I have a love + hate relationship with Amazon. I mostly love them, even though occasionally they do really stupid things. Anyway, I got an e-mail from them reminding me that they actually have groceries for sale. I was like… “what?”

In my mind I was imagining one of those old failed grocery services where they’ll bring stuff right to you. Milk, eggs, whatever! Well, they don’t seem to have that stuff… but they DO have just about everything else.

According to their description of Grocery beta (don’t know why it’s a freaking image):

• We offer more than 45,000 non-perishable grocery items–and our selection is growing every day
• We can ship many products for free, via Super Saver Shipping, Amazon Prime, or free standard shipping
• We have great everyday prices plus Sales & Special Offers on your favorite brands
• We make it exceptionally easy to find products you buy routinely, or to discover new items we think you’ll like

So, whatever you order you can get shipped for FREE (especially if you are a PRIME member like me), plus remember that you don’t pay any sales tax on Amazon stuff…
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Recent deaths during “Black Friday” sales give a whole other meaning to the phrase, and they illustrate how completely out of control some people are getting based on the mindless greedy rush to get a deal.

A worker at a Wal-Mart in Nassau County, N.Y. was trampled to death on Friday as a crazed crowd of shoppers broke down the door and proceeded to run right over him. The exact Wal-mart location is 77 Green Acres Rd, Valley Stream, NY‎ (at the Green Acres Mall), and here it is on a map:

A Wal-Mart worker died after being trampled when hundreds of shoppers smashed through the doors of a Long Island, New York, store Friday morning, police and witnesses said. The 34-year-old worker, employed as an overnight stock clerk, tried to hold back the unruly crowds just after the Valley Stream store opened at 5 a.m.

Witnesses said the surging throngs of shoppers knocked the man down. He fell and was stepped on. As he gasped for air, shoppers ran over and around him.

“He was bum-rushed by 200 people,” said Jimmy Overby, 43, a co-worker. “They took the doors off the hinges. He was trampled and killed in front of me. They took me down too…I literally had to fight people off my back.”

A 28-year-old pregnant woman was knocked to the floor during the mad rush. She was hospitalized for observation, police said. Early witness accounts that the woman suffered a miscarriage were unfounded, police said.

Three other shoppers suffered minor injuries, cops said.

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Today my love affair with Amazon.com diminished by a sizable notch. In one fell swoop they moved from my preferred shopping site to being on par with everyone else. It happened when I learned that Amazon.com offers customers no price protection whatsoever. And that makes it not such a good deal after all.

You see, after weeks of searching for a new printer I finally settled on the Brother MFC-9840cdw Color Laser Multi-Function Center with Wireless Interface. Basically everyone had it for $649-699, but I decided to get it from Amazon.com because they have been my favorite retailer for a while since I paid the $79 per year fee to become a member of Amazon Prime, which gives you free 2 day shipping on all your orders.

Well, even though the printer doesn’t arrive until Monday, I saw ads from two different major retailers this weekend that this printer has dropped to $549.99. Instead of being upset, I was actually glad because I figured that Amazon would match the price! But when I contacted them my joy turned to disappointment.
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Hey folks, this season there are going to be some serious deals to be had if you’ve got the spare cash to take advantage of them. But don’t run all over town hunting down those damned Black Friday deals! First of all, they never have the item you went for in stock, and secondly… just remember all those lines and whiny people!

Instead, prepare by doing your research online, and keep an eye on the following Web sites to see all the hottest deals being offered. The key is to act quickly, because a lot of these deals will disappear quickly.
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Two years ago I paid $2,000 for the predecessor to the Sharp 42″ HDTV that Dell currently has on sale for $799. If you’ve been waiting for a good deal to purchase a new TV for yourself, this is the best deal you’re going to find this season on a kick ass TV.

The Sharp 42″ AQUOS Model: LC42SB45U television features:

• 1920 x 1080 resolution – Full 1080p!
• 6.5ms response time
• 500 nits brightness
• 178-degree H/V viewing angle
• 8000:1 dynamic contrast ratio
• 3 HDMI Inputs

This TV is currently $1,000 on Amazon, and $1,099 at Best Buy.

So, head on over to Dell and pick one up now before they are all gone. Hey Pop! This means you!

EDIT: Just discovered that you can also get it from Costco Online for the same price, but a little more shipping. Might be worth it to have the abiltiy to return it to a local Costco if you’re a member. Plus for Executive members you’d get your 2% back at the end of the year…

Yeah, yesterday I got an e-mail from Best Buy welcoming me to their Premier Black membership level, presumably because of the amount of cold, hard, raw, green cash I give them on an annual basis. It read as follows:

Congratulations! We’d like to welcome you to the Best Buy® Reward Zone® program at our most elite membership level – Premier Black.

Premier Black is a pilot in select areas that rewards our best customers for shopping at Best Buy stores.

Your Reward Zone program member ID is: XXXXXXXXX

But then a few hours later they sent me another message telling me they had made a mistake, and apparently I’m not “Premier Black” quality:
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This is one of those times I’m gonna vent. So get ready…

Yesterday I was at Costco to get meat to make my world famous Souvlaki when I decided on a whim to purchase an Apple iPod Touch. This thing sells for $489, so right off the bat it had better be good.

Now, I don’t know jack about iPods or iPhones, but the signs in Costco all said something about coming with the latest greatest software functionality and they tell you all these things you can do with it… surf the web, watch movies, etc. So, I left the store happy and went home to give it a try.
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I was reading in the Mens Health magazine for May 2008 and came across an article called “Cleanliness is Next to Girliness” which goes a little something like this:

What’s on your washcloth? An antimicrobial ingredient in some soap may sap your testosterone levels, say University of California at Davis scientists. They found that when triclocarban enters a man’s bloodstream through his skin, it mimics testosterone, causing his body to ratchet down production of real T in response, say study author Bill Lasley. Ph.D.

Low testosterone has been linked to everything from infertility to depression. Go to hpd.n.m.nih.gov for a full list of soaps and other toiletries that contain triclocarban.

The new study was published online this week by the journal Endocrinology (”Triclocarban enhances testosterone action: A new type of endocrine disruptor?“).
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So, today my friend Bruce gave me a call and told me that Best Buy had a 42″ 1080p LCD HDTV on sale for $796.99. In fact, he had just come from our local Best Buy in Frisco, TX where they had 17 of them in stock. He said it looked pretty good, and recommended that I get one.

So, of course, I blew about 30 minutes looking at the Web site and eventually placed an order online for in-store pickup. Before doing so, you have to choose a local store and it checks availability. (Clearly I did this, and placed the order.)

Flash forward to this evening, when I finally get around to heading over to Best Buy to pick it up, and lo and behold – no TV!
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The worst thing about emergencies is that you just can’t predict them. The only good news is that you can plan for them.

Since people are always under duress when an emergency actually occurs it is prudent to assemble a kit that you can pull out when needed that covers most bases. So, here is a fairly complete list of the items you’ll find in my personal stash, plus a couple of extras that might be helpful for some folks with special needs.

Now seriously, why don’t you take a couple of hours and really honestly think thorough this emergency thing. You never know, perhaps the reason you’re reading this article today is a sign. You don’t want to be the person that didn’t pay attention and were left unprepared when disaster struck!
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Today I added a new Gift Ideas section on the blog (just look up at the top) because I thought it might be helpful to share things that I’ve found which would make for birthday, anniversary, wedding and other gifts. I get a lot of catalogs, and I do a lot of shopping in general, so as I come across cool things I’ll add them into the Gift Ideas page.

The underlying technology behind the Gift page is an Amazon Shop. Any affiliate can set one up, and most people would usually do it to try to earn a little cash. Please remember, I donate ALL proceeds from OMB, so I didn’t set it up for that reason.

So, check out the new tab, and remember we’ve got it the next time you’re pressed to come up with a gift idea for that someone special.

This soap looks like it belongs in a thrasher film. Seriously, its one thing (as a play on words) to have “hand-shaped” soap, but these tiny baby hands look like they were just lopped off a fresh batch of infants.

They were created from molds based from dolls’ hands and the set will run you $16.