April 23: Put It Back

It's meant to rain tomorrow (happens we got a small shower today, as well), and Friday we have Travis coming in, not to mention all the House Blessing cleaning and planning that I do on Fridays.  So today we headed off to Sam's Club to do our every other month shopping.  

Y'all...The number of things I looked at, considered and then carefully put back on the shelf was great.  John said to me on the way home, "I started to wonder if you were going to buy anything.  You just kept putting things back."  Well, I put things in the buggy as well, but not nearly as much as I'd thought I might.  I had looked at preview ads for the grocery stores yesterday, so I'd have the prices fixed in my mind before shopping today.  It proved to be a good strategy because it made me very mindful of what I'd pay routinely if I didn't go to Sam's Club and most all of what I bought was a better purchase than I could get at the regular grocery.

That said, a few prices were down from the last time we shopped and others...definitely weren't!  I couldn't bring myself to buy ground beef today, although that was one of the reasons I'd gone to the store in the first place.  The 10-pound chubs were over $5 a pound.  I couldn't bring myself to spend $50 on ground beef at one time.  I looked at the smaller packages and found them to be well over $5 a pound.  I went back to look at the Chubs and then just walked away.  

I hoped to keep my spending at about $150.  I spent $250.  We had four bags of stuff and one of those bags held a 25-pound bag of flour.  I scratched off many items on my list that I'd hoped to purchase because I either didn't see the items or couldn't bring myself to pay the price.  We bought no impulse items, no snack items and no sweets.  

I am not that worried about things to be honest.  I have ground beef on hand at present.  I'll look for alternatives or better pricing elsewhere and if that doesn't pan out, it will be all right.  We will eat and we won't be going hungry.  But I couldn't help but think that I can easily recall clearly the day and time when I could purchase meat for $1 or less per pound, and $2, and $3...And I suppose if I must adjust to $5 per pound, I will eventually make that leap as well.  We've lived here for 28 years, and all of those price points were seen while we were living right here in this house.  Despite all of this, my grocery budget has remained exactly the same as it was back then.  Yes, truly, it's the same as I paid back when we moved in and we had constantly fluctuating people living in this house, anywhere from 6 to 2.

I was listening to a senator from Alabama talking on a pod cast we enjoy listening to and he said that we can expect some financial changes in the next couple of years including higher prices and interest rates, but this is apparently something that the financial whizzes have predicted as they follow these sorts of things.  You and I judge things by what we're paying at the grocery store...Which is how most all average folks 'check' the economy trends!

I've been doing a lot of thinking and studying and cramming far too much information from too many different sources into my head these past two weeks.  I think I need to journal more and take things one step at a time because I'm getting overwhelmed with all the conflicting 'facts' that I've been reading (not speaking of financial matters now but of mental, physical and spiritual things).    I've also had my phone in my hand entirely too often lately.  Today on our way to Macon, I suddenly thought of something I'd meant to look at, but I refused to get my phone out of my purse.  I decided that I'm going to be more present and mindful on these drives.  And yes, at home, too.  I'm going to return to limiting my online time.  I know too well that this is worse than a rabbit hole.  It is a black hole that sucks my time and energy and interest from the things that truly matter.   

I'm going to keep a sheet of paper handy where I'll jot down questions I have and want to research and during my computer time, I will look for information and answers but not until I reach that point in the day.  I'm going to journal more so that I am clear on what it is I want/need/feel which will help to focus me on what's truly going on with myself physically and mentally.  

And right now, I'm going to end here and pay attention to this Wednesday evening sermon.  This is the true nutrition I need!

Recommendation:  If you like crime dramas but hate the gore and hideous details, we've stumbled upon a few of late that were more than decent.  The Last Detective (3 seasons), The Inspector Alleyn series (I think just 1 season and 1 extra episode), and most recently Unforgotten.  I don't know how many seasons, but we just finished up season 1 and will start season 2 tonight.  All three are British by the way.

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