The Weekend...Good, Bad & Ugly

I went out on Thursday looking for those Wendy's gift cards other Dollar Generals in my area.  Found them at one, took a handful up to the register and the cashier couldn't get them to activate. ???
I hit the Bread Outlet while I was out and then grabbed a burger at BK on a gift card and headed home.

On Saturday it was a cold but sunny day so Hubs and I decided to head South of here to use a gift card I won at the Church auction last Fall for a local diner.
Diners in PA are most usually owned/run by Greek descent folks.  The menus are vast, the prices are good and the food in plentiful.
This is one we like Walnut Bottom Diner in Carlisle PA and this one, The American Star Diner in North Wales PA.  Both Greek American run.
Diners offer great deals and food except if you go to a diner it seems in the town we refer here to "Little Havana".  This isn't a negative reference,  It's just that after 9/11 Hispanic NYC dwellers moved here in record numbers to this little PA town.  It's now populated 50% at least by those folks.  You are more likely to see store signs in Spanish than English there or bilingual signage.

Anyway, this diner, both clientele and staff are Hispanic from what I could tell.  The menu was vast, the food plentiful but the prices were a bit higher(probably because being NYC refugees they are use to paying/charging higher prices anyway).
But the food.....sigh.....the food was not what we were expecting.  Not as good and some menu Greek staples which we tried were NOT authentically Greek.  Instead of real Greek olives on Hubs Greek Salad they were canned black olives, like you'd get on a pizza.
Ack!

So at least we didn't pay full price for the meal as the gift card cost me at the auction less than face value and we paid an additional $9 and change for the check.
Oh well.....you live and learn and remember not to go back there again.

On the way down to this diner we stopped at a Dollar General along the way to check for Wendy's gift cards and they had them.
Another attempt to purchase a stack and this cashier also could not get them to validate. ???  This store I had also tried to buy different discounted gift cards at back last Fall before Christmas and at that time the cashier also couldn't get those gift cards to scan.

So we stopped at another Dollar General right near our diner destination and I tired again to purchase the Wendy's gift cards.

Success!!!!!!
Why on earth do they scan correctly at one Dollar General out of the three I tired to buy these gift cards at?
I think it has something to do with the cashiers not knowing how to ring them up or not.
I now know where to avoid getting gift cards from.
This would have been so much easier if my town's DG carried the Wendy's one.

We've gotten a couple of warm days this past week.  Yesterday it hit the mid 60'sF here.
Here is what is left of our snow pack........

 Mostly the backyard is clear but the deck is still covered.

The front yard gets full sun most of the day so we just have some mid-sized piles left.

I cleared my bookshelf area, filed papers away, reorganized my gift card box and list yesterday.
Hubs finished and filed the taxes electronically yesterday.
We had to do FOUR tax filings for 2016....Federal, PA state, LA state and the local PA taxes.

We got a moderate refund on the Federal(which was our money we were FORCED to loan to the government for 12 months interest free!), we owed $2 on the local PA taxes and then we got pounded in the ass on the PA and the LA state taxes!!

Since the house we own and rented out is in Louisiana we have to declare this income in LA.
We also had to declare this income on our PA taxes for some reason with the caveat that we would get a "credit" to offset the LA income on our PA form.

Well that "credit" only amounted to half of what we paid to LA so basically we got DOUBLE TAXED on half the LA income in PA too!
Taxation is theft and doubly so if you pay it twice!!!

It's no wonder people LIE all the time about their income to the government and I don't blame them.
I am so tired of being made to pay for shit I shouldn't have to and supporting irresponsible people's financial irresponsibility.  And then you get made to feel guilty if you don't want to let the government pick your pocket constantly.

*Putting Libertarian Soapbox away now*

So I am off to make "Sunday gravy" and cook meatballs for Hubs' dinner and mellow myself out.

What are you up to today?

Sluggy
"Taxation is theft"

New Giveaway Winner

After waiting an inordinately long time for the Giveaway winner to contact me(after posting the info on the blog and TWO emails directly to her supplied email addy) I am selecting a new winner for the February Giveaway.

And the winner is........

Amber Ravis!

Amber RavisFebruary 24, 2017 at 4:13 PM

77 in Kentucky today..
Aacc442@yahoo.com

ReplyDelete

Please email me privately Amber with your full name and mailing address so I can finally get this box of goodies out to someone. lolz

Sluggy

Frugal Friday

Here are things I did this week that were frugal.  By spending more intentionally we can choose were to spend our money and where to save it.


* Purchased food gift cards at 15% off.

* Didn't buy many groceries this week and everything I bought was on sale and some I even had a coupon to use.  I also used a discounted gift card for that grocery store to pay for the shop.

* I had $30 in Kohl's Cash saved up from buying Hubs and College Boy some clothing(also got large pillar candles for $5.99 to put away for next Xmas in these shops too)so instead of using it on splurging out on Fiesta Ware dish sets(a great deal at $32.01 for two 4 piece place settings!)I bought my daughter a pair of sneakers.

I don't "need" new dishes and even though these would be rather inexpensive for that brand they would still have cost a LOT of money for dishes.  The sneakers on the other hand will be a need eventually when her current shoes wear out and after the Kohl's Cash only cost me $15 OOP and if she doesn't "need" them until late this year I can put these away until her birthday or Christmas so killing two birds with one stone so to speak.
I had the shoes shipped to the store for pick-up so I saved on the shipping as well.
And I shopped online through a cash back site and got an extra .42¢ in that account.  Hey, it may not be much but it adds up over the course of a year. 8-)

* I paid our sewage bill this week.  If you pay it annually instead of quarterly you save money.  It may be only $30 a year in savings but why not if we have the money, right?   Small savings measures add up over the years.

* Actually, this one was last week--I bought dish soap at the Dollar Tree for $1 a bottle.  I am very low on my dish soap stockpile so I have been looking for a "deal" on this item but have found none lately.  I figure a huge bottle of $1 dish soap is better than purchasing a much smaller name brand dish soap at 2 to 3 times that price.

* When I sent College Boy back to school I sent along a bag of goodies for him to open at Easter(since he won't be coming home next month).  That saved me the postage if I had to mail him a box of goodies.

* Not frugal but a result from a previous frugal action.....I received two cash rebates in the mail this week.

$9.62 total back which I will put aside with my saved coins for the year and my assorted online cash back rebate site monies and then dump it all into the food budget for 2017.

* I didn't do much cooking this week as we had tons of Leftovers to use up. This saved me time and money.

* Went on Youtube to watch a couple of cable shows I like that were posted there as well as two movies.  We got rid of cable 3 or 4 years ago.

So what did you do this week to keep money in your pocket or add to your savings?

Sluggy

My Wednesday out Shopping

I did a small grocery shop yesterday at Weis.

2 x Balance bars on sale=$2.
I used my last $1.50/2 Qs gotten from Rite-Aid so .25¢ each.

2 x Sea Best Haddock BOGO sale=$8.99 for 2 lbs. so 4.50 per lb after sale.

I also picked up 6 packages of fresh breaded chicken cutlets.
They were on sale for BOGO(reg. price $4 per package, so $2 per package)=$12.00
I paired these with 2 x $1.50/3 IPQ Perdue fresh breaded chicken items so $12.00-$3=$9.00 for all or $1.50 per package.

These keep for a long time in the fridge or throw them in the freezer to keep them for a year or so.
I like to have these on hand for various meals......chicken parm, chicken piccata, chicken w/fettucine alfredo, chicken marsala or even chicken sandwiches.  They are an easy shortcut to those meals when I don't feel like making a meal from scratch or someone else here has to do the cooking or someone wants a quick snack.

A 1/2 lb. of lunchmeat for Daughter's lunch rounded out this small shop and brought my total to $20.99.

I saved 55% over regular retail on the items and put the total on my Weis gift card bought last Fall so no OOP this year.
I have $45.01 left on that gift card.

I also made a stop at Dollar General.  4 specific food gift cards are 15% off purchase price this week there.

They only had the Domino's Subway and Taco Bell ones at this location, but no Wendy's.
I picked up $105 worth of gift cards for $89.25.  A savings of $15.75 on food we will be purchasing anyway so why not?
I might go out to a different Dollar General before Saturday evening when this sale ad ends to find the Wendy's gift card too as that brand rarely goes on sale around here.

Have you found any good deals this week?

Sluggy

2016 Road Trip....Day Two TN to GA to AL

Day Two, we hit the hotel breakfast then the gas station and a coffee place(for Hubs' "fuel")and were on I-75 before 10 am heading South.

We made good time and were driving through Chattanooga fairly soon.

Some houses were visible up on Lookout Mountain.

Next thing you know we were in Georgia...

The interstate South and West runs through a little corner of Georgia between Tennessee and Alabama. This wouldn't be the only time we drove into Georgia on this trip however.
Then with a blink of an eye we were in Alabama......

Pretty soon after driving into Alabama I saw a dead armadillo on the side of the road....and then another one.....and another within the span of 20 minutes!
Now I was under the impression that armadillos lived in the South West in places like Texas, New Mexico and Arizona.
Nope.
They also live in the South East in places like Alabama and such.
In total while driving through Alabama I saw EIGHT armadillos along the interstate that day and one was even alive still!

We stopped in Alabama at a rest stop to go potty. As this was the first rest stop once you get into Alabama on interstate I-59(near Valley Head, AL)it was also a welcome center.

They had big rocking chairs out front so you could sit and relax but it was too buggy and hot already.  So we wandered around inside and collected brochures for things to see/do in Alabama.

This was a photo I snapped of a truck on the interstate between Georgia and Alabama.  I can't remember why I took it just that there was some kind of livestock on that truck and not the usual chickens, cows or pigs.  Boy I sure miss my mind sometimes.......

4.5 hours after leaving the hotel we stopped to eat a late lunch South of Birmingham off the interstate in Calera, Alabama at Zaxby's.

We like this chain which we don't have where we live so we eat there when we find one.  They do a great salad(or as they call then ZALADS)and they specialize in chicken if that wasn't obvious from the logo on the drink cup. lolz

Back on the road for another 3 hours until we got to Spanish Fort, Alabama.  This was just a stones throw from our motel for the night and I had to make a stop at World Market.  I love that store and we don't have any around here so I stop in when we get near one and maybe find something food or drink to buy.
Then we drove not even 5 minutes further to the motel......

Oh! Lookie what is right across the parking lot from our room!

So we threw our stuff into the room and looked around.
This place was by far the cheapest lodging choice we found in this area right off Mobile Bay.
It was an old chain motel location that had been dropped from said chain and was now a private non-chain motel called the Eastern Shore Motel.

Now where I come from the "Eastern Shore" is a peninsula off the East Mid-Atlantic coast comprised of Delaware/Maryland/Virginia.....aka the Delmarva Peninsular.

Here Eastern Shore refers to the Eastern side of Mobile Bay.

Though it was only early May it was hot as crap already in Daphne Alabama.  And our room faced West so the late afternoon sun was beating down on our room window.  You can see it peaking around our room curtains behind me.

Me taking a photo of the broken mirror and inadvertently a selfie.

I was almost scared to touch the light switches.  Not because they were so dirty but they sure looked jerry-rigged.

We also had a state of the art *snort* microwave oven(circa 1982)which I wasn't about to try out.  Notice we got the deluxe room with a connecting door to the room next door.
Well what do you expect for $62 a night?  We were only there to sleep and get on down the road the next day.  All I cared about was if the mattress was aceptable and if the a/c worked(and it did, though noisily).

So after "settling in" ha! we freshened up and called my blogger buddy Lorraine who lives down this way.  The plan was to go over to the Clamco Ranch and visit and have dinner with her crew.

And here they are all bright eyed and bushy-tailed.

Well as bright eyed and bushy-tailed as one can be after working all day.  ;-)
Lorraine is a school cafeteria lady and had a trying day at work that day.  We got to hear all about the work drama and boy! was there!!
She has since changed schools/positions and things are better this year.....I think. ;-)

Anyway we got the Grand Tour around Clamco Ranch(we had visited before but that was when they lived in the Clamco Cottage in Fairhope, Alabama)and Chris's new workshop.
Then we sat a spell with a drink and petting time with Zoey.

Such a baby and wants to be the center of whatever is going on.  She's a love....

So dinner got ordered(local take-out BBQ), fetched and eaten.
Thanks again for the great vittles Chris and Lorraine!

We sat for hours it seems like and just talked and talked.

About 9 pm we left since Lorraine gets up waaaay to early in the am for work and it was past her bedtime.
We headed back to the luxury motel *snort* and hit the hay ourselves since we wanted to get back on the road early.

It was a great visit but way too short and it was so nice to see the Clamco Family again.  I am hoping Lorraine gets up North again this Summer or we get down her way(if I don't melt first).  8-))

Day Two was in the books and we were heading West again on Day Three.

Sluggy