Don't Come Home Without a Deal

We are all trying to find ways to make the recession and the cost of gas work for us. We are using coupons, Giant Eagle fuelperks, creating recipes that last three days…etc.

So when the perfect storm of appliance breakdowns happened this month, I became Recession Master (really mistress, but it sounds so wrong). I decided to buy all things reconditioned, on sale , or scratch and dent.

First I bought a scratch and dent $1600.00 refrigerator on sale for $812.00…I did the bargain dance on that one…Sears Outlet, the most amazing assembly of appliances per square feet I have ever seen…I even eyed up a chainsaw, just because.

Next, I found a reconditioned lawn mower on the sidewalk at Lowe’s … I sent my husband to inspect it and buy it , using our fuelperks gift cards (we never purchase without them ) …we got it home and it wouldn’t start…hubby heads back to Lowe’s…they tell him since we used a Giant Eagle gift card we can only get a Lowe’s gift card in exchange for the mower….hubby does what hubby should always do in a retail pickle…

…he calls the Recession Master

…and it goes like this:

Hubby, “Hey I’m here at Lowes and they will only give me a Lowes gift card back on the mower”.

RM, “Really? Who sez?”.

Hubby, “The woman at the customer service desk”.

RM, “Do they have any mowers on sale?”

Hubby, “No…but there’s a nice..”

RM cuts him off like a bad spot on an apple…

“Well then, you go find the manager, tell him or her that the purchase with gift card return policy wasn’t explained to you and that your wife has eyed up a Craftsman mower at Sears (yes, I did) ON SALE.”

Hubby, “Okay, but… “

RM cuts him off again,

“Honey, don’t come home without a deal.”

Hubby proceeds to find the manager, wrangle him back to lawn mowers, and explain his position on gift card refunds.

The manager, a pleasant fellow named Scott, explains the refund policy, again…hubby makes it clear that it wasn’t made clear by the sales people or at purchase…

The sky parts, the rainbow appears, and the lawn mower sales guy who had been listening in, does the best drive by affirmation ever…”Wow, I didn’t know that was our policy either”.

Manager Scott gives him an I –wish-I-could-fire-you-right-here-right-now-look, then turns to my husband and says, “So what do you want to do?”

Hubby, “I want you to make me a deal on a lawn mower, and did you notice none of your mowers are on sale? My wife has already eyed up a Craftsman at Sears…”

Manager Scott, “Which one do you want?”

Hubby eyes up a nice rear propelled mower that costs well over $100 than the returned mower…”That one, what can you do on that one?”

Manager Scott, “Give me a dollar, over that return of the other mower and we’ll call it even…”

Hubby is happy and relieved, he can now go home having acquired a deal and he can’t wait to call the Recession Master to relay his story of retail victory…when Manager Scott leans in to him and says…

“And tell to your wife I don’t want her to go to Sears…”

So now, Lowes has built in brand loyalty, by showing us fairness and giving us the service of a mom and pop operation, and I am writing this for all to read….mission accomplished on all fronts.

Don’t you love when it all works out?

Sandwich generation and the truth....

It's been nearly a year and a half since my mother passed on.

Now my father is heading there.

Many of you are sandwich generation people like I am, meaning that you are taking care of your children and your parents..."sandwiched" in between the responsibilities...and it's all one big learning curve.

With raising children you learn terms like Dip/Tet vaccine and Star Wars Clone Wars, late tuition fee penalty. With your parents, it's terms like Living Will, Medicare Part D and what's a chest tube?

It jumbles around in your brain along with that Starbucks Gingersnap Latte and the latest email you received from the Giant Eagle Fuel Perks Mall and omigod is tax time that close?

How do we keep it straight and make the right decisions?

Are we doing this right? Is anyone going to figure out that we are just winging it? Is anyone going to see how scared we are?

No...we save that reveal for the quiet moment on the steps of the porch when we sit with the dog and make sure the Big Dipper is still out there in the night sky.

Tell the dog all about it...he/she won't judge you, or question your decisions...no way, that dog of yours will just sit there, staring at the stars too , wondering if the Milky Way is where Milk Bones come from.

By the way, if you have a cat, no such luck. They will not only judge you, they will view you as the inferior food-walla you are.

Stick with the dog.

Then after you bring the dog inside and eye up that Dove bar in the freezer, take comfort in the fact that your parents were once in this place, and one day your kids will be too, and nobody,

NOBODY, will ever feel they did it right.

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What the F?

Okay this is by far the most bizarre exchange I have had with another human being in a LONG LONG time.

First of all, I must start this story by saying I am a white female, and I happen to be wearing a black coat.

I was in the Giant Eagle today shopping in the dairy section, when I forgot something and had to turn around and blast back to the yogurt case. So, I spin my cart around, kinda demo derby-like 'cause for once in my life as a consumer, I didn't get the gimpy wheel cart.

Now granted, I was returning on the wrong side, meaning the left side against the supermarket traffic (is there such a thing?).

An elderly black women walking towards me, directly in my path, said, "You're like the black Mariah."

Of course my mind goes to Mariah Carey. I politely laugh at this wierd comment and keep charging towards the yogurt.

Several aisles later I do a "Wait a minute..." moment and think, what the hell did that mean?

Isn't Mariah Carey part black? Aren't I completely white? What does she mean by Black Mariah?

Was she just daffy?

Later at home, after I put the groceries away, I look up black Mariah on the internet.

According to the Urban Dictionary:

1.
black maria

Police prisoner transport vehicle. Also black maria or paddy wagon.This is the spelling used in the Tom Waits song "Big Black Mariah":
"Here come the big black mariah, here come that big black Ford"

Soooo, that woman called me a paddy wagon ....I must have looked like one racing down the yogurt aisle.

Stranger yet, I actually drive a big black Ford.

But, how did she know?

Invisi-Gal too unnerved by the strangeness of it all to be mad about being called a paddy wagon.

WTF?

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Tead Off...

Okay, first of all I am a creature of habit in the sense that I like things MY WAY.

Meaning, I need my Constant Comment Green Tea in the morning.

I like that particular brand and flavor because it has FLAVOR , let's face it, green tea tastes like someone steeped up a leaf of nothing, 'kay?

After an exhaustive search of supermarkets I hit the motherlode at a local Giant Eagle. Now I must tell you, I hate this location because it's parking lot is like the bumper car ride at Kennywood with senior citizens and it's so massive you need a passport to get from the bakery section to the meat section.

But I go there because they carry Constant Comment Green Tea.

Until three weeks ago.

I waltzed up to the Bigelow tea section ready to pluck my CCGT from the shelf and to my cranky amazement, they had NINE MILLION types of green tea but not my CCGT.

I stood there for about 10 minutes thinking that maybe I could make it appear with sheer I -can't-believe-this-shit-will.

Hey, are you at the part where you think, "who the hell cares about tea so much" yet?

Goood, then I go on....

SO I ask the young stocker babe nearby "Aren't you guys carrying Constant Comment Green tea anymore?".

She gives me the look like I could almost be invisible, as in, you're too old to have have a cool purse like that kinda thing.

She goes over to the teas, looks at the NINE MILLION types of green tea and says in a most dissmissive tone "I'll bring it up at the meeting tomorrow".

TO which I replied, "You guys have meetings about stuff like that?"

She just kept walking away.

I felt like a chump with a cool purse.

The next time I was there , no CCGT.

So I ordered online from the Bigelow website, you have to by a case of it. http://www.bigelowtea.com/

My UPS guy had to walk up our 500 foot ice covered driveway to deliver it.

I had to clear out space in my pantry to store it.

I was at the Giant Eagle today buying my other mania, Static Guard (Please God, don't let them run out of THAT) and there on the Bigelow Shelf was about 20 boxes of CCGT.

They really do have meetings about stuff like that.

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