My Ridiculous CVS Haul, Baby It’s Cold Outside, and The Perfect Cup of Coffee
I’m such a slacker…
Quick-hitters:
- Argh! Watching the Pats-Ravens game was so aggravating! I was SO hoping for the Pats to choke!
Full commentary on that game tomorrow, along with yet another reason why I hate Fantasy Football.
- I could not believe that my Bruins lost to Texas on Sunday! What an awful first half! I hope UCLA coach Ben Howland does something to fix the slow starts that the Bruins have had in recent games.
- Current rebate-o-meter: $2,600. That includes the $400 or so in rebate checks I got over the last two weeks, and I have yet to file over $300 worth of rebates.
Anyone wanna bet on whether or not I’ll hit $3,000 again by the end of the month?
Speaking of rebates…seriously, Symantec, why even offer upgrade rebates if you’re going to reject every single one I try to claim? I filed four more upgrade rebates in the past month, and all four were rejected for various reasons.
- I’m not sure if my loyal readers knew this, but I love CVS. ECBs + rebates FTW!
(Rite Aid Single Check Rebates don’t suck either.)
I got eight bottles of Febreze, a bottle of Tums, some soda and Doritos, four bottles of mouthwash, a Gilette Fusion razor blade, and a stick of Degree “Clinical Strength” deodorant. Net cost: about ten bucks, and it would have been three bucks less if the cashier had followed my simple instructions of scanning my ECBs in the order I stacked them.
(Yeah, I know I’m whining about three bucks here, but WTH? I handed him three ECBs–a $10, a $5, and a $2–stacked on top of one another. What gave him the idea to scan the $10 first (on the top), then the $2 one (on the bottom???
Note to self: hand the cashiers coupons and ECBs one at a time from now on.)
So why so much crap? The Febreze worked out to about a buck a bottle. The Tums made me a buck after rebate (minus tax and the stamp, of course). Each bottle of mouthwash netted me $1.50. The razor and the deodorant were free after Rite Aid SCR. I rest my case.
- I hate this time of year, weather-wise. It’s kinda warm in the daytime–there’s enough sun to make it not cold–but it gets ridiculously cold and windy at night. I almost long for the ~120 degree summer days again.
(I know, I know; I shouldn’t be complaining about night time temps in the low 40s.)
Rain is in the forecast in the next few days…fantastic! And I’m considering a trip up to NorCal at the end of the month? I must be insane!
(Tangent: Until last night, I have never heard “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” sung by Rod Stewart and Dolly Parton. My ears are still bleeding from hearing the song last night.
If I hear the song again, I might just pass out. I’d rather listen to a record of chalkboard/fingernail scratching on infinite loop than hear that song one more time.)
Somebody get me an electric blanket.
- If you are the only coffee drinker in your house, and you do not brew coffee with a coffee press of some sort, you must be insane or only drink coffee five minutes before you leave the house. No thanks to my sister, who was kind enough to give me a canister of Folgers Simply Smooth coffee, I am now hooked on coffee.
(Tangent: I don’t want to be chewed out for suggesting that one can make a “perfect cup of coffee” using Folgers. Go away.
And by the way, yeah, you’re right.)
I have one of these Vietnamese coffee presses, and all I know is that this Folgers coffee tastes like crap when brewed in my sister’s Gevalia coffee-maker, and it’s quite tasty when brewed with my press. Water quality doesn’t explain the difference; my sister uses water filtered through her refrigerator–quite tasty water, by the way–while I use Brita pitcher water, which is drinkable only if I pass the water through the filter 2-3 times.
Drool…typing this up just tempted me to brew another cup of coffee. Yes, I’m an addict.
Later.
I don’t see how scanning them out of order would make any difference if these were $ off and not % off…
The order matters when your ECBs (which work like Staples coupons; that is to say, they are deducted from your pre-tax total) drive your total to near zero or a negative balance.
(I should have mentioned that I made three separate purchases at CVS, not one big purchase.)
The one purchase in question cost me $4; had he scanned the $5 ECB instead of the $2 ECB, my total would have been less than a buck.
And yes, I do realize that I’m quibbling about three measly bucks here.
so i’m a little confused. what do you do with this plethora of products? are you donating some of them to the salvation army or the food bank or something???
I’ll give stuff away that I know I won’t use (or won’t be able to use before they expire, like toothpaste and deodorant). Stuff like dish washing detergent, on the other hand…eventually I’ll go through the twenty bottles I have!
[…] I’ve gotten back to the habit of a cup of coffee or two daily. Normally, when I brew coffee with my Vietnamese coffee press, I don’t bother […]