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Food wars escalate as restaurants up the ante
Posted Feb 23 2009, 02:48 PM by Joan Melcher
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Filed under: savings, food, free, bargain, save money, Joan Melcher
Weâ��ve been covering the food wars of fast-food chains, restaurants and coffee shops — free deals and bargains galore designed to hold on to that elusive market share.
And they just keep coming. This Tuesday (Feb. 24) you can get both breakfast and lunch for free if you have the time and inclination to track the deals.
IHOPâ��s Fat Tuesday promotion of a free short stack of buttermilk pancakes is becoming an annual event — but there is a string attached. They suggest you make a contribution to the Childrenâ��s Miracle Network.
They�ll be flipping out the �cakes from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. and hope to raise $1 million this year for a network of 170 hospitals. The IHOP site explains that the hospitals in the network treat 17 million children annually and money raised is used for new equipment, patient services, research programs and health education.
There are no strings at your local Jack in the Box — just two free tacos this Tuesday with a coupon.
Last week we reported on TGI Fridayâ��s entrée deal — buy-one-get-one-free — until the end of the month. Ruby Tuesday has upped the ante — the same deal until March 24. But these coupons are rather hard to come by. Erin at Coupon Cravings saw one in a local paper and, although the Web is abuzz with the â��ideaâ�� of a Ruby Tuesday coupon, all trails lead to the corporationâ��s So Connected site, which would suggest the best way to get a coupon is to join Ruby Tuesdayâ��s online community.
If there�s a Houlihan�s nearby, you�ll want to check out their enticements. Perspective diners should note that the deals are good only after 4 p.m. Monday through Friday until this Friday (Feb. 27). Still, they�ve taken the most creative approach we�ve seen yet. When the Dow Jones industrial average is up, there are free Italian donuts for sit-down diners. When it�s down, diners can scoop up a voucher for a free appetizer on their next visit. And all patrons can enter a sweepstakes for a $5,000 U.S. savings bond.
Now that�s getting in the spirit: Free money.
via Food wars escalate as restaurants up the ante – Smart Spending Blog – MSN Money.
Venice Beach
We (Diane, Melanie, her SO, and I) had a taco lunch at Tito’s Tacos and went to Venus Beach to walk/scoot around and “people watch”.

Then we had dinner in Long Beach at Auld Dubliner pub to let the traffic die down. We took my car with the top down, until the drive home.
I felt it!
Magnitude 4.5 quake felt across Southern California – Los Angeles Times.
The quake was felt just before 8 p.m. in downtown Los Angeles, parts of the High Desert, San Pedro and coastal and inland Orange County, but not as far south as San Diego.
U.S. Geological Survey seismologist Lucy Jones said the quake appeared to strike near the northern end of the San Jacinto fault, which is considered part of the San Andreas fault system. It was initially reported as magnitude 5.0 but was soon downgraded.
The temblor was comparable to the 1988 Pasadena earthquake and about 25 times smaller than the Chino Hills quake last summer.
“It’s the type of earthquake we used to have in L.A. every year in the ’80s,” Jones said. “After Northridge, it went quiet.”
Jones said a magnitude 3.3 aftershock occurred about an hour later.





