Yesterday involved my weekly trip to the supermarket. Since my car is off the road I cycle the ~30-mile round trip. It's quite satisfying in the challenge of lugging back the many kilograms of groceries in my panniers (that and not buying too much to fit in them). There's usually at least one brief window of dry weather each week within which to accomplish this feat.

The trip there on this occasion was met with a puncture due to it being the time of year when the farmers scalp their hedges and leave the shrapnel strewn across the road. I got a similar puncture on a day last week too...

Luckily this farmer's gate proved to be the ideal place from which
to hang my bike while I addressed the flat.

I'd have thought it would take me only five minutes to swap an innertube but it actually took closer to fifteen; one has to be sure to check for remaining thorns lest the replacement tube gets promptly punctured and you're left up shit creek without a paddle, so to speak. Also, pro tip; keep some needle-nosed pliers in your tool kit for extracting said thorns (they can be small and tricky).

Anyway, once successfully at Lidl I got on with my week's shop which included grabbing a chocolate-filled advent calendar (it's cheaper to buy them a few days in rather than days before), what was supposed to be a free chocolate Santa by way of the Lidl Plus app, and what were supposed to be half-priced English muffins. More on these things in a moment.

Once back outside the shop I met this awesome doggo:

The owner exclaimed as he leashed it to the post:
"...a short leash so you don't pee on those Christmas trees, because I know you will..."

Anyway, once home with my hoard I discovered that I had ended up paying for the chocolate Santa due to missing the small print in the app:

I only spent £30.

This and the [less than flattering description of the checkout person] had scanned through the muffins at full price (this happens from time to time due to the reduced label not always being placed over the main barcode). I was only saved here a little by way of an app coupon for 20% (13p) off. Some things I just don't buy at full price. Ho-hum.

The app offers and coupons have their annoyances from time-to-time, such as presenting a pretend scratch card which you have to virtually scratch before it tells you "you've won" 15% off some still over-priced nonsense that I have no interest in. But sometimes there's actual free things, like vegetables.

Since I got my smart phone this time last year and I signed up to the Lidl Plus app, I've been keeping track of my savings each week in a spreadsheet. They amount to 6%, or a total of ~£60. This coupled with the two times ebay has given me money for installing and using their app (I remove it straight after) and my phone has almost paid for itself. But with this week's shop, using the app technically cost me £1.99 because I wouldn't have paid that much for the 150g chocolate Santa, again, it's cheaper to buy them a few days after Christmas rather than in the days before.

Anyway, I think that's all for now. I'll save more to say about my phone another day...