The price war between supermarkets is raging as products at knockdown price are thrust in front of our face at every store.

The amazing value on offer is unavoidable – top-branded products cello taped together, vying for our attention, half-priced, three for two, four for three, extra free. It's all brilliant, particularly for those who are still earning big bucks but also for those having to adjust their spending habits.

When I began shopping for my own groceries, I didn't know the price of a pint of milk, or any household item. I knew approximately how much they cost but, because they were necessary items, I usually fired them into the basket, handing over my laser without question, tired from a long day at work.

Now that I have become accustomed to a more frugal life, I also have time to shop around and know exactly the difference on most items in all of the big supermarkets and the smaller pound shops.

“Look how many pot scrubs I got for a euro,’’ I exclaimed to my boyfriend who looked at me puzzled and replied: “We only have two pots and even when you do use a scrub you still leave marks on them.’’

Hmm … fair enough but I still inform regularly on my amazing finds, enjoying this game of bargain hunting. Where can I find the best value shower gels and not the cheap nasty ones that cause a rash? Our bathroom is overflowing with unopened beauty products cluttering up the small shower.

He, the boyfriend, is also bemused as to why I can't squeeze three extra days out of the toothpaste and why I throw the milk out with enough left for a cup of tea. These are bad habits of mine!

I remember as a child regularly going to McDonalds with my grandfather, who always discretely pocketed the ketchup and salt sachets. It was a shock to see him so committed to saving and not wasting. But he was of that generation that came through World War 11 and rationing and such.

I remembered this last week while on a mini staycation with friends. For the first time in my life I took home the soaps and shower gels from the B&B. I felt slightly ashamed but also tried to explain to my boyfriend it was only because of the recession and we had, after all, paid for our room - including the bath products.

‘‘The last thing we need right now,’’ he sighed, ‘’is another bottle of shower gel.’’

Last Thursday night some friends lured me out, not something I've been doing too much of on a week night since becoming a recessionista. However, they assured me that not even a bottle of cheap wine was needed beforehand as we were off to Dicey Reilly's on Harcourt Street for €3 drinks AND a free platter.

I arrived to a lively bar heaving with a post-work crowd all eager to cast off the stress of the day. The bouncers won’t catch too many people sneaking a naggin in here in their handbags either, as a variety of popular drinks was all on offer for €3 with no catch. The free platter was a much welcomed bonus, as an assortment of greasy goodies were presented before us for devouring, all because we had freely reserved a table, ensuring elbow room in the thronging crowd.

When I left latish the queues were still snaking all the way down the street, a sight now rarely seen in mid-week Dublin. It reminded me of just three years ago, when as a student I had always been out on a Thursday evening, as well as the entire weekend.

A full-time student with a full-time job living at home rent-free afforded me that lifestyle. Now my luck has changed, less money with rent to pay in Ranelagh, my 20s seem to be going in reverse!

While it’s great to see a bar pull such a crowd on a week night, other bars are not so lucky and I was sad to learn recently that one of my favourites had closed. The Coast Inn in Skerries, Co Dublin, was the first pub I ever set foot in: as a child we were brought on many a Sunday afternoon for bacon fries and splash coke over crushed ice – a novelty in Fingal of 20 years ago.
It was also the first place I drank as an adult and the first place a guy ever took me for a drink. It was also the scene of many nights out in the years that followed – most notably the legendary Christmas Eve crowds that saw the whole town sneak out for a pint before Santy.

Unfortunately small town pubs have to battle for commuters who are city-bound mid-week and even cheap drinks make it a struggle to survive.
It does seem to be working on Harcourt Street though, with the suits and pencil skirts downing shots all around me. There were a lot of hangovers in town last Friday.
For once I was happy I didn’t have to be up early!

Friends have remarked on my unwaning positivity in dealing with unemployment second time around. It’s simply how I cope; reasoning that there is always someone a lot worse off than me and life is easier if I stay upbeat! Apart from once a week where the world threatens to cave in on me, the rest of the time I just get on with it.

Granted, I am lucky to have my writing to tide me over, but I do miss the routine of an office environment and to beat the monotony I have been indulging in lots of free activities to keep me busy. Overdue visits to family, a free check-up at the dentist and helping my Mam feel better about her own recessionary woes by decluttering her wardrobe, took up my time last week. I refuse to spend my days sleeping myself into depression.

For me work is more than making money, it's an extension of my identity and my career was something I worked long and hard at breaking into, involving four years in college and various unpaid internships before landing my first position. I’m attempting every day to view this time off as an extended holiday, a time to enjoy, Luckily I have racked up a number of interviews and meetings as well. I've surprised myself too how well I am faring in reigning in my finances. Quite the resourceful recessionista, I hauled two boxes of paperbacks to the local book shop and earned an impressive €65 for my efforts.

Helping Mam clear out the house inspired me to reorganise my own wardrobe and I was surprised to find I had at least nine dresses yet to be worn! This has forced me to promise that even if I can't shop again until 2012 I will survive and teach myself to be more creative with what I have.

I offered to help a friend organise his club night in return for free drink and, by hunting around all the supermarkets for different offers, managed to drastically reduce my food bill without compromising too much. The only thing that is still costing me unnecessary spending is actually looking for jobs. Dry cleaning and hairdressing ensure I look picture-perfect for interviews for that all-important first impression, and I have reluctantly hopped in far too many taxis these past few weeks so as to avoid the torrential downpours and not turn up as a drowned rat. The more meetings I manage to secure, the more broke I become!

Fingers crossed something comes along soon.

Check out this gold sequin skirt I got from Therapy at House of Fraser in the sales last week! Despite being totally broke it was so worth digging my wallet out to pay a tenner for this dazzler..I couldn't believe it was reduced down from €60 and skipped home from Dundrum forgetting all about my recession worries..it's the first time I've bought anything in ages but well worth it I think..wore it out on Saturday night with black opaques, black patent heels and plain black top and no jewellery..looking forward to wearing it lots over Christmas!

I felt sorry for my brother last week who missed out on his beloved mudfest at Oxygen. Despite working harder than ever, his disposable income isn't what it once was. I felt sorry for myself as well, as, ironically, the first year that I'm not working while the festival was on, I couldn't afford to go. It irked both of us then to see our younger brother, who I'm sure now knows the local dole officers by name, spend a weekend in his wellies having a grand old time.

How the hell does he afford it, the two of us mused? Only days before he had begged me for the use of my credit card to book a cheap flight to London to see his girlfriend. Sitting in for a week and being fed at home by our mother accounts for his shrewd amassing of coinage that allows him to continue his social life with no cutbacks. He headed for Oxygen with 24 cans of beer and €25 but, somehow, the cuteness in him means he never goes without and possibly because at 21 with his baby faced charm he still arouses sympathy from the family and is the one who gets handed €20 by a generous relative.

'Just move home' is his advice to me as I struggle with unemployment. He advised me that a social life is important for one's mental health and that I shouldn't be struggling with rent if it's making me miserable! But rather than succumb to such a disheartening alternative, instead I have been frugally calculating ways to stretch my euro further. I have brought clothes to the local swap shop, flogged unused vouchers to friends and reluctantly parted with my Electric Picnic ticket. It does annoy me slightly, however, that, afraid to even carry my credit card around right now, I'm using it to book my brother's flights! During a rant about how broke I am his eyes widened when I told him the limit left on my visa. “Sure you've loads of money,’’ he quipped, “and you have the column'.’’ Fair enough, I won't go homeless just yet but, unlike Carrie Bradshaw, my column does not allow me to skip around Dublin in Manolos.

Selling my Electric Picnic ticket is a pity, but putting food on the table is more important. Okay I’m lying; I sold the EP ticket to finance a pre-booked weekend away! Selling the ticket was a last desperate option as I was determined to find a way not to miss the weekend, no matter what. Maybe I'm more like my little brother than I realised …

If being unemployed is a short-term blip, I’m lucky it’s happened in July, rather than in the depths of Irish winter. Our recent heatwave has been perfect for lazy days in the park and lolling about town while others have had to endure sticky afternoons at their desks.

It’s many years since I enjoyed the perks of a summer off. As a child and teenager I spent summer roaming the streets of Skerries, cursing the town for its lack of excitement, not yet realising how lucky I was to grow up there.

During school holidays we got to experience endless hours of hanging around with friends, funded by pocket money or part-time work. My jobs of choice were babysitting and, later, waitressing, earning just enough to line my pockets for trips to town or to rent videos on drizzly summer evenings.

My days now are strangely reminiscent of these times, listlessly attempting to fill my afternoons with frugal but fun activities. I have now become queen of the coffee date, wandering around waiting for excitement, forced to be creative with my dwindling finances.

Plenty of friends are currently free for meeting as well. One of the lads is painting a fence as a favour, while another is enjoying the heady weather, his only interruption being some pizza delivery work.

Nice to spend time together but still the thrill of being free loses its appeal when it becomes the norm and most of us long for the return to a challenging routine and work that will afford us the money to finance our free time.

The difference is we aren't teenagers any more and my friends with the part-time jobs aren't just using their positions to fund some seasonal fun. The fence painter is an engineer and pizza boy has a degree in aerospace physics.

My coffee companions are an ever-growing group of experienced and eager, yet currently unemployable, professionals. And the little money that any of them has scraped together is not for ice-cream or day trips … it's for rent and bills. There is a heavy cloud looming over their otherwise stress free summers.

As teenagers it is typical to moan about the summer holidays, the common chorus of complaint being that there is 'nothing to do' and 'nowhere to go'. But when September came we always returned to school wishing for more time off.

Hopefully my friends and I, will have somewhere to go this September, only, unlike the kids currently on break, we won't be moaning about getting back into a routine.

Spent Saturday trawling around Penneys with my mam in an effort to convince her how far this shop has come and that it is now a wonderland for trendy recessionistas..a job well done it seems as she left with an armload of half - priced cotton casuals, a tribal patterned skirt reduced to 3euro because of a missing button, and the best pair of jeggings I've come across yet that look amazing on her slim legs.We continued our credit crunchy afteroon by stocking up on body lotions and shower gels at Tesco before marvelling at the amazing sale in A- Wear where there were rails of skirts for a fiver..three of which I had bought a few months ago for a much more expensive price unfortunately!

I love this pic of Rachel Bilson, who looks stylish as always stepping out in LA in her jeggings..