One of hubby's co-workers had a kid, and invited us to the christening. Apparently having a kid and getting a zillion dollars worth of flowers for the mother, and some kind of expensive, and probably worthless baby gift basket wasn't enough, now we have to shell out money for a christening (whatever that is, I think it involves water). What next?
We apparently didn't RSVP in enough time to attend the actual dunking to be held in a church, and probably a good thing. Churches make neo-pagans such as myself, nervous.
Still, we were invited, so its time for the obligatory gift. We have dogs, we don't have kids, and have no clue what to give people with babies. Thankfully, someone invented the gift card... but where do we buy one?
I checked online and found a Babies R Us, but it wasn't conveniently located. Baby Depot was, so off to the mall I went. Baby Depot, part of Burlington Coat Factory, which doesn't make coats, but sells just about everything else, in my humble opinion, is a dump, but if I can run in there and get a stupid gift card... so be it.
I ran in, stood in line, stood in line some more... gave up when I thought I would be dooming the recipient to this crap also, and that's not a nice gift.
Off to some other children's store where I quickly checked, and they did have infant stuff, so good to go.
First I was asked if it was a boy or girl. Hmm, I think its a girl, but I'm not sure, got any cards that are unisex? Of course not, so I tell the salesgirl to just pick one, and I'll blame her if its the wrong type. She wasn't amused, but I don't care.
Then the card wouldn't scan. She tried another card, and it scanned and I threw some money on it, but then she couldn't remember which card scanned, so there was a 10 minute drama of her trying to figure out which card had the money on it, while very cranky post birthing mothers waited behind me tapping their feet.
Great, I got the right card and escaped the screaming store, then remembered that I need to get a card to put the card in. Ugh, so off to Safeway for a card for the card.
Twenty minutes standing in front of the mile long card aisle looking for "baby christening" cards. Is baptism the same as christening? I don't know and there was no authority to ask at the moment. Do I make a horrible faux pas and grab one, only to find I've done something horrible by getting a baptism card when christening was a whole different religion thing?
Then I found the cards that said "baby christening" WOOHOO, except I read them, and its all like "We know that our God will watch over..." or "Our God is almighty and blah blah..." Um, I don't believe in a God, where are the ones that say "We really hope your God has his act together and keeps your kid safe", or "best wishes on the kid dunking"? Huh?
After ranting and raving quietly in the card aisle and scaring off a few customers, I found a cutesy card with nothing in it. Let hubby come up with the sentiment, because my brain has bubbled out of my ear.
As I'm walking up to pay for the card, I see thise HUGE carousel of gift cards for all sorts of place, INCLUDING kids places! AAAAH, all I had to do was go to a grocery store and take care of this in one swoop, instead of stalking a mall for a store?
There really needs to be a neo-pagan card writer out there, and this crap needs to just pop up as reminders on your calendar, the computer goes out, finds something, buys it and ships it to the recipient and sends me a reminder so that when someone says "hey, thanks for the toaster, the baby loves it", I can say knowingly "ah, shucks, it was nothing".
Tuesday, August 23, 2005
Thursday, August 11, 2005
Resealable Bags, Not So Much
I did the dance of happiness when manufacturers started putting their stuff in resealable bags. What a waste of money, you buy the thing, then you open the thing, then you have to put the thing in another bag so it doesn't go bad.
So, the first time I got something that screamed on the label " RESEALABLE BAG!", I did the dance of happiness... until I tried to open the bag.
Typically the "new" resealable bags come with a tear strip so small, you need tweezers to get ahold of it, and then invariably it doesn't rip right. You either end up with an opening the size of a needle point, or you rip right through the "reseaalable" part and end up stuffing it in another bag.
Another thing that pisses me off is when it's literally IMPOSSIBLE to line up the two sides just right to get the stupid thing to seal. You line up one side, pinch the bag and run it down the top and the one side is closed, the other side flips open. Repeat, now the closed side is open, other side is closed... shove it in another bag.
Cheese people actually caught a clue and started using the little zippy thing, thank you cheese people. I still have some issues with the initial tearing off of the strip, namely it's virtually impossible.
A lot of times I'll just use the 5 million little twisty ties that come with garbage bags to "reseal" the bag. Who uses the twisty ties on garbage bags? Totally worthless, just tie the stupid ends together.
Another pain in the butt are the new containers that you store upside down. No matter how hard you shake them before you open them up, like in the case of ketchup, the first bit of stuff that comes out is all water. You end up with a water logged slightly red tinged bun. The relish is most disgusting of all.
While it's nice that I no longer have to manually stuff a fork in the container, which has always been too strenuous for me lo these many years, the upside down containers don't contain as much stuff as the normal containers... AND COST MORE! I'm paying more so I don't have to stick a knife in a container. Still have to dirty a knife to spread the glop (and watery crap) over my bun, so its not saving me any time in the dishwashing department. Takes the same amount of time, so there's no benefit there.
What about coleslaw? At my grocery store, you can buy a bag of shredded cabbage (aka coleslaw), but you can't buy a bottle of coleslaw dressing. What's up with that? So, I save by not having to buy a head of cabbage and slice it up, but I still have to buy all the slaw ingredients and make the dressing... niiiice.
So, in a nutshell, if its marketed to save you time, and be more convenient, it'll cost you more and end up being a pain in the butt, so don't bother.
So, the first time I got something that screamed on the label " RESEALABLE BAG!", I did the dance of happiness... until I tried to open the bag.
Typically the "new" resealable bags come with a tear strip so small, you need tweezers to get ahold of it, and then invariably it doesn't rip right. You either end up with an opening the size of a needle point, or you rip right through the "reseaalable" part and end up stuffing it in another bag.
Another thing that pisses me off is when it's literally IMPOSSIBLE to line up the two sides just right to get the stupid thing to seal. You line up one side, pinch the bag and run it down the top and the one side is closed, the other side flips open. Repeat, now the closed side is open, other side is closed... shove it in another bag.
Cheese people actually caught a clue and started using the little zippy thing, thank you cheese people. I still have some issues with the initial tearing off of the strip, namely it's virtually impossible.
A lot of times I'll just use the 5 million little twisty ties that come with garbage bags to "reseal" the bag. Who uses the twisty ties on garbage bags? Totally worthless, just tie the stupid ends together.
Another pain in the butt are the new containers that you store upside down. No matter how hard you shake them before you open them up, like in the case of ketchup, the first bit of stuff that comes out is all water. You end up with a water logged slightly red tinged bun. The relish is most disgusting of all.
While it's nice that I no longer have to manually stuff a fork in the container, which has always been too strenuous for me lo these many years, the upside down containers don't contain as much stuff as the normal containers... AND COST MORE! I'm paying more so I don't have to stick a knife in a container. Still have to dirty a knife to spread the glop (and watery crap) over my bun, so its not saving me any time in the dishwashing department. Takes the same amount of time, so there's no benefit there.
What about coleslaw? At my grocery store, you can buy a bag of shredded cabbage (aka coleslaw), but you can't buy a bottle of coleslaw dressing. What's up with that? So, I save by not having to buy a head of cabbage and slice it up, but I still have to buy all the slaw ingredients and make the dressing... niiiice.
So, in a nutshell, if its marketed to save you time, and be more convenient, it'll cost you more and end up being a pain in the butt, so don't bother.
Friday, August 5, 2005
Runaway Bride Rant
I'm not sure this is true or not, but apparently the Today Show mentioned that the Runaway Bride (AKA: Jennifer Wilbanks) and her fiance were indeed going to get married... FINALLY.
My first reaction "who f'ing cares?"
Also, apparently, the Today show mentioned where they were registered, and hinted how nice it would be for them to get all of their stuff. Since I didn't see it, I don't want to claim that they actually told people to go out and buy them all the stuff they wanted, but that's the gist of what I was told.
Something else about it was mentioned on a local newscast, and (I laughed my butt off) one of the newscasters said "I bet she's registered at Greyhound". I'm sure HE will catch crap for saying that (since he's a man and all, picking on a poor demented young woman).
Since I didn't know where they were registered, curiosity got the best of me, and I chose to look at Macy's. Sure enough, there they are, registered, and still registered under the original wedding date... how nice.
I looked at what they wanted, and threw up.
A Waterford Lismore Ice Bucket for $250????
A $250 Ice Bucket? Who needs an ice bucket that costs TWO FIFTY??? Does it create ice with no electrical means? No! It just sits there and hold ice. What do you do with a $250 ice bucket? WHY would you need an ice bucket that costs that much?
The answer is: to match the Waterford Lismore Pitcher that costs $225.00!!!!!!!
How about the $130 tablespoon? They also want 12 sets of the 5 piece dinner flatware. TWELVE sets? at $360 a pop? That's $4,320 bucks worth of freakin silverware!
$225 for a cake platter (better be some damn good cake).
My all time favorite is the $140 gravy boat (on sale for $111.99, get it while you can).
On a personal rant, I feel that gravy boats are the biggest waste of money imaginable. Who uses them? You heat the gravy in the microwave and use a regular spoon. What idiot in these days has time to heat up gravy (let alone make it from scratch), dirty up one dish, then pour it in a gravy boat and dirty up another dish. Typically if I'm invited to weddings, I get them the gravy boat. If you ask for it, I get it because its stupid. If you don't ask for it and I give it to you, it's because I don't like you. I want everyone to remember me by thinking "why did we ever get this stupid gravy boat?"
Ok, so back to blanket head woman.
There's a general rule for picking out stuff for registries: If you can't afford it, don't put it on your stupid registry, if you can afford it, go out and freakin buy it because half of your friends can't freakin afford it. Another general rule is: if you can't afford it and you put it on your registry, then everyone laughs at you because you're a pig in a suit. That's probably why she ran in the first place.
Oink
My first reaction "who f'ing cares?"
Also, apparently, the Today show mentioned where they were registered, and hinted how nice it would be for them to get all of their stuff. Since I didn't see it, I don't want to claim that they actually told people to go out and buy them all the stuff they wanted, but that's the gist of what I was told.
Something else about it was mentioned on a local newscast, and (I laughed my butt off) one of the newscasters said "I bet she's registered at Greyhound". I'm sure HE will catch crap for saying that (since he's a man and all, picking on a poor demented young woman).
Since I didn't know where they were registered, curiosity got the best of me, and I chose to look at Macy's. Sure enough, there they are, registered, and still registered under the original wedding date... how nice.
I looked at what they wanted, and threw up.
A Waterford Lismore Ice Bucket for $250????
A $250 Ice Bucket? Who needs an ice bucket that costs TWO FIFTY??? Does it create ice with no electrical means? No! It just sits there and hold ice. What do you do with a $250 ice bucket? WHY would you need an ice bucket that costs that much?
The answer is: to match the Waterford Lismore Pitcher that costs $225.00!!!!!!!
How about the $130 tablespoon? They also want 12 sets of the 5 piece dinner flatware. TWELVE sets? at $360 a pop? That's $4,320 bucks worth of freakin silverware!
$225 for a cake platter (better be some damn good cake).
My all time favorite is the $140 gravy boat (on sale for $111.99, get it while you can).
On a personal rant, I feel that gravy boats are the biggest waste of money imaginable. Who uses them? You heat the gravy in the microwave and use a regular spoon. What idiot in these days has time to heat up gravy (let alone make it from scratch), dirty up one dish, then pour it in a gravy boat and dirty up another dish. Typically if I'm invited to weddings, I get them the gravy boat. If you ask for it, I get it because its stupid. If you don't ask for it and I give it to you, it's because I don't like you. I want everyone to remember me by thinking "why did we ever get this stupid gravy boat?"
Ok, so back to blanket head woman.
There's a general rule for picking out stuff for registries: If you can't afford it, don't put it on your stupid registry, if you can afford it, go out and freakin buy it because half of your friends can't freakin afford it. Another general rule is: if you can't afford it and you put it on your registry, then everyone laughs at you because you're a pig in a suit. That's probably why she ran in the first place.
Oink
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)