I am dead myself, Hil. Dead. I'm fiddling with emailing in working from home...

I made that call last night, except for the not working part.

Rabbit Grand National - it's Britain vs. Sweden.

I feed a family of 4 on $100 a week in ingredients (and could do it on less), but would be hard-pressed to feed them for 2 days in restaurants for $100. Go team cooking!

I think the cost/meal goes down the more you cook, though, because you build up a pantry. If I had to buy staples/base ingrdients (oil, vinegar, spices, etc) new every time, cooking could easily wind up costing more than takeout. Not a "reasonable restaurant meal," but definitely more than ordering Chinese food.

See see if I care. Wait, I'm being paid to care. Oh well.

Eh. I say that you don't have to care, you just need to get it done.

Yeah, when I'm putting together my grocery lists, most of the things I buy each week are vegetables, and the rest of the meal comes from pantry stuff that I just replace when I run out.

A friend of mine is married to an Egyptian citizen, and I sent an email to her letting her know I was thinking of his family in Cairo. This is what L wrote her SiL reported:

Its been "f"ed up seriously, his sister said, L you can never dream of this type of situation. What you see on the news it is true and accurate. Men Citizens protecting women and children. Taking the law into their own hands. She said, she can't believe how the people of Egypt are banding together. Makes her cry of hope for her country. One night all you could hear were gun shots all night. They were sleeping on the floor. No internet. We can call on land line. It is wild. Really, the Christians want that pres. to stay in power for protection.

My problem with groceries is twofold. One, things are rarely sold in amounts for a single person/meal (and when they are it's expensive!) and two, I'm not usually home lOng enough to eat leftovers. So stuff goes to waste. I budget $150 a month for groceries--but a lot of that is ready to eat or frozen. I budget more for eating out--and my employer pays for a lot of meals!

meara - your problem with groceries is my problem. Well, particularly the first part.

I have that problem, too, meara. I also live in a food desert and take public transportation.

I spend about $60/week for one person and one cat-- and I do end up having stuff go bad before I can cook it. I am also never home.

Hey all. I had Lulu put to sleep this morning. She declined sharply over the weekend. I know it was the right thing to do, but I just can't believe she's not here in the apartment anymore. My friend Jim insisted on being there with me the whole time, because he was there the day I picked her up from the animal shelter in 1998, and they have been BFFs ever since.

My vet's office was marvelous. I can't say enough good things about them.

I posted a bunch of pictures of Lulu on Facebook just now, and I realized there's one of Casper hugging her, when she was just a tiny thing. Classic.

I'm taking the rest of the day off work, because I can.