXE THE (iAMECOCK Living cheaply, like any mean ingful pursuit, is a union of phi losophy and action, where the the ory derived from practice begets practice itself. You shouldn’t live cheaply merely in pursuit of some moral end. You should live cheaply be cause you can. • Truth is, cheap is more inter esting. Getting in your expensive car and burning several dollars worth of gas en route to a store where you will spend several more dollars on food that will re quire further dollars to prepare is far less interesting than simply stealing food from a roommate-a roommate who is, unwittingly, lit tle but a component of a compre hensive living-cheaply system. Playing by the rules-being a good little capitalist and an ethical hu man being-is boring. Lying, cheating, stealing and taking advantage of the generosi ty of others... now that’s interest ing. By my own estimation, simply living in America as a single young man, taking into account food, shelter, clothing, trans portation and entertainment among other things, costs $25,000 a year. That means a full-time job. Which means at least 40 hours a week. Which means another 10 or 20 hours preparing for, commut ing to and recovering from work. That’s up to 60 hours a week just paying for the other 108 hours-up to 56 of which you will spend sleeping. America offers lots of fringe benefits, like corporate parties, grocery store samples and com plimentary coffee. One of the keys to living cheaply with style is to take advantage of the fringe bene fits of being a good American without actually being a good American. So load up on samples and keep an eye out for commercial grand -K1 openings, where there often is free food. You should try to eat for less than $5 a day. First, drink lots of coffee. It’s an appetite suppressant. Many coffee shops give free refills on house coffee or charge 50 cents at most. A buck-fifty usually will get you a couple cups. That’s enough caffeine to keep you sated for six hours. A cup of coffee twice a day replaces two meals for three bucks. That leaves two bucks times seven divided by seven. Fourteen bucks a week will buy more than enough rice, salt, soup and vitamins to make six meals with enough left over for one meal out. But everyone gets the munchies. That’s why you need roommates. Preferably two. When they’re out working nine or 10 hours a day, you’re at home skim ming small quantities from then food. Milk and cereal are particu larly susceptible to skimming. As long as you refrain from taking too much at one time, your room mates will never notice. Skimming can provide a meal or two per week, but no more. Taking too much might result in confrontation and, at worst, los ing a roommate. Which is why you should have at least two roommates. That, and it keeps the cost of living low. After all, you’re subletting. Which means you can charge them as much as you want, provided they don’t know how much the apartment truly costs. A bit of subtle roommate manip ulation can reduce your net room and board to nearly nothing. Oh, and you can bum rides from them too. The living cheap diet might sound Spartan — and it is — but it will keep you thin. So thin, in fact, that you’ll look healthy even though you’re not. Everyone’s got six-pack abs, but most people’s abs are concealed by fat. Not yours. On the living cheaply diet, you soon will look like an underwear model. Which is ironic, since you don’t wear underwear (it’s expen sive and unnecessary). The trick is to capitalize on your figure. You’ll still need a job. It should be part-time, flexible, easy, and it should overlap with other neces sary functions — like sleeping. University art department figure models often are paid generous wages for doing little more than reclining in a chair or sleeping on a mat. You, with your svelt physique derived from chronic under-eating, will be perfect for the job. Ten hours a week at $10 an hour should cover all your ex penses. And all you have to do is sleep. Which isn’t hard — because you’re tired. After all, you walk nearly everywhere. Yes, you have a car (a very cheap used one), but you rarely drive. Instead, you walk and bum rides. Gas, after all, costs money. And so does auto maintenance. Your car strictly is for emergency use. Rut thprp rtpvpr arp pmpropn. cies, because you don’t get sick. Disease mostly is a state of mind, so simply decide that you’re not sick and you rarely will feel sick. In the off chance that you gen uinely do get sick, ask for addi tional hours at work — because you’ll need the rest. And drink a lot of water. It’s free. Mostly. Water actually does cost something if you get it from home. So try not to use too much of your own water. Cut back on laundry and bathing. The former will beget additional savings by extending the lifetime of your clothing (of which you own very little). The latter is largely unnec essary anyway. The human body generates all sorts of wonderful oils to help clean itself. Embrace the oils. And every once in a while, wander down to the uni versity gym and have yourself a free shower. You are, after all, still in school. That’s an essential part of living cheaply. Higher education essen tially is an enormous welfare sys tem for young underachievers. As long as you get decent grades, school shouldn’t cost a penny. Getting good grades is mostly a function of choosing easy classes. Your GPA doesn’t discriminate between English (easy) and chem istrvtharrh So do the smart thine Shun the sciences, study English. It won’t get you a job, but you don’t want a job, do you? School might even turn a profit for you through scholarship over ages. And consider all the bene fits: free entertainment, free ac cess to a library, free basic medi cal care, limited free transporta tion and lots of opportunities to swipe food from student organi zations, departmental receptions and university-sponsored free events. If you play your cards right, you can stretch an under- | graduate education to five years and a graduate education to as many as 10. These various strategies will soon become second nature. You’ll be living cheaply and with style on no more than a $100 a week, while working only 10 hours a week. The only question now is what to do with all that free time. I like to watch network television. After all, it’s free. --{-] David Axe is a second-year graduate student in fine arts. j TIRED OF SEEING YOUR GAMECOCK JEWELRY ON EVERYONE ELSE? A Sterling silver Gamecock pendant on red or black soft suede cording. Available in limited quantities, just $34. 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