The subject is in jest; this is a question about how to communicate with our fellow frugal weirdos when our exact time/money calculus doesn't line up with theirs. The situation:
Us: early-mid 30s couple, 2 young kids, 2 (flexible) fulltime+ jobs, very busy. We save aggressively and are frugal, but also outsource strategically to spend time on family (e.g. we use daycare, babysitters, a house cleaner, we buy some convenience foods and cook less than Friends. This will change when our kids are older and we're also FI!)
Friends: late 30s couple, no kids, 1 partner is FI and works on startups/consulting, other has a FT remote job.
Our friends are great people: our values and interests align and we can talk openly about money, which makes spending time with them easy. They are probably more frugal than we are because they have more free time, not because they're misers (they recently completed a huge fancy kitchen renovation, and are spending the winter elsewhere away from our cold climate, for example). We usually get together at our house or theirs to cook/eat dinner, go on a hike nearby, or do something else low-key together. We help each other out when it's practical: e.g. my husband helped deal with a house issue while they were out of town, and they made us dinner several times after our baby was born.
The question: our friends will sometimes ask for favors that take time we don't really have at the moment, in order to save themselves a few dollars (e.g. a ride somewhere instead of taking a $10 Uber.) We're positive they would return such a favor if we asked, but at this point, we'd probably rather give them the $10 than spend 30-40 minutes giving the ride. Giving a ride cuts into work time (we're spending money on childcare and are away from our kids!), or it cuts into precious evening free family/chore time. These kinds of favors are different from something 'fun' than we can all do together at one of our houses (including kids)... [e.g. another friend once invited the whole family over for a 'work session' to get some house projects done, which was fine]. They're also different from helping out a friend who really has a problem or is in need.
So -- do we say something about it? This seems like it will sound very rude and selfish. Since we have somewhat flexible schedules, it's rare that one of us truly *can't* fit in a ride or a favor, just that it will come at the expense of something else. Also, our friends have mentioned that they're available if we ever need a babysitter in a pinch, and have otherwise made it clear that they would help us out whenever they can.