Grocery Adventures

This past September, the Carrs/Safeway in our neighborhood had a "Grand Re-Opening," for which we received different promotions and coupons in our mailbox in the weeks leading up to it. Needless to say, I was pretty excited to head out shopping--and luckily so was Mitch. We decided it would make an excellent "date-night"--and we were not disappointed.

There were tons of free samples, a live band (which according to Mitch, was "not that bad!"), and awesome deals. For most of the deals, there was a minimum purchase requirement of $25 for the coupons to work. We don't normally spend that much at Carrs, so Mitch and I sat down ahead of time and wrote up an entire purchase-plan-of-action. You should have seen us running around that store--talk about prepared!

Well at the end of the night, here is what we left the store with. Katherine, our poor tired cashier, was not as enthusiastic as we were about our awesome finds. Can you guess how much we spent?

2 gallons milk, 1 dozen eggs, 1 dozen fresh bagels, ice cream bars, french bread, several pounds of pork chops, peanut butter, apple juice, fresh pineappple, bananas, cantaloupe, apples, pack of bottled water, fresh deli black forest ham, cup of fresh coconut curry soup, box of cereal


Original price: $104.65
Our price: $25.94

Yess! Savings of $78.71.
Now THAT'S my kind of a party! :)

And now for my next grocery adventure...go back with me to October. October 2009 that is. (Better late than never, right?)

One morning I woke up early to get a crockpot stew in before I left for work. I pulled out the vegetables and started chopping them up. When I yanked off a stalk of celery, I noticed a big hunk of dirt in it, and was surprised because I had never seen celery that was quite so muddy before. But then, with a yelp, I noticed that this was in fact, definitely NOT dirt. No, instead, it was a huge, balled-up slug!

Eeeek! I flung the slug off the celery and into the sink. I was so grossed-out, but also slightly fascinated. Mostly, I thought, "I wish Mitch was here to see this!" In horror and amazement, I watched as the roly-poly slug streeeetched out and started climbing up the side of the sink. It was HUGE! I would say at least 2 inches long.

Well, I really wanted Mitch to be able to see the slug, so I took a few pictures, but then also tried to keep it contained in the sink. Unfortunately, when I turned on the water, it happened to be very hot....which meant this slug went the way of the Wicked Witch of the West.

I'm almost certain I heard it cry out in a high voice, "I'm meelllltiiiinnnnggg!!!"