How's this for a work excuse? I missed work yesterday so my dog could stay inside. It was really, really cold and misty, and the dumb dog won't go in his house. So he was soaked like five minutes after going outside. I felt really bad for him. And he was actually behaving pretty well when he was inside. I put him out for a while in the early afternoon, and then he came back in and more or less went to sleep the entire rest of the afternoon. Hubby let him out to pee when he got home, and the dog ran right back inside. He knows where he has it good!

Yesterday was Grocery Day, so here's the latest list of freebies.

I got 3 free packs "Wholly Salsa" from Albertsons. They were on sale for .99, and I had coupons for $1 off. I also go six free Reese's Whips from Kroger. They were 2/$1, and the coupon was for $1 off of 2. Dinner sausage was on sale at Kroger, 10/$10, so I picked up a couple. Normally I spend around $2 a pack on that at Walmart. I saved a total of $24.65 yesterday, so I got $71.01 worth of groceries for $46.36. That's a savings of 65%. In about six months, I've saved $1289.43, or 45.49%.

Just a few thoughts on the eve of Barack Obama's inauguration.

During the campaign, I can't remember how many times I heard everybody, not just the candidate, talk about how, "It's not about race." In this enlightened day and age, we're supposed to see everybody as the same shade of brown, regardless of their ancestry. But what was all the coverage about the day after the election? "OMG! We elected a black president! Eleventy!!!!11!!!1!" And it's still going on today. Every other interview on the news is about how people want to watch this historic event. Isn't every inauguration historic? But this one is EXTRA special because it's a black guy. And yet it still isn't about race.

In a similar vein, we weren't ever suppose to refer to Obama's middle name. We couldn't utter the name Hussein because to do so meant that you were claiming the man is Muslim. I even remember one clip from the Mark Davis radio show that referred to a man who was visited by the Secret Service when he used Obama's full name at a rally. But since the election, I've heard on more than one occasion, "We elected a guy whose middle name is Hussein! Zoinks!"

So is it about race, or isn't it? Are we allowed to use the man's full name or not? Why is it not okay while he's running, but is suddenly okay because he won? Are we going to have to forget his full name in four years when he runs for re-election? If he runs for re-election and loses, will it be because America has suddenly become racist again?

Gotta link to this one. I saw this quite a while ago, but was thinking about it for some reason this weekend. Lo and behold, someone posted a link to it in a forum that I read. *Cue Twilight Zone theme*

http://15minutelunch.blogspot.com/2007/10/strap-in-shut-up-and-hold-on-were-going.html

Time for the Monday grocery update!

Yesterday I got two bottles of Powerade for the hubby and two bottles of Dial hand soap for free. Schepp's milk was on sale in the half-gallon containers for $1.00 each, and I had a coupon to get a dollar off of three of them, so I got a gallon and a half of milk for $2.00. The going rate for a single gallon here is $2.25. Yogurt is still on sale, so I picked up a bunch of Yoplait for .37 each as well. Overall, I spent $32.62 on groceries this week, and saved $22.30, or 40.6%. Since starting TheGroceryGame.com I've $1314.08, or 45.23%.

By the way, this is the first week in a while that our entire grocery bill has been under $40. Hubby and I decided not to buy cheese this week since it isn't on sale. We're out of cheddar and mozzarella, but it's about $4/lb unless I go to Sam's. But then I'd have to buy five pounds of each and spend around $30, which is a lot to spend on cheese at one time. So we're going cheese-free this week. Hubby may not survive.

Can there possibly be anybody out there who does not yet know about the DTV conversion taking place in February? If so, is there any way the we can possibly round up these three people and explain it to them so that the rest of us don't have to watch these retarted commercials anymore? And I heard on the news yesterday that the $40 coupon program ran out of money, so a lot of them are back-ordered. What do you want to bet that the deadline will end up being extended to April, giving us another two months of not-so-brilliant ads?

Looks like the coupons are starting back up again - there were five inserts in the paper this Sunday. This week I got four of those really big cans of Hunt's spaghetti sauce for about .60 each, and several muffin mixes for .37. Yogurt was .37 as well. My months of saving stickers from Albertsons finally paid off, since I got two free sets of dinnerware. Altogether, I saved $28.37 on groceries, and $59.98 on the dishes. Since I started The Grocery Game in July 2008, I've saved $1286.27, or 45.3%.