Where's the Chicken?

In my enthusiasm after I joined Sam's Club I bought this.....

A large pan of Chicken Marsala.
I was anxious to try some of the "Pre-Made" entrees Sam's sells.  If the price and quality was good it would make a nice emergency "no time to cook" meal.
It looks apetitzing in the cover art, yes?

I love Chicken Marsala so when I saw a sign that said "Chicken Marsala $5.88" I grabbed this package.
Well, obviously I didn't read the sign well, because the item was $5.88 a POUND......

This item rang up $17.13 and not the $5.88 I was expecting.
I didn't catch this fact until I got home because I bought other things in the order and didn't notice this price at the checkout.
sigh.

I figured I wouldn't be buying this again at that price and once I opened the box up and found I was paying $5.88 lb. for mostly SAUCE that cinched it.
There were 3 small half chicken breasts(1 serving portions)in the box and they were swimming in sauce.
There also could have been more mushrooms in that sauce.  The mushroom count was pitiful.

Now the sauce was tasty but at this price?  Never again.
I'll break down and buy a bottle of Marsala wine and make my own sauce.

At $17.13 this came out to $5.71 a serving and I still had to provide/pay for side dishes for the rest of the meal.

At least I had the presence of mind to save the leftover sauce and stick it into the freezer.  There was a full pint of sauce left and that's enough to just add my own chicken(and some mushrooms)and get another meal of Chicken Marsala out of this questionable purchase.

I could purchase 2 lbs. of chicken breast, fresh mushrooms and Marsala wine and make at least 3 full meals of Chicken Marsala(with plenty of the wine leftover to make it again some other time)for less than the $17.13 I spent on barely 3 servings and a shit ton of sauce.

So what food products have you bought that turned out to not be such the deal that you thought they were at the time?

Sluggy

Rite-Aid & Weis Shopping

I know y'all get lonely for my voice every now and again, so here's a video instead of a long post with all my numbers for a change.
Not much of a post, sorry about that, but I've got stuff to do today in Real Life.

There is a messy garage calling my name! lolz



Sluggy

The Church Auction

We attend a local small church auction every Fall.
This year's was held last Saturday.

We ended up spending $400 at last year's event but we only spent $315 this year on our winnings.

Items offered include goods and services to local businesses as well as "things", both new and used, donated by church members.
Sometimes items when offered up don't garner bids so they add other more desirable goods to the pot.

This is why/how I ended up with a set of hair rollers(lolz), a used George Foreman grill, as well as this set of items........

A large pair of ceramic Staffordshire dogs.


Not something I want but the $50 of pet boarding and $20 in McDonald's certificates that came bundled with it was well worth my winning bid of $15.

These items they "throw into a deal" that aren't something we want or can use will be offered to family or then sent to Salvation Army as donations if no one else wants them.
And the SA donations we get to write off our taxes at the end of the year so it's just a win/win for us.

Here is what I ended up bringing home......

1 large jarred Yankee Candle
1 Fall décor tchotchke
$12 GC local Italian restaurant
$12 GC another Italian restaurant
5 x $10 GC McDonald's
$20 GC local bar/inn
1 Free Oil Change local garage
$20 GC local sub/pizza place
$25 GC Price Chopper grocery store
6 x Discount cards for Domino's Pizza
$20 GC Sonic
$20 GC Bonanza steakhouse
$20 GC Sheetz gas
1 George Foreman grill(used)
1 pair ceramic dogs
$100 GC  local pet boarding
$20 GC Red Robin
$25 GC Sweet Frog frozen yogurt
1 pie pumpkin
1 living room designer lamp
1 concrete Welcome statue w/puppies
1 free pizza local pizza restaurant
1 free haircut local barber shop
$50 GC local pet boarding
$25 GC Advance Auto stores
$10 GC local Greek restaurant

 

I figure the total value is about $605 for all this.
I paid $315.

                             
All the gift certificates except for 3 Hubs is holding onto.

A few of the deals were not so great.
I should know better than to do some of them since I go to this every. single. year.

The problem with the gift certificates is that you can't see what the actual "deal" is when you bid.
The give you the $ value of the item and where it's from.
Not until you win and you open the envelope do you see what you actually got.

One year I bid on a $40 value from a local restaurant and when I opened the envelope it wasn't just a GC worth $40.  It was 5 coupons for a free appetizer, each valued at $8.  This meant we'd get an $8 appetizer when we bought a meal, meaning we had to spend A LOT of money before seeing that $8 benefit. grrrrr.
 Not the deal I thought I was getting of a certificate worth $40 off your dining bill. lolz

Last year I bid on 2 different Domino's deals, worth $20 each, and won both.
One envelope held 2 $10 off gift cards.
The other envelope held 2 punch cards with 16 punches for a BOGO free pizza. 
These cards weree fundraising cards that could be purchased for $10 each(so $20 value). 

Now getting $10 or $20 off a pizza purchase is good, getting the opportunity to purchase 32 pizzas and then getting 32 pizzas free is NOT such a good deal.
Unless of course you eat A LOT of pizza on a regular basis. ;-)

Well stupid me bid on a $20 value Domino's envelope this year and won it.
Instead of OPENING the envelope and finding out that it was 2 of those stupid punch cards I didn't want I didn't THINK to check it before they offered more $20 Domino's envelopes up for bids.

I ended up winning THREE envelopes of Domino's punch cards for a total of 6!
Ugh.

Domino's had only given the church punch cards this year.......

So now I have until June 2015 to buy 192 pizzas and get 96 of them free.
That's 13+ weeks(THREE + MONTHS!) of eating nothing but pizza for dinner every night of the week.
Or if I spread it out over the whole stretch from now until the end of June 2015, that's a pizza for dinner about every 2.65 days.....or pizza about 3 times a week.

I.
Am.
An.
Idiot.

So I'll be offering some of these punch cards to my 2 oldest kids and maybe put one in the next giveaway box because we can't possibly eat that much pizza.

Well we COULD eat that much pizza but it wouldn't be a prudent thing to do....... ;-)

I did bid on and win 1 "thing" I wanted.
A lamp for the living room as we are still gathering items to furnish it.

A new lamp with a green base.  Won it for $15.
My new living room is slowing turning into the "Green Room"....... lolz

The only other regret on my bidding at the auctions that I had was that I didn't win that purple slow cooker!
I really didn't NEED it and the bids when to $26 which was too high for me.
But the freaking thing was PURPLE!

Sigh......


Sluggy


 

October Net Worth

I like to do these "snapshot" type totals on the personal net worth on the 1sts of every month.
Just take all your assets(cash,investments,loans owed to you) and subtract your liabilities(debts) and you get your Personal Net Worth.
Not very scientific but it gives me a sense of which direction we are heading in.  8-)

We are up from September 1's total.
Net Worth on just our cash and non-retirement accounts on October 1st went down $721.55 from the September 1st total.
Well that's what happens when, though you didn't spend all your month's income, you shell out a couple thousand dollars of savings on a new driveway.

The retirement accounts went up by $4,863.93 however, leaving us with an overall gain of $3,911.90 for October over our September net worth standing.

Yay us!

Since moving the bulk of our retirement money into safer more stable instruments(since we are so close to cashing out), we don't see the gains we use to on that money.  This disappoints me every month until I remember that we are being prudent and wise with the money at this stage in the game.
Not very wise to keep gambling with assets with the market so volatile.

Hubs and I had a sit-down a few days ago to see where we need to move money to.  We had some liquid cash sitting not earning anything for us so we'll move it into a CD where it will at least earn 1%......a pitiful 1%....... 8-P

How is your money doing?
Is this month better than last month or not?
How do you keep your money working for you when you aren't using it?

Sluggy




 

My Day Out & Grocery Shopping

The weather here was nice and the colors on the trees are about at their height for the season, so I had a rare day out by myself.

I drove an hour away to a Shop-Rite to get some groceries.
It's a wonderful drive through the forests on back country roads around here and little traffic as the ski resorts aren't open for another 2 months and the Summer tourists have gone home.
I had the moon roof open and the radio blasting.

And on the way back I stopped at an old isolated cemetery to snap some headstone photos to add to the back log I have of those.  During the Winter when it's too wicked to wander the graveyards I'll have lots of pictures to post on Find A Grave.
Just thinking ahead and gathering as many photos as I can before the weather turns.
But I digress......

I like to go to Shop-Rite a few times a year for some deals, if not for the lovely drive.
I must confess I haven't been in almost 2 years.  Eek.

I checked out the coupon matchups for this week, clipped or printed some Qs, and scored a few things.

First I did this transaction--

4 x Arm & Hammer laundry detergent $1.66 each
I used 2 x $2/2 ManQs to bring the price down to .66¢ a bottle.

2 x Scrubbing Bubbles bathroom cleaner
1 x Shout stain remover/cleaner
1 x Windex multipurpose cleaner
These 4 were $7.96 wyb 4.
I have $4 in IPQs(2 x .50¢ ones doubled), plus $2 in electronic Qs loaded to my Shop-Rite card so each bottle cost me .49¢.  I can't make my own cleaners for that cheap!
Buying these 4 also generated a $3 OYNO Catalina Q.

Then I spent $7.98 on 3 x Oreos, $6 on 2 x Ritz crackers and $6.16 on Power-Ades, totaling $20.14.
$3 in electronic Qs came off making all this $17.14.
I also earned a $5 OYNO for spending $20+(before Qs)on these items.

The total for all was $22.67 including .60¢ tax.
I received $8 in Cats to spend OMNO.
Regular retail value of $60.37.

Then I bought this load--

3 x Barilla boxes of pasta on sale .99¢
I used a $1/3 Barilla ManQ so these cost .66¢ a box.

1 x Box of Dole Corn soup on sale $2.50.
With the electronic $1/1 Q loaded onto my SR card and the $1/1 ManuQ combined this box o' soup cost me .50¢.

1 x Dole Smoothie Shaker on sale for $1.49.
With the $1/1 ManuQ this cost me .49¢.

1 x Tropicana Juice on sale $1.97.
With the $1/1 ManuQ this cost me .97¢

2 x Hall's cough drops on sale .99¢=$1.98
With the electronic $1/2 Q loaded onto my SR card and the $1/1 ManuQ combined  these cost me negative .02¢.  8-)

4 x Flipz choc. covered pretzels on sale $1.50 each.
With the 2 x $1/2 IPQs I used, they cost me $1.00 a bag.
Nom. Nom. Nom.

I also picked up 4 x 1lb. blocks of mozzarella on sale for $1.99 each.
Good price as these are usually $6.49 each.

A 1.67lb. piece of Atlantic Salmon on sale for $7.99 lb.
That came to $13.34 for the whole piece after discount and will yield us 4-5 large helpings.

And 1.23 lbs. of fresh ground turkey on clearance for $2.52.
That came out to $2.05 lb. and usually retails for $3.99 lb. in the stores here so about half what we pay reg. retail here.(Of course I only buy it if it goes on clearance....lol)

Subtotal of $40.73-$9 in Qs=$31.73-$8 Cats from previous transaction=$23.73-$2.11 SENIOR CITIZEN Discount the Cashier spontaneously gave me without asking me if I was one!lolz=$21.62 + .06 tax=$21.68 OOP.
Regular retail on this stuff was $70.99.

Some of it I only bought because I had a coupon and it was on sale and it didn't cost much.  We've never had that Dole soup so for .50¢ will give it a try.
.97¢ for a bottle of 100% juice is a great price.  .66¢ for laundry detergent, .49¢ for cleaners and pasta for .66¢ are worth picking up as well at that low price.

I spent $44.35 total on $131.36 of groceries.

Now I am down to 3 items left on my grocery list to pick up tomorrow on my regular grocery shopping day--green chiles, trout and clams. 
Then there is the Rite-Aid run......of course! lolz

I had a pleasant day out and didn't spend it sitting on the internet in the house like usual and got me some dealz.

Have you found any good deals where you are this week?

Sluggy