Resourceful or Stingy?

A stark contrast exists between the definitions of the words "resourceful" vs. "stingy". Nevertheless the vast majority of people tend to confusingly stereotype those that are merely being resourceful in money-saving techniques with those that are actually penny-pinchers and live a stingy life. A resourceful individual is defined as one that is "able to act effectively or imaginatively in difficult [economic] situations", while a stingy person is one that is "selfishly unwilling to share with others, giving or spending reluctantly."

A few illustrations of situations where this confusion exists are listed below:

1) During a period when I would sometimes get dropped calls on my cellphone, I would spend about 10 minutes at the end of each month (only lasted 3-4 months) calling Sprint's customer service. I would talk to "Claire", the automated customer service agent and merely say "dropped call", which would immediately generate a credit of $.50 to my account for the inconvenience. I capitalized on this credit by repeating myself 20 times and receiving the maximum alloted $10 per month for dropped calls.

2) Waiting overnight in front of Fry's Electronics from 12 AM until 8 AM in a long line freeezing my ass off in order to be one of the first 30 people to obtain the limited release of the Xbox 360. Since I am not a avid console gamer, my sole purpose was to resale it on craigslist for double the retail value ($400). .

3) Going on restaurant.com and purchasing $25 gift certificates for $3 in order to experiance new restaurants and try new types of foods given that you do have to eat anyways, might as well save a few bucks.

4) Petitioning a $45 parking ticket that I recieved in a 20 minute zone and I got it waived. My line of argument was that although it seemed like my car was parked at that location for more then 20 minutes, in reality I was in the process of moving. Therefore, I was not ever actually parked in the same spot for the full duration necessary to warrant a ticket. (All BS of course, but makes sense.. no?)

Anyhow, these are merely a few instances where ingenuity and resourcefulness helped to save/make a few bucks but should not be considered stingy/cheap. Although I'm sure there are those out there that beg to differ, I feel my actions are CLEARLY acceptable as great money-saving techniques!