I'm sure most of you were hanging onto to your seats anxious for updates on the success or failure of my month long commitment to do without sugar. I've now gone 21 days without it.* Its siren song remains alluring, but has less power over me -- for now. I've matched that effort by swearing off most carbs after dinner and exercising almost daily. As a result, I've lost over 10 lbs. in this same span.
A nearby Ralphs recently sold 12 oz. bags of M&Ms for a dollar a bag (with coupon). Tempting fate, I had Michelle purchase 2 bags of peanut M&Ms for safe keeping nearly two weeks ago. I haven't touched them.**
Last week Albertsons offered all General Mills cereal at 6 for $10 -- 8 for $10 on a special Thursday 8 hour sale. Additionally, for every 3 boxes of cereal purchased, they gave out a coupon for a free gallon milk and a coupon for an additional $2.00 off the purchase of 5 boxes of General Mills Cereal. At last count, I think I purchased 23 boxes that week*** -- also I believe a Clark record.
* By my calculations, it's been over 8 years since I've gone this long without satisfying my sweet tooth.
** By my calculations, this is the longest any two bags of Peanut M&Ms have survived in the Clark household since the candy was invented. [Not counting, of course, the time last year when I'd purchased 24 packages of discounted "Pirates of the Carribean" M&Ms. The fact that any two of those packages survived more than two weeks had little to do with self-control -- since all 24 of the 12 oz. packages didn't last much longer than a month collectively.]
*** No, Michelle wasn't thrilled with me buying 23 boxes of cereal - citing some phantom "storage space" issue. As it happens, though, aside from the bargain basement price of the cereal itself, these milk coupons turned out to be quite valuable: They're apparently worth "up to $4.50" depending on the price of the gallon of milk. However, our local store automatically rings up the coupon as worth $4.50, irrespective of the actual price of the milk. Last Saturday then -- while I was buying 5 boxes of cereal, a gallon of milk, and some 99 cent day old bread -- the cashier accidentally rang up the milk coupon twice, deducting $9.00 from the total, and I ended up with a grocery bill of $1.19. [Of course as soon as I noticed the error, I pointed it out to the manager and cashier, both of whom decided the mistake wasn't worth correcting]. Today I actually used 1 of my milk coupons to buy 2 gallons of milk: the 2nd gallon ended up costing me 19 cents. I suspect these kinds of victories can only be truly enjoyed by those on a tight budget. Or maybe just by me.
**** For those keeping score, this is the 150th posting on the Forbidden Donut.
