shopping big-time

Yesterday afternoon, I went with Patty and her mother to BJ's - one of those membership discount stores. I used to have a membership there, but found that I bought far too many large amounts of food products, which eventually went bad before I could use them. How can one person use up 8 jars of olives before the sale date? Anyway, about once a year, I go with Patty and stock up on mostly items that will keep. If you've never been to BJ's or Cosco you might have trouble imagining the store. It's huge - like a warehouse - and has primarily food products and medicines. They even have baked goods and very nice produce. Also some non-food items like TVs, electronics, clothes, books, etc. The catch with the food and drug items, is that they are all in very large packages. I bought toilet paper - 32 rolls, I think. Eight boxes of tissues. These things will keep, of course, but they did take up a bit of room to store. Since I don't have a freezer (except in the top of my fridge), I don't buy much frozen stuff or meat products. This time I rather overdid it on the frozen low-cal dinners, the Skinny Cow ice cream sandwiches, and frozen blueberries. Blueberries, as you know, are supposed to be especially good for us, but fresh ones this time of year are outrageously expensive. The frozen ones will do fine on my breakfast cereal. However, when I got home and started putting things away, I wasn't sure I would get all my frozen items into my little freezer. They made it - just barely. Guess I'd better start eating those blueberries right away!

Even before I got home, I knew I had bought too much stuff. (Actually, that idea came to me at the cash register!) My mini-van was already somewhat full of: three bags of books are going to the hospital gift shop where we sell used books; a HUGE bag of plastic bags that I can't seem to remember to return to be recycled at the grocery store; a folding chair that just stays in the car, various car related items, and at the moment, a desk! I got this very cheaply at a local thrift store where it was loaded into the back of my van. This will be my work table in my ceramics studio, if I ever get the thing out of the car and down into my basement. Hopefully, my young strong neighbor will come over one of these evenings and take it down for me. I don't mind driving around with a desk in my car, but I really would like to get in into the studio. With my car loaded up already, perhaps you can see why putting all my purchases in there too was an interesting exercise in creative stuffing. It reminded me of years ago when college students would compete to see how many people could get into a VW beetle or into a phone booth. (For younger readers: phone booths were wooden boxes that sat on street corners and contained phones that anyone could use by putting coins into a slot in the phone. I think they are found only in antique stores now.)

I walked twice yesterday - not counting the hour of wandering around BJ's. Walked through the woods and around the ponds at Patuxent Wildlife Center with my friend Bill. We don't walk very fast, as the trails through the woods are tricky - tree roots and fallen leaves. I, who am likely to trip just walking around my house, am fairly cautious walking along unpaved paths. It's a lovely walk. The trees are beginning to turn and we saw a Great Blue Heron as well as many Canada Geese. One gaggle of geese had a leader who was white - obviously a domestic goose, gone over to the wild side!

Then after our shopping expedition, Patty, her mother and I walked around my favorite lake in Columbia. It's on our way home, so it was a good choice for our evening walk. There were still a few people on the trails, but the sun was setting as we finished. That was beautiful, as we watched the sunset on the water. The yellow and brown tree leaves look golden in the setting sun. Next time I must take my camera. Not much wild life on that walk. We did see another Great Blue Heron. The white egrets seem to have gone south for the winter. I haven't seen one this week at all. I'll see them again - hundreds of them - if I get to Florida this winter.