Tuesday, May 1, 2007

First shopping trip

So because of my weekend camping trip, I had $27 to begin with. Minus $1 for milk (what we calculated we pay through our milkman) and $2 for coffee (what Jay and I estimated we would spend; right now we make coffee for the two of us every morning from the stash I brought from Uganda, and it seemed silly to brew two separate pots, that's $24 I had to work with. I didn't want to spend it all in case I had a major craving at the end of the week: craving contingency money is important. So I did my shopping at Safeway. Here's what I got:
Cheerios (on sale) - $2
Grape Jelly (on sale) - $1.69
Peanut Butter (on sale - also non hydrogenated! woo!) - $2.00
1 bag lentils - $0.69
1 bag brown rice - $0.69
Big bag of spaghetti (on sale) - $1.25
2 Oriental Ramen (I know you can get em way cheaper elsewhere)- $0.50
1 can tuna (on sale) - $0.66
2 yogurt (on sale for 50c ea) - $1.00
Safeway crushed wheat bread (on sale) - $1.50
2 oranges (on sale) - $1.30
3 bananas - $1.08
1 roma tomato (on sale) - $0.33
2 fuji apples - $1.74
3 carrots - $0.55
a few celery stalks - $0.41

plus 1 jar of tomato sauce i'm carrying over from tj's - $2.00

Total: $19.39


Surprises: I was really happy to see there was an alternative to Adam's super expensive peanut butter for simple, just peanuts, non-hydrogenated peanut butter. I was dismayed at how impossible it is to get cheap jam that doesn't have high fructose corn syrup. As it is, I'm eating 100% more high fructose corn syrup now than before. The main tragedy for this week is NO CHEESE. I will probably go back later and buy some with my contingency moneys. Cheese is one of the most compelling arguments for sharing food. Cheese in the 2lb bricks is, I think, more than twice as cheap per pound than in the smallest quantities. I could spend 3 dollars on a teeny amount of cheese, or 6 on four times as much. Also, I am appreciating vegetables and fruit way more right now than I do when I get them through the free organics box. I mean, I gave up cheese before I would give away one of my oranges or apples.

Food today:
cheerios & coffee for breakfast
pb&j sandwich, spaghetti and sauce, half a carrot for lunch
plus i brought a bunch of teabags so i'll be drinking tea all day instead of coffee

How's everyone else's first day going?

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