August 10, 2008

• I know that I've stood on top of my little current economy pedestal before and preached about the coming "Great Recession", but I was just wondering if the current state of the economy has affected any of your habits.

  Thankfully Amanda and I are doing ok, but I have noticed some changes in our behaviors.  Our single largest spending category outside of our mortgage is eating out and we have been doing a pretty good job reducing the amount we spend eating out.  With the work announcement coming soon (hint hint) we should be able to increase our eating in another time or two a week. 

  Even eating in is different now.  The prices in the grocery store has turned kind of crazy recently.  It seems like most items are up 20-40% and some things are up 60-100%.  Absolutely nuts, these food increases along are going to eat up the typical American pay raise of 3%.  You figure in increased gas prices, increased inflation across the board, and who know what else and suddenly you have the typical American family making 20% less next year than last year.  That's a serious serious hit to the pocket book.  Take that 20% hit and figure in the mortgage problem and all the foreclosures, possible tax increases, banking dilemmas, and the crappy stock market and we are in for a beating. 

  So, what have you changed recently to accommodate all this crap?  I've already mentioned the grocery store prices.  I know that last year if I was going to get cheese I would spend the extra buck or so and get good cheese, but not anymore.  Since I am buying more house branded products I actually went against my opinion of Krogers and started shopping there again.  The other grocery store chain around us got bought out and their house brand is terrible.  Krogers house brand is pretty good quality so if I need a meal or two at a time I'll go there. 

  I'm also buying more frozen vegetables instead of fresh, even though vegetables are in season and they *should* be cheaper now.  I can't imagine how expensive vegetables are going to get when we have to get them from South American during the winter.  Can you say $3.50 for a green pepper?

  I know that I am driving my car less now.  It seems that Amanda and I have started to become more home-bodies.  We aren't going places that we could possibly spend money as much as we used to.  I'm probably getting 2-3 more days between fill-ups.  One of the nice additions is we have a new mall about 2 miles from our house.  That has reduced the distance to shopping.  The next closest mall was about 8 miles away. 

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  Ok, on to other things...

  I finally got to play cards.  Thank God!  We had dinner at home and then went to a friends house and played Euchre until late.  I had high hopes after the first game when Amanda and I won 10-1, but we could buy a win after that.  We had a couple rays of hope, but that was it.  We drank some and had some great guacomole that I made.  It was a pretty good evening, even though we lost

  Last night we finally got a little bit of rain, which was good since we've been dry the last two weeks or so.  I've been throwing a lot of water at our yard lately and thankfully all the hard work and heavy watering if finally starting to pay off.  Our backyard is not that great yet, but it's 100% better than last year.  I have high hopes that about 40 pounds of grass seed this fall, an aeration, and then a roller over it may be exactly what we need to have a nice yard next year.  The front year looks really nice again.  I think the main problem with the back was just last year being so damn dry. 

  I guess that Amanda's family is going to be over today sometime.  I was thinking about making a big breakfast, but with her family here in a couple of hours it probably wouldn't be a smart idea since they want to go out for lunch.

  I might make some quick eggs though. 

  Ok, I'm off!

  • 10:19 am
  • 3 Comments