Shopping

I'm not a fan of shopping for non-food items but sometimes I need to.  I came back from London on the tube to Epping which is a bit posher than the town I live in so better quality in the charity shops.  I was particularly looking for a bright loose cotton top to wear to an Andre Rieu concert. Nothing in 4 charity shops but I did find a beautiful red dress for £7 which is more than I normally pay but it is for a special holiday later this year - a cruise to Norway.

I also found 2 books for 50p and an as new hippo glove puppet for £1 all for GD.  I decided to get the bus home and checked the timetable and number of the bus. Along it came so showed my bus pass and stated my destination. I was waved inside as no need for a ticket. After a while I realized this bus was going to Ongar a very small town not my town. Never mind I thought as I have been meaning to check the charity shops out there anyway.  There was only one there and very overpriced so I just bought a book for £1 and went home. At least I know no point in going there again.

These are my purchases.

I still didn't have a top to wear with my new black trousers though so had a trawl round town on Friday afternoon. I looked in every possible shop both new and charity and nothing cotton, bright and in my size until Matalan and then not really what I wanted but bright red and cotton and at special price of £5. So at least I could get away from the shops then and get back to cooking and gardening.

Animals are amazing!

We had a sad event last week when one of DD's beloved greyhounds had to be put to sleep. Although she felt he wasn't going to have a long life this was quite sudden due to kidney failure. On Monday he had his usual walk and dip in the river and about 6pm ran in happily when called from the garden but an hour later he was panting and kept moving about to get comfortable. As he has arthritis we thought it might be that. Then about 10pm he suddenly threw up and seemed more comfortable after that. As soon as we saw him the next morning we knew he was very ill and we had to carry him out to the car on a quilt to get to the vet's. They kept him and rang a couple of hours later to say there was nothing they could do so we went to say our goodbyes very sadly.

The amazing thing is daughter remembered he had been eating a plant in my garden a few days earlier. It was golden rod and he had never eaten it before so she was worried it may have been poisonous. It isn't but is medicinal and especially good for the kidneys. We didn't know that until we looked it up but Nugget did. It is still used today in herbal treatments.

Nugget is in the blue collar snuggled up to Poppy. She was a lost soul without him but is settling down now. We are just glad that Nugget who was a retired racer and adopted 5 years ago, did not suffer too long and had a happy life with DD.

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A bargain

After a few stressful days trying to get DB's repeat prescription from the pharmacy, I ended up at Asda at 8pm to pick it up ready for the next morning. It wasn't quite ready so I had a wander to the reduced section and as nothing there had a look to see if any fruit or veg reduced. Couldn't see anything at first then noticed some big boxes with yellow stickers. They were boxes of wonky veg reduced from £3.60 to 20p! I staggered with one to the check-out and decanted the contents into my shopping trolley which fortunately I had taken as I walk there.

The cashiers were very surprised and I told them plenty more there if they wanted to make soup. The reply was they couldn't be bothered. Well I could. The contents were sweet potatoes, carrots, a huge swede, a white cabbage, 3 peppers, leeks and new potatoes. I had to throw a sweet potato and a few carrots but still very good value.

My freezer now contains several portions of soupe au chou from Delia's frugal food. That is bacon and white cabbage soup. I had some and it is really nice. I also made a large box of coleslaw with carrot, cabbage and leek. The rest has been used in various meals. So at least something good came out of the prescription mix up.