What do senior citizens do when money is tight and they don't have much left for shopping and entertaining?

You find things to do that are free. Here I'm still cutting grass and trimming garden edges and the street. I just rained and things have grown feet. I miss the city I moved here from...there were free seats for plays and the opera and things were always going on in the parks and our wonderful zoo was free. I used to walk around the zoo for hours on end...it was so peaceful. Here I do a lot of volunteering...something I think every retired person should do to pay back their community and make something a bit better.

Paying our essential bills on time helps keep us debt free because there is a discount for paying by a certain date.

Eating is more important that being entertained but being entertained does not have to cost money (unless we have expensive tastes and feel the need to have everything that another person has).

Be entertained by watching children playing in the park. Use free facilities such as libraries, museums, local parks and well-kept gardens.

If you have a free bus pass then use it to go to a different town to see something a little different and take a packed lunch and a drink. Buying just a cup of coffee drains the resources by an amount which would buy enough food to make a simple, basic meal for yourself.

When money is tight entertainment for which you have to pay should be bottom of your list of 'needs'.

We go for the 'free' entertainment available. In my town there are concerts of one kind or another in our local park every Saturday. Sometimes they have local singers and sometimes someone more well known, sometimes it's a brass or silver band. There is plenty of variety for those who cannot exist without that kind of entertainment.

If you are short of money entertainment should be bottom of your list of the things you think you 'need'. If you have a computer (which I assume you have to be able to contact Yahoo) then you can watch catch up T.V. on it (assuming that you don't actually have a T.V.) and you can log on to many games etc.

Also you could entertain yourself through books, either to read or do puzzles etc. or you could use your computer to start writing a book or a play or a song etc. Use your imagination and give your brain a workout. Your whole life will benefit from doing such things.

They get their priorities right and buy food and other essentials and forget about luxuries and entertainment. If you wish to get away from your own four walls then go out for a walk or go and feed the ducks in the nearest pond or watch children playing happily in your local park etc. Entertainment does not HAVE to cost money.

Don't buy daily newspapers, the important news in the radio and t.v. every hour. Don't subscribe to magazines, don't smoke or drink and don't buy luxuries such as chocolate. If you are not already buying the basic range of all your foodstuffs (many of us have no choice in this matter) then start choosing a cheaper label of some things and see how you find them. All these things make a difference and all this helps us to pay the heating bills.

You assess what our absolute necessities to stay alive are and everything else gets put on the "when we have extra money" burner. There's not a whole lot of entertainment aimed at senior citizens these days anyway, although sometimes senior citizen groups (if you join) get discount tickets to entertainment. And places like movie theaters and museums often have discounts for seniors. Shopping, aside from food, I don't think most seniors do a lot of shopping, it's just not fun after a while and unless they have a mental problem (hoarding), most seniors don't want to have to figure out what to do with more junk. I think most seniors I know, whether they are on a tight budget or not, tend to do things that are free and don't cost much--walking, window shopping, hanging out for hours someplace. There used to be an elderly woman who used to hang in the Peasant Pies shop for most of the day, in the window seat, drinking tea mostly. People would stop in and sit and chat with her. The Peasant Pie people were just fine with her being there not buying stuff. There's an older woman in my immediately neighborhood who sits on the benches that many of the shopkeepers have put out in front of their shops and she talks to familiar faces. It takes us longer to get things done, I used to be able to zoom out to 3 different grocery stores back 20 years ago but now I feel I've accomplished a major goal by just getting to one market and back in one day (and I usually have to take a rest afterward--yea, I've always walked it). I don't think seniors need to be entertained like the younger folks do.

It depends on the weather. Last weekend we got together with another retired couple from the US and played table tennis, then we had drinks and pizza at their flat. We split the bill with them.
Because we live in a big city we enjoy walking the old streets while running errands. We have a car but usually walk instead to kill time, get some exercise and to see the city up close.
I no longer really enjoy walking in the malls, way too crowded and I do not want to be tempted to spend.
When the weather is warm we go swimming several times per week either at a lake or river or in a spa setting with a garden.
We make sure we eat something before going to big events so we are not tempted to buy over priced snacks and drinks.
I used to go to the gym for hours daily but since my husband isn't a gym rat, I have taken up working out at home, that kills at least 2 or more hours per day.

I save up for several months to go to the movies. Other than a few groceries I don't shop any more,

when one goes on disability or retirement benefits people need to stop entertaining because there is no money left for that. In fact entertaining means spending money on movies, meals, treating family to dinner (in or out of the home), dancing, etc. and instead doing things that don't cost money like going for walks, driving to see the sunset, chatting over coffee at maybe MacDonalds, walking thru the mall for exercise, and if you live in a complex where there is a pool you might go there for exercise, other wise you just keep each other going by fun things you see on tv, hear on the radio, books you've read, things your grandchildren or pets did, etc. Lots of people like to read (all it costs is gas to get to the library,or read things from the internet).

When it comes to shopping one would just realize that there really isn't anywhere to wear new things, and what you do have left will last you 10 or more years so you don't need to shop anymore for you or your family.

The shopping we still do is food shop, and determining what to buy when and with what coupons and how to buy the cheapest yet tastiest item we can find usually takes up our time.

I have two cheap hobbies: 1) fixing things that fall apart or are broken, and 2) art work...the dark #3 pencil is cheap and so is the light cardboard at about 68 cents a sheet and it takes me 1-5 years to complete a picture. In the past I've purchased a jigsaw puzzle and it took me ages to put together, glue it and now it's on my wall to look at a lovely picture.

They don't do much when they don't have money. Some call and ask their children to help them out but most don't. Some go to food banks to stretch food and many live in low income senior housing so visit each other and have pot luck dinners and things that are cheap.
When I have know poor elderly we have always taken them things like snacks when we go to play cards so they don't have to provide anything. I had an elderly great aunt who loved to entertain and her senior group have a dinner party at a different home each month so she needed to entertain about once a year. She loved entertaining so for Christmas once I made her a box of fancy foods she could use to entertain but would keep like cans and jars of olives.
Entertaining doesn't need to be expensive or frequent and if the family knows you are having problems might try to help with the cost. You can invite people between meals and serve some cheap beverages like tea.

I'm not at that point yet.
My sister (who lives 1800 miles away) volunteers at a local church soup kitchen for the poor and homeless ... she gets to take leftovers home and that makes up for how tight her food budget is.
She's an excellent cook .. would probably do well on the Iron Chef TV show, since she can make a delicious meal out of any odd combination of foods. So when she does entertain at home .. she has food to cook with.

She also has a deal with a neighbor who has more money and cannot cook. He buys 3 chickens ever 2 weeks, hands them over to her raw .. she cooks them and gives him 2 back, keeping one for herself. This deal was his idea, and so far in 3 years he hasn't make a move on her, so I suppose it's not sexually-motivate on his part. At any rate, she she takes that chicken and packages it up into small serving sizes and freezes it, adding it to stir fries, rice dishes, soups, etc. as needed.