I generally consider myself a pretty money savvy gal. I hate to pay full price for things and it literally makes me cringe to think when I find out that I could have bought something for less. 95% of the time I use coupons at the grocery and drug stores and I peruse slickdeals and the savings blogs (to make sure I’m getting the best deal) before I make a purchase. I’m not shy to barter or ask for a discount and I always shop through one of the cash back sites like ebates or shopathome when I’m making an online purchase.
But sometimes (probably about 5% of the time) convenience overrides frugality.
And this Thursday was a prime example of that! So here goes (brace yourself), This thanksgiving my family had a beautiful meal from…Boston Market. Yup, that’s right, I purchased $100 worth of Thanksgiving heat and serve, “fast food” from Boston Market and warmed it up in the microwave (yes I’m laughing to myself as I type that). After a long couple of weeks, I was too stressed and too tired to fool with Thanksgiving cooking.
Long story, short, Tuesday night in a fit of panic I almost had a meltdown because I couldn’t get our stove, “streak free”. Normally, I’m pretty relaxed, and don’t care much about a streaky stove, but Tuesday night all of the stress from the previous weeks seemed to culminate in a massive freak out (ask poor Eric, I almost cried at 1am as I googled “natural cleaning recipes to clean a black stove”).
I’ve been pretty quiet for the past couple of weeks because our kitty Liam took a dramatic turn for the worse and we ended up having to put him to sleep (RIP my little love). Since then I haven’t really felt like blogging, or cleaning or cooking. So the thought of my family coming into town to our dirty house, followed by a day of massive cooking and cleaning, pretty much pushed my to my breaking point.
Sadly, I had most of the food I needed to make the Thanksgiving meal, including a frozen turkey breast. Thanks to my, “mad couponing skillz” I probably could have bought the rest of the ingredients to make the whole meal for $20 or less. But the thought of spending all day cooking was too much.
Thanks to the wonder of the Internets, I ordered a turkey breast, mashed potatoes, gravy and the whole shebang then went to bed (streaky stove and all).
When I picked up my parents at LaGuardia the next morning, I told them they were in for a, “real treat” because they wouldn’t have to eat my cooking. Instead, I’d ordered a delicious, “catered meal” (wink). Neither of them had eaten Boston Market before (they live in rural Maine) and both agreed the meal was delicious.
So thank you to Boston Market for helping me retain my sanity and thank you to Eric and my parents for understanding that it’s not what you eat, but who you’re with on Thanksgiving that matters!
Have you ever bought Thanksgiving, instead of making it (even if it was more expensive)?
Full disclosure: I don’t really like to cook and this isn’t the first time I’ve avoided cooking on Thanksgiving. A couple of years ago Eric and I went to our favorite Indian restaurant on Thanksgiving (Yes, I’m very thankful for a partner in crime who doesn’t really like turkey, and doesn’t care that I’m not a great cook ;-))