I have learned that if you that if you take your own bags to the grocery store, even if you only pack their bags into them when you get to your car, it takes A LOT fewer trips to get all that crap (er, food) into the house.

AND the worst part about grocery shopping, in my opinion, is carrying that stuff up the steps into the house.

Because by that time, you have already touched the stuff FOUR times:

• once from the shelf to the cart,
• once from the cart to the belt,
• once from the belt to the cart again and
• once from the cart to the car.

Yes, you still DO have to touch it to get it out of the bags and away.  But I figure, just ONE fewer time, especially THAT one time,  is at least a 20% saving in energy.