To be meticulously frugal to the point of stinginess, often due to extreme poverty or a habit of calculating every tiny expense; to count every grain of rice before cooking, symbolizing extreme poverty or excessive parsimony.
他生活节俭，简直到了数米而炊的地步，连买个小物件都要反复比较。
He lives so frugally, almost to the point of counting grains of rice before cooking; he compares thoroughly even when buying a small item.
Era:
Ancient
Frequency:
Synonym:
Story:
During the Tang Dynasty, the famous poet Wei Zhuang, though from a humble background, maintained an extremely frugal lifestyle even after gaining fame.
He would often count out rice grains before cooking and weigh firewood before burning it.
This level of extreme thriftiness was often ridiculed by others, sometimes seen as bordering on the contemptible.
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