One of the advantages of growing up in a lower-middle-class household is that you don’t acquire expensive tastes.

I agree with Jerry Seinfeld who says he has never eaten a fancy restaurant meal that tasted better than a Pop Tart.

I live simply. I drive a 10-year-old car that I clean out with a yard rake.

When I was single, I bought toilet paper one roll at a time because I didn’t want to overcommit. (If you want to be a hard-core miser try this: I once met a cheapskate who hand-washed paper coffee filters and dried them on a clothesline.)

If money is an issue at your house, here are three cost-saving strategies you might want to consider.

n Tip No. 1: Shop at the Dollar Store.

At the Dollar Store, you’re not likely to make an impulse purchase. At Wal-Mart, I once bought a vibrating neck massager. At the Dollar Store the checkout temptations are easy to skip, like “Start Wars” Pez dispensers and video-cassettes of “Leave It to Beaver: The Lumpy Years.”

A story: Once I stopped at a Dollar Store in Red Bank to buy some emergency mouthwash. I got a little 2-ounce bottle that I thought was a travel size. I took a big swig and immediately began to feel the stuff eating through my mucous membranes.

Haw!

Frantic, I read at the label, and it said something like: “Mouthwash concentrate. Mix with five gallons of water.”

Show me a person who MIXES his own mouthwash in a bucket, and I’ll show you somebody who ain’t afraid of no stinkin’ recession.

n Tip No. 2: Vacation at Pigeon Forge. Trust me, Pigeon Forge is way better (and cheaper) than Orlando, Fla. Why spring for the nightly fireworks at the Magic Kingdom when you can by some sparklers, sit in a lawn chair on the Pigeon Forge Parkway and watch traffic whiz by.

Yee-haw.

Sound boring? Hop on over to the Elvis Presley Museum, where you can seen the king’s official bottle of Brut. And if you want the real “inside” story of Elvis, the museum even has a set of his X-rays.

n Tip No. 3: Eat at the Waffle House.

At least twice a month I take my two sons to the Waffle House. It saves money, and I consider it part of their cultural education.

I knew my enrichment plan was working when my 6-year-old asked for a dollar to play the jukebox. Later, as we walked out of the Waffle House in Red Bank one night, he asked: “Daddy, what’s a cheatin’ heart?”

“Son,” I said, sucking on a toothpick, “I could tell you, but you wouldn’t believe it.”

E-mail Mark Kennedy at mkennedy@timesfreepress.com.