I am so susceptible to advertising and promotions that I should just stop going into stores.
A couple days ago I was riveted to the Vita-mix stand at Costco. The guy was making a fruit smoothie, which I like to do at home, but then my eyes widened – he was throwing in entire strawberries, stem and all, whole apples, and even a pineapple barely peeled, but still with its core. The smoothie was delicious. And then he threw in more strawberries with ice and made instant strawberry sorbet. And then he made baby food that Christian gulped down ravenously – out of raw zucchini, carrot and apple. And finally he made a piping hot tortilla soup. This amazed me most, because he started with all raw ingredients and had the hot soup in our hands in 8 minutes.
I thought to myself, I HAVE TO HAVE A VITA-MIX. My monkey mind just went nuts trying to figure out how to come up with the $375.
We would eat so many more vegetables and fruit with one of these babies! We could eat more raw food and certainly I would never ever waste anything from my CSA basket again. I went home despondant – Chad had admonished me to be more “fiscally responsible” just the day before and now I was going to say that I wanted to buy a $400 juicer? I thought about just squirreling away twenties and waiting until I had enough.
And then suddenly I realized I had enough!
If I put the $200 my mom gave me at Christmas for new eye glasses (I have a perfectly good pair, but was just looking for a fresh look), plus the $100 I got for trading in the sweater my brother gave me, also at Christmas, (it was a lovely sweater, but I put it on and my mother said it made me look like a granny – then she asked how much it was. I told her that Bella had told me that it was a $100 sweater that had been discounted to $60. My mom hurried into her room, grabbed a $100 bill, thrust it into my hands and said, Buy yourself another sweater, I’ll take this one…), plus the $53 Costco rebate check I have in my wallet – I am almost there!
So to get that last bit of cash I made a bet with Chad last night. He rolled over in bed last night saying that it was late. I said it wasn’t even 10:30. He said, IT IS SO. Wanna bet? I put $25 on the bet, and guess what? It was 10:29. I won, don’t you think?
So I am practically out the door to get this juicer, but it occurred to me today that might be able to get one used.
Now, I’m just chomping at the bit. And fussing about on the internet seeing if there are any used vita-mixes for sale…
womantalk.org 
January 15, 2009 at 9:56 pm
How LIKE you!!
January 16, 2009 at 6:49 pm
That’s the first time I’ve heard to Chad losing a bet.
January 17, 2009 at 12:39 pm
OMG I wish you hadn’t posted this. Now I want one too.
January 20, 2009 at 4:48 pm
what, you gave away the sweater i gave you!? i gave you a sweater?
January 21, 2009 at 3:24 pm
Darlene: Yes, VERY like me.
Nathen: Chad loses bets to me all the time.
Ann: ha ha ha.
wait ’til you hear the end of that story!
Songbae: I SOLD the sweater that you had Bella buy me (to mom).
January 24, 2009 at 7:23 pm
y’know, i have a vita-mix, and i don’t really think they are worth it. i’ve seen those demo’s too, but i think there is some kind of deception going on. my smoothies tasted really bitter when i used the whole fruit. i used to use my vita-mix a lot when i was making my own soymilk, and yes i have ground flour in it on occasion, but it’s basically just a blender. a very powerful blender.
the soup making thing is impressive in the demo, but in reality, it’s a lot more pleasant (and energy efficient) to cook soup on the stove and then blend it, rather than cook it using the heat produced by sheer friction. plus they take up a lot of room and are super noisy.
between my cuisine-art, and my immersion blender, i almost never use the vita-mix. and you know i do a lot of food preparing. just my humble opinion…