Why? Because I can.

Did Friday really arrive… and zip right by already?? That’s insane! We woke up yesterday morning to find we had no internet. Thank goodness for smart phones these days!!! I don’t ask for much in life, but DON’T take away my internet! I rebooted the computer, the modem, the router – nothing. Off to work and I’ll worry about it later. 3:07 finally rolled around – this app makes you wait 24 hours to the MINUTE – and my phone acted up, froze, anything to prevent me from doing what I needed to do. GRRR… 10 MINUTES later I finally had my coupon. Hopped on Staples website to try and “use” the coupon – if it’s valid it will error and say you can only use it in store. If it had said it had been used already, I was just going to cry. It was valid!

By the way, there is a great thread on SD that tells you all you need to know about the Staples app. You can find that here: http://slickdeals.net/f/4047718-Staples-App-Thread?t=4047718

I got home to find… no internet! Screw it – I went to Staples instead.

When I finally did call Comcast later, I had a lovely conversation with the rep over there. Nothing is wrong with our cable signal – it was the BRAND NEW router. A hard reset (and starting from scratch) fixed that and we are now back online. While I was on the phone with the rep, I had him explain the difference between DOCSIS 1.0, 2.0, and 3.0. We were running 1.0 and I had him swap that out for a 2.0 modem. We just have the economy internet and 3.0 would be pointless for us right now. Good to know. Our first modem was free after rebate and the one we were running we got on Freecycle after the first one died. The “new” one is something I picked up at a yard sale for 7.00. Our modem expenses have been QUITE affordable over the years.  ;)

Oh… but you came here to read about Staples, right? Sorry…

Don’t panic! Not all of this was for us!

We used a 25.00 off 75.00 coupon that I will split across the two machines to be fair. We also used the 50% off break room app coupon that took 50% off… EVERYTHING! I’ll post the whole transaction, then break down each individual person’s items for my own record. It’s so easy for me to post this stuff on my blog to reference later.

Note: we bought so much french roast decaf because this is on clearance for 5.50 – 50%!

8 French Roast Decaf: 44.00

6 Donut House: 71.94

2 French Vanilla: 23.98

2 Nantucket Blend: 23.98

2 Columbian Decaf: 23.98

1 Breakfast Blend: 11.99

1 Hazelnut: 11.99

1 Butter Toffee: 11.99

1 Donut House Decaf: 11.99

1 Revv: 11.99

2 Keurig Office Pro: 259.98 (pending 50.00 rebate)

Minus 25.00 off 75.00

Minus 50%: 253.94  *gasp*

Plus 7.32 tax

Total OOP: 236.19

Pending rebates: 50.00

That was quite a rush…

Here’s the breakdown per person:  (will only matter to a few)

Friend #1: 1 Keurig, 8 coffee: 62.87  (discounted by 25.00 since we get the rebate)

Friend #2: 6 coffee: 35.97

Friend #3: 3 coffee: 17.98

Us: 1 Keurig, 8 coffee: 119.37 with 50.00 pending rebates

After playing around with the two cameras we bought last night, we determined that one was a better fit for us than the other. Since the rebate was limit 3 – off to Staples to pick up a second M23! Dave’s mother already staked claim on the camera we don’t want… before we’d even voted it out. That one will be heading to her and we all get great deals on cameras!

I found it funny we came up with *exactly* 75.00 worth of items to purchase. Can’t get more perfect than that with a 25.00/75.00 coupon. We opted for more clearanced k-cups and Dave needed a small lined journal to jot down some ideas.

Kodak M23: 52.50  (pending 25.00 rebate)

4 French Roast Decaf k-cups: 22.00

Journal: 0.50

Minus 25.00/75.00 q

Plus 2.21 tax

Total OOP: 52.21

Pending rebate: 25.00

My new camera is charging now and I can’t wait to try it out later!

I’m just having one of those days where I feel like nothing is going right. I think it’ll be a miracle if I even get this blog post up. ARGH!!  It doesn’t help that this is the first time I’m posting from my recently moved blog – now in wordpress. I spent almost all day trying to make some changes to our network: set up the new router, reconfigure everything, reclaim my 2 tb drive from the server, etc. The router was a nightmare, reconfiguring things is going along well, but I have apparently stumped the internet on my 2 tb drive problem. All I want to do is figure out how to reformat it OUT of zfs… and into something Windows can use. No luck yet. I feel like I’m stuck with a brand new brick.  :(

Even one of the Staples transactions made my head spin! I’m afraid to even look at the receipt…

Seriously – I went to Staples to buy THREE things. See what I mean about the day being out of whack?

I had 78.00 in rewards to play with, a 5.00 off 25.00 q, and a 25.00 off 75.00 q. The plan was to pick up the usb drive and the photo paper and call it good. Then I found out about the decaf k-cups for 5.50 – and our store had a ton of them! We didn’t even buy them all. We tossed in a few of the sweet tea for variety – these were marked down because they’re past their expiration day. We sure don’t care about that.

I really CAN’T make heads or tails out of the 2nd transaction. We ended up paying 0.12 less than we probably should have and I have no idea what happened. The tea didn’t override correctly and after 4 attempts at adjusting things we called it close enough. Yes, I’m aware that using the coupon will decrease the rewards we get back for the usb drive and we are ok with that.

1st transaction:

7 Green Mountain French Roast decaf: 38.50

2 Celestial Seasoning iced tea: 11.98

2 Staples photo paper: 19.98  (pending 19.98 rebate)

2 Puffs 3 pack tissues: 4.20

Memo board: 0.50

Minus 25.00 off 75.00

Minus 50.16 rewards

Total OOP: 0.00

Pending rebates: 19.98

Remaining rewards: 27.84

2nd transaction:

2 Celestial Seasonings iced tea

usb drive (pending rewards)

Plus tax

Minus 5.00 off 25.00

Total OOP: 20.77

Pending rewards: 6.72?

We were QUITE happy with all the k-cups we brought home! Nice use of rewards.