Ready Blog

The tips below are from an article published on Reuters by Linda Stern. Read the full article for additional discussion of the topic.
Rising food prices are making it more difficult for families to maintain the same level of living on salaries that are not rising as quickly as the combination of food, energy, home heating fuel and other necessities. Ways to control and manage rising prices are outlined below:

– Coupon carefully. If you’re willing to put in the time and effort, you can buy a basket of groceries for pennies on the dollar. It involves using coupons, shopping sales, finding stores that double coupons and putting it all together carefully. One site to check for more information is www.hotcouponworld.com.

You can find coupons to match items on sale at your local grocer at www.thegrocerygame.com. Beware: Unless you’re using good coupons on products you would buy anyway, this can be a spending trap instead of a money-saving deal.

— Buy some good containers. Roughly 13 cents of every food dollar goes to packaging and advertising, and you’ll spend a lot more than that if you are always buying 100-calorie snack packs and tiny bags of chips to send to school with your kids. Buy some reusable containers, buy your favorite products in bulk and make your own individual packages.

— Use meat for flavor, not bulk. A mixture of meat and beans over pasta or rice will satisfy those who love the taste of meat and poultry, but cut costs significantly than eating large cuts of meat.

— Make your dollar buy more nutrition. Instead of buying sugar-coated cereals, white bread and chips, buy items like whole-grain bread and oatmeal. Instead of candy, buy fruit. Popcorn that you pop yourself has been heralded for generations for being cheap, fun, nutritious and tasty.

— Buy frozen fish. Almost all of the “fresh” fish you buy has been frozen and thawed. Fish from the freezer section has often been frozen on the boat, so it’s equally fresh — and cheaper.

— Do your own work, as a family. You’re spending more on labor than on food when you buy lots of presliced, prewashed, preseasoned foods. Yet all the experts seem to agree that family mealtime is an important ritual. Extend the ritual by getting the whole family in on the slicing, dicing, cutting and stirring that dinner requires, even if it’s just a once-a-week cooking session. You’ll save money and maybe bond a little.

— Eat out judiciously. Last year restaurant prices actually rose less than grocery prices, but it still costs a lot more to eat out than to cook at home. Americans typically spend about half of their food budget eating out, according to the Agriculture Department. Cut the cost without cutting the fun by mixing it up: Have appetizers and drinks at home before going to the restaurant, or have dessert at home. Or buy a precooked, carry-out chicken, but fix your own side salad.

— Stock up on sales. You know you’re always going to use pasta, lightbulbs and toothpaste, so buy a bunch on sale. Sure, this is inflation mentality, but double-digit price increases on food means we’re in an inflationary environment, food wise. Furthermore, if you already have easy, good food in the pantry, you won’t have to run out at the last minute and buy over-priced convenience items just to throw together dinner.

— Grow your own. Oh sure, anyone who’s gardened has thrown too much money at their tomato plants. But some crops are more worth growing than others. Basil and other herbs, hot peppers, eggplant and lettuce are some items that are very easy to grow and are never cheap at the grocer or farm stand, even when they are in season.

— Make it fun. Save with a goal in mind so it becomes a game and not just drudgery. Shave $10 a week off of your food bill (that’s less than 10 percent for the typical household), and you can all do something special, like go see a movie at the end of every month — Of course you’ll bring your own snacks.

http://nysun.com/news/food-rationing-confronts-breadbasket-world

I really don’t like posting things like this. It seems to be a self-fulfilling prophecy. Even if it is not true, media attention can make people believe there is a food shortage and cause panic buying. Self-fulfilling.

I will admit my first reaction was to rush to Costco’s and see prices and availability in my area. Maybe buy a few extra things to stock-up on. I didn’t, but will make a regular shopping trip this month. Let me know if you notice any changes in availability in your area.

It is Earth Day and worth a reminder to take care of those things around us. I retweeted a set of links today on how to reduce your carbon footprint. This has great parallels to simplifying your life and lifestyle. http://www.metroactive.com/metro/08.15.07/50-ways-to-go-green-0733.html

These ideas don’t require radical changes to every day life choices. Simple things can be implemented over time to reduce your carbon footprint and help make life more sustainable. Reducing hot water time in the shower? Makes sense. Passing on all those free give-away items you will throw in the trash the next time you declutter your house anyway? VERY EASY. Read through these ideas and see how you can go a bit greener without turning your life into a hemp wearing hippie commune.

CNN reports the FCC has approved an emergency alert text based system. The major cell phone carriers have indicated they would work with the FCC to deliver text-based messages in the event of emergencies. Customers would have the option to opt-out.

As I have indicated before, the only good emergency system is one that is familiar and we use on a nearly everyday basis. This seems one step closer to a viable system of alerts.

The article indicates the carriers could voluntarily deliver messages for any of these three types of events:

Quote from a un-typical surbabanite on how she thinks about current events. “I now think of storing extra food, water, medicine and gasoline in the same way I think of buying health insurance and putting money in my 401k,” she said. “It just makes sense.”

The NY Times writes this week about how the new trend in lifestyle may be preparedness in the wake of economic uncertainty and maybe even a touch of Peak Oil worry. A depression, either real or self-prophecy, has many middle-class americans learning new(old) skills of gardening, wine making and living more energy efficient to sustain their way of life if the world around them changes.

How, in the digital age do we simplify? Janet Luhrs wrote a book years ago… LOTS of years ago and I have my copy that I still tote out once a year. It is called, The Simple Living Guide by Janet Luhrs. Hmmm. Easy read? It really is, except for the fact it challenges most of the messages we receive from society and even our loving family on a daily basis.

Each time I read it, which is typically at least once a year from cover to cover, I have to ask myself to value the choices I make in my house, at the grocery store, in vacations and more. I am in no means advocating the giving up of travel, family, and those things that make life so enjoyable. But, you are challenged to value the cost of a, say… new shiny pasta maker for example. Pasta maker, that you probably use once every few months if you stretch it. I remember this example from the book, but please insert your favourite, had to have it so I rationalized it, gadget that was going to save you time and make dinner with you family more enjoyable. Don’t smirk at me… you know we all have something equivalent.

You paid somewhere around $50 for the “pasta maker”, how long did you have to work? and the time to research and go pick one out, have it shipped or go to the store and purchase said new shiny kitchen coolness machine. Great! It is a blast and the family loves it. Now you have to clean it, find cabinet space to store it with the other cool machines. How many hours do you have to work to pay for that larger kitchen? and store all the devices in that larger kitchen and clean them so you will see them and use them more often? See where this is heading. The initial cash outlay compounds terribly over the years as you hump the pasta machine to each new kitchen, work longer hours to pay for the larger kitchen, work longer hours for someone else to clean the newer bigger kitchen full of stuff, so now you have no time to use the kitchen devices and just go out to dinner with family or worse, go out for work and networking events to keep you on the right track to keep paying for the cool device. WHoof.. I don’t know about you, but I am sucking it up and putting that baby on Freecycle.

This is just one example of how we often get caught up in shiny gadgets and their external and variable costs compile to make our lives more complicated. Less stuff, more valuable stuff, then we become happier. Value might be that one really well made item that IS worth it. Maybe a really good cutting board and set of really nice knives would have served better than above gadget. You can still make pasta the old fashioned way on a flour dusted board and the family can still help. The value of the knives can make the entire process a culinary event. Love it!

The book includes sections on Travel, Lifestyle, Food, Home, Gardening, Finances and Career and a great chapter on Health and caring for family. Stories of real people are interspersed just enough to make me see the reality of living in a more “rich and valuable” manner. Unclutter your house, your office, and your brain. Simple living leaves you room to be more productive.

After talking to my “dahling and brilliant” colleague today, Happy Katie, I pulled my book out of my shelf for a new look see. My household is on a continued mission to simplify and build relationships with friends and family we care about. Time to dust off the cover!

This probably goes under the cateogry of “I’m Just Sayin.” Most of us are pretty comfortable for food. We want something, we go to the store, offer a debit card and walk out of the store with usually more than we went in to purchase. Easy.

Most of us are aware that the economy is experiencing a bit of heartburn from the housing mortgage crisis, subsequent lending and financial institutional bailouts, and maybe you are even aware that the value of the US Dollar is making the United States the newest travel destination for Europeans. The price of oil and changes in the ethanol and formulations are also having some unsuspsecting effects on both food delivery costs and stockpiles of grain storage. In fact, investors at MSN Money are suggesting food related stocks are a growth oriented area.

Does this really have an impact on any of us? Hmmm. Probably more than we want to realize. Bread, dairy, eggs, the wheat and grains needed to feed both people and protein machines like cattle are all related. If some people have started to notice the price of their grocery cart going up, their right. Both inflation of the basic food costs and the decline of purchasing power of the dollar are starting to change from pennies to dollars. Shortages, either real or perceived, are also inflating costs as outlined in the article above from MSN.

I live in Houston, a pretty large metropolitan area with selection and variety the name of the game when I go shopping. Other parts of the country are rumoured to be posting signs with sale type limitations on quantities purchased. You know, limit 4 per customer or household? These are typically associated with sales to entice customers in to stores. Now, the cost of stocking goods is hurting some stores and resellers and they are limiting goods below the demand.

What does this mean? Two things. Food costs will continue to rise, and availability may become an issue depending on the part of the country you live in. To protect the value of your wage earned dollars, buy in bulk at today’s prices. The cost of rice has increased 13% over the last twelve months with most of that in recent surges. Eggs are soaring at over 25% inflation. We have started using a mixture of Powdered Eggs and fresh eggs to extend the cost. I am not ready to give up eggs, or the flavour of real eggs, but extending our egg omelette’s and such with partially pantry eggs is great.

If you shop at a local Costco or Sam’s or bulk food provider, watch for good deals on things that will keep in the pantry for a long period of time. Buy things your family will use and pay for it in today’s dollars. Tomorrow’s dollars may not stretch as far. Canned goods, pastas, rice, and grains are great to have on hand. It’s nice to look in my pantry and think I am saving both by buying in bulk, and buying now instead of later.

I am at SXSWi or South By SouthWest in Austin, TX this weekend. An annual geek fanboy/girl conference with panels on technology, community building, design and all things related to online interactivity. The latest focus spins alot of information on building communities. Both offline and online. How do the two interact? If you meet first in one venue, how do you transfer the relationship to the other. Nice questions and I am learning rapidly.

Two other technology things of interest right away. Technology solves problems, only when it is available. And used. I have been playing with FAST or http://www.firstalerttext.com/ this past couple of weeks. It worked great last week when I quickly received a notice about a weather alert in my area. My interest of course is if it will stand during a major technology onslaught during a disaster. The premise is there, now it needs more implementation by multiple groups. Check it out, especially if you are a parent and want alerts from your children’s school.

The second is redundancy hit me again. Need back up batteries and more than one major source of power for digital devices. I am constantly dragging around adapters, cords and looking for recharge stations as I work off my laptop, cell and others throughout the day. I am always open to suggestions on ways to slim down my backpack and still have the necessities for work and safety. Ooof… my shoulder hurts already!