Aimlessly Driving Around

Or: What We Did This Weekend.

Saturday was spent with some cleaning and a trip to Fresh and Easy to get some chicken and whatever else looked good. When Fresh and Easy first opened I really wasn't all that impressed. We bought some of the store brand frozen entrees and they were so unappetizing looking after they came out of the oven and the ones that we were brave enough to even taste were even more unappetizing. So, I kind of wrote them off as someplace I wouldn't make the effort to drive to. We have one just around the corner but the building has been empty and unopened for something like two years now, don't know if they'll ever get it together enough to open.

Anyway, after giving them another chance and finding that the prices were fairly reasonable, and trying their store brand coffee which is REALLY GOOD AND CHEAP! I decided to shop there once a month or so. Especially when they put a $5.00 off coupon in their flyer. I don't buy their frozen entrees, though. Lesson learned there.

Keith dicked around in the garage ALL DAY LONG sorting through stuff and pulling things out that he wants to yard sale next weekend.

Then Sunday morning was a trip to Winco to get all the stuff that Fresh and Easy either doesn't sell or charges too much, and then on the way back from there a stop at Foods Co for my low carb 'yogurt'.

We had been wanting to go to the local nurseries to look at plants for potting, so after grocery shopping, Keith looked online for nurseries around here and we took off down the road in search of one of them. That we never did find and might be out of business. We drove around for a while and then stopped at a newly opened nursery that was of course closed on Sundays. Then we drive and drive some more, me complaining because I told him that I didn't really want to drive around all day and I had to go to the bathroom and needed more coffee, so we stopped at McDonalds for potty break and a cup of coffee, and let me tell you, McDonalds really does make some good coffee.

We end up driving all the way to the other side of the city and finally turn around to start back home and see the Home Depot so Keith decides to stop there. The Home Depot that is way on the other side of the city, not the Home Depot that is directly behind our house and if we'd just gone there first we could have saved a lot of gas and time. And we end up buying a few plants and some pots and some dirt to put in the pots, which really bugs me that you are actually PAYING MONEY for dirt. Plants and pots and dirt that we could have gotten at the Home Depot directly behind us and saved a lot of gas and time.

But, anyway.

My idea has always been for Keith to make some sort of bench out of some of the huge piles of wood that he has in the garage (and yard) that we could put under the windows in the bedroom and living room and put some potted flowers and plants on so that when we look out of the windows we are looking at something pretty. So, three of the plants are for the bench that he WILL BUILD! for outside the bedroom window. I'm hoping that he will build the bench within the next few weeks, but I've learned not to hold my breath about things like that. He is easily distracted and projects often get started and then something shiny catches his eye and off he goes. SQUIRREL!

So, anyway, fairly busy weekend for us. He planted the plants for me, I would have just tossed the dirt in the pots and stuck the plants in there, but he has to put some rocks in the pot first for drainage and mix the dirt up special with some topsoil and stuff like that. So, I let him do the planting around here.

Fresh and Easy and Broke Down Car Blues

First, the car. It's really really broken and needs major major work. We are waiting for a complete estimate and then will decide if the work will get done or not. My car is one of those cheap throwaway cars that when it starts falling apart means that it will keep falling apart until all that is left is a trail of auto parts strewn across the road. Do we pay $2000.00 to fix a car that isn't even worth $2000.00 or take that money and put it on a new car? If we fix the old car, do we have any confidence at all that something else won't break down next week? It was probably good that the weather kept us from traveling on Christmas Eve because the car would definitely have broken down somewhere on the trip over the mountain and then we would have been spending our Christmas on the side of the road. We had to go put $470.00 in tires on the truck yesterday so that Keith would have something to drive to work today. Regardless of what we decide, this will be the last year that we drive old beat up cars, a new car is in the future. (unless the economy finishes totally melting down and nobody has a job, of course)

Second, we were excited to see a new chain of grocery stores being built here in town. They are called Fresh and Easy neighborhood markets and originate in the UK. The concept is great, a smaller market for those times when you just need a few things or just want the basics with no frills and no aisles full of fishing and camping gear and garden furniture in your grocery store. Just your plain old groceries in a small store where you don't need a map to find the milk. And, they were handing out $5.00 off your purchase (of 25.00 or more) coupons. The UK version of Trader Joe's. Sounds good, right?

Wrong. The stores are really really no frills with a very small selection in a warehousey type setting. I hate grocery shopping period but really hate warehouse type grocery stores the most. We did buy a few of their house brand (fresh&easy) products to try out. Lunch sized fresh pizzas for $1.50? Sounds good! Not! They were good if you like your pizza with absolutely no flavor whatsoever. Frozen dinners? The prices were good, under $5.00 for a complete frozen dinner, so we got a few to try out. The first one was shepherds pie, which was almost tasteless but we ate it anyway because we were hungry. The second one we tried was tamale bake. The picture on the box looks appetizing enough, right?



Wrong again. I'm sorry, but this dish just totally reminded me of VOMIT! Yes, vomit! I couldn't eat it, it just looked too too nasty. Keith tried it and said it not only looked like vomit, but kind of tasted like it, too.



And, like so many frozen dinners, once again the actual product looks NOTHING LIKE THE PICTURE ON THE BOX!

Oh, and they have no cashiers. All of the checkouts are self checkouts. And if you buy beer the whole checkout stops and you have to find a well hidden button to push to call somebody over to get the whole thing going again because they have to make sure you are old enough to self checkout that beer.

Sorry, fresh and easy, I don't think I'll be stepping into your store again anytime soon, I just wasn't impressed and the food we tried was a total waste of money.