Tuesday, March 1, 2011

Drive-in Market

Of all the things in life I detest there are two I detest most--grocery shopping and laundry at the laundromat. You would think my now, in this modern era, we would have grocery shopping down to a fine science.

Nope. We're still doing like our Mamas, only now we're paying more for less and we have about a bazillion more choices on the shelves. Half the time we spend in the store is just locating the few things we can afford on our pitifully short lists.

Since we retired, the hunk and I have drastically changed our shopping strategies. For one thing, we only buy enough for two. That's more difficult than you might think. Groceries aren't packaged for two. If they are, you pay twice as much for the smaller package than you would for a bigger one.

There there are the strange ways things are packaged. Hot dogs. Most of the packages have FIVE hotdogs per package. What do you do when there's two of you? Eat two and a half? Same thing for Italian sausage. Five in a package.

English muffins? Six. The last time we bought them, there were NINE in the package.

And toilet paper. We have those containers in our bathroom where you can store spare rolls so one of us doesn't have the wake the other one in the middle of the night to go find the tp. The containers hold three rolls. But! The package of toilet paper comes with four rolls. That fourth roll just hangs out on the back of the toilet for two days waiting for us to finish off the last roll from the previous package.

Toothbrushes come three to a pack. Three. One of us better brush twice as much...

Anyway, I really like this concept in the picture up there. Wouldn't that be cool? Pull up. Order the list. And hang out waiting for those neato guys in white outfits to load up the trunk.

What would be better? If they just delivered it to the house and you never had to go in another grocery store. Think of all the money you would say by not impulse buying. No more extra bags of chips or chocolate because they happened to be there tempting you.

Yeah. I could get behind this idea.

anny

7 comments:

  1. Hi Anny- I agree with you. I hate laundry and grocery shopping. Blech. I was ordering groceries online for a while. It was nice, but then I started eating less packaged food and it got harder to find specialty items (organic). Now I'm back to wandering the store.

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  2. There's always mail order for household items; I miss that option. Course, sometimes you have to buy in bulk.

    That would be awesome, to call Kroger or Walmart and arrange for delivery; downside to that is you'll have to be specific about brand/flavor/size.

    And grabbing a candy bar at the check out stand...or that copy of People....or stopping by the book aisle to see new arrivals!

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  3. Better yet. Hot dogs come in 5 (or 10) packs. Buns come in 8. Huh?

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  4. Nah, we're getting too bloody automated and cutting people out of the equation altogther. The more automated the less personal and the lack of jobs and the squeeze on the economy. As for the 5 hotdog thing, I feel if that is the worst that life has to bring me then I'm doing ok.

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  5. I love grocery shopping! Love it! We buy lots of fresh fruits and veggies - pretty much buy what I need daily, but then I have this small neighborhood market I can walk to. I don't freeze much.
    I love to make like a really big lasagna and divide it up into four meals.
    Toilet paper - keep it in a wicker basket on the floor of each bathroom - four rolls per bathroom. Works great!
    For me, grocery shopping is pure pleasure, recreation!

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  6. Funny how everyone has a different take on the business. I figure if someone else was doing the shopping, that would employ people to "pick 'n' pack", plus check out, plus it would employ more people to deliver it. So maybe that would start an entire new industry. Hmmmm. I must look into this.

    At our grocery store, they're already cutting down on employees, expecting people to check out their own groceries! That I do NOT like.

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  7. They don't have a way of online ordering where you are? I know around here, there are several options for online grocery shopping. You tell them what you want and when they should arrive to deliver your groceries.

    I've never tried it, though. I enjoy grocery shopping.

    (Although, I do HATE the idea of self-checkout. I worked in retail as a cashier, and self-checkout just smacks of my old job. Besides, I'm not getting paid for it.)

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