Dollar Store Demise

With much publicity, Dollar Tree announced an across the board quarter mark-up to all items.  Some are worth 25 cents more, like the low dose Nature Garden Sleep Aid that prompted my visit but I couldn't find.  Other items probably aren't worth the dollar.  Pundits place the shoppers in two genres.  One group are people trying to get by who just cannot spend supermarket prices on certain staples, school supplies, snacks, and OTC remedies.  Others are people like me with ample funds who just enjoy puttering around, selecting bargains with no restraint, and counting the total as I go.  

This visit rather alienated me.  Profit margins must be strained, cashiers at a minimum with no self-cashier, shelves empty, an image of grunge with toiletries and OTC section strewn across the shelves.  Snacks, which I shouldn't be eating, no longer included the small boxes of cheap pastries, replaced by those two-packs of cake or buns that you get at the gas stations during road trip stops.  No longer bargain.  No longer fun.

Didn't Last Long

Staying at home for Covid-19 safety seems to be transitioning from what we do to an analysis phase that should generate a fair number of PhDs over a number of social and biological sciences.  I still cope with boredom mode at times.  Early in the pandemic I would go to stores, not that I needed anything beyond  but at least there were people milling around and I could protect myself with recommended public isolation measures while there.  Over time I stopped, partly for waning interest, partly for shift to online shopping for the few things I really needed or wanted other than groceries, and partly for an observation that the stores had less on their shelves to look at.

But now we emerge, with a real trip planned within a few days.  What better time to visit the Dollar Store even though I really didn't need anything.  I wanted to get away prepared.  I already have enough grooming products.  Can never go wrong with another set of $1 ear buds.  I really needed another cannister of coffee creamer.  But most of my $13 total went to munchies which I hoped would last for the ride to the Poconos but didn't.

Among my great successes these past few months has been modifying my diet to promote weight reduction.  No squishy bread, potato chips, 2 liter soda bottles, or cookies, though an occasional treat of a Big Gulp from a convenience store.  These happen to be the very items that Dollar General can purchase in bulk for a song in order to retail for a dollar.  Sardines at least have protein.  Unfortunately only one brand had a kosher certification, unusually absent on canned fish, so I only got one can, which turned out a great disappointment bordering on disgust.  Then Mrs. Freshley's discounted donuts and yodels, each packaged as four reasonably generous servings per box.  The amount of fig newtons that you can get for a dollar has gone way down so I got a package.  And fruit bars and discounted cheese crackers, all kosher certified as dairy and all pretty much consumed in three sittings.  Nothing to take on the trip unless I return for a refill, which I won't.  Weigh-in weekly on Mondays.  See if lasted longer than I though at the next session before I travel.