Apparently Weird Al Yankovic and Lin Manuel Miranda are friends, which results in a very strange collaboration.

So now you can do all your shopping in one location?  Kohl’s plans to partner with Aldi to use up some of the extra space left after their slim down of stores.  Read the article here.

If you’ve ever encountered chain stores selling the same item for different prices (I’m experienced it at Target and Walgreens), this article is for you.

Forget clipping coupons and searching through the sales circulars – if the authors of a new study have their way, you could save up to 10% on your groceries just by shopping in a different part of town.

Have you ever paid more for a product in one chain store, and less for the very same product at another store in the same chain? That’s often the result of “zone pricing”, in which retailers deliberately charge different prices in different stores. You might experience it from time to time, but a couple of researchers say it doesn’t happen nearly as often as it ought to.  Read more here.

Are printable free-item coupons making a comeback? Or are brands that offer them simply setting their fans up for disappointment?  We know about the Chobani and Kind promos – now there’s a Hershey’s coupon as well.  Read the Coupons in the News article here.

Avocados have wormed their way into every nook and cranny of our psyche. Nothing and no one is safe from the fatty, green orb. They’ve overtaken bananas as the chief fruit imported by the United States, and now Britons have put their own spin on the stone fruit that’s less of a superfood and more of a sweet treat.  For the rest of the article, click here.

In a surprise deal, grocery company Albertsons has swooped in to buy the rest of the Rite Aid chain that’s not already being acquired by Walgreens. The result will be a food-and-pharmacy giant that both companies say will be a convenient, affordable arrangement for customers.

The two retailers announced their merger agreement this morning, which will see Albertsons ending up the larger partner, with a roughly 75/25 ownership split of the combined company. There’s no initial word of any Rite Aid store closings or rebrandings – on the contrary, the companies’ announcement says they will not only retain the Rite Aid name and continue to operate existing Rite Aid stores as standalone locations, but they will also rebrand Albertsons-owned grocery stores’ in-store pharmacies as Rite Aid, replacing those currently branded as Sav-on or Osco (likely prompting Albertsons’ hyphenated grocery chain Jewel-Osco to dump the second half of its name).

Apparently those giant concrete balls that line the Target front aren’t as stable as one would hope.  I always thought they used a rod drilled into the ground, not just a dab of crazy glue…watch the video, rolling, rolling, rolling.

Beginning today, shoppers in Austin, Cincinnati, Dallas and Virginia Beach will be able to place a Whole Foods order online and have it delivered within two hours. There are plans to expand the program across the country before the end of the year.

“We’re happy to bring our customers the convenience of free two-hour delivery through Prime Now and access to thousands of natural and organic groceries and locally sourced favorites,” Whole Foods CEO John Mackey said in announcing the news.  Read the rest of the article from Coupons in the News here.

… PepsiCo’s CEO suggests that the company is working on making different chips specifically for women.

In a recent episode of the Freakonomics podcast, Indra Nooyi mentioned that the soft drink and snack maker needs to make a chip that caters to the experience of snacking in public while female. In Pepsico’s view, male Dorito fiends can “lick their fingers with great glee, and when they reach the bottom of the bag they pour the little broken pieces into their mouth, because they don’t want to lose that taste,” generally snacking with enthusiasm and panache. Read the rest here.

Elon Musk’s The Boring Company is now offering personal flame throwers (fire extinguisher sold separately) with shipping this spring.  Read the official offer here.  On a side note, this guy’s cute, although with three marriages already under his belt, I wouldn’t go looking long term here…just saying.