It's Not Easy Being Green

Last week, I visited an Aldi's grocery store. It was the second time I've been there (the first being last year, at which time I was not impressed, as they did not carry many items that my family uses consistantly.) This time I brought my kids, and we found $50.00 worth of off-brand alternatives to our usual grocery list. (The thought just occurred to me: did I find more out of necessity? Were my mind's eyes opened by the change in our financial status with me being out of work recovering from my back injury and related migraines, compounded by fears regarding our current economy?) Regardless, at check-out, I saw them: huge cloth grocery bags! It was then that I realized that I am a Go Green Grocery Bag Whore.

I can't explain the allure of these cloth bags. Maybe it's that they rarely cost more than a dollar. Maybe they remind me vaguely of those huge cloth bags by Guess that were all the rage in high school in the early 90's. Maybe it's the illusion that I'm doing something good for the environment (I'm not; these bags will never be returned to a store to be used instead of paper or plastic.) Maybe it's just one of those things that I'm destined to unintentionally collect, like the cups that I'm continually culling from our cupboards, I don't know. What I do know is that off the top of my head I own a minimum of 4 Anoka County Library bags, 2 Half Price Books bags, 2 Cub bags, 2 Walmart bags and now, 3 Aldi's bags. I guess I'll just focus on the silver lining: I can always use one of the bags to...store the rest of the bags.