What's In Your Wallet?

One of the things I love about Jason is how he shops around for everything. Whether it is a computer component, a camera, or book, he is always researching how he get the most for his (and now our) money. (He is apparently rubbing off on me-- I spent several hours the other night looking for the best garment steamer that I could buy with leftover giftcards from the wedding.)

But what cracks me up about this is his obsession with finding the “best” credit card. You know, the one that offers the most cash back or other perks. While I think cash back is great and that we should get some, that is all I have to say on the subject.  I am pretty sure Jason, on the other hand, thinks about it constantly.  Just today he sent me the following g-chat:

Jason: http://money.cnn.com/galleries/2009/moneymag/0907/gallery.credit_cards.moneymag/6.html
we have two cards in this list
and the only other good card in it is the penfed one

Me: that’s good

What else could I say?! But at least I can sleep well knowing my credit cards...they're working for me!

Don't Drink the Water

Lately Jason has taken to compulsively using our Brita water filter. He, of course, drinks its filtered water (which makes sense). He uses it to water the plants.  And this morning he used it to fill a pot up with water to poach some eggs for breakfast.  As I watched him fill the coffee maker with freshly filtered water I said “I think we could probably use the tap water, you know.”

His reply?

“We have to get rid of the chlorine. And the fluoride. And the government mind control.”

I think he was kidding about that last part.

But I am not totally sure.

A Matter of Taste

Anyone who knows Jason knows that he can be very opinionated. And he’s not afraid to voice his opinions on a given topic….sometimes at great length. Recently, he’s been opining on the evils of high fructose corn syrup. He’s concerned about its health effects of course but also has a strong dislike for the corn lobby as a whole. After listening to him go on and on about his concerns for the umpteenth time one morning over breakfast, I finally told him to put up or shut up. You see Jason is the resident pancake-maker in our little family (generally making them for us to eat one breakfast a week) and loves nothing more than dousing his hot-off-the-griddle pancakes with good ol’ Aunt Jemima Pancake Syrup. Let’s take a look at the ingredients, shall we?

 As you probably could have guessed the stuff is pretty much entirely high-fructose corn syrup!  No maple syrup (or even maple flavoring for that matter) in sight….no wonder they have to sell it as “pancake syrup.”  Which is why I told him that if he really thought HFCS was evil then maybe he should stop his blatant consumption of it. To show my support, I even bought him his very own bottle of pure Vermont maple syrup for Valentine’s Day (so romantic, I know).

Well apparently he actually listened and now he’s on a roll, determined to rid his life of as much high-fructose corn syrup as is possible. Next on his hit list---ginger ale.  We generally limit our soda intake to the occasional restaurant, but Jason likes to stock our fridge with those mini cans of ginger ale (a work week treat when water for dinner just won’t do). Of course as with most sodas, the typical ginger ale is chock full of the dreaded HFCS. However, a number of companies are starting to make sodas with cane sugar as well and Jason decided to make it his mission to find an “all natural” ginger ale. After a quick trip to the local Whole Foods (our usual grocery store left us empty-handed), we came home with a six-pack of their 365 ginger ale and the idea to do our own version of the Pepsi Challenge: a blind taste test pitting the traditional HFCS ginger ale (In this case Seagram’s Ginger Ale) versus a cane sugar version.

The verdict? We could definitely tell the difference between the two. Not so much on a sweetness level (we both thought they were equally sweet), but more on a ginger-flavored level. The Seagram’s brand was a bit “softer” (for lack of a better description) than the 365 brand which had a bit more zing. And while we may prefer that softer bite now, it’s probably because that is what we are used to tasting.  Honestly, we drink the stuff so infrequently that the hardest thing about making the switch will likely be saying goodbye to the mini cans (we're partial to the portion control). Now if I could just find an all natural, zero calorie drink (other than water, of course)....