the economISt

Your Lent Term Budget

Arjun Banwait, resident financial adviser, draws up your termly expenses

Having inevitably overspent during Michaelmas with Freshers’ Week, Halloween, and Bridgemas, you may have resolved to maintaining a degree of fiscal responsibility through this term— here’s your recommended budget for Lent term.

Food

Apparently, it’s a necessity. With Hall meals costing approximately £40 each, it seems only reasonable to enjoy the delights of Hall food three times a day, every day—meaning that, for the term, your food bill should come to £7,080.

Snacks

Sitting at your desk reading, writing essays, or solving equations, you might find you also need to work through a pack of digestives or two, or even a few protein bars (though gym membership is a prerequisite for this option). Based on this—and the spread of supervisions throughout the term—it seems only reasonable to allocate £3 per normal day with an additional £20 per supervision bringing the snacking budget to at least £500.

Gym membership

You’ll never go, but at least you can claim you do. £30.

Toiletries and household items

Taking a shower requires leaving your room (unless you’re lucky enough to have an ensuite), meaning for the majority of Mathmos, this may not be a primary concern. However, a certain amount of money needs to be reserved to buy wet wipes—useful for cleaning your room—and tissues—for drying your tears after mock exam results. Realistically, given the absorbance of Sainsbury’s Basic tissues, you’ll need to reserve around £200 for this.

Refreshments

To endure the term, it can be useful to partake in the consumption of cold beverages, such as apple juice, soft drinks and anything else that comes to mind. For this particular aspect of the budget, we recommend at least £250 because there’s nothing better than a cold pint of apple juice to end the day.

Total: £8,060

Petr

Potato wedges

Since the year 1982, all of these have been made in-house from fresh, whole, unpeeled potatoes. The process involves throwing the potatoes up above the frier and slicing them mid-air into thin wedges using a razor-sharp Japanese sword weilded the Head Chef himself. Only a highly experienced swordsman can ensure they fall into the boiling hot oil. Rumour has it, Halfbrick Studios Pty Ltd attempted to sue the catering departement for copyright infringement, pertaining to their game Fruit Ninja. However, following a series of “unfortunate, but notprovably related incidents”, the case was dropped. Some have claimed that every one of Halfbrick’s Intellectual Property lawyers being found with a katana-shaped hole in their hearts cannot be a coincidence, but what do they know?

Besides being tasty, they are very practical. Fixing a wobbly table, propping open a door (although not within Trinity), making sure your truck doesn’t run away while parked at an inclined road, you say it.

Spicy potato wedges

Same as above but spicy. Damn!

Herby diced potatoes

This is a potato dish that has been widely enjoyed since the Roman times, as documented by the full version of the famous quote herba potatoa alea iacta est loosely translated as “herby diced potatoes have been cast [onto the frying pan, apparently]”.

Curly fries

Everybody loves the curly fries. Literally everybody. This anthropological mystery has been haunting the