Tag Archives: shopping

Pandemic Buying

6 Aug

Admit it, you bought something during the pandemic that you look at now and go “what was I thinking?”

For me that item is a Dutch Oven. I bought it when everyone was baking bread and I thought I might want to try. All the easy bread recipes I found said you had to use a Dutch oven, which of course I didn’t own. Because why would I?

Canadian Tire was having a sale so I impulsively bought one. And by “impulsively” I mean I kept refreshing the page for hours because apparently everyone and their dog was trying to buy from Canadian Tire that day.

I just assumed it would arrive quickly. It did not. By the time I got it in the mail I was already back at work. I was on two weeks self isolation in March but after that ended I was back at work because I’m deemed essential.

To help you realize how dumb of a purchase this was for me, I bought it in March, I finally got around to opening the box in July. The end of July. As in, the very end of July. And that was only the packing box! The actual box with the Dutch oven in it was opened yesterday. Yeah that’s right. August 5th. Go ahead. Judge me. I can take it. 😜

It is now washed, dried, and I’m trying to figure out where it is going to live. Obviously in the back of a cupboard where it isn’t blocking access to any of the other kitchen tools I don’t use.

I mean seriously, I couldn’t have at least bought a new purse? That would’ve had way better odds of being used! 😂

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My No Spend Attempt

9 May

Ok, so, if you look at No Spend challenges in a very black and white sort of way, I failed. I however, choose to acknowledge the grey in life and think I didn’t do so bad.

no spend challenge

I set for myself a No Spend challenge, it was to last two weeks, and officially ended yesterday. I was allowed to buy gas for my suv, as well as food / household items as needed. Oh, and pay bills, obviously lol.

In that two week period I had two opportunities to donate to charity, one to the Edmonton Food Bank and one to the Vancouver Food Bank, and I donated to both. Neither of those donations fit in any way, shape, or form, to the short list of acceptable purchases but I have no regrets.

I also paid the entry fee for a virtual marathon. This one is a bit trickier. I had intended to wait until the end of my No Spend challenge to buy my entry but found out last week that it was the last day for the early entry fee, which meant that after that date it would cost more to sign-up. I suppose I could have just said I wouldn’t do it, or I could have waited until my challenge was over and paid the higher entry fee, but, well, no. I wasn’t going to miss doing this with my friends, and why would I wait a week and pay more for something when I could buy it that day and pay less?

The No Spend challenge was meant to help get my spending back in line with my budget, that doesn’t mean I stop looking at the bigger picture and spend less on a certain day only to spend even more 8 days later. Sometimes logic is what is in that grey space.

So yeah, technically, I broke the No Spend rules. Ok, not even technically, I did break the No Spend rules but not in a bad way. Not in a I bought more books, or clothes, or some other random item that I don’t really need but I’m bored and saw it online and impulsed bought it way. I donated to charity, and bought something I was going to buy anyways on a day it was a cheaper purchase, how can that be bad?

This is why I tend to shy away from No Spend challenges, and similar things I see in the budgeting world. They don’t always lead you to making the logical purchase, or they may restrict you from an opportunity to help someone else.

To me, I think the better way to go about curbing your spending is to stick to the budget you gave yourself. Maybe you don’t budget, and ya know, if you don’t and that works for you, cool. For me, I budget. I set myself an exact amount of money to be used for gas, food, household items, and other categories. My problem is lately I’ve been going over budget by buying more online, things I never would have bought before, partially out of boredom, anxiety, because outside of work I do nothing and interact with almost no one, and somehow that has led me to increasing my shopping. Not good. Shopping is not a coping skill. I need to stop treating it like one.

Which is why, for the next two weeks, I’m not putting myself on a No Spend challenge, I’m putting myself on a Stick To Your Freakin Budget Challenge. Much more my style, don’t you think? 😉

 

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The Evolution of Shopping

12 Apr

I wrote a little while ago about how my shopping experience went when I had to go to Bosley’s to buy cat food. It was odd, but not in an unmanageable way.

This past Thursday I went to Safeway and experienced the next step in the evolution of grocery shopping. The week prior I was all icked out when I went to that Safeway because people weren’t social distancing within the store, it seemed crowded, and I was uncomfortable enough that I left before getting everything I needed.

This past Thursday I went back and oh how things have changed!

First there was the line up to get in…

April 11 2020

I don’t know why I was surprised by the line-up, I’d be hearing all week about stores having lines, I guess I just didn’t think this Safeway would since it didn’t have one a week prior. It was a nice spring evening and the line moved fairly quickly. There isn’t a sign saying how many people are allowed in the store, just that a “limited number” of customers are allowed in, which makes me wonder how the guard at the door knows when to let people in and when to make them wait.

You might be thinking he lets people inside when people inside the shop come out but no, that wasn’t always the case. I’ve decided to not think about it too much, like any of us need another thing to stress about?

Once inside I eventually noticed the aisles are all one way, like in Ikea. Arrows on the ground showing which way to walk as well as hanging on the signs at the start of each aisle. I didn’t notice at first, so I may have gone the wrong direction in an aisle or two, in my defence, I am not the only one who did that!

The shelves were looking a little sad. The combination of a sale and it being later in the day meant a lot of stuff was gone. I found it interesting that when I noticed there was only a small amount of a product left I would think about buying it, even if it was something I don’t normally buy. Like the baked beans. I haven’t bought those in years but seeing the shelves so low in stock made me wonder if I should. Does everybody else know a secret I don’t about what food I should be buying right now?

Luckily I came to my senses and stuck with buying my normal food items. No point in stocking up on things I don’t eat.

April 11 2020 a

I should have taken a picture of the produce, so many things were moldy, or wrinkled and almost no good anymore. Isn’t it better to have no produce for sale than produce gone bad? The quality of the produce has me buying more and more frozen fruit and veg…which was another area that was scarily low on stock.

The internet is exploding with people baking bread, which ok, I guess if you’re in self-isolation and have time to kill why not? One of the aisles had yeast for sale and it was packaged like this…

April 11 2020 b

I don’t know if that is a normal price for yeast but I’m fairly certain that is not the normal packaging for the yeast. I admit, I bought some, not because I have some overwhelming desire to bake bread but because the bread section was scarily low in stock, I bought one of the last loaves. Maybe my baking bread will have to become a thing, I hope not, but better to be prepared, right?

Eggs were still out of stock, sigh, but I was able to find vanilla for a friend who couldn’t find any when she was shopping. That turned out well because when she was shopping today she found eggs for me, yay!

This might be the new way of shopping, see what you can find not only for you but your friends, and they will do the same, and everyone will swap items. I figure if we combine what the grocery store near me has, and what the grocery store near my friend has, we can almost always find the items we want. It is an odd system but it seems to be working for us so far.

Something I noticed in the store are people being much better at social distancing while inside. Whether it is because the aisles are one way only, or because there are only so many of us inside at a time, or we are all scared of being near someone and getting sick, there was a decent amount of space between people. If I needed something and a person was in the same area I’d stand back and wait until they moved on before I reached for what I wanted, and others did the same. It made me feel a bit rushed in having to pick items from the shelves but I’d rather be a bit rushed because I know someone is waiting their turn than have that person come up beside me.

We are all going to become this cat…

april 11 2020 c

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Tuck Visor Review

9 Sep

I bought a thing called a Tuck Visor to help block the sun streaming in through my driver’s side window when I am commuting to and from work. It arrived on the weekend and today was to be the first day trying it out.

Tuck Visor 2

May I present…the…Tuck Visor!

Which means it of course was pouring rain when I woke up, and when I started driving, and for most of my commute. It would appear that fall is well and truly here…it also appears I should invest in rain boots…

Since it was pouring enough rain that there were flooded streets during my morning drive I almost didn’t take them with me, it was predicted to rain all day after all, but I’m lazy and figured if I don’t take them in to my suv now and tuck them away somewhere I’ll forever forget to take them to the suv and who knows how long it will be before I try them.

And yes, that really is how my brain works. shrug.

Good thing I made that choice because by the time I was driving home it was sunny. Well, sort of sunny. That type of sunny where it goes between so sunny you think your eyes will be burned out of their sockets and cloudy with the potential to start raining again at any moment.

I decided to put the Tuck Visor in to place before I started driving, figuring even if it wasn’t sunny enough to really need it, it shouldn’t be in the way, so what was the harm with having it up.

That thing is brilliant! It used a combination of static electricity and being tucked up in to the top edge of the window to keep it in place, it didn’t shift the entire drive, it doesn’t come down any lower than the sun visor when you have it swung to the side, and it blocks sun. What more could a sun avoidant ginger want?

Oh, and it was relatively cheap. Thank you Amazon.ca!

When I first put it in to place I worried about loss of vision out of the window, it is solid black after all. But then I realized it is only blocking the upper part of the window and when I’m looking out of the window I’m not looking at the sky, I’m looking at the road, and traffic, and all that fun stuff, and the Tuck Visor doesn’t block any of that.

One review I read said a negative about it is that you can’t have your window open and use it, which is a valid point. I don’t like driving with my window open so I don’t care about that, but if you like the window open than this won’t be for you.

The pack I bought has two in there, and when not in use I am keeping both in the packaging tucked in a pocket in my suv so they are out of they way and not visible to those who may look in. The ad on Amazon made it seem like it is easy to put in place when driving but I don’t know about that, I used two hands to get it in place which, in case you didn’t do the math, leaves zero hands for the steering wheel. Not a great equation. Maybe positioning gets easier in time?

This is what mine looks like when in place, apologies for the bad picture, I wasn’t willing to climb over the middle console to get farther away from the window to get a better picture, tsk tsk bad blogger.  😉

Tuck Visor

I’ll provide a link to the ones I bought on Amazon.ca…

Click Here!

The company itself does of course have a website, http://www.tuckvisor.com if you want to check them out.

They also have a version that is not solid black, it is a bit see through. It apparently also effectively blocks the sun but I figured I’d rather the solid black one than one that still lets some sun come through. It doesn’t take a lot to burn me so why chance it?

Hopefully this random little invention will be the end to my getting sunburned on my commute to and from work, oh wouldn’t that be nice! 🙂

 

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Retail Therapy

9 Feb

Ah yes, retail therapy, that thing we all hope will help us feel better but actually doesn’t.

Well… at least my feet will look good! 😛

 

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Receipt Checker

10 Jan

I don’t know about you but until last year I’d go shopping, take the receipt, stuff it in my purse where it would get crumpled down at the bottom and stay there until I got annoyed with it and threw it out.

Receipts

Last January I started budgeting. And not in a vague sort-of not researched type of way. Oh no, I did massive research, read books, watched YouTube Videos, read everything on Gail Vaz-Oxlade’s website (re-watched a bunch of her tv show episodes),  and pestered my parents multiple times a week with questions, sort of way. Hey, if you’re gonna do something, might as well do it right!…or to the best that you’re able cuz oh wow was learning how to budget a frustrating experience. There were a bunch of mistakes made, things I could have done better, a decently large learning curve to navigate but I did eventually manage to navigate it. I learned from my mistakes, took notes so I knew what I wanted to change for 2018, and overall think that starting this whole budgeting dealio was a solid choice.

Now, and all of last year, I take the receipt, write down in a tracker the date of the purchase, what I bought, how much it cost, and I would deduct it from my running tally. Yeah, I became that person.

Today I went to Wal-Mart for some stuff and when I got to the checkout I thought the total was high but didn’t think to question the cashier cause, well, why would I? When I was home, comfie in my sweats, and happy in the knowledge I didn’t have to go out again, I was checking my receipt as I wrote the expense in my tracker (because yes, I’m still that person!) and to my surprise there were two items at the top of my receipt I didn’t recognize.

Now, sometimes the short description on a receipt is not easily translated in to the item you bought but this was a tiny purchase, I only bought 6 things, though this receipt said I bought 8. That and all the other items clearly said what they were and I knew I bought those things.

I had been charged $14 and change for two things I didn’t buy.

Not cool.

I called Wal-Mart, the phone rang over 30 times (not even kidding) and when I finally got a person and told them what happened I was told to call back in ten minutes.

*rolls eyes*

I called back in ten minutes, I stopped counting the rings at 50 but I didn’t stop calling, I just let it ring, and ring, and ring and finally someone picked up. It turned out to be the same lady I spoke with earlier so at least she knew what the problem was.  She asked me a couple questions about the receipt and told me if I came back in tonight she would fix things.

Not gonna lie, I was torn between staying home cozy in my sweats or going back out for a refund of $14 but the cheap side of me won out and on went real pants, up in to a pony tail went the hair, and off I went.

Sure it’s only $14 but every dollar counts, especially when you are budgeting and you know where that $14 should be going…like next weeks groceries!

So lesson learned, take a look at the receipt before leaving the store to not only make sure I wasn’t charged incorrectly but to save me having to change out of my cozy sweats and back in to public appropriate clothing. Really, it’s all about comfort in the end lol 😉

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That Consumer

20 Jan

So apparently I am that consumer, you know, the one that calls stores and complains about something.

Ugh. I hate the idea that I am that person and yet…I did it, and I would do it again lol

The other day I went to Costco, you know Costco, the store that convinces you buying everything in bulk quantities is a great idea, even if it means you’ll be eating the same thing every day for a week just so you can finish it up before it goes bad.

I sound like I don’t like Costco when in fact I love Costco lol

Anyways!

I was at Costco and one of the things I bought was Diet Coke, which to me is a requirement for living a happy life. A case of Diet Coke at Costco has 32 cans of pop in it, yay!

diet-coke-2

So, I get home and start putting the cans of pop in the fridge. Because of the size of the packaging I take the cans out of the main package and put them loose in the fridge. Normally I put a couple cans in the fridge and as I drink one I put a new can in but this time I decided to put them all in, that way the room temp cans aren’t taking up valuable floor space.

Well, turns out I was missing a can. Sadness! No way was I attempting to get the cans back in the packaging and carting them back to the store but…I didn’t want to be shorted a can of pop.

Which is how I became that consumer. The one who called customer service, told them what happened, and just by being on the phone with them was obviously expecting a solution to the problem that would not inconvenience me lol

The lady I spoke to was entertaining, and didn’t make me feel like an idiot for calling about such a thing, which was nice. I told her I couldn’t get back there until Sunday so they have a can of Diet Coke waiting for me at customer service that I can pick up this Sunday after work.

I’m sure she was rolling her eyes at having to put one can of Diet Coke to the side for me but I kinda don’t care…I paid for that can of pop so I want it…obviously. lol

The whole thing is ridiculous, and I think in the past I would have just shrugged and figured oh well, but I am on a strict budget this year and every penny counts…can I still say that or should the expression change to “every nickel” since we don’t use pennies anymore?…hmm, something to ponder…but yeah, I’m being super strict with money this year and apparently that also covers something as silly as a single missing can of Diet Coke.

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My Coach Experience Part 2

2 Jun

After I wrote a post a week or so ago about my horrible experience shopping with Coach via their customer service line I did something I have never done, I emailed the company and in my email I added the link to the post I had written.

If ever I needed proof the written word can at times have power, that did it, because in less than 24 hours I had a voicemail from a gentleman at Coach wanting to talk to me about my shopping experience.

Go fig.

We played phone tag for a couple days but did eventually manage to speak on the phone. He wanted some more details about what happened. He explained why it happened, then said that is no excuse and they are looking in to things, and apologized. He also said they were refunding the entire cost of the bracelet and that refund should show up on my credit card within the next 3 days.

Pretty awesome, am I right?

2016-05-18 21.40.37

I really didn’t expect them to do anything, let alone respond to my email with anything more than an email saying we got your complaint and am forwarding it on to the appropriate department so I was impressed with the speed at which they phoned me. I was even more impressed with the refund.

Apparently, if you call Coach after business hours the call doesn’t go to the Coach call centre it goes to a call centre that they outsource to. My guess is it is cheaper to outsource evening and overnight calls to people not working at Coach because then they don’t have to worry about things like benefits, and handling such a large work force etc. Oh, and in case you were wondering, no they aren’t outsourced to a call centre outside of America, I was talking to Americans every time I phoned, so don’t even try to climb on to that soap box about outsourcing cause it won’t fly with this incident. 😉

But yeah, they outsource and the gentlemen I spoke to said that even though it is not Coach employees handling the evening phone calls they are still held to certain standards and the other company had been contacted so the phone call could be pulled and listened to and the employee dealt with. Which sounds ominous but I’m sure will result in nothing more than a quick “mute the phone so customers don’t hear you yawn” comment on her next evaluation, shrug. Can’t be expecting miracles lol

So yeah, I thought I would update all of you and let you know that while my shopping experience with Coach was horrible, the follow up and fixing of the problem was handled with speed, manners, and generosity. Oh, and a compliment! The gentleman I spoke to apparently actually read my post and said I write quite well…probably something that given the circumstances didn’t make him all that happy lol 😛

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LV Costs What??

21 Apr

I have this totally awesome friend (who is awesome even though she doesn’t read my blog 😛 ) who is getting me a freakin amazing birthday / Christmas present this year. My birthday is Dec 23rd and she never ever gets me combo presents but this one is above and beyond and in reality should be her present to me for two or three years, not just one. She talked to me about it before going ahead with it, which is how I know about it so far in advance, and I was completely blown away.

Well obviously I want to get her something totally beyond anything I have gotten her in the past, because even though it won’t compare with what she is getting me I have to do my best on my smaller budget.

She really loves designer purses and shoes and I had this oh so brilliant idea to get her a designer purse. Now, I don’t know a whole hell of a lot about designer purse brands except that I can’t afford them normally but for this, well, I’ll save, and it’ll be worth it, and really, just how much could they possibly be?

Ha! What silly naive thoughts I had!

I watched a bunch of YouTube videos of people talking about their various designer purses to get an idea of which were good and which were found to be lacking and it seemed Louis Vuitton was super popular and almost never disappointed people. I also learned women collect LV stuff like it is going out of style, or like it is some sort of investment or something which has led me to believe that some people have way too much money and if any of them read this feel free to donate to the cause of moi! 😉 lol

After getting it in to my head that I’d get her a LV clutch or something similar I went to the LV website and almost had a heart attack as soon as the page for wallets loaded. The first wallet that popped up was this one…

louis-vuitton-wallet

Want to know how much this wallet costs? Go on, guess, I dare you!

This, the Sarah Wallet is $1030.00, Canadian.

Seriously? For a wallet?!

After the shock dimmed a bit I skimmed through some more of the website and kept blinking in disbelief as I saw the prices scroll by.

I feel so poor now lol

And yeah, I may love my friend to bits and pieces but no way I am getting her a LV anything cuz there is nothing on that site that is a price I can ever afford.

So now I am back to square one for what to get her, I have a couple months so I’m sure I’ll think of something but wow, what an eye opener for how the other half live. 😛

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A New Year

2 Jan

We are a little over 24 hours in to 2016…how are things going for you so far? Is it everything you were hoping it would be? 😉

I know it is hard to tell this early in to the New Year but maybe you have an inkling of how things might go…or at least a hope!

It is kind of funny,  I always think of the New Year as a chance to wipe the slate clean, start fresh, ya know? But this year I am still dealing with a bunch of stuff that happened at the tail end of 2015 and it doesn’t feel like a new year has started, that I’m at the beginning of a new chapter in the Book of Me. I feel like I am still cleaning up after 2015.

It kinda sucks…

Not the happiest New Years post is it? sigh

It isn’t that every thing is bad or anything, I’m just in a bit of a down spot I guess. It’ll get better, promise!

I wish I had been able to post the past couple of weeks, due to technical difficulties I wasn’t able to easily get online or write anything so I thought I’d do a catch up post Dec 31st but that didn’t happen…obviously lol

I went home for Christmas, got to hang with the family and friends, got to enjoy the snow and remind my weather wimpy body what true winter weather is like lol I had a great visit! Which is one of the reasons I wish I’d been able to post while away, it is always so much more fun to write about things the same day they happened!

I took a bunch of pictures, though not as many as normal, they are currently uploading to DropBox as I type…I don’t think they will be uploaded in time for this post, seems I took over 100 pics! Eek! But I’ll do a post another day showing you some of what I got up to. 🙂

Mostly my trip consisted of taking advantage of the measly 5% sales tax Alberta has (lucky bastards! lol) and hanging with people. In fact, a happy benefit to my being where there was only 5% sales tax aaaaaand great Christmas sales is that I am writing this post on a brand new oh so lovely laptop! wOOt! Which I’m hoping means I will no longer be having tech problems that keep me from posting. *crossing fingers*

The laptop came loaded with Windows 10, which is going to take me a bit of getting used to lol I’ve spent the last little bit installing Office and anti-virus and logging in to various websites so this laptop can remember my log-in deets for all the various sites I visit. I didn’t get the old laptop backed up and then have it all dumped on this one so I am starting fresh, which is oddly unsettling lol

2016 may not be starting off quite as I envisioned but I’m sure it will be great! Awesome things will happen…some sucky things will happen…but then other even more awesome things will happen to balance the scales and by the end of 2016 I’m sure I will have forgotten how I felt on the first day of this year. 🙂

2016

 

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