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Shopping

Frugal Shopping at the Estate Sales

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Yesterday morning La Maya and I made a run on an estate sale in Troon, an upscale high-desert area of north north Scottsdale, where for $500,000 you get a stryofoam-and-stucco tract house nestled among the boulders in Commuter Hell. Houses in foreclosure out there go for upwards of four hundred grand.

It actually was a moving sale, and not a heckuva lot was left by the time the estate-sale organizer was hired—the real estate transaction closed yesterday, and the owner had moved almost everything out. But we found a few tschochkies.

The owner was given to buying crafty and ethnic items at galleries and upscale craft fairs. The sale offered a number of stoneware and art glass items that were kind of interesting. I snared three stoneware canisters, thinking they’d be nice on the kitchen counter, which right now is inhabited by an eclectic collection of various holders. I paid $15 for the three of them:

Stoneware-canisters

Once I got them home, I found the pea-green effect didn’t work at-tall in the kitchen. Casting about for someplace to put them, I realized the color would look just fine in the living room, whose walls are painted an Alexander Julian shade I think of as “swamp green.” I already had the pair of stacked square plates with the stone “fruits” on it. The canisters look like they were made to go with that arrangement. That little blue oval box also came from the moving sale.

It’s a little busier than I like. To pull this off, I got rid of the decorative gadget that has been sitting there for the past four years or so, a glass vase with a spray of twigs sticking out of it:

Glass-vase-and-twigs

The glass vase actually  looked better than the stoneware things. However, I’ve been getting mighty tired of it, and besides, those damn twigs threaten to poke me in the eye every time I sit down on the sofa. I’ve wanted to get rid of it for awhile. The stoneware things may not last there, but I don’t think the glass and twigs will be coming back.

Where Do All the Shoppers Come From?

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Must be payday, that’s the only explanation.

Out of food and out of about everything else, too, I made a long circuit of the globe by way of refilling the freezer, the fridge, and the pantry.

Started around 10:00 ayem at the Sprouts just down the street. Determined to avoid a run on Safeway, I managed to pick up most of the non-Costco food items: cabbage and celery and ground lamb, and to find the shea butter I went there to track down.

The place was overrun with bluehairs. From the minute I walked in to the minute I walked out, flying phalanxes of elderly women made it their business to park themselves and their shopping carts everywhere I went. If I was already where I needed to be, they’d come up and push me out of their way! Have you ever been in a store where you just could. not. get. AWAY. from some annoying customer? One old gal and her hubby fit that bill today. When I walked in the door, she was parked in the bakery section, smack in the middle of the lane that would allow one to get around said department. She was just standing there: not looking at the merchandise, not doing anything…just standing there. So I find another route around, and the next time I look up, there she is again, with her husband’s cart blocking my way! The two of them homed in on me like heat-seeking missiles! Everywhere I went, there they were…parked smack-dab in the middle of the aisle!

Oh well. Thence, on down the road…

Surfaced at Costco shortly after the store opened. Consumed half the month’s gasoline budget at the tanks and then moved on to the store itself.

What a zoo! It was just jammed. This, in the middle of Friday morning. It must be payday. Or Unemployment Insurance benefit day. Where do all these people come from??? When I hit the parking lot, the coast looked clear—I even got a crip space, a miraculous development, since those are almost always occupied. But during the time I circumnavigated the store, the place filled up.

Which reminds me of another funny Sprouts story: As I’m loading groceries into my car, one of my fellow crips comes along and parks his car smack in the middle of the lane, holding up a line of traffic, and waits for me to move so he can grab my crip space. It’s a 100-degree day, and I know the Costco junket will take a good hour, so I’ve brought along a small cold chest and a bunch of those frozen blue cold brick things to keep the Sprouts produce cool. This requires me to take some time to unpack the bags the check-out lady has tossed together, sort the perishables, and fit them into the cool container. Then I have to pack the rest of the stuff into the plastic bins that keep stuff from flying around the back of my van.

The guy stands there and stands there and stands there. His fellow shoppers stacked up behind him stand there and stand there and stand there. I finally climb into the driver’s seat, change into my distance sunglasses so I can drive without killing or crippling some other motorist, and pull out. He races into the vacant spot. The wacky thing about this is that not twenty feet away was another parking spot that was closer to the door! It wasn’t a crip space, though, so I suppose it didn’t meet his exacting requirements.

LOL! Ain’t human nature grand?

By the time I was ready to leave the Costco, check-out lines were halfway back to the far side of the store. Naturally, I picked the line where the guy who was stocking his sports bar with every spirit in the damn store had parked himself in front. Not only did he have to buy every bottle of booze in the house, he had to send his wife back into the store to pick up something else.

While he gassed on and on and on, I moved to another line, where things didn’t move one whit faster. At least the lady who looked like she was buying only one thing but really was waiting for her companion to show up with a truckload of purchases let me go in front of her. Not that it did much good.

Packed as much frozen and perishable stuff into a cold case as I could. Decided against the run on Target, which is always crowded and often nuts. Moved on to Trader Joe’s.

I swear, I have never seen so many people jammed into one building in my life. Here, it was impossible to get a place to park within walking distance. I gave up and parked in the semi-shade of some trees on the far border of the parking lot. Hiked a quarter-mile to the door. The younger set of greenies shops here, while their parents and grandparents hang out at Sprouts. They have their forebears’ manners: if you’re standing in front of a display trying to find, say, the capers, they weasel in front of you to search for what they want, so you can’t see what’s on the shelves. Two women with children encountered each other and parked their kid-ridden carts side by side, coming and going, in the middle of an aisle, yakking companionably while they blocked the way for all comers. When one lady tried to s-q-u-e-e-e-e-e-e-z-e around them, they just ignored her.

Lines were interminable there, too, but miraculously they opened a new line and I got picked to be first! w00t!

Stopped at a Walgreen’s to pick up couple of the Target things I missed by opting that leg of the junket: rubbing alcohol, doggie tennis balls.

Argha! I spent $214 at Costco and about another $75 at the other stores, consuming almost half this month’s budget in one day. But the freezer and fridge are now stuffed and the car is reloaded with gas. With any luck I won’t have to go out again for another two weeks.

Hope not. I hate shopping!

Hmh. Am I alone in that sentiment?

Two hectic—and expensive!—days

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Good grief, these past two days have been hectic! And expensive: I’ve mortgaged my patrimony to renew my wardrobe.

The state sent me a notice saying I had to get a new photo for my driver’s license. Some time back, the State of Arizona decided testing and retesting people for driver’s licenses was just too much government intrusion, and so they instituted long, long renewal periods. Now instead of making your renew your license every few years, they make you get a new photo once every twelve years. No driver’s test: just a photo. When you reach the age of 65, you have to take a vision test and renew your license, after which you have to renew every five years.

The state has laid off workers in every department, including DMV (Department of Motor Vehicles). Some of my students reported waits as long as four hours.

So I carried the 439 pages of proofs I’ve been editing with me to the closest DMV office, 11.3 miles from my house, and prepared to settle in for the long haul.

The wait and the process of jumping through hoops wasn’t as time-consuming as expected. After sitting for a few minutes—not long enough to get a running start on editing copy—I was called to a desk where I was made to fart around with a form. Fortunately, they didn’t give me any argument: we’re told that if they can’t find your photo in their system, you’ll have to prove you’re a U.S. citizen, and so I had to dig out my birth certificate and carry it with me. Then it was off to sit in line to get a new photo—here, too, I barely got started reading copy before they hauled me up to the camera. Sit and wait again while they processed the new piece of plastic.

Took a good look at it and saw the expiration date was still May 7, 2010. Back to the front desk: “How do I get this thing renewed?” They had failed to do the eye test when I showed up, and so I had to start over and jump through all those hoops again!!!

It took two hours to go through the whole damn process twice.

I had already decided that since I was going to be on the west side, I would go up to the strip mall near Arrowhead (home of the highest per-capita proportion of millionaires in the Phoenix urban area) that houses a Talbot’s, a Chico’s, and a B’Gauze, two of which normally have clothes that fit me. My clothes are all falling apart, because I haven’t bought anything other than an occasional pair of Costco jeans since last March, and at that time it was only a couple of shirts and a pair of socks. Otherwise, the last time I bought decent clothes was in 2007.

At Talbot’s and Chico’s, every stitch I put on made me look like a potato sack tied in the middle. Talbot’s was particularly discouraging, because their clothes used to fit me. I’ve put on weight, no question of it: about five pounds since 2007. And I’m getting saggy because I spend way too much time parked in front of the computer. But it doesn’t seem like a five-pound gain should cause every skirt, every blouse, and every pair of pants to look dumpy on me. After all, I haven’t gone up a size in jeans.

Chico’s clothes have never fit me, so I wasn’t surprised. I found one shirt, for which they charged me $64. Talbot’s used to carry great clothing—understated, classic, and perfectly fitting—but when the company changed its look, the wonderful fit went away. So, IMHO, did the good looks of the outfits Talbot’s used to sell. Which, I suppose, explains why I haven’t bought anything there in a while. I did pick up a knit shirt on sale: $24. When I wore it today, the dye rubbed off on my white pants.

B’Gauze carries light cotton gauze outfits that are great in the summer. But because they’re shapeless and loose, they look like what they are: fat lady clothes. That notwithstanding, I bought a decent blue skirt, very flowing and airy, plus two white shirts, one that looked great with the skirt and one in the same artist’s-smock style as a turquoise shirt I already own and love, which is wearing out. The bill: $194.

These two expeditions consumed half the day.

Then it was back to the house to read copy until 5:30, when I had to race up to the college to attend a workshop in the new BlackBoard version 9. As we’ve observed, BlackBoard is one of life’s prime time-wasters, and the new version is changed enough to require one to diddle away a great deal of time figuring out how to operate it. So that sucked up the whole evening.

By the time I got home, Cassie had hunger-barfed all over the living room floor, a fine ending to a tedious day. Well, not quite: I worked into the night to finish reading proofs—the copy was a tangled mess that apparently was never edited, the content tedious drivel that left one wondering who at the press has the author as his sister-in-law. Because I had to return the copy to the client today, I plowed through to the end of that, finishing around 1:00 a.m.

This morning it was off to the Friday classes, which mercifully end at 11:30 because the 101 section meets only on Mondays and Wednesdays. From the college, I had to drive into Tempe to meet Tina and pick up a batch of completed work. From there, it was up to mid-town Scottsdale to return her project and mine to the client.

On the way home, I had to pass Scottsdale Fashion Square. M’hijito has been wanting a sideboard, so I thought I’d drop by Crate and Barrel to see if they had anything. Or, more to the point, if anything was on sale.

No, and no on those two counts.

However, Dillard’s was having a bra-fitting event. The wait was half an hour, so I tracked down a much-needed bra and underpants on my own.

In my old age, I’ve come to find underwire brassieres singularly uncomfortable. The decrepit wireless numbers I have are worn out and leave me sagging and bouncing. Cheap bras are even more uncomfortable than good bras—the ones I bought in a package of three from Costco ride up, gouge, itch, and hurt. I tried on three bras in the $25 range and ended up buying a $60 Wacoal, another of the few clothing brands that now fit me. By the time the bargain panties were added in, the bill came to $93.

I wasn’t happy at having to pay sixty bucks for one bra, when I really need two or three bras. Oh well.

I found a pretty belt in Dillard’s notions department, another item that I’ve been needing: $17.

Then I decided to visit J. Jill, which sometimes carries linen clothes that sort of fit me. After Thursday’s miserable experiences at Talbot’s and Chico’s, I was pretty discouraged with trying on clothes. Nevertheless, I wrestled myself into a few things—the arm is still quite sore, and pulling things on and off can elicit quite the jab of pain. I found…

• An ankle-length knit dress with pleated front and near-empire waist that does a nice job of hiding the flab, lumps, and bumps. Matter of fact, it looks very nice.

• A plain black knee-length knit dress that also reveals no cellulite and hides the fat very nicely. Comfortable and socially acceptable. Perfect for church and general out and about.

• A black linen maxi-skirt that despite being a size 10 fits well around the flabby waist as well as around the capacious rear end. Astonishing!

• A white knee-length linen dress that feels like it has its own air-conditioning built in. Good for summer; also disguises the fat effectively.

• A pair of linen cropped pants that fit adequately and are not jeans, a style of which I am becoming royally sick.

• A white knot-button linen shirt with the same air-conditioning qualities, very nice with the black skirt and with the linen pants.

• A tie-died knit cotton maxi dress that also does a pretty good job of disguising the fat and the sags.

• A linen jean jacket which looks cute with the tie-died dress, works OK with the capris, and will look great with the endless collection of Costco jeans. And in the sort of shabby-chic style currently in vogue, it sort of works with the pleated maxi dress and the black skirt.

I needed these things very much, except for the jean jacket. I’ve been wearing the same two pairs of old washable wool slacks to church, week after week after week, and the Costco jeans have become so ubiquitous I wear them to teach in and sometimes sneak them into church. I had one rather gaudy casual skirt—a survivor of some long-ago trip to B’Gauze—and two ancient Eileen Fisher outfits, one of which has been resewn and has to be pinned together to accommodate the crumbling elastic in the waistband.

The bill for all this stuff? $730.

The J. Jill ladies gave me a coupon discount plus $73 off for opening a J. Jill charge account.

I really didn’t want to open an account there. However, these maneuvers cut the bill to $613; taxes raised the bottom line to a breathtaking $662.

Holy mackerel. I’ve never spent that much on clothes in my life. On the other hand, it is objectively true that just about everything in my closet is shot except for the dozen pairs of Costco jeans, one of which was now smeared with red dye from the Talbot’s pullover.

Well, I figured, I can afford it. There’s $3,300 in the savings account set aside for just such purchases as these, plus FaM cranked $450 on the late, great traffic spike: AdSense owes me more than enough to cover the bill.

Yesh. That’s what I thought.

Then I pulled in the driveway and got the mail.

The air-conditioning company sent a bill for the work they did at the downtown house: five hundred and eighty-seven bucks!!!!

Damnation!

Well, M’hijito says he will pay for it. The rent he gets from his roommate will cover it. But we were both furious: normally the office will call when a bill of that size is proposed. I did not like being blindsided with a $600 bill for what I expected would be, at most, a $200 job.

So I think I’ll return the Chico’s shirt, which on reflection is kind of garish. And $65 is way, way, way too much for a knit pullover. The belt that looked like it fit at Dillard’s is actually too large, so I’ll take that back on Monday when I’m relatively close to the Paradise Valley store. And I’m annoyed enough about the Talbot’s shirt rubbing red dye all over my white jeans that I may demand my money back for that, even though I wore it all day Friday. One thing is for sure on that count: I never will buy anything from Talbot’s again.

Returning the overpriced shirt and the belt alone will knock about $100 off the total two-day damage. I don’t know whether I’ve got enough chutzpah to take the dye-leaking shirt back to Talbot’s. On the other hand, since I’m never going to shop there again, why not? Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

My plan, at least before the AC bill showed up and shocked me back to reality, was to use this mound of clothes to build the basis of a new wardrobe. Throw out all the worn-out, tattered old junk, and the cotton jeans that have shrunk so much I have to lie down to zip them up, and get rid of everything that I’m not wearing.

Then, once the diddle-it-away savings recover, I’ll plan to spend about $60 to $100 about once every three months to build on this new foundation. Over the course of a year or two, I should end up with enough decent clothes in the closet that, even as things wear out, I won’t be stumbling around looking like a bag lady or a latter-day hippie. That’s affordable. And maybe I can even buy another bra sometime in the next year or so.

Buying Futures at the Supermarket: Groceries as investment

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Guest post by Pinchnickel

PHOENIX, Ariz. – Save big bucks by playing the commodities future market at your grocery store every week. Buy in season, freeze, preserve, and consume later when prices double. Save even more when you factor in clipped discount coupons.

Let’s go shopping. Today’s futures bargain is bananas. Late spring is harvest season in tropical Central America, home of those shoot-em-up banana republics. “America’s favorite fruit” has become a “price-fixed” commodity, meaning all local grocers charge the same price [currently in the Southwest about 69 cents a pound]. But grocers in your area may break from the price-fixing mold and list bananas as a seasonal loss leader. For example, a Phoenix grocery chain currently offers four pounds for 99 cents, or 25 cents a pound.

Bananas spoil quickly, but I’ll preserve the nutrients of that banana bargain by converting them into low-sugar banana bread and muffins stored in my chest freezer for future consumption.

Strawberries currently are arriving here by the truckload from California, as they do every year, and are now available for $4 a 4-pound container, or a buck a pound. To bank strawberries seal in a zip-bag and freeze for up to a year. I mix them with rhubarb for pies, but they can also be turned into toppings for shortcake or ice cream.

Spring is also the time when veggies grown in warmer zones like Mexico arrive at your grocers. They include asparagus, broccoli, spinach, carrots, cilantro. Preserve by blanching in boiling water and freezing for future use. Turn the cilantro into pesto—delicious spread on toast.

At other times of the year lower-priced pork, beef and even fish will arrive in your local grocery at seasonal prices. Fruits such as apples, peaches and pears arrive in late summer. Learn how to preserve them in syrup or as jams and jellies. Canning supply companies Ball and Kerr both offer recipe books by mail.

The very best “loss leader” season across this land, of course, occurs in early to late autumn, when the great American harvest begins everywhere. Leading the list of good buys then: white flour, beet sugar, potatoes, berries, apples, corn. Because I produce all my own baked goods, autumn is when I put in 100 pounds of flour and 30 pounds of sugar for use throughout the year, when a glut of flour and sugar hit the market for only 99 cents a pound. The same flour and sugar costs $2-plus later in the year—a 50 percent return on my commodities future buy.

If you’re a joyfully consuming foodie or simply a Pinchnickel like me, acquaint yourself with the harvests and when imported products arrive at your grocer, and buy ahead of need. Keep your freezer full of these wonderful bargains. Save big, and enjoy those buck-a-pound strawberries over shortcake next January when your friends are paying $3 a pound for them.

Images:

Bananas: Steve Hopson, Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Generic license, Wikipedia
Strawberries, Ken Hammond, U.S. Agricultural Research Service, public domain
Asparagus: RyanFreisling, public domain
Flour, R.Wampers, Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Belgium license, Wikimedia Commons

Purchases!

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Thanks to FrugalScholar‘s mention in a comment, several moons ago, of the online store Footprints, I found a source of shoes from the original maker of Dansko shoes, which back in the day were the original, authentic pain-frees.

Dansko used to make the classic nurse’s clog—truly an ugly clunker and laughingstock of the modish set, until styles changed and suddenly young women would bounce up to us gimpy old dinosaurs and ask where we got the great shoes. My feet won’t tolerate normal women’s shoes, and, not being much of a believer in the adage that beauty knows no pain (far as I’m concerned, if you have to hurt to be pretty, I’ll keep on being homely, thank you), I’ve worn Birkenstocks, Mephistos, Naots, and Danskos for years.

Mephistos are now priced well beyond the reach of sanity, so they’re out. About three years ago I induced a roaring case of Achilles tendinitis by traipsing around in a pair of Earth Shoes, whose negative heels are bad for your feet and legs, the manufacturer’s health-storesy ad campaigns to the contrary. Since then, I haven’t been able to wear Birkies or Birkenstock knock-offs, which pretty much lets out most styles in Mephisto and Naot. Dansko changed hands a few years ago, and in the new regime sizing changed so the shoes no longer fit well, and quality dropped so noticeably that some people think the manufacturing was outsourced to China.

Sooo…. That doesn’t leave an awful lot of choice. Like, none?

Thus it’s been a while since I’ve bought any shoes, and, needless to say, most of my clodhoppers are wearing out. I really, really need new shoes, and since the tendinitis recently flared up again, I need a decent-looking pair of pain-frees with a strap or open back that will not put pressure on the back of my ankle, which just now hurts quite a lot.

Fortunately, Sanita, the original makers of Dansko, has quietly continued to manufacture the same kind of shoes. These still fit, still are made to last a lifetime, and still look…well, good enough for nurses and dinosaurs. Some of the styles, actually, are pretty cute. These “Freya” sandals, for example, are not too hideous. They look quite very much like a pair of original Danskos I wore until they dissolved into shreds, come to think of it.

Also much needed were a pair of strappy sandals for this summer, preferably in brown. And lo, what should come up on the Footprints site but a model named “Havana.” I think these should be OK. They’re better than utterly ghastly, anyway.

The first time I visited the site, at FrugalScholar’s behest, I came across and coveted a great pair of CFMs that look like they’d go spectacularly with jeans, my favorite costume. “Christie” is not exactly a CFM because it does have an ankle strap, but…what can I say? Believe it or not, the raised heel is specifically what the doctor ordered for the inflamed tendons. More or less. How my august orthopedist at the Mayo would regard the wooden soles does not remain to be seen, because we are not gonna tell him about that, no way no how.

All of these goodies were either close-outs or seconds, marked way, way down. So, the bill for three pairs of shoes that have a good shot of not hurting my feet came to just $149.85—that’s only about fifty bucks a pair, a lot less than I’ve resigned myself to having to pay for pain-frees. Matter of fact, I’ve dropped $150 on a single pair of decent shoes that didn’t hurt. Many times. Shipping was only $12, less than the sales tax would have been had I managed to find any such things here in Arizona.

So I felt pretty good about that.

From Footprints.com it was on to Amazon.com, there to pick up a $10 bottle of AlphaHydrox, the AHA goop that’s no longer sold in local stores, far as I can tell. This is the stuff I used until three or four years ago, to good effect. About the time it disappeared from retail shelves was, coincidentally, about the time I fell into a deep enough blue funk to abandon taking care of my skin and quit wearing make-up. Being unable to find the stuff now that I’ve perked up, I bought the RoC wrinkle cream whose retinoids led to the late, great complexion fiasco.

The “enhanced lotion” contains a 10 percent dose of alpha hydroxyl acid (AHA), about as strong as you can get this side of the pharmacist’s prescription pick-up booth. The so-called “soufflé” is supposedly 12 percent AHA, but after the RoC adventure I decided that discretion was the better part.

AlphaHydrox also manufactures something it bills as a “targeted skin lightener,” much ballyhooed by Amazon reviewers for effectively fading age spots. This product contains hydroquinone, a chemical that interferes with melanin production; enough concern has arisen about its safety that it is banned in France, and the FDA at one point considered banning its over-the-counter sale in the U.S. It can irritate your skin, and so you probably wouldn’t want to use a product that combines AHAs with hydroquinone, as this one does.

At any rate, though the 10 percent AHA lotion itself cost only $9.99, in one respect I didn’t do as well as with the shoes: shipping was $2.75, a whopping 27 percent of the sale price! If I could find it in town, I wouldn’t think of ordering it online at that rate. But I can’t, so I did. If it works as well as it used to without causing another skin-scorching episode, I’ll probably find something at Amazon to trigger the free shipping and then order a boatload of the stuff.

And so it goes. Otherwise I have accomplished exactly nothing today. All the comparison shopping for the shoes occupied about as much time as a real-life drive-through-the-traffic, trudge-through-the-mall, wait-in-line-to-pay shopping trip would have consumed! Oh well. At least it didn’t use up any gas.

😉

Costco rocks!

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At the risk of making this blog sound like the official house organ of the Costco Fan Club, I have to say that the joint certainly came through today. I could not believe it! They took back almost $200 worth of junk, some of it stuff I would normally not dare to ask a retailer to accept.

Okay, it wasn’t surprising that they refunded all my money for the Flip video camera that didn’t work. Their return policy on electronics has always been pretty amazing. Even though they shortened the period in which they would accept returns on such gadgetry, they still will take back just about anything. So, voilà, $130 back on the card.

Now, here’s where it gets amazing…

After the CSR kindly returned my money for the camera, I presented a bag full of raw, sliced-up leg of lamb.

Yes.

My excuse: after I cut it up and put the stuff I intended to eat later in the freezer, I fried one piece of it and realized it had turned. (Rancid is the word we’re groping for.) Yea, verily, you could smell the off odor even though the stuff was frozen solid.

More money back on the card. That was only slightly surprising.

It gets better…

Then I trotted out the RoC facial blowtorch and explained what had happened when I applied it, following the instructions.

She said, “Oh, yeah…I can see that redness on your face.”

“It’s better today than it was yesterday,” I remarked.

Incredibly, she returned my money in full even though I presented her with three unwrapped tubes of face cream, two of which had been opened and partly used!

I couldn’t believe it. Really, I thought they might refund my money for the rotten lamb, but I expected to be told to take a flying f*** at the moon when I asked for money back for the used cosmetics.

Is that or is that not astonishing?

A$k and ye shall re¢eive!