Tag Archives: errands

Self Isolation Day 13: Almost Done

27 Mar

Today is my last Friday in self-isolation, who knew 14 days could go by so slowly! Fridays are one of my regular days off so I spent today doing things I would normally do on a Friday.

Laundry, general tidying up, cuddling the cat, chillin, running a quick errand…

Yup, you read that right, I went out in to the world! Freeeeeeedom!…sorta…

I had an errand that had to be done before the weekend that I classified as essential, which means I got to go outside! I chose to walk to the shop and even though it was rainy, and a tad chilly, it was lovely. There was hardly anyone around, which I guess proves in my neighbourhood social distancing and self-isolation is being done, or everyone had left the neighbourhood so it just appeared that way lol I think that a lot of people were around, tucked safely inside their houses, as on my walk there and back I saw a decent number of people popping out on to their front steps for a quick breath of fresh air, and who can blame them?

day 13

I hadn’t realized until I got outside that the cherry blossoms are in bloom, so pretty.

It was eerie walking to the shop and passing all those closed businesses. I understand and support them being closed, and even judged this one shop that was open that I don’t think could classify itself as essential, but the more closed signs I saw the more I wondered where all those workers are and what they are doing and how they are coping with their work being closed. I hope their employers are treating them well during all this.

The shop I went to had tape on the floor in each aisle, showing you how far apart you need to stand to be at a safe distance, like there is really a safe distance?

day 13a

They even had these barriers put up so you and the person working at the counter can’t breathe on each other, or really see each other. There is a little cut out for items to be passed through, and bags on your side so you can bag your own items. I wish I’d gotten a picture of that but in the moment it seemed rude to take one.

After I got home normal Friday things commenced. I started laundry, put the items I bought away, called my mother for cooking advice. What strayed from the norm is instead of deciding the cooking was too hard and ordering in I actually followed through and cooked. Again. This is almost becoming a habit!

I made Tuna Broccoli Pie, almost. That is what it was supposed to be, and I did follow the spirit of the recipe but (1) I cut it in half because it makes two pies and there is only one of me and (2) I didn’t have enough broccoli so I used different veggies.

Oh, and (3) I only had white cheese so instead of a lovely orange cheese layer on top mine looks sickly and gross because I used too much white cheese, but hey, use what ya got!

I got the recipe from my mom, I asked her for a recipe that uses a frozen pie crust as I have a bunch of them in my freezer and I don’t have the ingredients needed to make a dessert pie. Growing up we used to eat this, I want to say frequently but I really don’t know how often she made it. It is one of those dishes that you can eat hot but it is just as good cold so it is great for left overs. I mostly remember eating it cold in the summerย  with a side salad. I intended to replicate that, only eat it hot, but then I realized I don’t have the fixings for a salad and can’t pop out to buy them so in the end all I ate was two slices of the pie.

The ingredients are: egg, milk, miracle whip, mustard, flaked tuna, vegetables (I used broccoli, snap peas, and beans, all chopped up), the pie crust, and of course the cheese for the top. You can skip the cheese if you don’t want it.

Ok, now I want you to brace yourself because it does not look good at all, but it really does end up being tasty, I promise!

day 13b

All you can really see is that I put too much cheese on top and the vegetables are sticking out. The crust browned beautifully!

I was so sure it was going to taste gross because (1) tuna, and (2) my mom cooks way better than I, recipes she makes that taste great I try and they flop, so my hopes were not high.

Which means I was even more pleasantly surprised when I took my first bite and liked it enough to not need any condiments for it, and even went back for a second slice! It’s always nice when dinner turns out to be edible, especially when you use a hot commodity ingredient like an egg!

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$18 Jug of Milk

8 Apr

Do you ever do that thing where you go in to the store for one item and come out with a bagful?

That was me this evening, so my intended $2 and change purchase of milk turned in to $18 and change for milk plus some other stuff. *rolls eyes*

This doesn’t happen to me when I go actual grocery shopping, then I go with a list and I get just what is on the list…ok so sure I also sometimes end up with a treat or I buy something I know I’ll need soon that is on sale now but in general, I follow the list.

When I go to buy one or two items though it is like all hell breaks loose with my willpower over choosing what I pick up and next thing you know I’m spending $20 when all I intended to purchase was a bunch of bananas, or like this time, milk.

What’s with that?

My mom does the same thing, so maybe it is genetic? ๐Ÿ˜‰ lol

This time I justified some of the items because I didn’t have cash on me and no way was I using my debit card for such a small purchase so I figured hey, buy one or two other things just to make the purchase amount less pathetic but those one or two other things turned in to about 6 things and next thing I know I’m unpacking croissants and cereal and turkey pepperoni and milk and a couple other things on to my stove (I don’t have a kitchen counter) and wondering what the hell I was thinking.

I’d love to say all the items are essentials but who am I kidding? Froot Loops are not essentials…well, essential to my sugar levels and happiness but nutritionally? Not quite! lol Though if I thought on it long enough I’m sure I could find a way to justify them…it is a fortified cereal after all… ๐Ÿ˜‰

grocery shopping

 

Hot Cross Buns From Cobs

8 Mar

I have been trying to publish a different post but due to technical difficulties it just isn’t happenin, and hasn’t been happenin for a couple days now so let’s change topics shall we?

I don’t go to Cobs. Not that I have anything against the company it’s just, all they sell is bread, and why would I go to a store that only sells one thing when I can buy that item, along with all my other groceries in one store, like Safeway? I like to manage my time and in doing so I choose not to go to a whole bunch of little specialty shops. Also, those little shops tend to be pricier so hey, one more reason to avoid them right? Right!

Well, I got a coupon from Facebook saying if I bought a six pack of hot cross buns I would get a free loaf of bread at Cobs. For some reason this appealed to me, even though I wouldn’t normally be buying hot cross buns lol Before work today I popped in to Cobs and holy hannah, Cobs is soooooo much more than just bread. It’s like bread heaven. Mmm!

I stuck to my plan and bought the six pack of hot cross buns and received my free loaf of bread but lemme tell ya, there were many a tempting item in there. When I got to work I was informed I should have caved and bought a cinnamon bun because they are the best ever so I may go back one day when I want a treat since cinnamon buns are one of my favourite things. ๐Ÿ˜€

How are cinnamon buns not one of Maria’s favourite things?

Back to Cobs! lol

Did you know there are different types of hot cross buns? I didn’t know this. I had only ever seen the one kind, the semi-ok-not-my-fave-thing-trying-to-teach-myself-to-like-kind. You know what I’m talking about, dried fruit inside and the line of frosting on top in the shape of a plus-sign?

But the lady at Cobs asked me what kind I wanted and my hot cross bun world expanded, just like that, boom!

They have: chocolate chip, cranberry & orange and traditional…there might be more, those are the ones I remember. To be honest, my brain kinda stopped reading the different types once I saw chocolate chip lol ๐Ÿ˜›

I could mix and match so I got 4 chocolate chip and 2 cranberry & orange. The plan is to wrap them individually and freeze them so I can bring them out randomly for treats but of course I ate one this evening, it’s practically an obligation to eat one the same day as purchase for quality control. ๐Ÿ˜‰ teehee

Chocolate Chip Hot Cross Bun

Chocolate Chip Hot Cross Bun

It doesn’t look much like a hot cross bun, there is no frosting of any type on top – they probably figured the chocolate made it sweet enough…and it wasn’t as soft as I am accustomed to. Maybe all this time I had been eating sub-standard versions and they are not normally so soft? I dunno. shrug. I popped it in the microwave for 15 seconds and Mmm! Tasteeeeee! ๐Ÿ™‚

I would say if you like chocolate, aren’t married to the idea of what a hot cross bun has to be like and enjoy bread type foods you’ll probably like this little creation by Cobs, and hey, if you get a coupon from Facebook you can even get a free loaf of bread when you buy a 6-pack of them!

Reverse Shopping

9 Jan

Today was a day filled with errands that I had kept putting off. It’s not that they were particularly hard or trying errands, or even that I had to go very far away to do them, I just, shrug, kept putting them off. But alas, I had to get them done and today became my day for that. I organized myself the day prior so I wouldn’t forget anything, I’m practically famed for forgetting one essential item when going out to do errands, and I didn’t want to have to go out another day when I could, hopefully, get it all done in one excursion. Time management ya know? ๐Ÿ˜‰

The weird part about these errands is that all except for one involved reverse shopping aka returning items to stores. I kinda like returning things, not because I want to be that person whose being a pain in the butt at the retail counter but because you get all the fun of going to the shops, all the exposure and socializing of someone who has gone out to spend money but instead of leaving at the end of the day with less money than I started with I reverse that and go home with no bags and a fatter wallet. Who doesn’t like that!

All but one of the shops was in a mall that is usually a 20 minute drive from my place. Tonight however, there was massive fog all over the place and visibility was almost zero in some spots (while being perfectly fine in others, oh the specialness of fog lol) so it slowed my driving time down a bit. I almost turned right around after I started driving the fog was that bad but being the person I am I figured I’d keep going, after all, I’d gone to all the effort to put my hair in a ponytail, slap on a small amount of make-up and change in to something that wasn’t my lounging at home sweats, I wasn’t putting all that work to waste lol

Thanks to my planning I was able to get to every shop in the mall I needed, without having to backtrack…well, backtrack much, I hate this mall and almost always get lost at some point while in it, sigh. Every shop was happy to give me store credit, which was what I figured I would get so I am now the happy owner of 3 new gift cards. I love gift cards. They are like money, only they can only be used for the one specific shop, which means I feel nooooo guilt when I go shopping and use them since I had no possible way to put the money that was on the card towards something more important, like bills. ๐Ÿ™‚

Something to keep in mind, with Superstore, if you are returning something after the 14 day time limit you either have to exchange or get a store credit. I opted for store credit which is when I learned the gift cards there only come in specific amounts so I would have to top up the card if my store credit amount wasn’t enough to be the amount of a card. Does that make sense? The lady at the desk explained it much better than I just attempted to do. I’ll do better explaining with an example I think, so say your refund amount is $23, the lowest gift card amount you can buy is $25 so you have to pay $2 to make up the difference and then you are given a $25 gift card. Stupid huh?

All the other stores were way more normal about it lol I now have gift cards for LuluLemon, Chapters and of course Superstore.

The fourth shop I visited in the mall was Sephora, *wistful sigh* I love Sephora, I can’t afford Sephora, but I love Sephora.

If you are a person who ever, even if it is just once a year, buys make-up or make-up related items you should sign up at Sephora if for no other reason than to get your birthday present from them every year lol Some years the present is reeeeally good!

I bought a couple of make-up brushes to replace some of mine that had died, and happily got my bday present from them. I tried to get it on my actual birthday but the shop location I was at had run out and the girl told me I should wait and pick it up in January because the January present was waaaaay better. Ooooooh, insider knowledge!

The options I got to choose from were (1) a Nars lipstick set, two colours, thick pencil style, in what is apparently going to be “THE” colour of the season every one will want or (2) a Peter Thomas Roth duo of face wash and cucumber gel mask. I know make-up people who swear by nars, but I almost never put strong colours on my lips so I opted for the face wash and mask. I know nothing about Peter Thomas Roth products so maybe I made a stupid decision but at least this way there is a chance I will try the product out lol

love this little bag

love this little bag

hopefully this is good!

hopefully this is good!

After the mall I drove to the one shop that wasn’t in the mall that I needed and proceeded to confuse the crap out of the girl working because I had multiple items to return and they were split on to two different receipts and it just somehow became really confusing lol She handled it like a champ though and luckily that store has a longer return time than the others so instead of another gift card I got a refund on to my Visa card. My Visa card will be very happy about that lol.

So there we have it, at the end of the day I felt like I had spent hours shopping but instead of being loaded down with bags and having an emptier wallet I only had one tiny Sephora bag and no guilt, yay! ๐Ÿ˜€

These Shoes Ain’t Made For Walkin’

9 Oct

Oh my poor feet!

I own a pair of shoes that look like this…

converse

Well, they almost look like that, just think of those shoes but grungier lol and nooooo internal padding left, sigh.

I like to walk, especially when doing errands, it’s multi-tasking at it’s finest! Exercise and errands all at one time, plus the added bonus of saving money by not driving (not using any gas) and being a bit environmentally friendly. ๐Ÿ™‚

Normally if I am walking longer than a half hour I wear the runners I wear when I run, they have great padding for the feet, are super comfy and well, duh, are meant for things like long walks. Today however I decided to wear my converse. Dumb, dumb move.

See, my converse are old, and I don’t mean 6 months old but 2-3 years old. I know! I should have replaced them ages ago, but I can’t afford to and I love em too much to get rid of them. Besides, they are ok for shorter outings lol

I didn’t take in to account how long I would be walking, mostly cause I mis-remembered how far the store I was going to is, oops! By the 40 minute mark of my walk I was really regretting the shoe choice. It had been so long since I’d worn them, I’d forgotten about the lack of padding within the shoe and the ball of my left foot was blistered, sigh.

I got to the store an hour in to my walk, wandered the shop for a while, I was looking for items for my halloween costumes (yes, the pluralization of the word costume is correct, I need two!) then started the walk home. I was sooooo tempted to catch a bus but I just couldn’t bring myself to take a bus when I could walk and burn calories.

So, hour two of my walking happened, and by the end of it I had a matching blister on my right foot, oh and the left foot’s blister had grown, ugh. ย I hate blisters, not cause of the pain (which is there), or because of how I am now limping (which makes going back and forth to the laundry room all kinds of fun), but because of the squishy feeling I have with every step, the feeling of walking on two water balloons that are just waiting for the perfect time to pop! Ick! Ick! Ick!…did I mention ick? ๐Ÿ˜›

Least I got a decent walk in, 6.7 miles or 10.8 km, guess that’s worth two massive blisters, right?

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