Tuesday, April 18, 2017

Idaho or Bust.....Planning a Road Trip!

I've got a mega-Road Trip in the works for this Summer.
Yay, Sluggy's loose in the USA again!!! ;-)

We are going to Idaho via road trip this year.


We are still in the planning stages for this but if you are up for spending time with Sluggy and Hubs sometime in late July or early August this year, shoot me an email with details on what town you are in and your availability.
We are up for a visit, a meal, a trip to Rite-Aid or the grocery store or an overnight stay(if you think you can stand us that long!).

We've got a lot of territory to cover and our routes(both there and back)are pretty flexible at this point so let me know if you want to spend time with this awesome couple.......



Ok, so the one on the left is a bit weird but I'll try to keep it together.  ;-)

Sluggy


Monday, April 17, 2017

This Week on the Dining Table

The "Great Weather Ahead" Edition--

Well yesterday, Easter Sunday, we hit 83*F here.
What???


The flowering tree has started blooming.  I still can't figure out what variety of tree it is.
We aren't suppose to leave the 60's this week.  It's about time! ;-)


Moving On....

Onward to the meal planning!

Here's what was planned last week--

1. Sunday--Cheeseburgers, Macaroni Salad
2. Monday--Chicken, Broccoli, Cheese, Rice Casserole(using up grilled chicken)
3. Tuesday--Leftovers
4. Wednesday--Leftovers
5. Thursday--Fish, Veggie Stir-Fry
6. Friday--?
7. Saturday--?

And this is what actually happened--

1. Sunday--Cheeseburgers, Macaroni Salad
2. Monday--Chicken, Broccoli, Cheese, Rice Casserole(using up grilled chicken)
3. Tuesday--Leftovers
4. Wednesday--Chinese Take-Out
5. Thursday--Leftovers
6. Friday--Frozen Pizza(sort of-it tasted off so we threw it out), then leftovers
7. Saturday--Salmon, Stir-Fry Veggies

5 meals cooked at home, 3 of them a night of leftovers or Fend For Yourself, and 1 night of eating-out/take-out.

As for the grocery spending.....2 trips to Weis and 1 trip to Target brought the food spending last week to $0.00.  Well the total should have been $119.54 but I used free gift cards.  This brought my April food spending total to $172.27.  There are 13 days left in the month.

My savings percentages last week was 100%. 8-)))

Leftovers going into this week....... Fajita filling for 2 tortillas, Beef Pie(enough for 2 helpings), Macaroni Salad, Roast Chicken slices, Chicken/Broccoli Cheese Casserole.

Here is this week's "food plan"....
* Denotes "complicated" meals

1. Sunday--Ham, Beans, Rolls, Deviled Eggs
2. Monday--Tacos
3. Tuesday--Leftovers
4. Wednesday--Kielbasa on Rolls, Onions, Beans or leftover Mac Salad
5. Thursday--Leftovers
6. Friday--Chicken Cordon Blue, Mixed Veggies
7. Saturday--maybe Take-Out Subs?

This week will see 4 new meals cooked, 1 night of Take-Out/Eating-Out and 2 nights of Leftovers.

What I need to buy for this menu?  Maybe salad greens and fruit(but the fruit isn't on the menu).

What is getting fixed and served at your house this week?

Was last week's plan successful, did you go off plan or did you not even plan what was going to be eaten last week?

Any great deals on food at your stores this week?


Sluggy

Sunday, April 16, 2017

From Figs to Catholic School to the Titanic

Ok, if this post title has you scratching your head, just keep reading and it will all make sense eventually.

About 2 weeks ago or so Hubs, Daughter and I were sitting in the den watching TV and talking.  I don't know how the subject came up but I told Hubs and Daughter about this funny Fig Newton cookie Song I knew from the early 1970's and then I sang it for them.
They couldn't believe it was a TV commercial and accused me of making this up.

Then Daugther found this video HERE on Youtube and I was vindicated.

Can't remember if I was in 5th or 6th grade when this commercial came out. 
A school friend and I called each other Mama Fig and Baby Fig and we performed this dance/song at recess on the playground for our own enjoyment.

So of course my brain, being how it is, I got to thinking about the kids I knew back in grade school.
Besides 1 friend from that time in my life I haven't seen any of them since I left Virginia to go away to college, and most of them well before that event in my life.

So I dug out my 8th grade yearbook the following week and using my records access on Ancestry attempted to look up whatever became of some of the folks who I graduated from Christ the King School with.

Here's my photo from the yearbook........



You can't tell in the photo but I had a mouth full of braces which just added to the awkward 13 year old angst of hormones and changing bodies. lolz
The lovely crocheted vest I am sporting in the pic I made myself.

Here is a photo of my friend, the infamous "Mama Fig"......name withheld to protect the guilty...


Seems Mama Fig has been married three times and divorced twice(unless husband #2 died-He was 13 years old than her).
Anyway she is on husband #3 and I hope she is happy.  Evidently she is not on Facebook because a search there turned up nada.

A funny fact I turned up is that Mama Fig's older brother ended up marrying a mutual classmate/friend we both had in 8th grade.  They are still married as far as I can tell from the records I could find..

Anyway, seems many of my 8th grade classmates have been married and divorced over the past 44 years.  A couple have died, one in her 20's due to drugs.  She was married, divorced, remarried and dead all by the time she was 25.  Many of the girls I can't trace as they had common maiden surnames and what with marrying and moving it's difficult to trace those.


Then I got to thinking about the actor who played the Big Fig Newton on this series of tv commercials.
A search quickly turned up his name and some acting credits.  Most notably he was nominated for a Drama Desk Award for best featured actor in a musical for a really inane Broadway Revival in 1975-76 of "Very Good Eddie", a show originally from 1915.
But the work I found most interesting is a small part in an underground NY scene film from 1971 called "The Telephone Book".  It's about a sex craved hippie girl who is on the hunt to find the best obscene phone caller she ever heard.
I wonder what Nabisco would have thought about hiring Jimmy as the Big Fig Newton a couple of years later if they had known about this acting gig he had. ;-)

The actor's name was James Rhodes Harder.  But no mere hoofer was James.  No, he was a graduate of exclusive prep schools in Manhattan and Southborough, Massachusetts with a degree from Princeton University.

He is also the son of George Achilles Harder.......


George Harder went down into history when he took his new bride Dorothy Annan Harder on a 3 month honeymoon to Europe in January 1912.
They got on the RMS Titanic in Cherbourg France for the trip home to New York.

We all know what happened the evening of April 14th and the early morning hours of April 15th to that ship.
George and Dorothy, 1st class passengers, boarded lifeboat #5 and survived the disaster.
George gave a first-hand account of his experience on the Titanic after they were rescued by the RMS Carpathia.


A well known photo of George and Dorothy Harder speaking with another survivor of the Titanic sinking.

George Harder was often asked to lecture/speak on his experience aboard the Titanic through the years but he declined to ever do so.  The stigma of having survived(now known as survivor's guilt)made it something he wanted to forget.
Dorothy and George went on the travel the oceans again(in 1916 to Asia)and have two daughters.
Dorothy suffered from kidney problems and died young in 1926 at the age of 36.
George remarried in 1928 to Elizabeth Peebles Rhodes.
In 1930 they had a son, named George Achilles Jr, and in 1931 another son, James Dickinson Rhodes Harder, named after Elizabeth's father and a younger brother, who died at 1 years old of meningitis.

George Achilles Harder's Find A Grave memorial HERE.

James Dickinson Rhodes Harder died in 2009.  His obituary from the NYT is HERE.
I found his wife, Dorothy's obituary online HERE.  She died in 2015.



And while I was writing this blog post for the last three days, we celebrated the 105th Anniversary of the sinking of RMS Titanic.

Now how is that for tying up a bunch of flotsam and jetsam?

Sluggy




Saturday, April 15, 2017

Giveaway Winner

71 valid entries and random dotorg picked #12 so the winner is.............

Rhitter94

Sluggy - posted about this.. here is the link!!

http://planetdebtfree.blogspot.com/2017/04/on-sluggys-giveaway.html

Congratulations Rhitter94!
Please email me your full name and mailing address and I'll get this out on Monday to you.

Thanks to everyone who entered and played along.  I'll be back next month with another box of goodies to give away.

Sluggy

Friday, April 14, 2017

Target Shopping This Week...Nothing OOP

I went to Target earlier this week and I brought $65 in free Target gift cards with me when I went.  One of these was gotten from cashing in some credit card points and the others(in $5 and/or $10 increments)were free incentives from purchasing various items at Target in past trips.

They have a "Spend $50 on food/beverage, Get a $10 Target Gift Card" coupon this week.
There were a few things I needed this week(cream cheese, rolls and eggs for Easter)so I figured I'd do the bulk of my grocery shopping this week at Target because nothing beats shopping for free! lolz

I got--
24 Hawaiian rolls=$5.49
12 Hawaiian rolls=$3.00
1 bag blue tortilla chips=$2.79
1 box Whole Earth sweetener=$3.19
1 tomato=$1.29(needed this for lunch that day)
4 dozen eggs=$2.00
1 bag salad=$1.49*Had a 50¢ sticker which the cashier missed-I'll go back at a later date to get that .50¢ back*
4 boxes cream cheese=$5.96


3 bags Starbucks coffee=$17.97
4 6-packs diet Pepsi bottles=$12.00

Before Qs this subtotaled....$55.18

I had a $1.50/1 ManuQ for the Whole Earth and a $3/2 ManuQ for the Starbucks coffee so $4.50 off makes my total $50.68.
I earned the $10 Target gift card on all this.

I also bought.......

4 boxes of Q-tips on sale $2.99=$11.96  Q-tips is one of the few items we are "brand loyal" about.
Earning the $5 Target gift card for these makes them $1.74 per box.  Even without using Qs that's a good price. 8-)

Everything bought--
$55.18 + $11.96 + .12¢ tax=$62.76 OOP.
I paid with $62.76 of Target free gift cards so Zero OOP for all.

I earned back a $10 gift card(for spending $50 on food/beverages)and a $5 gift card(for buying 4 Qtips).

I sent for a free $5 Starbucks e-gift card when I got home HERE(incentive for buying 3 Starbucks coffee bags in one trip).  I'll probably give this to the nephew for his upcoming birthday since I don't "do" Starbucks.

I also submitted for a $2 cash rebate for the Whole Earth sweetener and a .25¢ cash rebate for any item you bought on Ibotta.
I also submitted for a .25¢ cash rebate for the Salad on Checkout51.

So I bought home all the above for $62.76 in free gift cards and earned $15 in new free gift cards(plus $5 for Starbucks)and $2.50 in cash rebates so the effective price for everything above was $45.26(if I had paid for the gift cards). *Once I get my .50¢ back for the discount sticker on the salad the effective price for all will be $44.76

I am off now to go get my free turkey breast from Weis(PMITA)Markets since I have 50 gas points.  This will go into the freezer for later as I am defrosting the ham I also got for free from Weis with gas points at Christmas time.  8-)

Did you hit Target or some other store and get any good deals on groceries this week?

Sluggy