We'll Be Having Tuna Again Tonight

Today I read the FlyLady email about "Old Condiment Syndrome." (If you've never heard of Flylady, go to http://www.flylady.net/ - I swear by her method.) This email came a day or so ago, but I wanted to give it the attention it deserved, and not just a cursory once-over, so I saved it until this afternoon when I had some time.

Anyway, the email was about having stuff in the pantry that's a bit aged. The whole "If it says 'Best if used by --fill in some date in 2005--then get rid of it!'" made me kinda curious. Did I have "Old Condiment Syndrome?" This also came on the heels of grocery shopping with kids. I usually am alone for the weekly trip up and down the aisles while the kids are at gymnastics, but that doesn't start until next week. When we got home, I was attempting to put away things, wondering "how did this get in my bag?" and not having much luck due to overflowing cabinets. So I decided to organize the pantry. Today. Now.

I have a small pantry in the kitchen for stuff that we use every day, or stuff that is opened, and a set of four double cabinets in the basement for storing extras. Well, I went to the handy dandy Internet and printed off several Pantry Inventory sheets and headed downstairs. I had loosely organized the cabinets when we first got them, into sections for jars, bottles, cans, bags, boxes and "other." (Is there an "other"?) So I began by making sure nothing overlapped the sections. I started pulling out container after container, and finally realized I had grossly overstocked our pantry. There is enough food down there to last a family of 4 for MONTHS. And yes, there were bottles and jars that had the dreaded 2005 on them...into the trash they went. To my credit, though, there weren't many of those.

I got everything arranged and began writing quantities on the inventory sheets. Near the end of this escapade, my sweet honey came home from work bearing a yummy cappucino for me. How thoughtful! I thanked him and turned back to my task. I was beginning to feel a little embarassed by the sheer amount of stuff I had purchased, and was feeling less than a good steward of our money.

I sipped my hot drink as I continued counting. Here's a little snapshot of my obsession with Buy One, Get One Free... 11 jars of peanut butter, 9 bottles of salad dressing, 18 boxes of couscous, 10 large tubs of ground coffee and 36, yes thirty-six cans of tuna. I sighed as I filled in the last of the spaces on the inventory sheets and turned to go upstairs to start dinner. I reached down to pick up a bottle of salad dressing I was taking to the kitchen , when SPLOOSH...I turned over the box that was holding my cappucino. It went everywhere, even in my shoes. I sat down on the floor and just started to cry. I was already feeling bad about tying up so much cash and real estate in food storage, and I just christened the walls with a $2 hot coffee drink.

Ah, well, in the end I did get all the pantry shelves organized, even the ones in the kitchen, and I realized with BOGO sales, I had only paid for half the stuff there. I have a little dish-hutch that holds cute bottles and cans of things which I call my "general store." That got a good dusting and rearranging, too. At least I can go to sleep tonight knowing I don't have to go to the grocery store for several weeks, and I can just read a book while the kids are in gymnastics. Or maybe I can plan menus for the month of January...heaven knows we have all the ingredients.