Sunday 16 November 2008

Weekend round-up

I've just found out that the official term for ice fog is "Fog Depositing Ice" which is how Environment Canada describes it. Regardless, it's fog and it's ice and it was quite heavy and made the 10-minute drive into town a careful one in the -20C morning. It will dissipate once the temperatures go up, but as it's only 8:17 a.m., still dark and still cold, it will probably be several hours yet.

Yes, there are times when I wish I lived somewhere else (mostly when I'm scraping my car windows in the cold and the dark and am just sick to death of it), but those times are few and far between.

My spends from Friday look like this:

Lunch with a friend: $7.50 (a really excellent organic lentil/brown rice bowl)

Tea: $1.92 (I've decided to ask for a Tim's card for Christmas, seeing as I spend so much of my own money there every month - why not ask someone for a gift certificate to use instead?)

I was at the shelter dog wash on Saturday from 12 - 3 and afterwards stopped at the grocery store to pick up a few fresh things. I bought:

pasta $1.58 x 4 bags (the no name brand)
cat litter/food: $13.95
cucumber $2.59
egg nog $2.99
(9lb) box of mandarin oranges $6.98
cheese $12.18
cream of chicken soup (2 tins)$3.18
feta cheese (bag) $4.99
container of cat litter $10.48
3 tins cat food $2.97

Total: $53.35

Who spends $2.59 on a single cucumber? We northerners. Further north, in, say, Iqaluit, prices are even higher because everything is flown or shipped in. Prices for 4L of milk sometimes hover around $12!

You have to really like spending some time grocery shopping because produce can be pretty sketchy sometimes, so my general rule of thumb is that if it looks like it's been run over by a truck once, BUY IT! Twice, forget it. There'll be another truck in on Friday. All our produce is trucked in from Edmonton - takes at least a couple of days to get here and if the roads are bad during the winter, sometimes the trucks simply don't make it, or are delayed. Coming from Vancouver Island, where the produce is fabulous and cheap and plentiful, I was initially horrified by quality and cost, but you have to eat, right? You just have to suck it up and shop carefully.

My problem with coupons and fliers here is that most of the stuff that goes on sale, I simply don't eat or use. A lot of it is processed food items, some of it is stuff I just don't like, and there are a lot of cleaners that I don't use because they're not environmentally friendly. So it's mostly convenience stuff, which is great, to a point, but that leaves me with not much to choose from on the sale shelves and whatnot. I think I shall have to start scouring the coupon websites to see what sort of things they have and try to pick and choose what will work for me.

I am going to make some muffins now, so that I have them for work this week.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

can you get frozen or canned produce? seems like it would be cheaper and healthier! cold is not my thing - would love to hear tips and tricks for dealing with it - i will be experiencing my own cold weather living next year!

Canadian Saver said...

Yikes, I won't complain about your winter weather here. We're supposed to get our first snow on Wednesday.

I agree with paradigmshifted, maybe frozen would be a good alternative? Most nutritionists will say you have more vitamins in there anyway.

Good idea about the Tim Horton's gift card!! You'll use it often and won't have to feel bad since it isn't your money :-)

Sharon S said...

Hi there-the muffins sound glorious, enjoy them!!

Anonymous said...

I've been complaining all day because it is 60 degrees out. I decided I was going to bring out my winter coat this weekend.

I wish I could send you cucumbers. I plant a few plants and we could never eat all they produce.