I have a friend who is preparing to buy his first house, to take advantage of the current buyer’s market. Since he’s been tightening his wallet to save for the down payment, he has been avoiding the bars, and eating out less. Last weekend though, a party took him to a bar, where his newly conditioned frugal spending habits had him gasping at the cost of a single beer. Eight bucks!

He said it made him realize how much money he used to drop on alcohol in one weekend, without ever thinking twice. Reigning in his spending on beer and wine has had the added benefit of a loss of about 10 pounds, without him even trying to lose the weight.

So when I read this story about lagging Girl Scout cookie sales, it reminded me that my friend isn’t the only one cutting back on extra beverage and food expenditures.

My initial response was the same I have every time one of those girls in the funny green dress comes to my house to sell me Thin Mints - I felt sorry for the knot-tying, oath-saying, campfire-singing, badge-wearing, business leaders of tomorrow. I thought, how sad for those little door to door salespeople and how sad for an American tradition to be dying because everyone is broke!

But then I thought, wait a second - this is a good thing! I mean, Girl Scout cookies alone, probably contribute to 5 lbs of extra calorie burning we have to do during the year, right? I remember at least one pathetic binge eating spring in my late twenties which had me downing, in one month, five boxes of those damn Thin Mints (which may very well be the gateway drug to rock cocaine and might as well be consumed by me through a crack pipe, because I find them so addictive). 

Perhaps one of the blessings in everyone’s financial struggles is the necessity it creates for people to reduce junk food consumption. 

Who needs to chow down two sleeves of Do-Si-Dos in one sitting, anyway? And as for those damn caramel, coconut Samoas - does anyone other than me believe that the simple fact that a cookie with the same name as a country known to have a population of people with an obesity prevalence that is one of the highest of any population in the world, makes it unappetizing?

So, ladies, let’s embrace this bad economy and our tight budgets because our hips and thighs are loving it! Besides, how many of us really like being accosted at the grocery store- flanked on both ends- by four panhandling go getter-pesky pre-teens, while we’re running in to pick up a fixings for dinner? 

And who among us just loves being bombarded by requests from our parent-friends with kids who wear the green sash, to order cookies from their munckin’s ordering form? This year the green-dress entrepreneurs can take pity on me: ”Sorry, girls - the Tagalongs won’t be tagging along with me today - the economy (and my butt) - just can’t afford it this year. But hey, I know a guy who’s buying a house - here’s his new address - go sell door to door. He’s got ten pounds to gain back, anyway.”