We went down to do our fortnightly (that's 2 weeks for my US readers) grocery shopping today.
As I was loading up the car at the end - admittedly a little bit of a squish since I forgot about the things in the back when I went out - a man walked past me and said "you need to get yourself a bigger truck darling". My response, "nah, it fits fine thanks". Huh? Why would I get a bigger car for my once a fortnight shopping trip, and considering my car had Nathan's bike, a stroller and a scooter, plus a few bags of other things, I think it was way big enough - afterall we managed to go away for a 10 day road trip with the use of a roof storage box to help out - I think I could have fitted another 2 weeks of shopping in somewhere else if I needed to!
We then drive over to the service station with our discount voucher from the supermarket and I couldn't believe my eyes to see that the price had risen 3 cents a litre from the time I'd driven past it an hour prior. We're now sitting at $1.918 ($1.51 USD).
So to the guy in the carpark, WHY would I want to a/ bother upgrading a car, forking out more $$ when petrol is getting so spendy that I will soon be cutting back my driving even further, and b/ get a bigger "truck" (I only have a little 1.5 litre wagon) only to have my $$ go less distance.
And as for food prices - well, we're doing OK so far I guess and I'm still maintaining our budgeted amount. We're not too much affected as yet (aside from dairy prices and needing to cut back on how much cheese I buy, and I now only buy milk powder), but I do wonder if because we buy only basics and mostly whole foods that those things haven't dramatically risen to be noticeable (we don't eat a lot of rice or pasta). Of course, over the past year I've been skimming the shopping list where I can. Meat purchases are now reduced to minced beef only which we eat twice a week (and we had 2 sheep in our freezer from a family friend's farm which we are slowly going through).
2 comments:
My thinking is opposite to yours! Not on the car front though! On basic food. I think we are noticing the pinch because it is the staples that have increased - milk, butter, cheese, eggs. If we ate margarine and biscuits full of hydrogenated oils and prepackaged meals we wouldn't be quite so affected!!!
That is the weird thing though - although the prices have risen I haven't really noticed it?? Maybe it's things like dropping the extra 1kg of cheese at $10 a pop over a fortnights shopping that kind of soaks up the difference - actually, we only buy 1 doz of eggs now too (and no chicky eggs atm) instead of 2. We also don't buy marg or biscuits etc, so I guess you're right, only it's been a slow transition and perhaps that's the key and why I feel good about doing all this now instead of when the S really HTF. Less traumatic than those who have just lived as they always have and then suddenly feel it so much more.
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