Cool Weather!

The last few days have been rainy and cool, so I decided last night was a good night to check out the usual spots. I stopped at each of the three grocery stores that I frequent and one of the pharmacies. I immediately spotted loads of stuff and was thrilled to find that everything was still cold to the touch! I'm glad I went because each spot had either something on my wish list or a random gem. Here's the list:

2 cucumbers
4 zucchini
3 squash
4 potatoes
1 sweet potato
1 onion
5lb bag naval oranges
5lb bag red grapefruit
1 qt. Simply Lemonade
20 cans diet Dr. Pepper
8 pack Yoplait pomegranate-blackberry and blueberry yogurt
4 pack store brand vanilla yogurt
2 10oz. pkgs Sara Lee roast beef
3 tubes sticky buns
24 oz. block medium cheddar cheese
8oz block Kraft Monterray Jack
10pk Sargento Vermont sharp white cheddar cheese sticks
8oz pkg shredded sharp cheddar
18oz jar apricot preserves
16oz jar maraschino cherries
12oz jar Marie's chunky bleu cheese dressing
pkg honey wheat rolls
pkg Hawaiian sweet bread
1lb box macaroni noodles
1lb Blue Bonnet margarine

Medium women's Columbia coat... wtf?

Most of the stuff was especially dirty with lots of other food residue on it; garbage trucks had been the day before and the bins were empty when they took out trash that day, so everything was just getting thrown in together and lots of their containers broke. One bin had tons of yogurt, juice, milk, soymilk and such, but the individual yogurt cups had broken all over everything. Fortunately, the large packs were in tact, kept cold and protected from the yucky by the cartons they were in. The salsa and cherries were part of cases that had been dropped and the other jars were smashed and all over everything. I would have gotten a few more jars, but one poke through my gloves from the tiny shards of glass was enough to convince me that one good jar is enough for now; after all, there will ALWAYS be more tomorrow....

One thing I noticed that concerned me were several bottles of salad dressing, oils, packages of deli foods and other items had obviously been opened and poured out, a practice that my stores don't typically employ.. I'm not sure if the manager that night was just being extra thorough in policy practice, if they are starting a new policy of opening packages before throwing out (like many corporate stores do) or if an employee was just screwing around on the clock... I definitely hope that they are not enforcing this practice because not only does it ruin that particular item, it spills out all over everything and ruins whatever else may be salvageable, resulting in a nasty, mucky mess that even I am reluctant to dig through.

The notion of dumpster diving immediately turns off most people because it conjures images of landfills and domestic household waste when the truth is that most of the time, food is put in boxes and bags separate from other waste before making it to the dumpster. All I(you) have to do is open it up and take it.