The 82nd Annual Academy Awards are this Sunday evening, and if we know anything about LA, chances are you'll be watching it. But why just watch it when you can experience it? The best place to be on Oscar night is in the Kodak Theater. You're probably not special enough to be there. Instead, you can sit on the bleachers with the plebeians. Only problem is if you're just finding out about this now, it's already too late. Looks like you'll be stuck at home. But there's hope! Here's how to make your Oscars night a real party.

It's that time of year again. Merchants hope to hear the cha-ching of your hard-earned cash being handed over so you can curry favor and avoid guilt. By now everyone has heard the news about jobs being cut and salaries reduced, so feel justified in playing into the general tightfisting. Giving cheaper gifts is a bit trickier because they usually require more hunting down, but we've decided to help you out. Here are some tips for high fun/low pain gift giving.

Los Angeles is the home of the movies. So why's it always gotta be so darn expensive to go out to one? Well, it doesn't. We've already discussed ways to watch movies at home and some ideas to get in for cheaper. Here's a fairly exhaustive list of discount movie theaters in the greater LA area. None of these theaters will cost you more than $9.50 to see a movie — ever. In general, the theaters that are more than $7 are first-run theaters (meaning they show movies currently in wide release), and the cheaper ones are second-run theaters (meaning they get the movies some time after their initial opening) with some getting the big movies just weeks after they open in the big theaters.

Your pearly whites are critical for slipping past a doorman without paying a cover, negotiating a business deal, and charming your coffee gal into a free grande upgrade. You never want to look straight out of the UK, but oops! Your dental insurance went out the window in the last budget cut. A new, benefits-laden job is nowhere on the horizon, so what's a broke candy-muncher like you to do? Get it for free, of course. Duh.

People need to eat. But food costs money. And money is…shall we say tight? Enter the magical miracle of ramen! For under a dollar, you can eat warm goodness packed with noodles, freeze-dried veggies, and something pretending to be a protein. This is not a mockery; this is an ode.

Hi. My name is HeadBum and I'm an addict – to sugar that is. Being the broke bum that I am, it's sometimes challenging to share that dependent love/craving/omigodgiveittomenow with my friends. Lucky for me, lots of obese Americans and corn subsidies have helped drive down the price of my crack. Thus, I can ask my bummy friends to a sweet tooth orgy and feel no guilt about assigning them each a sugar-loaded wonder. And if they complain tomorrow, well, sweetness has its price. Cheap!

As my manicurist once told me, "of course you can't go to a job interview with your nails all raggedy." I might be paraphrasing, but you get the idea. Knowing this town, you can sabotage the interview you've been dying for with jagged cuticles.  Problem: Having spent the last couple months chewing them off, how's a bum to get presentable nails without blowing two weeks of grocery money?

I’ve been wearing the same t-shirts and pants since high school, but now they’re starting to fall apart. What’s a poor boy to do? Luckily, there are a number of places in LA to find some über-cheap threads.