Maybe the title of this post should be "Cheaper Rent..."  After all, San Francisco, as you know, is not a cheap place.  And the #1 expense for most folks is rent - that huge chunk of change you fork over every month to the person (or faceless corporation) that owns the building you live in.  (Hell, even if you"own" your place, it's the bank that really calls the shots -- and they won't even fix your toilet if it backs up!)

A donkey's age ago, way back in 1993, Snoop Dogg released the song Gin and Juice, which instantly became a West Coast G-funk hip hop classic (much to the delight of frat boys everywhere).  But with the seemingly materialistic chorus "with my mind on my money and my money on my mind," was Snoop actually offering advice to the Cheap Bastard in all of us?

Those of you who are working people with kids know how difficult finding affordable, trustworthy, quality childcare is. In fact, it can be a major hassle: expensive, hard to find, and generally maddening.

If you're a home or business owner, you ought to be spending more time thinking about your toilet.

It all makes sense: firefighters need money, we need ice cream.

In 2007 we posted about where you could get free light bulbs from Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E). Well, that offer was, as they say, for a limited time only, so I think you're out of luck.

We here at CBSF.com really think that health care needs to be free across the board. The government needs to pay for it and get those insurance companies out of the business. (Yes, higher taxes, but lower health care costs all around, therefore its cheaper in the end, yay!)

A free movie? In San Francisco? With the price of tickets on the upward march, that's worth taking advantage of in this town, fellow Cheap Bastards! And, as a bonus, you get to support one of the City's remaining independent theatres.

Now, this is only on your birthday, but the savvy cheapskate knows that opportunism works: wait patiently and grab the freebie when you can!

I began to realize that even though the site promises information on cheap haircuts in San Francisco, there actually is no posting on the subject here on cheapbastardsf.com. For that, you have to but the book, but, this being a site dedicated to all things cheap, a lot of you aren't going to shell out the $15 for that!

So here are few real cheap options taken from the book. I'll add more ideas in the future. In the meantime, feel free to add your own tips!

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San Francisco Barber College
64 Sixth Street
(415) 621-6802

A therapist just isn't the status symbol that it used to be in old Woody Allen movies. At least, not when it's a bargain like this. The SF Center for Psychoanalysis offers a low fee clinic for those who feel they may benefit from Freud's talking cure. One pal of ours goes twice a week for a mere fifty bucks - a total steal for private mental health services. Help resolve your mommy issues here:

http://www.sf-cp.org/Comm_Edu/clinic_services.htm