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Good morning you lovely firedogs! There’s coffee, and I’ve got french toast on the griddle. Sit a spell, eat, and peruse the links.
Fancy some french toast? Come into Over Easy & chat a while.
I’m sure everyone remembers Kelly Thomas, the homeless man beaten to death by Fullerton, CA police last July. Thomas was schizophrenic. Now, Salon has the links to a study that shows at least half of the people shot by police in this country each year suffer from mental illness.
How Civil Disobedience Improves Crowdsourced Disaster Response (and Vice Versa) by Patrick Meier, PhD.
This must have stuck in Bloomberg’s craw. I love seeing him humbled. Also, The Guardian has a nice piece about Occupy Sandy and the NYPD.
How about some political activism from a politician? Cory Booker, Mayor of Newark, NJ, challenged himself to live on a food stamp budget for 7 days. $30 to spend. The tech-savvy guy even blogged the entire experience. Here is the final blog post from day 7. If you have a few minutes, check out his updates from all 7 days here.
Interesting news from CNet. This just made getting arrested a lot more interesting.
Gender, Debt, and Dropping Out of College. (Will need to open .pdf at link to view full article.)
Bank protestors in Switzerland demonstrate how to take on a loan shark. Pic.
Oh hey! Remember those formaldehyde-tainted trailers that FEMA bought in the wake of Katrina? FEMA is selling them.
I saw this yesterday and had to pass it along. Too cool to not share. Rare cat filmed up close.
Since I’ve done this two weeks in a row now, I might as well continue. Some music.
See you in the comments.
Photo by Jules Morgan released under a Creative Commons license.
181 Comments
Good morning folks.
No picture today. I spent over an hour last night trying to make a picture work, but everything I used from wiki commons was blocked, and everything I used from flickr was broken. Crappy.
Your link to salon is bad.
Boxturtle (You horrible person, you!)
Thanks, Kris, we’ll go with the cat pic, that’s okay.
Good morning Kris and fellow firepups.
Good morning Kris and thanks for the postnhost. And The Song.
Good morning all you yet to arrive pupses (h/t Om)
Not anymore :p
mornin’ BT. Thanks to you and all the Over Easy crew cookin’ up our daystarter!
The cat video is pretty great. I watched it a few times yesterday.
Good morning to you JC.
I figured you’d dig the song. It was a toss-up between that and a Michael Buble Christmas track. I hope I picked the right one.
You did as far as I’m concerned. Nothing like starting the day with the incomperable Steve Hunter/ Dick Wagner guitar work and the amazing Prakash John/ Whitey Glan anchor. Thanks.
Wonder how much the shipping charges would be to get one or two trailers.
Morning Kris and Pups.
Anyone trying to post a picture into your diary, I have found it works to save it to your computer desktop, then put it in your post, but that’s me.
Morning nonq. Shipping would probably cost more than the trailers.
Good morning, Kris and pups. I “overslept” this morning and just rolled outta the waterbed about 10 minutes ago.
Kris, I haven’t read all of the links yet, but Cory Booker has been in the news lately for some not-good venal politician stuff related to getting a crony on (I think) his city council. I will go look for a link.
Sorta tarnished him in my eyes. Somehow I thought he was different…
I’ll give that a shot next week Ruth. Thanks!
It’s the Hazmat suit to go with that you need to get first.
He is certainly a career politician. I’ve read similar stories about him.
Then he goes and does awesome things like this. He was also in the thick of the storm a few weeks ago, evacuating folks, feeding folks, braving the elements to help out.
Here it is. I read it several places at the time.
Cory Booker Engineers City Council Coup in Newark, Near Riot Ensues
His “living on food stamps” was also trashed as a stunt, but I’m not sure how reliable a source that was (since I can’t recall where it came from) so I’m reserving judgment on that.
btw, if you’re in N.TX., you’re seeing heavy frost. And warmly dressed, if you are on your computer and out of the covers.
Glad you fixed it, that Salon link is a nice find. Need more data though. i don’t care if your crazy, if you’re waving a weapon about or threatening somebody being shot by police is something you should expect.
Though the implication is that we could reduce police shootings by more than half if we treated mental illness rather than throwing them on the streets.
Boxturtle (i guess we’d rather pay lawyers than shrinks)
It was 29 here when the post went up. Very dry air though, so no frost.
Keep in mind you could spend quite a bit of time in those trailers without problems. Used as storage or a workshop, they’d be fine.
However, i suspect these will be resold several times and eventually detail cleaned and resold as house trailers. Given the return on investment, we probably should have shredded them.
Boxturtle (We’ll spend more on uninsured emergency room visits than we got from selling them)
We’ll see. If it’s a stunt, there will be no action. If he right away starts trying to fix things, it was not a stunt.
Boxturtle (Betting on stunt, but open-minded)
Raygun saved a lot on those releases though!
That’s where I was headed with it, and why I reminded everyone of Kelly Thomas.
The other aspect of this; if police were better trained to recognize signs of mental illness, they may look for an excuse to help someone rather than shoot someone.
I have a very dear friend, goes by the nickname Milkshake, who is severely schizophrenic and has 18 years clean and sober. He still sees and hears things, which makes for very interesting conversations with him.
32 outside the city here, city is at 40. See what a concrete heat sink does for you?
Boxturtle (nice in winter, sucks in summer)
Also, Kit O’Connell can help with the photos, including finding one for you and putting it into the post. Just give him a holler when you have difficulty.
Coworker reports 21 just up the road. It was a fun 25 mile motorcycle ride this morning. My winter gloves are only effective to about 40 degrees. Low 20s they are epic, and I do mean epic, fail.
I notice the same thing here when I check the weather. We’re only a dozen miles north-east or so of Austin, yet Austin is always 2-3 degrees warmer than we are.
Kind of where I was going with that. The gov can’t even break out the non-hazardous manufactured homes in their inventory and sell them as a separate lot for a few bucks more. Sheesh.
Fluffy light snow drifting down 26 F.
Looked at the cat pictures and then then music and sure enough, yourtubes had selected three other cat videos that I might wish to view.
Can’t tell if snark, but those “savings” just moved money from treatment to enforcement. Very few cities have open jail cells and even fewer have enough resources to effectively run what they’ve got.
I would rather have private, government financed treatment facilities then private, government financed jails.
Boxturtle (Is it wrong of me to prefer paying shrinks over cops?)
:) Normally I would’ve called on Kit, but I caught via Twitter that he was at the Occupy Austin general assembly last night. I didn’t want to interrupt that.
I’m sure he’ll come along here shortly and add a picture for me. He’s awesome like that.
We actually got a bit of snow (maybe an inch) overnight here in NW Indiana. Looks heavy and wet so it’s coating the trees and is kinda pretty. Have I mentioned lately that I hate snow? There should be a law of nature that snow can fall on Christmas Eve and must be gone on Dec. 26th. And I want a pony.
I like this cover to Reed’s Baby Jane by the Cowboy Junkies.
I saw a guy at the service station stop when I was returning from Indy on Sunday who was wearing some sort of lower face mask that looked like it zipped up over his nose. It wasn’t like a knitted hood, it was lighter weight material that probably had a wind/chill blocking property. It wasn’t that cold (probably low 40s) but foggy misty and wouldn’t be fun to ride in.
Didn’t want to put this in the body of the post, due to the mildly inappropriate content of the story, but I’ll post it here.
Maine man gets 5 days in jail
Tried light liners under them? Tractor Supply should have some.
Good Morning, And definitely too cold for my preference. Thanks for the post and comments. My dau is in MN; last night they were at 3. Makes me weep and head for the bed….
Neoprene probably. I have one that I could not put my hands on this morning. I did put 2 double wraps of the CBLs really nice scarf around my face along with my Occupy Supply watch cap and the trusty turtle.
I can’t deal when it’s that cold.
I will never live in a place where it gets that cold.
And good morning to you Bev.
Good morning, oldnslow and pupses :)
Thanks, Kris, for putting this all together this morning.
Something that jumped out at me in the Booker diaries, on day 6, I think: “The SNAP program is at great risk for budget cuts as Washington pares federal spending to avert a year-end fiscal crisis.”
This framing simply could not be so awful if it were not intentional. Would you or I write something like this of we were in a position of influence like Booker? F@$k no we wouldn’t! We’d write something along the line of: it’s at great risk for budget cuts as Washington screws the bottom of the pecking order (again) rather than raise taxes on the rich and corporations.
No, gotta throw more green wood on the fire to keep up the ‘year-end fiscal crisis’ smokescreen. Anything to avoid planting the seed in someone’s mind that maybe there is another way to handle this. SOAB!
If only she’d had a gun!
If she had shot him for that, they’d have real problems seating a jury that would convict her.
Boxturtle (Or an elected prosecutor willing to prosecute :-) )
You’re right Om, and good morning to you.
I’d love to see stronger language from Booker on these issues. As I said above, he’s a career politician. This is probably the best we can hope for from him, but it is still leaps and bounds better than what most of our ‘dems’ are doing.
“.. as irresponsible poseurs demand the needy suffer to assuage their supporters’ bloodlust.”
How’s that.
I am trying to imagine the size of that attack “instrument” that would prompt a lawsuit. LOL.
Thanks, Im with you; hate the cold. Been a hot weather girl most of my
life and very thankful.
But the exhibits might involve more public in the court process.
*g* yes.
I saw that story on twitter yesterday and thought ‘this has to be an Onion headline’.
Only one of many outlets for some cold weather gear related to motor sports. You might still have time to get your xmas wish list written and sent to
cblSanta.I saw a photo (HuffPo, maybe) of Booker’s food after his $30 shopping. Lots of veggies (he’s a vegetarian) but also a bottle of olive oil. I’m sure people on SNAP wouldn’t buy olive oil. But I applaud his attempt to bring the issue front and center.
Sometimes we can deplore the politician and still applaud the act. I always liked Booker…Rachel has had him on a few times. There are many worse politicians.
I caught a tweet from him on day 3 or so that said he regretted buying the olive oil. He wished he had gone with a cheaper cooking oil and used the money saved to purchase a higher food volume.
Trying to live like a poor person must have been a difficult mind-shift for him. Just how difficult is evident in silly purchases like olive oil :)
Love to see that when the news stenographers garble it out.
I need an engineer to draw me a diagram of just how that might work….. can’t.stop.laughing :)
Off to start my day. Thank you, Kris!
Safe travels and safe home, holiday pupses.
Love from
Om
Shouting out to Jane; Knitting something nice?
*g*
Have a good one Om. Thanks for being here this morning.
It is a great place. Thanks.
A very valid point. Even if it’s just a stunt, it got some people thinking. Which is more than we had before.
Boxturtle (I hope he follows through)
Good point, we are used to looking for savings, something some people just have no experience with.
I imagine he will. At least at the state level.
Methinks Cory Booker is angling for a governorship in the not-too-distant future. Either that or a seat in the House.
Welcome back, and best to you both/all.
We sure are. I remember going through the opposite experience, coming off of welfare and food stamps a few years ago, and being able to buy a few frivolous things from time to time. I felt shameful when doing it at first, like I was being wasteful.
BTW, follow @jeffrae for updates from inside the Michigan Capital building this morning.
Serious protests going on there.
Well, to be honest, I am far from wealthy, but I’m not sure I’d make the right choices either in the first attempt.
My sister and her first husband were very poor (NOT food stamp poor, though) during the early years of their marriage, and her thrift has persisted to this day, 40-some years later. They obviously spend much more on food, and they eat out a lot, too. But she’s retained that sense of carefulness about purchases.
oldnslow is having some browser issues at work, and has some real work to do there, so he’s stepped away for the day. Wanted me to pass on well-wishes to you all.
That outfit is in Bemidji, MN where people have likely put that gear to the test. Knitting is nice but doesn’t quite cut the wind-chill factor, mustard. ;^)
If you say so. I did once have some sock liners out of a shiny space gear sort of substance. Worked wonders when I walked my pups in the MD cold.
*sigh* No picture of Snooki, no front page for you!
Boxturtle (A photo of Snooki in those handcuffs would probably get you a link from Fox!)
Lol. I thought about throwing a picture of Britney Spears or a link to a Kate Middleton pregnancy story in, just to see what happened.
Decided against it.
I’m wearing these right now. A friend gave them to me a few weeks ago.
Sooooo warm.
I am with you on the liners of various sorts, even wearing them under my pj’s around the house in winter. Cross-country skiing (which I actually did yesterday) one generates considerably more body heat than straddling two wheels at however fast that motor moves you.
I did pass up the option of heated hand grips on my snow thrower. I bet they are an option for motorcycles.
I have some gloves made from a very fine metallic stuff, a very fine knit, that are meant to wear under other gloves or mittens for outdoor stuff. They work quite well for x-c skiing. My neighbor, who runs half marathons and does triathlons, showed me some gloves that have a sort of wind protection cover that arches over the fingers of the gloves.
Kris, thanks for your fine post this morning. My morning break is over.
Good day everyone.
(something funky with submitting, hope this doesn’t double ppost)
Nice. No little faces? Well, whatever will do.
Long long ago and far far away, I remember hand warmers that you could keep in your pockets, but never actually had any. If I lived in WI, that might be something I’d search out. Liners is as far as I’ve been down that road.
Do you know, I got some of those, but not for this TX weather. I’m ready for winters farther north, should that stay cold.
Nonquixote,
I broke out the Crosscountry skis for our slushy 3 inches on Sunday. It’s great to feel the glide and stretch some muscles.
I have a pair of those. Mine run on calcium carbide and water and are about the size of a thick cellphone.
I’d get the battery operated ones today.
Boxturtle (Don’t wash ‘em)
Maybe I’ll go looking for some, they sound like the sort of thing I can see spoiling myself with. Maybe out of olive oil.
I actually did make myself french toast this morning. Just finished. Yum.
Here it should have been oatmeal, but I gave in to my weakness for an egg in a cut out piece if multigrain toast. Toad in a hole, to some people.
Why so light at breakfast?
Good morning folks. I haz an assortment of hand warmers.
Good morning.
I could go for some bearsign with my coffee this morning.
I’ll trade you a FEMA trailer for a box of hand warmers.
I had to look that one up. It’s either some kind of jam, or cowboy slang for donuts.
My SO taught me that years ago. Wasn’t called Toad, just Egg.
Isn’t my fav. I prefer an omelet, so long as we are going to fry the egg.
Which supposedly is unhealthy. It oxidizes the cholesterol, which is Baaad!
Because it leaves me room to be indulgent later. I have some pumpkin pie waiting.
Ding!
cowboy slang for donuts.
I’m not sure whether it refers to the footprint or scat. I’ve never seen doughnut shaped scat, but being a cowboy slang from the 1800′s, I would assume the grosser version.
Anyway, I like the term.
(Reading too many Westerns these days.)
Two or more of them have four legs.
True, and a childhood taste for fried bread isn’t all healthy, but I use olive oil even tho I understand frying in it isn’t use of its best properties. Working my way through my tastes as they appear to be good and/or bad for me makes quite a wake.
I pre-baked a little potato in the microwave, then sliced it with onion and sage, and accompanied that with eggs over easy. It was YUM.
And the sun is now out shining on the new snow. Very pretty.
I immediately assumed it meant scat, but had forgotten the word and didn’t want to say poop. But now I’ve said it. LOL.
I meant sliced it and fried it with sage, onion, and eggs.
Another favorite of mine.
Just did a little research, and what I find is that fried cakes were the ancestor of the donut, so having a hole in it is not needed. And you can imagine, cowboys on the trail are not fancy. So it seems bear scat would be the right image.
http://www.hub-uk.com/interesting/doughnuts.htm
Just so long as we are not holding a wake for you due to bad fry bread!
It’s interesting about olive oil. Yes, heating it for frying is supposedly not good, and usually I’ll substitute Organic canola ( best ratio of Omega 6 to Omega 3. Too high Omega 6 isn’t good either, from what I have read)yet Italians seem not to suffer from cardio diseases to the extent we do supposedly because of the olive oil, and they do saute in much of their cooking.
I’d rather talk about hand warmers.
Yum! New snow! All I have is gray skies and 45°.
Maybe having your wood stove heating the house up makes you think that way.
Interesting story, Ruth. Thanks for the link!
I have no way of determining the nature of the doughnut in the western novels. However, doughnut is a specific shape, having mathematical properties.
Really pretty out now. The snow stuck to all the tree limbs and not to the ground. And that thought mixes so well with bear scat. Doesn’t it.
I’m reading Cory Booker’s daily posts on his SNAP challenge, and was struck by this comment from a reader:
Where are you? That’s about what we had here yesterday. The week’s forecast is for sunny and cold (30s).
Next we’ll have to talk jelly doughnuts. hmmmm
My image of the cook on a cattle drive is somewhat contrary to the art of making little holes in all the patties.
Bears are not concerned about appearances, so I’ll leave it up to them and the scenery.
Portland OR
I’ve only read that term in the last two novels. For many years before that, the term never showed up.
The two that use the term use it for baked goods from either a well loved cafe in an established town or the wife of a rancher who was raised in the East in a well off family.
Trial food for cattle drives seem to rely on biscuits cooked in a cast iron pot.
Sometimes they could be used as weapons!
Way across the country, then. Prolly too far for your weather to travel here! Portland is lovely, though!
Here in NW Indiana our weather seems to move west to east, so if there’s a weather system in Illinois or Wisconsin we can count on getting it a day or two later, unless it moves north into Michigan and misses us.
This morning’s bit of snow may be courtesy of the storm that hit Minnesota and then Wisconsin a couple of days ago. Although I dislike snow, this is a small enough amount to be just pretty and not troublesome for driving.
That’s a great point. I didn’t read the comments. I hope Booker did.
I still struggle with those purchases, and my household has a weekly grocery budget of $150. There are weeks where we need to buy paper towels, toilet paper, dog food, cat food, cat littler, shampoo, tooth paste, etc. Those things always seem to fall together on a single week. Pushes the shopping trip way over $150.
Seems to me the cook would want to make stuff that was not going to take a lot of extra work, and clean up after it quickly, so biscuits sounds right.
But I’m no authority.
I am in for some coffee, a little project in the shop is started.
Those weren’t warm sticky buns were they? (ducks)
NW Indiana. So you probably know of Valparaiso. I went to school there, at a tech institute.
Now you got me interested.
I have a book called “The Cowboy Reader” It is a compendium of terms and lifestyle. I’ll see what it says, if anything, about cooking.
I’ve never made biscuits in a Dutch oven, although I have two and use them constantly for many cooking chores. I love ‘em!
Just had breakfast. Omelet cooked in butter and garlic.
Do you have a Mi Pueblo in your area? They have very inexpensive produce that is better quality than other chain grocery stores in my area. My average dinner trip to MP is around $20, whereas at Safeway it’s close to $40. I’m a very experienced frugal shopper, so I consider myself an authority. Gotta make about 5 stops and spend a lot of time, but $150 for a family of 4 should be doable with sale papers and a mission.
Of course, with fresh icing! you want the dogs and cats to keep coming up for lovin’, right?
Do you have IGA? We don’t but I’ve heard in Dallas they are a gift to the needy.
No Mi Puebla here.
We make the $150 work well. Last week I only spent $103. Most weeks I typically spend around $120. I always budget $150, though. Anything left over = a night to eat out.
For 2 people here in PDX, we spend over $100/week. There is an either/or problem here. Cheap and dirty or upper crust.
New Seasons/ Whole Foods or Winco.
Huh. Wow. Just wow. Just when I thought I had seen it all…
On the anniversary of his passing. Sam Cooke
‘mornin’ all
de lurking to remind everyone SNAP was cut by 25 F***ing % in 2010 by the Dem Majority (lifelong ‘liberal’ George Miller, D-Richmond leading the charge) so as to “pay for” the First Lady’s ‘healthy lunches’ program
His honor has tweeted that, right ???
don’t be hatin’ but . . . .
I heard a clouded leopard in the Bornean jungle in 1978
It’s dying before our very eyes.
Who among us will give the eulogy?
Who’s dying you might ask?
Well, Firedoglake.
What might lead one to think this?
The ‘Over Easy’ diaries responded to by a gaggle of regular commenters shooting the shit everyday gets on the average more hits than the rest of the diaries combined.
Is this bad?
I don’t think so.
But what does it tell us?
FDL it was nice knowing you.
Res ipsa loquitur
R.I.P.
Just getting a bite of lunch and saw this. Of course I know Valparaiso. Home of “Valpo” (Valparaiso University).
I am in South Bend, so Valparaiso is about an hour south and west of me. You went to school in Valparaiso — very small world, isn’t it?
I suspect your eulogy is premature. Number of comments isn’t exactly related to number of page views. Lots of people probably read the other posts and don’t comment, while those of us who come to Over Easy use the comments just to chat with each other. If you count up the unique commenters here, there probably are a dozen or so, if that, translating into more than 100 comments.
We also come back occasionally during the day, unlike the other front page posts that are replaced by the next newer front page post about 1-1/2 hours later.
Your cynical comment puzzles me. Why trash FDL? What are you looking for that you aren’t finding?
If you have a nearby Costco and work the budget out, buy in bulk. I’m single and live alone, and I buy ALL of my staples, including some toiletries, at Costco.
And to add to my other comment, please go look at the latest Sitemeter stats:
http://www.sitemeter.com/?a=stats&s=s21firedoglake
“Why trash FDL? What are you looking for that you aren’t finding?”
Au contraire!
I truly enjoy FDL and find it to be a beacon of progressive thought and a standard of the creative humanistic mind.
I’m only commenting on what I see as a trend based on the number of comments associated with the diaries on the sidebar.
I surely have no evil ulterior motive or hidden agenda.
I was hoping that my ‘cynical’ comment would encourage more people to comment on all of the diaries instead of only the ‘usual suspects’.
The more comments on all of the diaries the more enlightened points of view we have to consider, and I ask you: Isn’t enlightenment the ‘raison d’être’ for our interaction with each other?
I don’t interact with you folks for enlightenment.
I do it to boost my ego.
IGA…That sounds familiar but it’s all mixed up with the Bell chain in my mind. If it’s the place I’m thinking, it’s expensive here. What’s the story with the needy and IGA?
Dude. That’s kewl.
Yes! Non perishables from costco, fancy pants canned and jarred foods from Trader Joe’s, perishable staples from Mi Pueblo (good meats there too but not on the cheap). Safeway remains the best place for decent, cheap cheddar cheese and club soda, but the customer service sucks, the produce is horrible, and they run out of anything and everything on sale. Smart and Final is great for milk and dairy and bagged bulk spices. Restaurant supply stores are also *fabulous*, but may require documentation like a biz license to get through the door.
You really should do a diary, Stan. Seriously, put it out there where there might be a more enlightened response.
I don’t feel intellectually qualified on any particular subject to write a whole diary. Seems you might have the gift, though.
Don’t have most of those here in little South Bend Indiana. The nearest Costco is a bit more than an hour west of here. Nearest Trader Joe’s (I think) is in the Chicago area.
I do my Costco runs usually when I visit my kids in Indianapolis (Trader Joe’s there, too). The other places (except for Safeway) I’ve never heard of.
We do have Sam’s Club but I rarely go there just as a matter of principle. We also have Walmart and I avoid it for the same reason, but if I were on SNAP I would go there for the prices.
For someone who taught creative writing, your comments seem to miss the mark a bit. Saying “R.I.P FDL” because you assume that people aren’t visiting the site because they aren’t commenting comes across in “print” (which is all we have to evaluate) as a cynical put-down of FDL, not as an invitation to engage more widely and comment more frequently. Often I read the other posts here and on other blogs and don’t comment because I have nothing to add that would further the discussion.
Why don’t you write a diary? Or offer to do an Over Easy post as I invited folks to do last week.
I’m lucky to live in a place that has Trader Joe’s close by and a number of other choices that are reasonably convenient.
Isn’t there a relationship between Sam’s Club and Walmart? Yeah, the prices at Walmart are great, but we pay in other ways like taxes going to cover emergency room visits because our stoopit government won’t do universal health care for Walmart workers.
Been there many times.
Funny, but at one point in my young life, I considered seriously the priesthood (Catholic) and had I continued, I would have picked an Order that is in South Bend. Fate stepped in but in any case a significant part of my late teens was spent in NW Indiana.
Also, as fate would have it anyway, that Order of the Holy Cross runs University of Portland, which is now a client!
I do all of my shopping at WalMart. We have only two choices here – WalMart or HEB. HEB is like a Safeway or Raley’s or Lucky’s.
Their produce is better, their meat is better, but they’re really proud of that fact and show it in their prices.
WalMart is all we can afford. Pains me to shop there, but oh well. Nothing else to do.
Sam’s Club is like Costco, and is owned by Walmart, or they’re both owned by the Walton family. So I avoid both for the most part. I am fewer than 5 miles from Sam’s Club, but I will drive an hour west to go to Costco instead.
There’s no reason to be ashamed to shop where you can afford to, to feed your family. None at all.
I have a couple of reasonable choices other than Walmart here, such as a midwest chain called Meijer. I do nearly all of my shopping there. It is probably a bit more expensive than Walmart (I’ve never comparison shoppped the two) but is less expensive than the other two choices. We also have a local really cheap grocery, Aldi, but the selection is very limited. You can find bargains there, but I’m not sure it is a good choice for all of your weekly shopping.
Ever hear of Rose Hulman?
We have a trader Joe’s here as well. People treat it like a cult. More than once I’ve been at a dinner where I compliment the cook and the response is “Trader Joe’s!” But I cannot find what I really want there. It’s so decided, what your taste ought to be. Then they package everything so if you want to sample, for instance, you have to buy a package.
That’s a budget buster.
Aw, just wrote a longish post that failed;got an error message, notify the administrator-type.
Just running by with tasks to accomplish, so won’t re-write; just say “hi” to all, and thanks to kris for posting.
(oh, and kris, ha! HEB boasts that their prices are low, doncha know. But they have driven out any real competition, that is, grocery-only chains like Kroger and Albertson’s, during my time here, by undercutting prices. But they’re damn near a monopoly. I’ve noticed that prices vary at HEB’s located in different parts of San Antonio. you might find that HEB prices in Austin are cheaper than where you actually live.)
Hear, hear!
Of course! (grew up in Indy, college at IU. Bloomington, of course.)
Is that where you went? Not sure if it’s still around under that name. Terre Haute, right?
I did not attend Rose-Hulman, but have a great nephew who is about to graduate. I have another nephew who is a Butler alum, a brother with a Master’s from IU, and a sister who once taught at Ball State. Family still in Muncie.
Let’s see, oh yeah. I worked for Cook Inc., a Bloomington Company for 9 years.
IU is an outstanding school, and Bloomington is just the coolest place ever!
I’ve never lived in IN (I grew up in Portland, OR) but I have many connections there.
Small world!
You weren’t asking me…but I have!
My kingdom for edit. That should be a lower case “c.”
It’s small. I had to look it up!
My kids (now in their 40s) are Purdue grads. My grandson is a freshman at Ball State.
Don’t know a lot about it, but I think it has several campuses.
No, but I looked it up. Turns out I have a bit of familiarity with it.
I knew it as Rose Polytechnic Institute
OOPS. No. Just Terre Haute. 2000 students.
I am! Some wristlets. It’s a complicated patter. Just to see if I can.
; ) Isn’t it, though?
Very tempted to become a “perpetual student,” of which there were many in my day. Still have a few friends (who were originally from nearby towns) living there. One of these days I’ve gotta go visit them and look around.
HEB actually varies their prices depending on income levels where the store is located. Unfortunately for me, I live in a small town and have to go over to Round Rock to visit an HEB. The area of Round Rock that the store is located in is right next to the Dell HQ, so their prices are high.
Totally true. I love TJ’s but I can’t buy everything I need there, so it’s a place to stock up on certain things once in a while (artichoke hearts, frozen hericot vert, breakfast cereals, crackers), but all the stores I mentioned above are the same for certain products. Only Safeway is a sure one stop place, and I dislike Safeway fiercely.
What is this HEB of which you speak? Sliding scale for groceries? Did I read that right?
H-E-B
They do have a sliding scale for their pricing.
One of the reasons they won’t move into our town. We have enough people for them, but not a high enough income level.
My sister shops at Safeway — and TJs, and Whole Foods even. I never thought Safeway was bad. Nice wine aisle.
I used to shop at Raley’s when we lived in the Bay Area. Did Safeway for a couple of months back then, but it was too expensive.
Safeway has a brand here, Randall’s, that is just as expensive as Safeway. Same products, store feel, etc.
It’s too much damn money, though, and also located 14 miles away. Further than Walmart (5 miles) or HEB (8 miles).
Huh. So they’ll put their stores only in higher-income places and then offer discounts to poor people who can’t get there? Ah, well…I’ve never heard of a grocery store chain offering a sliding scale. That’s some good marketing.
H-E-B. Howard Edward Butt. Teehee.
I am very surprised South Bend is getting a Whole Paycheck (AKA Whole Foods). I suppose Notre Dame attracts their clientele.
Their prices are competitive on some items, but not enough to save on an overall grocery bill.
It really is great marketing. They’re HUGE on Texas-sourced products, capitalizing on the rabid tribalism of the local rubes.
We call it the ‘Heeb’. Don’t know why. CBL and oldnslow were doing that before I moved here.
Not all Safeway stores are bad, but the local one is *horrible* and has a yelp page to prove it. Stoopit management, long lines day and night, and always out of sale items. *spit*
*spew* Whole Paycheck!! LOL!
I used to shop Safeway as well, but no more.
New Seasons here is local, starting out in the 70′s as Natures, complete with sawdust floor, no meat products. It’s the only place I’ll shop for cheese because so many cheese manufacturers have thrown in the towel and are buying milk that is tainted with drugs.
Tillamook Cheese has been a long time favorite but they also flicked it in. I won’t touch it.
So that leaves mostly imported cheeses and some very local.
We also have very small one store co-ops that we shop.
Kris @169: lol. I’ve never heard anyone call HEB heeb! Maybe an Austin thing?
msmolly, we don’t have one nearby but from Madison WI, PRWatch, this article has been on or near the top of their most read for quite some time.
Sometimes I just hit the back button and it is still there. Would hate to miss your contribution.
Aw, dang. Tillamook is the cheese I like the best and Safeway is the only store brand that can compare. I didn’t know it was tainted with bad stuff, but I can’t say I’m too surprised.
Oh, how I wish I lived near a co-op. Funny story…back in the 70′s, my parents used to shop almost exclusively at a co-op. I grew up thinking The Co-op was a grocery store chain! There is a certain co-op in SF that I like very much and I wish it was closer.
Monsanto is evil. Just sayin’
They are directly in the immediate neighboring farm crops all around my small farm holding that I have been hoping develop into non-certified organic and sustainable. Certified organic needs some rule clarifications, imho.
How is our little tail-less friend fairing day three, ysd?
Nagi is a *spectacular* cat. No exaggeration. He is lithe and graceful, and his movements are mercurial in a happy, friendly way. He can’t get enough scritches and always asks for more. He is a cuddler.
We’ve had two hissing incidents by the resident cats, but no tail poofage or growling. I plan on keeping him in the bedroom alone for one more night before we try to integrate Nagi into the cat fambly. I’m sure everyone will grow to love each other. Nagi has so much experience with other cats that it would be a big surprise if there was any real trouble.
I’ll have to post some more, current pictures soon…
Sweet (as WI maple syrup on blueberry pancakes, breakfast for supper Kris)!
Thanks ysd.
You can buy Tillamook cheese at Costco, and I have, occasionally. I didn’t know it was problematic.
Sometimes I think if I read and took to heart everything, I’d starve because I wouldn’t be able to eat anything!
I buy farm fresh eggs from free-range hens, fresh fish and free-range poultry, milk from grass fed cows, and homegrown veggies at the Farmer’s Market. I doubt that it’s cheaper there, but at least my purchases support local merchants and farmers.