Little Cheapies

Tommy was heading down to Home Depot after work the other day and asked me if I needed him to get anything while he was out. Of course I jumped on to Flashfood. He was hoping for dessert, so I ordered this small vegan banana pound cake. It was $3.  The tomatoes were $1.64 per can, so I had to order them all.  I was buying cans for $1.79 to stock my tariff pantry, but prices have gone up. The price at Doordash through Flashfood was a good deal, so I ordered all that they had.

Last night's dinner looks a lot like dinner from my last post, but it is a little different. We still had potatoes and green beans, so my only change was to bread marked down chicken breast with melted cheddar on top. There were two breasts, which I sliced in half lengthwise, which gave each of us half a breast.  The other two were set aside for tonight.  Dessert was homemade caramel hazelnut ice cream, made from FF whipping cream, marked down hazelnut syrup from Burlington, and caramel dip from Flashfood. The chocolate syrup is Giradelli, which I would rather buy than Hershey's or other brand which use high fructose corn syrup.  It's a bit of a splurge, so I am going to start looking at odd sources, like the food section at TJ Maxx or Marshalls.  I could make it myself, but good cocoa powder is not inexpensive either!

Today was a pool day, and I wore the navy-blue slacks I found at Amvets last week.  My spiffy rainboots were actually a marked down end of season find at Aldi.  Once at the pool, I realize I'd lost my lock on Tuesday but it was not in the lost and found. I did not swim because I would not leave my purse unsecured.  Instead, I did some discount shopping. I've been pricing outdoor bar stools and wanted to do some comparison hunting. Nothing was worth buying -- but I did find an interesting oil dispenser at Gabe's, which was marked down to $3.50 from $4.99.  My tariff pantry has a few large cans of EVOO and that means refilling a smaller bottle for the kitchen.  This bottle has a wide mouthed jar which will make refilling easier. The spout is covered, but swings open when the bottle is tilted, which means it will be sealed when not in use, but still easy to pour.

Dinner tonight was a fig, spinach, goat cheese, and chicken pizza using the rest of the breaded chicken from last night.  The dough and cheese were from Flashfood.  The fig component is actually Fig jelly from Aldi mixed with olive oil. Although it might sound odd, it was actually pretty good!  There are a couple of slices for Tommy to bring to work tomorrow. I am still eating leftover ravioli from Monday and have one more lunch from that.

One big worry off of my mind, is health insurance. Our premium notice arrived in the mail yesterday and we sent a check off today. Once we have our subscriber cards, I will create an automatic payment.  Our coverage is a "silver" plan, which is $977 per month, after our $669 subsidy.  There are people who complain taxes are too high in NY State, but I am not one of them.  I've been to over half of the states in the US, and our tax dollars benefit our citizens. We have a public healthcare exchange and subsidies to lower earners.  This means we can afford decent coverage and if there are expenses, we'll be able to afford treatment too.  Both insurance and health care are too expensive in the US, so I consider us every lucky to have it.  I just hope Medicare isn't destroyed in the next year and half, once we become eligible.

Does anyone else have to buy private insurance? How is everyone's insurance in general? We try to stay healthy, but would never want to go without!