Jewel-Osco stores will be sold to a consortium of investors led by Cerberus Capital Management, Jewel’s parent Supervalu said Thursday.

The deal, valued at $3.3 billion, also includes the Albertsons, Acme, and Shaw stores.
The announcement ends months of speculation that all or parts of the troubled grocery chain would be sold to New York-based Cerberus, an investment firm. Supervalu acquired Jewel in 2006 as part of a larger, complex acquisition of the Albertsons company.

Read the entire article from the Chicago Tribune here.

Goddess predicted this when Cerberus announced they were selling their Freedom Group, freeing up a whole buncha cash.  Cerberus bought firearms maker Bushmaster in 2006 and later merged it with other gun companies to form Freedom Group.  So what’s more wholesome than a gun group?  Well, anything, actually, but grocery stores have to be right up there.

Got a call from a friend much earlier today who drove by a PetSmart and saw employees dumping out case after case of dog treats, specifically Waggin Tails and Canyon Creek.  I immediately pulled up the voluntary recall notice, which basically said that the chicken jerky was found to have traces of an antibiotic not approved for use in this country, although it’s approved for EU use (it’s also approved for use in China, but we won’t go there).

Here’s a quote from the Washington Post and the link for the complete article:

Milo’s Kitchen said there is no known health risk associated with the antibiotics, but their presence means the products don’t meet its standards. It said the chemicals “should not be present in the final food product.”

The recalls come after the New York State Department of Agriculture detected the antibiotics in samples of the companies’ products. Purina said that the regulator asked that its affected products be pulled from stores in New York.

We’re doing the road trip today and Monday – wake today, funeral tomorrow – for the wife of an ex-neighbor.  Saying ex-neighbor doesn’t sound very close, but funeral for a friend was already taken.

She actually died just after Christmas, but apparently that’s a popular enough time that things were delayed until now {insert obligatory dying to get in joke here}.

DH and FirstBorn were asked to be pall bearers.  DH looked upon this as a buying opportunity (I need a new suit!) while FirstBoarn was more concerned with zombies and bodies faling out of coffins (what do you tell those kids, anyway, Rachel asks?  Hey, it’s not my fault ’cause you just never know what will stick)..

So now we’re driving along and I have no Diet Coke!  DH and FirstBorn say Drink Water.  Seriously?   People pee in that stuff, so no thank you.  They’ll have to pull over at a Speedway ’cause there is no way I’m going through this thing uncaffeinated…  Family insists I will be talking for a couple of hours there about coupons – not likely since this town only has a dollar store – put in a CVS or Walgreens and they’d call it a mall.

Wake had pound cake, cookies, pound cake, cookies…and a small tray of veggies.  Was surprised to see that the sweets had Dominicks labels on them, since the g-daughter is a baker.  She said people were calling, asking what they could bring.  You couldn’t have said hoagies?  But it was getting dark and we were hungry, so stopped for dinner at a diner.  Meant to cut off FirstBorn’s head (in the picture!) because my little petunia hates that Christmas sweater as being too bold.  Got a chocolate malt  and took it back to the car.  Pay attention now, ’cause this is the quiz part.

While driving back, DH made a “turn” and my Diet Coke tipped over.  It was mostly empty, so I grabbed and offered it to PITA.  The malt had about a quarter left, kept nice and steady between my legs…which, as it was a cardboard product, decided to decompose and escape.  One entire pack of wipes – cold, wet, nasty wipes – was yanked from the glovebox in a vain attempt to mop up the damage.  Which only served to make my butt even colder and wetter.  DH:  “You know we’re taking your car tomorrow.  You know that, don’t you?  Why do you always have to make a mess and your daughter is just like you.”  Although that last part is kinda weird because I don’t know who else she would take after…

I don’t really have to worry about us taking my car tomorrow because I hold the ultimate weapon:  Sirius Broadway.  My car = my tunes.  And there’s no way he will sit there for an hour while PITA and I belt out hit after hit.  Or even plug in the phone to screech to The Book of Mormon – HELLO!

If you are not yet aware, Google has gone stone-cold crazy, showing the Danger: Malware Ahead! warning in bold when you try to print coupons, visit sites, or do anything a normal couponing/blog-reading person would.  There is NO malware and the only way to access pages is to use that Advanced link and click the Proceed at your risk button.  Seriously, there is NOTHING wrong with us, it’s just Google messing up.

the Goddess feels that Google having a temper tantrum over making a large settlement to the Feds.  toddlers…sigh

So DH’s relatives come in from out-of-town…way out of town.  Met them for brunch yesterday and spent the day at Yorktown – – shopping retail.  The person who said shopping is therapy was in need of same.  Get booted out when they close the Mall and DH gets the bright idea to invite them all to the house.  They have plans (thank you, Jesus), but tomorrow works.

I’ve mentioned *cough* in the past that I’m kinda flexible when it comes to cleaning.  Yes, I’ll do the laundry on a daily basis and run the dishwasher and stuff, but the rest?  Before now, the surface of the dining room table was only family legend.  So today I get up, run a couple of loads of laundry, run the dishwasher, make a couple of boxes of chocolate chip cookies, large pot of chai tea ’cause it’s friggin’ cold out, large Dutch oven of scalloped potatoes and ham, large pot of shredded chicken for tacos and snacky-type stuff.

Cars pulled into the driveway about 3 — so I went upstairs to get dressed.  Yes, it was that kind of day.  Come downstairs to DH telling them how he’s the only one who cleans the house.  Then asks where we keep the pots (that would be the pot rack hanging from the ceiling).  He also has cooking delusions, so I just tell people he’s going for the triple and the next claim will be that he can fly.  Updates at 10.s

But everything went smoothly up until I cut my thumb slicing french bread and Hello Kitty bandaids didn’t help much.  It worked out well because then i was done with prep work since none of the foods contained tomato sauce…

But everything went well and we all had a good time with a large fire in the fireplace and  burn pit  and the aforementioned food.  Oh, and lots and lots and lots of booze.  ‘cause they’ll forgive you anything if there’s enough booze in them.

So Happy New Year to you all and tomorrow we’ll get back on track.

Today we’ll be spending time (hopefully without cutting our throats) at the Shedd Aquarium, using the recent Groupon that includes Jellies.  While I’m gone, here’s a repeat of the deranged.me Holiday Greetings from last month for those of you who might have missed it.  Even if you watched it before, watch it again, ’cause it took me way too much time to make!

Click the picture or here.  I’d forgotten how funny JibJab could be. You can design and send your own Holiday emails, too.  And yes, I spent waaaaay too much time on this…

In today’s mail I got the $10 Domino’s gift card I bought on December 3 using my Coke Rewards AND my coupon for one FREE Wholly product from Wholly Guacamole from ????

On the Wholly Guacamole Facebook page (for December 5), they had this offer:

we had such a blast last year decorating with your christmas cards that we decided to do it again this year!
send us a card, we’ll send you a BOGO coupon worth about $7! send us a card to get your holiday guac on!

– MUST be postmarked by Dec 21
– MUST have a self address & stamped envelope inside (or we can’t mail you your coupon)

300 Burlington Rd
Saginaw, TX 76179

Here’s another recipe that’s simple to make, but costs an arm and a leg at the Supermercado:  Pork carnitas.  While you could theoretically make this in the slow cooker for the first part, it’s easier to do the whole thing in the oven.

Start with a big old hunk of pork, the fattier the better.  This usually means cheap bottom roasts.  If you have a boneless roast or one with a bone that you can easily divide, then split the whole piece so it’s only half as high.  In this case, my husband bought a very large roast with a bone right in the middle, so I just extended the cooking times.  I prefer to use cast iron because it’s a very even heat distribution, but any shallow baking pan would do.  Pour enough oil on the bottom so that the pieces won’t stick and then hit it up with salt.  I’m rather liberal at this part, because I won’t add any salt at the end.  Cover the entire pan tightly with aluminum foil and put in a 375° oven for at least an hour, depending on how large and thick a roast you’re using.  The timing here isn’t really critical, so if you get involved with something else for an extra half hour – like Angry Birds – don’t sweat it.

Next you take out the roast, remove the foil and replace in the oven, increasing the temperature to about 450°.  Your meat is pretty much cooked by this time, but you want to allow the fat to dissolve and crisp up the ends.  Again, depending on how thick the roast is, you would go another hour or so – this looks like it’s gonna be another 30 minutes.  Start with the rice about now  (if you’re cooking any).

The last step is to break apart the large chunks of pork and cook for maybe 20 minutes, just to get as much crisp as you can.  Place the pieces in a shallow bowl or serving plate.  Serve with warm corn or flour tortillas, lime wedges and rice.  Salsa isn’t necessary ’cause the pork has so much flavor, but hey, if you’re a salsa kinda family, go for it.  This is a great way to warm up the house and make enough food for a couple of meals – fast and easy leftovers.

¡OLÉ!