whofearsthenight

But things like chicken thighs ($1.39 / lbs at Costco vs $1.49 / lbs at the local grocery store)…I don’t think it’s worth the price.

2 things:

1. The chicken you get at Costco is probably a better quality, and generally you get more actual chicken per pound. Google "air chilled vs water chilled."
2. Get the things there that make sense for you. We like calrose rice in this house for a lot of stuff, go through quite a lot of it. At costco, the gigantic bag is like $20 compared to a tiny little bag that is $10-$12 at the cheapest regular grocer.

Combine those factors and I think it's worth it. I have things that are "costco items." Bulk spices, rice and some grains, dog food and treats, chicken, paper towel and TP, plastic wrap, hot dogs, pretty much any cheese, laundry soap, frozen convenience foods (dino nuggets, kirkland pizza, eggos, etc) and even some produce. Anyway, I go maybe once a month, and I've done the math many times over and it more than pays for itself. I wish I lived closer, because there are some things that I would buy more frequently that are way cheaper usually - milk, eggs, salad mix, fruit, etc.

But yeah, this is a 6 person house, with 3 adults and two teenagers.

Oh, last thing. Buying quite a lot of things at Costco is basically like buying an extended warranty or insurance. If you're going to buy a TV, for example, and Costco sells something that's close, buy that one. The OEM is going to offer a 1 year warranty, Costco will take that return for much longer.

It's also crazy because at least stateside enough fresh herbs from the supermarket for 1-2 meals is like $2.

iirc that is deliberate. They move things around so you have to browse and hopefully buy more than what you came for.

I'm in the US, the general hyperbole against self check here doesn't come close to matching my experience.

Just scan the alcohol first, scan the rest next. As long as it's not the only thing you're getting, it's almost def faster. Even if it is the only thing you're getting, the time for someone to do an age check compared to standing behind 2 carts/trollies is nothing. Self check for me almost every time is way, way faster. Exception being if I have a ton of groceries (I can scan as fast as teh employees, but the self check shit has more guardrails that slow shit down) or a ton of produce (employees at a lot of stores are required to memorize the PLU, I am not.)

The only thing is that I wish I had something other than the phone for the scanning. Using the phone camera to scan isn't anywhere near as fast/good as using a scanning gun.

But my guess is that it got removed because too many people were "scanning" and just taking off. It's pretty easy to fool self check, but enough people will avoid trying because there are people there, cameras, etc. Pretty hard to get that coverage on the whole store.

and then they sign the receipt at self check and on the way out. My guess is that this is still not accurate enough for them compared to traditional scanning. That said, it's batshit if they if they don't replace it with some express lines. Obviously most people in costco are there for a cart full of shit, but I (and judging by self check lines) often go in with a specific thing or 3 in mind.

Yeah, I went a little more overkill. I got a rack for free, and I have a Dell CS24 (that's probably due to upgrade just for power savings at this point) that connects to a Rackable 3016. This runs unRAID, so I end up with the same thing roughly you have - JBOD with parity that I can bring any disk to, and 16 bays to fill before I have to start cycling drives out. So I check disk prices, when something tickles my fancy, I buy a new disk and shove it in there and it just keeps growing. If I had to do it today, I'd probably do it a bit differently just because the drive density, but it's been going strong for 7-8 years now.

12tb is literally $100 right now new. also my fellow hoarders, save a bookmark to that site it's great.

If you want to hit eBay and buy used disks, you can probably build something with redundancy and 20tb+ for around $300. If you've got a machine laying around and don't plan on downloading everything on every service, you can grab 16tb used for $100, use one drive for parity, and the spend $50 when you run out of space for another 8tb.

It is, and IIRC you don't even "own" a movie even if you physically have it. You own the physical disc, not the content on it. Granted, it's a lot harder for Sony or Discovery to come kick down your door and take your copy of Ice Road Truckers so you have to rebuy it...

I mean, he seemed pretty fucking high out of his gourd, so I suspect that he didn't really know what reality he was in.

It's shorthand for Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix, and Google.