Humor Me for Just A Second

Hi! I am back from a much needed blog break. Life was kicking my ASS. Hopefully things will slow the hell down for a little while.

I am kicking off the end of my sabbatical with yet another paranoid post. Yay!

I know you all have heard of the Swine Flu by now. Well.........living so close to Mexico where it is a pandemic, I am a little worried. But not worried enough to Saran Wrap my windows shut, lock my kids up inside the house or start rockin the Michael Jackson surgical mask look. But just worried enough to wonder about stuff.

So far, here in Arizona, there are 4 confirmed cases and 40+ unconfirmed cases waiting on results from the CDC. I am not 100% sure WHERE these cases are located except for 1. The 1 I know about is about 3 hours away from me.

This morning, my daycare lady told me that her son came home from High School yesterday and told her that a kid in one of his classes is suspected to have it.

Needless to say, Monk Man stayed home from daycare today. To be honest, he was going to stay home anyway. He wouldn't get out of bed and Hubbs said he could stay home and help him in the yard.

I am not putting too much thought into the rumor of someone having it here in town. Yet. I will believe it when they close the school. Small town talk is always blown out of proportion.

Are you surprised about how calm I am being about all this? I am a little surprised at myself. Don't get me wrong, I think this can become a huge issue but all you can do is take precautions not to get it and be prepared if you do get it.

We are taking precautions as of yesterday when the first case was confirmed here in Arizona. Lots of hand washing, antibacterial tissues, not sharing drinks just to name a few of the things. We are getting prepared in case it really is her in town. I have my stockpile we can use if the grocery stores close down or we have to shut ourselves inside. Thanks to couponing, I am guessing that we have about a months worth of stuff in the pantry and freezer. We would do okay.

I have been meaning to take some pictures of my pantry/stockpile room for months now and haven't gotten around to it yet. Maybe some day I will get to it and you will all get to see how crazy I really am. (Only half kidding)

On a happier note, Monk Man is turning 4 tomorrow. I am a little sad that he is getting so big so fast but I am ready for the terrible 3s to be over. That boy is a Hellion! Luckily Bobblehead hasn't figured out how to be bad like his brother yet. All I want is 6 months with 2 sweet boys and I think I will be able to manage going through the terribles again.

Damn my bad luck

The kids have been sick since we got home from Vegas. Both of them have been coughing and running fevers. They seem to be feeling better today so off to daycare and Nonnies they went.

I have been feeling kinda shitty since Sunday night. I thought at first I was getting another sinus infection.

Well today I have decided that it can't be just a sinus infection. My normal symptoms are not there. I have no drainage anymore, no sinus headache, no dizziness.

My head feels fine but my throat is killing me and my voice sounds all froggy. I have been popping cough drops and extra strength Tylenol all day.

I shouldn't even be at work. I should be at home in bed. Maybe tomorrow I will stay home.

To top it all off, I think I am getting pinkeye. Yay! I thought the pinkeye shit was over when the cats went to live with my mom but I guess I was wrong. My eye looks and feels so gross. I did get some pretty good advice from the coupon girls as to how to get rid of it.

The best part of all of this? No insurance. I couldn't go to the doctor even if I wanted to. Hubbs' job screwed up and reported to the insurance company that Hubbs took a leave of absence instead of being furloughed so they terminated our coverage as of February 28th. I didn't find out about it until last week when I called to double check we had coverage for Monk Man's dentist appointment.

Aaaarrrrrrhhhhh.

I am keeping my fingers crossed that tomorrow turns out to be a better day.

I love Safeway

Nothing exciting has been happening lately so I will post about my super trip to Safeway.

I don't have any really great stores anywhere near me except Safeway.

I have been planning my shopping trip for 2 days. Usually I can plan and plan and something always goes wrong but not this time.

Here are a few of the great deals:
Quaker Granola Chewy Bars- Buy 2 get 3 free. According to my receipt each box is $2.99. Somehow I ended up getting $11.97 off.

Colgate Toothpaste- On sale for 1.29. Use the $1 coupon from a recent insert (or the .75 coupon if your store doubles) for .29 toothpaste.

Vitamin Water10- On sale for 10/$10. There was a coupon for $1 off in last weekends inserts. Free Vitamin Water10. I found them on the shelf below the regular Vitamin Water.

My total before coupons, club card and 10% discount: $235.23
My total after coupons, club card and 10% discount: $99.49
Total savings: $135.74 (60%) I have NEVER done this well.

One last thing to mention:
Check the beer/wine section for a rebate. I found a tearpad for a Coors Light rebate. It was on a display on top of a bunch of stacked 30 packs. It says: Offer begins March 28,2009 and expires May 3,2009.

The deal is buy 1 12 pk or 2 6 pks of 12 oz cans for $5 refund, 1 18 pk for $7 of 12 oz cans for $7 refund, 1 24 pk of 12 oz cans for $8 refund or 1 30 pk of 12 oz cans for $9 refund. Collect the receipt with the purchase circled, the UPC from the box and complete the back of the rebate form and mail in.

Offer is good only for AK, AZ, CA, CO, DC, DE, FL, GA, IA, ID, IL, KS, MA, MD, MI, MN, MS, MT, ND, NE, NH, NM, NY, OH, OR, PA, RI, SC, SD, TN, VT, WA, WI and WY. 1 rebate per household.

This week Coors Light 30 pks are on sale for $16.99. This is the best price I have seen since the Super Bowl.

Free Samples and Good Deals

Taken from the coupon gals on BBC

Huggies Free and Natural Free Sample

Caress Evenly Gorgeous
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Taken from moneysavingmom

Buy 5 get $5 Rebate--You can submit 6 for each household

$10 in Coupons

Crest Pro Health Enamel Shield Toothpaste Free Sample from Walmart
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Here is a pretty cool blog that I ran across today. The Freebie Blogger I LOVE getting stuff for free.

Back from Vegas

We had so much fun!

It was a VERY long drive to Vegas. The wind was blowing around 70-75 mph so the highway was shut down. So instead of waiting until 4:30 for the highway to open up we decided to go south and then over. That added 1 & 1/2 hours to the trip. We ended up getting there around 5:30. We headed over to Circus Circus and got all checked in and unloaded.

The rest of the trip is kind of a blur.....I drank too many Margaritas and Daiquiris.
Some highlights of the trip:
~I won $240 on a quarter machine the first night at New York New York.
~We rode in a limo.
~Hubbs is an amazing Black Jack player. I am guessing he won (but didn't come home with) close to $1500 the whole time we were there.
~The hotel room sucked. Dirty, old and broken down.
~Hubbs and I only went to 1 strip club.
~I decided I like Old Vegas much better than New Vegas.
~The Titanic Exhibit rocked.

The next time we go I want to stay at the Luxor. It has such a relaxed atmosphere.

We did pretty well sticking to the $200 gambling cash. We paid cash for everything except for the Titanic Exhibit and our hotel room. I freaked out the last night and pulled some cash out of the ATM for "just in case" but we ended up only spending $40 of it.

We are hoping to go again next April. We will have to find a different sitter for the boys other than my family. Long story short, my sister took off Friday morning and ended up in South Phoenix instead of where she was supposed to be. Any other freaking weekend would have been okay but this one? Such bullshit. I am just adding it to the list of things that piss me off about my family. One of these days I will get around to posting about it.

The Final Countdown

In less than 24 hours I will be in Vegas.

I can't even begin to tell you how excited I am. I don't think I will be able to sleep tonight.

I have already crossed some things off my To-Do list.
1. Get cash for gambling. Check. I figured that since we already can't really afford this weekend, I should put a limit on how much we can spend at the slots. Hubbs will be handing me his bank card as soon as we cross the Nevada border.
2. Get Friday off work. Check. I asked, they said yes. Easy peasy. I deserve a day off since they left me all alone last week.
3. Clean out purse. Check. I took out everything that I don't need. Like receipts. And random coupons. And gum wrappers. And paperclips.
4. Make sure we have a room when we get there. Check. I made reservations last night. It almost KILLED me to put the room on my bank card instead of a credit card. But we don't have any open credit card accounts anymore and have paid them all off except for 2. Plus, I went through Ebates and got 1% credited to my Ebates total. Plus I got a couple of Swagbucks for searching for the best deal.

Hi, Circus Circus? I think your hotel is ridiculously overpriced. It had better not suck. $114 a night? Obscene

Still on the To-Do list:
1. Pack for me and Hubbs. He can't be trusted to do this for himself.
2. Pack for Monk Man and Bobblehead. Whoohooo for grandmas house.
3. Pack the laptop and all the shit that goes with it. Because you never know.
4. Find the camera. This stupid thing has been missing for a month! I have almost given up on finding it.
5. Get the biker neighbors to keep an eye on the dogs and the house. We do it for them, they can do it for us.
6. Wash the car. We have had 2 massive (50+ mph) wind storms followed by a light sprinkle of snow in the past month and the car is COVERED in nasty red Arizona dirt. It is even up in my brakes. They scream if I barely touch them.
7. Find the cell phone chargers. All 4 of them. 2 wall chargers and 2 car chargers because Hubbs couldn't get a phone that was compatible with my chargers.
8. Find my MP3 player, headphones and charger. If there is a baseball game (or any kind of sports thing) on tomorrow, Hubbs will find it and listen to it for the ENTIRE 6 hour drive.

I know I am forgetting stuff. Oh well. I will remember before we leave or else I don't need it that bad.

Vegas Baby

I just found out that we are going to Vegas on Friday for the weekend.

The best part???? No kids!!! I am sooo excited. My mom is going to keep both boys over the weekend.

I so need a break.

Hubbs' brother is going to be there this weekend so he called and asked us if we wanted to meet them up there.

We haven't been to Vegas since we got married almost 6 years ago. And I haven't been anywhere at all without at least 1 kid.

This is going to be so much fun.

New Coupons Available

I need to be better about posting my deals.

Most, if not all, of my deals come from the Coupon Deals group on BBC. So a big thanks to you girls for the help.

On to the money stuff............

~~Save .50 on Heinz Vinegar It is a bricks coupon so have your printer ready. You can print it twice. You also have to fill out your information so use your spam email account.

~~April Coupons at Coupons.com It looks like there are 101 available this month.

~~Don't forget that last month's P&G easy saver coupons expired last night so reload new coupons on your store cards here. These coupons are good until June 30. Remember, you can stack these with other coupons. Normally, you can only use 1 Store Coupon and 1 Manufacturer's coupon on each item.
*For example, you go to the store and buy 1 8 pack of Duracell batteries. They are on sale at Safeway for $5.99. There is a Safeway coupon in this week's flier for $2 off. Combine that with an P&G insert coupon for .50 ($1 if your store doubles) and the $1 P&G Easy Saver coupon on your Safeway card brings your total for an 8 pack of Duracell batteries to $2.49 ($1.99 if your store doubles or even down to $1.40 if you have 10% savings on your card). That is a pretty good deal on Duracell, especially when just about everything needs batteries.

~~Get a coupon for $1 off any 1 package of any Oscar Mayer Deli Creations sandwich when you sign up for Kraft First Taste. It is bricks coupon but can only print 1.