the siren song of costco...

so today . . . i went to costco. it was time. we were out of almonds.

going to the grocery store is not my favorite thing to do. it ranks right up there with cleaning the shower or going to the dentist. but sometimes i have to go. we need food that i can only get at costco--like two pound bags of almonds or five dozen eggs or a giant bag of kettle corn (which, btw, is only 150 calories per serving. and guess what? a serving is 2 1/2 cups!!! this is new knowledge that i gained while shopping at costco today! now the big bag of kettle corn is on my 'must have it' list.)

i had put off going to costco as long as i could. but this morning we were totally out of almonds, which is 1/3 of rollie's breakfast. thankfully, i had a small bag of trail mix (no almonds, but it did have peanuts and raisins, and bonus m&ms,) so i left that out for him--you know, because it's sort of my responsibility to make sure we have cheese and eggs and nuts at all times, and i didn't make it to the store yesterday. so i knew i had to go today.

when i left school and headed for costco, i realized that i was going to drive right past the house we are hoping to buy--well, not right past, but really close to it--so i decided to make a short detour and just drive by again...

i didn't have the address, but i've been there twice. how hard could it be to find it? it is in a housing development, surrounded by a cement block wall, with only one entrance. i figured if i got in, i would eventually find it.

eventually turned out to be right! i made it to the street that the house is on with no problems. and then i turned the wrong way. i went left when i should have gone right. this was not good, not good at all. i had no idea there could be so many dead ends and cul-de-sacs in such a small area! it seemed like no matter where i went, i had to turn around and go back! i kept thinking that if i just went a little further, i could get out. i was wrong.

i finally got turned around the right way and found the house... and a whole street lined with giant pine trees!

how could i have missed that before?!? our possible new house is on a street lined with pine trees! i am not a fan of pine trees, unless i am in oregon. that is where pine trees belong! they look normal up there! in southern california, they look like they are lost, like somehow they were on their way north when they just got too tired to continue, and so they put their roots down here. i don't like it. it isn't a deal breaker, but i don't like it.

eventually i found my way out of the housing development, and continued on to costco. i was just there to get the staples of our diet--lettuce, broccoli, cheese, bananas, dried mangoes, almonds and pecans, eggs, and wheat thins. (ok, we eat other stuff too, but this is what i get at costco.) i walked in, flipped my card at the entrance guard, and stopped.

i was in big trouble.

let's just say that if you are in the process of buying a new home, you should probably stay out of costco unless you have a credit card with a zero balance.

before i even got to the first aisle, i saw a commercial grade garden hose, water resistant throw pillows (for that outdoor furniture i will one day have,) and refrigerators (because we might have to buy one.) and then it occurred to me that costco might be a good place to get a whole bunch of stuff we will need when we move into a new house.

but not today. today i did not have an empty credit card with me. today i do not yet have a new house. today the house i am living in does not have room for anything else! so today was not the day to stock up on new house stuff.

i turned my cart toward the lettuce, moving quickly past all the shiny kitchen gadgets. because even though i don't like to cook, i looooove shiny kitchen gadgets. if it plugs in and whirrs, i want it. i might never, ever use it, but i like having shiny kitchen gadgets in my kitchen. because you just never know when i might be inspired to prepare something... i got the lettuce and turned toward the cheese. but to get to the cheese, i had to go through the bakery...

ah, the bakery... the bakery at costco is like the fourth level of hell. it lures and entices you with the delicious smells that are created when white sugar and flour are baked together. if they sold any of those baked good individually, i would be in deep and serious trouble! but since you have to buy them in great quantities, i can usually resist.

i got the cheese and then braved the cold of the giant cooler to add some eggs to my cart. while i was on my way to get wheat thins, i spied the outdoor furniture...

ok, we are going to need outdoor furniture. one of the things we like about the new house is the back yard. it isn't great yet, but we have plans for it. big plans. and i am pretty sure that at some point outdoor furniture is going to be a part of those plans. so it is good to know what the options are...

i sat in chairs. i sat on loveseats. i sat at tables and pretended i was having 'breakfast out on the terrace.'

i moved on to the nuts. i finished my shopping and headed home. i did not go past the new house again.

i don't know if we are going to get this house. they've asked for another day to think about it. they may reject our offer, and i don't want to get too attached until i see if it is going to be ours. but if it is, i see more than one trip to costco in our future. because costco pretty much seems to have everything a new house needs...

...except the kitchen sink. thankfully, we won't need a kitchen sink!

an identity crisis--no, not mine!

so today . . . i got this email from payless shoes:

Introducing the Payless bath & beauty collections by Unforgettable Moments and zoe&zac!‏

yes, you read that right. payless shoes will now be selling beauty and skin care products.

i am somewhat perplexed by this. i thought this was a shoe store. typically shoe stores sell... well... shoes. when they started selling socks and handbags, i thought, ok, i can kind of see the connection between socks and handbags and shoes. but then they started selling jewelry. and now, beauty products!

i admit that i have occasionally looked at the jewelry. i can't help it. it sparkles. but none of it has come home with me. and if i need beauty products, i am either going to go to shopping tv or ulta--payless shoes will never be able to compete with their selection. besides, there is just something wrong about buying beauty products in a shoe store!

i think some stores may be experiencing an identity crisis. maybe our current economic situation is fueling this diversification. a few months ago i got a flyer in the mail announcing that target would now be selling food. and not the kind of food they have always had--the snack foods, or the "oh no, we are out of milk" foods, or the"aaaggghhhhh! i'm on my way home from work and need something in a box that i can microwave for dinner and i have to stop at target anyway" kinds of foods. apparently now they are going to carry real food, just like the grocery store.

i know that some wal-marts have been doing this for a while--combining a grocery store with an all-purpose type store. but target?? no! leave my target alone!!

i love target. it is kind of my "go to" store. sadly, it is a well known fact that a person cannot go into a target and come out with only what was on their list. it is impossible! there are just too many choices. and they are genius at store layout. the most direct route from the door to the m&m's leads you right past the clothes. looking for toothpaste? better keep your blinders on or you will end up in cosmetics. socks and underwear? located just across the aisle from shoes--which are temptingly displayed on the ends of the rows. and just when you think you have successfully completed the gauntlet and emerged victorious with only those items on your list, you have to go to a cash register--the purgatory of impulse purchases. dvds, magazines, individual serving sized bags of chips (just sitting there taunting you with their crunchy, salty goodness... "don't feel guilty. just get one bag. your clothes will still fit--yes, those clothes you are buying that you didn't come in here to buy. they will still fit. i promise...") not to mention items from the $1 section, all clamor for a spot on the conveyor belt...

so real grocery store type food in target is going to be a problem for me.

first of all, i am concerned with what will be eliminated from their inventory to make room for this new section. personally, i think they could get rid of all kitchen items--except for toasters. and maybe the men's clothing section. i mean, really. do you know any men who shop at target?? the only men i ever see in there are... ok, i never see any men in there. i think target is sort of a 'girl's only' type store. men are going to buy their electronics online, their clothes at the mall (if you can get them to go!) and, well, do they buy anything else?!?

i guess as long as they don't decrease the electronics department, or women's clothes, shoes, and accessories, i will cope...

one afternoon diandra and i were headed to target for something (i don't know what we were going to get, and it doesn't even matter, because we were going to end up buying different stuff anyway,) and we discovered that those geniuses of store layout had struck again--because the food section was right in front of the doors and across the aisle from the clothes. and it looked pretty good! i thought the food would be priced at convenience store prices, but we were surprised to see that it was about the same as at the grocery store. we wandered through and bought quite a few things that we needed... no really, they were things we needed. unlike some of our target purchases. we got bananas, and hot pockets, and yogurt, and raisins, and lunchables.

ok, mostly diandra bought food. but i looked at what they had and found that i could buy most of my non-costco food items at target now...

...which is going to be an issue. because while it is very convenient for me to go to target, it holds so many more shopping traps than food 4 less.

but who knows. it may be just a matter of time before i can stop off at payless shoes for my groceries. they could make room, by eliminating the jewelry and beauty sections...

and so begins my life of crime . . .

*disclaimer--while i would not call myself an environmentalist, i am not opposed to taking care of our planet. today i am just venting frustration at how it will inconvenience me. so please find the humor in my discomfort rather than being indignant at my attitude.

so today . . . i've been thinking about this whole illegal plastic bag thing . . .

in case you haven't heard, the california legislature has banned plastic grocery bags. you know, those plastic grocery bags that we all use to put our shoes and laundry in when we travel, and collect our empty soda cans in to take to recycling, and to line our small wastebaskets, and most importantly, to pick up doggie bombs? yes, well, we will no longer have access to those bags.

ironically the language in the legislation actually bans "single use plastic bags." for me, a sandwich bag is single use. a large garbage bag is single use. even plastic wrap is single use. the one type of plastic bag which is definitely NOT single use is the plastic grocery bag. we keep them in our kitchen, in both bathrooms, in the trunk of the car, and with our luggage. i even keep a bunch of them at school for those occasional bathroom accidents that preschoolers are prone to have. and i cannot leave the house to walk milo without one of those bags. because while mia is too busy walking to stop for anything, milo's walk is not complete until he has proven to the neighborhood that his digestive system is working just fine!

apparently california legislators do not have to deal with their household garbage or doggie poop. because for those of us who do, those plastic grocery bags are essential and definitely multi-purpose. but we are going to have to learn to function without them. instead, we are being encouraged to buy reusable cloth bags for our groceries.

i don't really have a problem with the whole cloth shopping bag idea. in fact, the trunk of my car is home to three giant costco reusable bags, three small trader joe's bags, two red target bags, one green subway bag (which scores me a free cookie every time i use it!) and a bag i got at forever 21 with a colorful bird on it. i could probably use the bird bag at any store since there is no name or logo on it, but i always think of it as my forever 21 bag. clearly i am going to have to buy some stater bros bags, or getting my groceries home is going to be a challenge . . .

i know that technically i can use any of these bags in any store. i know this in my head. but if i were to walk into stater bros with my trader joe's bags, i would feel like i was cheating on trader joe's! after all, i bought those bags at trader joe's, and i'm sure it was their intent that i use them when i shop at trader joe's. i'm sure they want me to look at those bags in my trunk and think, "oh, i need to go to trader joe's to buy groceries today," NOT "oh, i'm glad i have these trader joe's bags to carry my groceries home from stater bros in." then again, maybe if i used my trader joe's bags at stater bros, other shoppers would see them and abandon their shopping carts and flock to trader joe's, but i kind of don't think so.

i can see this cloth bag thing is going to be an issue for my ocd tendencies. i am going to feel like i have to have the correct bags for each store. the trunk of my car is doomed to be filled with all these shopping bags, which is going to make actually bringing any groceries home in it a challenge. but i think the bigger challenge is going to be remembering to take the bags in with me . . .

i already have trouble with this. how many times have i found myself at the checkout line at costco thinking, "oh rats! i left my reusable bags in the trunk of my car again!!" which leaves the cashiers no choice but to put my eggs and cheese and broccoli in big cardboard boxes which won't fit in my trunk. so when i get to my car, i have to unload the boxes, then find a place to dispose of the boxes (because as i just said, they won't fit in my trunk!) and then take my groceries into the house one armload at a time. i could use the reusable costco bags i keep in the trunk to take the groceries into the house, except they are always underneath the unloaded groceries.

so, you may ask, what do you do if you live in california and you go to the grocery store and you forget to take your properly silk-screened cloth bags in with you?

well, you have two choices. you can either buy new cloth bags--which are usually fairly reasonably priced (but after i forget 20 times, it is going to add up--at $1.99 each,) or you can spend a minimum of five cents for each paper bag you use. that's right, we will be allowed to buy paper bags.

ok, so let's just think about this for a minute. we can't have plastic bags because they are bad for the environment (even though they are very useful around the house,) but we can buy all the paper bags we want (even though technically trees must die to produce those bags.) ok, just so we are clear--we are doing this for the environment . . .

lest you think our legislators are totally crazy, (i'll just insert a pause here so you can laugh hysterically,) the paper bags are required by law to be made from 60% recycled materials. i guess paper bags are environmentally friendly as long as you only have to kill enough trees to manufacture 40%. and i guess plastic bags are ok as long as you buy them from glad or hefty. and i guess the planet isn't in immediate danger, because this ban on plastic grocery bags does not go into effect until january 2012.

i figure that gives me a year and a half to stockpile them. let's see . . . if i double bag everything and only put an item or two in each one . . .