February Savings Round-up

My budget is:

Pharmacy $50
Grocery $250

Let's see how I did.

Harris Teeter
Subtotal: $283.49
Coupons: $159.93
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Total: $123.56 which represents a savings of 56%

CVS
Subtotal: $136.44
Coupons: $ 68.92
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Total: $ 67.52 which represents a savings of 51%

So I am still over-budget at CVS, however, those categories blend a little. I do get some personal care items at Harris Teeter and some groceries at CVS. Maybe I should just make a general "Grocery/Personal Care" budget since I do so much overlap-shopping and am not OCD enough to split my receipts when I've made purchases in both categories.

Overall I'm excited about my grocery store savings. I'm eating well, I have a decent stock-pile of dry goods and yet am coming in pretty consistently under-budget, at least in the first few months of the year!

At CVS I think I just need to be picker about deals. Now that I know how good a deal I can get on certain items, and I have some of those items in stock at home, I should make sure I'm not paying more than I need to.

For example, I recently got two tubes of toothpaste for $0.17ea. Since two tubes will last me quite a while AND since the final price was so low, I should remind myself to pass on seemingly 'good' deals where the toothpaste is on sale but my out-of-pocket would be $1 or so.

GOAL FOR MARCH: NO personal care/beauty products will be purchased unless they are LESS THAN ONE DOLLAR after coupon!

What A Difference Fifteen Minutes Makes

In an effort to maintain some semblance of health and fitness, I'm trying to retrain my brain when it comes to what I consider "long" runs or hard workouts.

There is absolutely no reason why I can't knock out a 5+ mile run during the week. Typically I run about 3 miles on a weekday and save anything longer for the weekend. In my mind, 3 miles is a basic run and anything more is "long."

Eehhhhh. Wrong. I can run five miles in under an hour and there's no reason why an hours worth of exercise should be considered especially intense.

Consider the following routes. The longer one adds about fifteen minutes onto my time when you consider not only the additional distance but also additional stoplights that require waiting, yet the longer one is longer significantly so when it comes to overall time on my feet.

A 45-minute route (starting and ending at home):


Simply continuing on down to the Lincoln Memorial adds about fifteen minutes and 3/4 mile (remember... stop lights... I am not THAT slow!)



Point is, that's hardly any additional distance but enough additional time to really kick the workout into the next level.

I just need to get over the mental block that says that 5-mile run is 'long' and therefore reserved for the weekend. No. If I can work toward a 5-mile run becoming a more common and regular occurrence I will not only improve my weekday calorie burn but increase my overall long runs to a distance that truly qualifies as long.

No More Excuses

At a little English-style diner pub in Fredericksburg, VA yesterday we came across the gem sitting on our table.

No more excuses for not being able to order the perfect glass of wine!

Grocery Porn

What does $30.84 worth of groceries from Harris Teeter look like?

Voila!



Subtotal: $78.93
Coupons: $48.09
Final: $30.84
Savings: 61%

Five boxes of pasta, two tubs of hummus, one tub of guacomole, two boxes of rice, one gallon of soymilk, a huge thing of Quaker oats, two pouches of tuna, two Simply Asian noodle bowls, two Cracker Barrel cheese, two shampoos, two conditioners, a deodorant, two toothpastes, one Ziploc plastic bags, bananas, and an onion.

Opening Ceremonies!

Two great Red Wings, Nik Lidstrom and Nik Kronwall, will be among others from Detroit and elsewhere joining Team Sweden for the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver! Opening ceremonies kick off tonight and the men's hockey matches start early next week.

I can't wait to watch some classic Russian finesse hockey, see the Swedes play their intellectual game, witness the Czechs pound the crap out of their enemies, and take in the Canadians doing what they were born to do.

Snow Day #2

Unbelievable! My agency is closed for the second day in a row! I can't believe it. I was sure we'd be open today and I've have to trudge through wind, snow, and ice to my office in the dark. I am really happy for the additional day off.

Yesterday I napped a little, watched three movies, did a lot of reading and crosswording and playing around on the computer. It was a lovely day spent almost entirely in bed! I might consider getting out and being a little more active today... or not. It remains to be decided and at 7:30am the day is my oyster.

I'll work tomorrow but Monday is a holiday, so this has been and will continue to be a really nice break from the routine.

Now hopefully our roof won't collapse under the weight of all this snow and ice!

Owwwww

You know how when your uterus is spasming for 10 hours and it's coming in waves so after each wave you get a few breaths of peace and you're almost tricked into thinking that that one could be the last one?

But it isn't.

Hormonal

I know when I'm running on a surplus of hormones when the slighest things just make me want to scream.

I have one co-worker who's smacking on a peppermint in her mouth... another with the sniffles and one who has this weird whistling tic... he whistlest these short notes that go up at the end, almost like he's calling a dog, about once every ten minutes.

Ordinarily I wouldn't care about this sort of thing and just take it as regular office background noise but today it is driving.me.nuts.

Thank god I have an ipod... and as soon as the first flakes start falling I am OUTTA HERE.

Rant over.

Snowy Run

Well, I was inspired. Even yesterday with the snow still basically falling I saw people suited up and out running. A half-marathoning girlfriend told me that she had gone out for a run as well, so today after work I did it! And it was great! Warm, sunny, lots of runners out, clear and salted sidewalks, light breeze.

I couldn't go everywhere I wanted to go; I basically followed the plow, but I ended up with a nice 35-minute spin around parts of the Capitol and the Mall and feel a lot better for it!

Unbelievably, we are expecting another FOOT of snow tomorrow night and into Wednesday. Yikes.

A Feast and A Snowstorm

To prepare for the impending SNOWPOCALYPSE/SNOWBLITERATION a feast was prepared that will last days... if not weeks.

Moose burgers
Moose meatballs
Sausage and peppers
Barbecue pork

My kitchen and fridge are overflowing with meat, the dishwasher has been run 3 times in 24 hours and the trash has gone out twice. I have more food than I know what to do with! Not a bad problem to have.

Finally summoned the energy to go for a walk in the gorgeous snow. It's going to take us a long time to dig out of this one. The roads, under the snow, are coated with ice 2 inches thick. But the snow made for a gorgeous backdrop.

Finger Condoms

Between the Super Bowl and the impending snow storm the grocery store was packed today.

I did get a great deal on coffee. Eight o'Clock coffee was on sale and also buy-one-get-one. So I got two bags for $5.89 minus a coupon for $2 off 2 bags. Total $3.89 for two bags of coffee!

Also Dannon yogurts were on sale 10 for $4... I had a coupon for $1 off ten so that was ten yogurts for $3 or $0.30 each.

Anyway, the line for check-out was so long that I ended up waiting halfway down the first aid aisle.... and I snapped this funny photo! I didn't know such things existed!

Dinner

I just put together what may very well be the most random and disorganized meal, ever.

I was going to bake a chicken breast and steam some peas. Okay, good plan. But while the chicken was baking I got really hungry so I made the peas and added some chopped sundried tomaties and shredded parmesan cheese. I ate that while the chicken finished up.

But then just chicken on my plate looked pretty pathetic, so I rustled up half a green bell pepper and sliced it, raw. Didn't really feel like roasting or sauteeing it. I could have put it in with the chicken but I wasn't thinking I'd eat it.

So yeah. Peas for an appetizer, now a chicken breast with half a raw green pepper.

The only redeeming factor? A really good bottle of Belgian beer.