I still had lots of food in the house, but DH told me to go ahead and stock up since he'll probably be on the road for 5-6 weeks this time and the immediate future of our para-transit sytem is iffy at best right now due to budget cuts. (We won't know its fate until March 19. On the 22nd, we'll either have it or it's immediately gone.) So, hey, I'm no dummy. I stocked up. Trader Joes - greek yogurt eggs Cheddar cheese bacon almonds frozen haibut frozen green beans frozen mixed veggies frozen mixed peppers frozen naan butter canned diced tomatos quinoa mustard Regular Grocery Store bread Tortillas raisins black beans lentils canned tuna (my lucky day - albacore at .79 a can!) 5# chicken breasts (on sale at .99 a pound!) 2# pork bag of baking potaotes 2 cucumbers 3 onions 2 gree peppers # asparagas quart strawberries 1/2 gal milk canned mixed fruit # bananas # mushrooms garlic limes flour olive oil freezer bags pinto beans # coffee 2 boxes tea bags On the clearance shelf, we found organic pommegranate juice, V8, cherry juice and peanuts for $1.00 eash. The store isn't going to carry them anymore. So we got two each of those. And I had coupons for two free bottles of laundry soap that expire at the end of the month, so I got those now. Total - too much. OTOH, I'm set for another 4-5 weeks except highly perishable items like lettuce or milk. (Althogh I have some canned milk if I really need it.) That doesn't include the things we get for DH to take on the road as I consider his road supplies separate from my grocery budget.

I'm one who would rather do anything than go shopping, grocery or otherwise. It occurred to me that if I used my head I could eliminate the backtracking that nearly doubled my time in the grocery store. Since I typically shop at the same store, I mapped each aisle and used the aisle numbers to organize the list of items I buy most often. I laid this out in Excel, allowing a few blank lines here and there. This list fits 2/page on letterhead size paper. The last section is dry cleaning/fish market/pharmacy/library/hardware so I can plan my route, save gas and reduce the number of side trips. I print 2-3 sheets at a time and post one on my refrigerator. Whenever I am low on something it goes on the list and it's rare I run out of anything. We staple coupons to the list and when it's time to go shopping, half the work is already done. Even DH, who is ultra disorganized, has gotten with the program. If he knows his errands will be near a grocery store, he will take the list or call home and I can rattle it off in seconds. Any store layout changes (a pet peeve) are easily updated in the Excel file. The 15 minutes this took years ago has repaid me many times over.

One of the reasons that Whole Dog Journal will not put a dog food on their "approved" list without the manufacturer freely giving out the name of the manufacturing plant when asked by a legitimate inquiry is that such full disclosure helps guard against the kind of accident that occurred in 2007. Many of the small dog food companies have their foods made at plants that manufacture for many different companies. Knowing that the precise ingredients that the individual manufacturer specified for their food were used in the manufacture of it is part of the trust that small companies must have in these "batch" manufacturing plants. At least one pet food plant used ingredients not specified by the pet food manufacturers whose food they were making, according to Wikipedia's article on Protein Adulteration in China Having the name of the plant that manufactures your food easy to look up in case of a food contamination event allows consumers to decide whether to buy other foods made at that plant. Given all of that work that WDJ does to get this info for us, it is pretty obvious that the plants that are making these foods are right here in the US and Canada. The protein supplement that was imported from China was criminally poisoned with the addition of melamine plastic in 2006 and 2007 and there is evidence that there was a similar outbreak in 2005 (see the Wikipedia link below). Chinese companies who participated in this in 2006 and 2007 that poisoned our pets were not immediately sanctioned, and the milk industry went on to commit horrific poisoning of baby formula and milk products in China that was not discovered until May 2008 and not made public until August or September. Milk products from China shipped all over the world were found to have melamine in them even into 2009. From Wikipedia: "Two people were executed, one given a suspended death penalty, three people receiving life imprisonment, two receiving 15-year jail terms,[6] and seven local government officials, as well as the Director of the Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (AQSIQ), being fired or forced to resign. Yes, all that had to do with the poisoning of babies and others who drank the milk in China. It only came to light because a New Zealand affiliate of the Chinese milk company kept insisting that something was wrong and had to be investigated. Melamine can be manufactured from urea (a concentrated part of urine), coal, and other sources. Urea and other nitrogen sources are added to the feed of ruminants (multi-stomach animals, animals who chew a cud) to increase the nitrogen level because they can get protein's nutrition from these non-food sources due to their unique digestive processes. THAT is how melamine started being put into food - the waste from making it was used in cattle feed. when it was made from urea. A crude way to measure how much protein is in a food is to measure the nitrogen level. Melamine, urea, and some other non-foods increase the nitrogen level without adding to the nutritional level (except for ruminant feed). So now, they have to use more sophisticated testing methods to test foods for animals and people. Because people cannot be trusted, in capitalist or socialist countries, not to poison each other for profit or to make their expected output! This all goes back to my sneaking feeling that this planet can only healthily sustain a very tiny fraction of the people we have living here. If we can't eat whole foods, or feed whole foods to our meat livestock and pets, then we are going to have this kind of thing happen. I have been discussing the need to change our diets to "no processed foods" with my fellow chronically ill friends online. Most of us had no children. It is turning out that this is a good thing.

And another thing: elevation placement. The stuff they wish to move is placed at eye level (for the lady shopper). Its a little low for the average male. Knick-nacks and items that appeal to kids are on the lower shelves where they can grab and whine. This can backfire, so the more expsnive choclates are on higher shelves out of reach of toddlers. At my local store, they use automatied sprinklers to keep the veggies moist. A few seconds before the sprinklers turn on, a recording of thunder is played with the sound of falling rain to warn shoppers to stand back - the spray is about to begin. Over on the other side of the store are dairy cases. Motion sensors detect when you are nearby and a recording of mooing diary cows begin - that can be anoying. The store is laid out so that people arriving through the main entrance passes by the office. Usually, the owner or a trusted staff member is seated to see you pass by the open office door. They'll say "hello" to each customer as he/she enters the main shopping floor. Music is played over the intercom. Golden Oldies are often selected. In the late afternoon and evening hours whem shoppers are tired, the music selection changes to more lively tunes such as "76 trombones" and marches. This helps to put a bit of spring in tired clinetel's steps and keeps the masses moving.