Honestly, I rarely go to your store for a cornucopia of delightful reasons. The main reason being that when I go into the store I come out feeling musty and dusty and like I need to take a shower. While you may have a more varied selection than my preferred store, Target, I’ve noticed that some products look like someone has run them over with a Hummer and that they have been opened, sampled and then put back like I won’t notice that someone else has taken a huge bite out of the Doritos I plan to purchase. Consequently, I no longer purchase Doritos, but I will talk about that in a later post.

In any case, I frequent your store in two circumstances: when I’m in a city, like my hometown, that does not have a Target, or when the item I need is not one that Target, Best Buy or any other store in the whole world (the whole world being a 15-20 mile driving distance) sells. In this case, I was looking for a 16G Zune player. This was necessary being that I was overly zealous on the treadmill the other day and whacked my rhapsody player off the treadmill deck and sent it spiraling to the belt where it promptly went zinging to the back of the treadmill and skidded 5-feet across the gym floor. It inadvertently almost knocked a boy off the elliptical behind me because he was laughing so hard he couldn’t stay upright. I realized it was unusable when it popped open in my hand. After trying other rhapsody players from my beloved Target, I gave up.

Wal-mart online showed me a Zune player that was $30 less than Best Buy. By this time, I’m already crabby because I haven’t worked out in 24 hours and I am kind of wishing I’d pushed the boy off of the elliptical machine. I got to Wal-Mart and, lo and behold, they have the Zune in stock. For $30 more than they advertised online. This isn’t new. Wal-Mart frequently discounts their items on their online store and charges more for their items in-store. So, to get something that is IN STOCK, I get to pay $30? Pass. I’ll go to Best Buy where I get a clean store, great customer service, a Best Buy rewards system and can use my $5 certificate for my rewards and where that same player will count towards MORE rewards. Oh, and hey, where BEST BUY won’t UNDERCUT ITSELF online. I’ve heard stories about Wal-Mart doing this with various products and refusing to honor the prices in their stores. If I wanted to wait five days, I could get Amazon free shipping. Or, better yet, use Amazon.com and get prime shipping or one day shipping and pay $30 less than both Wal-Mart & Best Buy.

What I know is this: I won’t be using Wal-Mart. And their policy of not meeting their own prices? Bull. This isn’t a franchise. This is a corporation. All the money goes to the same place. Enough is enough. I walked out today even though I really wanted that player and I had spent time, gas and money going there.

Places that continue to give me good service, Target, Best Buy, Amazon, the little stores around here? They’ll continue to get my cash. Keep up the good work, Wal-Mart. You make it easy not to give you my money.

Sincerely,

Some of you follow my twitter feed and some of you know better than to rock the image of the good wife and mom you think I am. Those that follow understand that the reason my posts have been scarce is that, immediately following my finals, AJ got incredibly sick. Within 48 hours, I, too, got sick and Leon followed. Then, yesterday, AJ had to go to the hospital for chest pains. He got the all clear after an x-ray and CT-scan. None of us are completely healed from the stomach virus of last week and we are about to travel for the holidays.

We haven’t really had time to shop for the holidays.

Tonight, I took an hour to go get Leon his presents, as it is the one duty I cannot schluff off onto him. Part of that trip led me to Best Buy (who is not paying me, nor do they know about this post–I’m irritated with the need for disclosure, but there it is). Best Buy was packed, even at 9pm at night. I expected to leave irritated and wanting to sleep.

Instead, I walked in, found exactly what I wanted, talked to an uber cheerful cashier and, when I beeped when walking out, I slowly turned around to face the music. No, I didn’t steal anything. What do you people think of me?

I turned to hand my bag to the man at the door and he laughed at waved me out. I heard, from behind me, “You really oughtta quit stealing stuff! Run! Run for the car!” I laughed and went back to my car where Molly was waiting for me to drive home with the windows down. She wants to freeze to death.

Why bother writing this? Well, mainly because I spend a lot of time talking, thinking and taking in energy about what is wrong in my world. I had expectations that my experience was going to bite and it was the exact opposite. It was a great experience. I got what I needed and everyone was friendly and I was home within an hour. It was time to share a positive experience and increase the positive energy that is out there.

Take some time to appreciate those out in the retail world right now. I worked it for four years during this time of year and it is a hard job for little pay around the holidays. If someone is particularly nice, please return the kindness.

Oh, and bring cookies. Those are good, too.

That doesn’t mean I don’t love a good bargain. I love goodwill, garage sales and places like Ebay and TJMaxx that give me cool, designer type goods for cheaper prices. Half.com and Chegg.com have been lifesavers when book buying time rolls around each semester. I have a list of places in my head that I go for a great bargain, and, when I’m shopping, I will often run the list before buying.

Tuesday, I was looking online to find A.J. some new books. Over the summer, we have run through The New Captain Underpants Collection: Box Set (Books 1-5), Diary of a Wimpy Kid, as well as Stink: The Super-Incredible Collection: Books 1-3 and other various single books.

It was time for another series, if I could find one. I was lucky enough to stumble upon My Weird School #1: Miss Daisy Is Crazy! and I was sold! There are a TON of books in this series, as well as a secondary series! We may be set for the summer.

And, best of all? Amazon gives you free shipping at $25, so I bought 8 books. They also give you buy 4-for-3, so I got 8 books (2 totally free!) for a total of $23. Not bad, not bad at all. I couldn’t have bought them used for that! Oh, and Amazon isn’t paying me to say that they have these deals. I just wanted to rub my bargain in your face. Isn’t that the best part of bargain shopping? It’s not nice? What? Oh. Sorry. My bad.

It was a bargain. And I love a good bargain. I’ll let you know what A.J. thinks of the series. He loved the first 3 series I was able to find.

Where does my love of the bargain stem? Let me quote my mother: “Don’t you dare buy anything unless it’s on sale. If it’s not on sale now, it will eventually be on sale and if it’s sold out before then, you’ll find something else.” Which of course is a total lie, but something in that idea has stuck with me, otherwise I wouldn’t be so reluctant to spend money on things that I consider to be too expensive.

She was here, recently, and found a shirt at Macys that was originally $48 and had been marked down to $13. She considered it a good shopping day. I would have, too, but she was also bummed that she “couldn’t find anything else” and that the “selection was so dismal.” Let’s be clear: selection here is fine–sales weren’t going on because it was the week before memorial day and everyone knows that the sales really happen that weekend.

I don’t take my love of a bargain to that extent. If something looks amazing, my vanity will force me to buy something that looks nice. However, I won’t go into stores that charge a lot for clothes in the first place. I don’t care if they have great sales, I won’t step foot in there.

She planted the neurotic apple and I fell from the tree.

Well, all those things, and I’m lazy. I don’t want to carry around a bunch of visually unappealing cards on my cute little keychain. Not to mention that I break those cute little keychains like crazy on a regular basis and don’t want someone using my perks, benefits or gym memberships for their own sordid means. So, how do I get around the hullaballoo of the plastic membership cards?

I recently discovered a couple of free services (one is free, the other is free for you NOW, but will cost soon, so get it while it’s hot). The one that is free for NOW, but usually costs $0.99 is called Cardstar. It’s for those of you with iphones or an ipod touch (neither of which I have, but might be nice). It allows you to download the Cardstar application to your device and then put your membership numbers into the application. When you get to a place that has a program for rewards or membership, you pull up your card on your iphone or your ipod touch and a bar code will show up on your device. Again, this is currently only available on IPHONE devices, but they are working on it for Blackberries, Androids and Palms. Hopefully it will stay free until they get the Blackberry app developed, because I’m intrigued! They are in the process of adding new reward/membership programs, but you can request any that are not currently available.

For those of you non-Appleites, there is another FREE program that sounds really promising! It’s called Just One Club Card and it will allow you to put up to 8 barcodes on a single card that you can carry in your wallet. You can create as many cards as you need and you print out your barcodes on a sheet of paper. There are some restrictions on cards, such as Blockbuster, due to barcode issues, but they are well-addressed in the FAQ and this can decrease the amount you carry in your wallet by a great amount.

One card you SHOULD carry, if you don’t already, is one more FREEBIE I found and it is the Wallet Medication Card offered by Mercy Hospital. I requested some about 3 months ago and received them within 2 weeks. Carrying mine has been invaluable because I always know my meds when I go to the doctor. I don’t have to carry pill bottles or question my dosage. It’s all there.

Here’s to lighter bags and wallets and happier shoulders!

Before you tear me to pieces, which sounds reasonable enough, I’m sure, try to keep in mind that last semester (Spring 2009), I worked two part time jobs, that both require massive amounts of at-home work as well, and did several hours in a doctoral program. Oh yeah, and I did the wife and mom thing, too. I’m not trying to be eco-unfriendly and I would hate for Captain Planet to show me the errors of my way. Many days, I’m too tired to know where to put the toilet paper, let alone where to put he empty water bottles.

So, when I find something that makes being eco-friendly easy, convenient and gives me pizza, I say, KUDOS to you, inventor. You have effectively saved me money on those oft-unavailable when needed paper plates. Take a look.

Well? What do you think?

Recently, there was a fantastic discussion on my blog about what happens to cadavers when they are donated to science. Many ethical questions were explored and I’m still bouncing the final thoughts around in my mind. I enjoy well-presented debates a great deal and have had this one on my mind. Because of it, I was googling around (googling around sounds much naughtier than it is) and found the Lifegem website.

Initially, I was as repelled by the idea brought forth in this website as I would be by the thought of wearing 6 inch heels and running a marathon. My initial take on Lifegem is that it is a website that offers to take the carbon from the cremated ashes of your loved one and make it in to a sparkling diamond that you can then wear in jewelry. This allows you both closure and the ability to wear your loved one and keep them with you until you die and then, HEY! Maybe your next of kin will make you into a sparkler!

Look, I never said my empathy extended into what I consider hairbrained ideas.

And yet, the further I read into the website, the more this seems like a decent, feasible idea to me. When people are grieving, memories are so terribly important and if they can afford this, why should it bother me? As I continued to read, the key aspect that changed my opinion was that, in order to create the diamond, they don’t have to use ashes, rather they can use hair from your loved one. Heck, your loved one doesn’t even have to be dead! If you are a stalker and have your “loved one’s” hairbrush, as long as you have the equivilent of 8oz worth of hair (a typical men’s haircut worth), you’ve got enough to create a piece of jewelry.

Personally, the more I think about this, the more I think that it isn’t any different than getting a tattoo or a painting to memorialize a lost loved one. The ashes part creeped me out because the idea of someone possibly cremating someone they love against that person’s wishes just to create jewelry from their remains is a little abnormal for me, however, I think that is an extreme thought as opposed to the “norm” for this situation.

What do you think? Beautiful memory keeper or creepy sparkly no-no?

We live in a nice, safe neighborhood that is filled with well-manicured lawns and well-designed sidewalks. Daily, Duder, Weiner and Pea lose their noodles over people who walk or ride bicycles past the house because the area invites us to get out and move. I have a membership to a local place, but the beauty of the weather, when it hasn’t been raining, has beckoned me to get out and move. Well, that and the dogs are eating us out of house and home and I’m afraid that they won’t be able to get up the steps if they don’t exercise soon. I’m not kidding. Weiner could pass for a Sumo-dog and Pea is getting close to Shamu proportions.

So, I ordered them some harnesses because they are adept at getting out of collars, especially Pea who is like Houdini. For the record, I like Puppia harnesses and I don’t get paid anything to endorse them. They are comfortable and they keep my dogs safe. That’s what matters to me.

What I’ve been doing is taking the dogs around the neighborhood several times. They are so good! They don’t do their business on anyone’s yard and they walk at a brisk pace, which keeps me on track. Pea is good for a couple of trips around, which is good for her little legs. However, this is where Weiner isn’t just good: She SHINES. She’s like a miniature Energizer Bunny. She will go around the block as many times as you’ll take her. She’ll walk quickly and be a good dog. There is no sniffing for a sweet spot. She’s all business. We’re here to walk.

I wondered how effective our walks were as exercise. I go for about 45 minutes. Thanks to a book I’m reading, I was pointed to a website, CalorieControl.org, that tells me exactly how effective my walks are and I was blown away. I’m not going to tell you how many calories I burn while taking care of my dogs, but it was a lot. How many calories are you burning every day? Was it more or less than you thought? This is a great resource and I’m glad to have found it.

My dogs are just glad to get out of the house.

First, we have my purse and it’s basic contents(counterclockwise):  My black purse, which was a gift from my husband for Mother’s Day this year.

My black organizer, which you already know that I have a somewhat abnormal obsession with and refuse to lose.

My black pill case which holds a mini pharmacy for any unexpected need.  It has bailed me out for many unexpected headaches.

My debit caddy is wonderful!  It’s so much lighter than a checkbook and I really only use my debit cards.  It’s big enough to carry a little bit of cash and a couple of checks, too, “just in case.”

My Plantronics 320 bluetooth earpiece, which is the best fitting earpiece I’ve ever found, and yet, has been discontinued. 

My keys on their lovely keychain, along with a blue Bic stick pen.

My Sephora lip attitude glamour lipstick in 09 Mauve Emotion.  I have been looking for a moisturizing lipstick that goes on like a gloss for a while.  I’m happy about how reasonably priced this stuff is.

My ebags mini bag and my card holder, which actually holds my flash drives.

Here comes the fun part: What’s REALLY inside?

In the red case, I carry: MAC Studiofix powder, Wisp mini toothbrushes, Stila lipgloss, Clinique lip balm, Neutrogena sunscreen, Aveeno moisturizer, Eucerin lotion, dental floss, tweezers, hand sanitizing wipes, my smashbox mirror, sunglasses to put over my glasses, Annik Goutal perfume vial, hair ties, Orbitz spearmint gum, a heart calculator and some mints. Yep. Everything on that left hand side FITS. Barely. OH! As do the mints in the blue container and my little necessities kit that I ordered from mytagalongs.

The rest has all been described.

Now, the gauntlet has been handed. What’s in YOUR bag? It doesn’t have to be a purse. What’s in your gym bag, your bookbag, your briefcase, your lunch pail? Write your own post or comment here!

Eventually I’ll hit each of those here. What’s stopping you?

Today, I was introduced to mytagalongs. This site has a shiny factor of 8.5 because of the coolness of it’s gadgets. Boys have tool sites, girls have tampon cases and purse organizers. I do have several men who read this site, so I’m not writing you guys off. There were also some cool items on there that were gender neutral such as running bands to keep items in while you are getting your fitness on as well as inexpensive shaving kit cases or even an entire office to go for your briefcase.

Also, if you want to make your wife really happy, I cannot tell you how much a wife would appreciate The Handywoman’s Kit for her purse. The Swiss Co. makes another version of this for about $20 more and it’s certainly not as pretty.

I have gone forth and spread the word and I urge you to check it out. The prices are VERY reasonable as is the shipping. I placed an order today, so I will let you know if it takes forever to get here. I’m looking forward to the purse organizer. Anything that cleans out my purse can’t be a bad thing.