The ex has pretty much killed my efforts at frugal living.

[Curmudgeoness]

2. There may not be ways to be frugal that you are used to,

but you can still do things that are not as radical. You have to give up some things, but there is still the simple things---buying foods in season, thrift stores, not buying things you don't need, etc. When you are living with someone else, there is always a give and take. I am sure that if I lived with another person, they would have to stop doing some of the things that I do...but I would not give up everything. But don't give up your soul.

BTW, I use a cheap paper shredder to shred newspaper for the compost pile. It saved a lot of time. And I have been told that all I would have to do is just tear it up a little (and I even have a friend who just puts it in rolled up and it decomposes) and it would work fine, but the shredder works great. Plus it saves a lot of time if you are cutting it up by hand.