Hmmm.... Just another indication that stock is more important than the employees.... :D


posted by Sarah Reilly 1:22 PM -

Customer Service is Dead
I consider myself to be a web-savvy person. In fact, I'm happier doing my Christmas shopping online instead of at the mall - parking isn't an issue, you don't have to listen to Muzak Christmas carols, there are no lines at the cash registers, and if you decide to shop at 6AM the day after Thanksgiving, you can do it in your pajamas. But this year my experience has been less than stellar. Last year, all the online merchants would do anything to get you to shop at their site instead of a competitor's - free or upgraded shipping, discounts, that sort of thing. This year, they mislead you about availability of items, the shipping times and rates are either hard to find on the site or way out of line, and they're grouchy on the phone when you call to find out where the order you placed three weeks ago is. I guess I can understand if something's back-ordered, but at least tell me when it's expected, and let me change my now useless priority shipping to something cheaper. Instead, every single online customer service rep I've contacted has been surly and unhelpful. I understand that they deal with upset or angry people constantly, and they might not even have the information I'm looking for, but they could at least pretend that since I'm the customer, I must be right.

Next year, everyone's going to get hand-made stuff. Or I'm going to start shopping in February. At least then, everything I order will be sure to arrive before Christmas, back-ordered or not.
posted by Sarah Reilly 8:18 AM -

It's cold and foggy, and I woke up with a headache...not a good start to the day! But then we stopped on our way to work at a coffee shop which had chocolate chai and pumpkin muffins. Mmmm. I think I'm in heaven.
posted by Sarah Reilly 9:16 AM -

Used Car Blues
I've decided I hate car shopping. It doesn't help that we really haven't decided what kind of car we want. Ideally, we'd get a wagon, but nice used ones are really hard to find - apparently, people tend to drive them into the ground rather than trading them in. So we've also looked at a couple of pickup trucks. I really don't think we're truck people - we test drove one last night. It was fun to drive, and it actually fits in our garage...but there's no space for a laptop bag or even a coat except at the passenger's feet. We seriously considered it anyway, but decided to wait for the perfect used wagon to come along. For now, we're helping the environment by carpooling everywhere we go.
posted by Sarah Reilly 9:03 AM -

Still Stuffed
I am so glad leftovers last only a few days. I don't think I can look at turkey, stuffing, or pumpkin pie for at least another year! I made a triple batch of stuffing (yes, I toasted 90 slices of bread and crumbled them into cubes) and four pumpkin pies. The sweet potato balls were actually a huge hit with my family - who would've guessed? - and of course, my grandmother made all the other trimmings.

Even better, I'm almost done with my Christmas shopping, and I have all the supplies for the things I'm making. I even managed to find a way to re-arrange my living room furniture to fit a tree. Now we just need to find a way to get a tree home... Unfortunately, the Shadow died. It just won't start - doesn't even try to turn over. We're sure it's not the battery, since jump-starting it didn't work... Since it's a 10-year-old car which also needs a new clutch and other assorted repairs, we've decided not to revive it again - which leaves us, at the moment, with only one car. And I'm having a hard time convincing Denis to get pine needles all over the inside of the Jetta. (OK, I'm not too sure I want that, either). So we also went used-car shopping this weekend. Which is a whole long story in itself...
posted by Sarah Reilly 8:51 AM -

I need a weekend to recover from my weekend!!! I can't imagine how we packed everything we did into two days! Saturday we did some shopping - I actually managed to buy gifts this time - and cooked the food we brought to Matt's party. Oh, and the sweet potato balls actually came out really well, I think I might make them for Thanksgiving at Grandma's house...I just might call them something else. :) Thanks, Matt, for a fantastic party!

Sunday we bought a snowblower, did more shopping, helped my parents take a bunch of stuff to the salvation army bin, planted a few bulbs, and Lisa and I went to Tina and Jenny's Tupperware party. I somehow agreed to host a party, so if anyone's looking for some Tupperware... I think it will be fun - the house will already be decorated, and it's a great excuse to make sure everything's really clean!

posted by Sarah Reilly 8:26 AM -

Mmmm. Turkey...
Tonight we're going to Matt's Turkey Party. I made a huge batch of stuffing and sweet potato balls. Those are a complete experiment - they're mashed sweet potatoes and butter rolled in crushed cornflakes, covered in maple syrup, with melted marshmallows on top. It sounds really strange, I know, but all the reviews I read of the recipe say they're fantastic. I think they're a perfect sounding accompaniment to fried turkey. We'll have to see how they taste (I'm not going to tell anyone what they actually are until they taste them - otherwise, I'm sure I'd be bringing most of them back home!)
posted by Sarah Reilly 5:03 PM -

Harry Potter
Well, as much as I absolutely loved the books, I have to admit (unwillingly) that I was a bit disappointed in the movie. Part of it was that so much had to be left out - and some of the left-out parts were favorites of mine - and part of it was because they tried to smoosh so much of the book into the movie, it ended up feeling like disjointed scenes from the book. <sigh> But it was really cool to see that the ideas I had in my head of how all the characters looked and sounded were almost exactly how they were in the movie! It's really too bad they couldn't make a mini-series with the same cast and faithfully reproduce the book... However, I'm glad I saw it, and it was really cool to see it on opening night. And the flying key lollipops that Dar bought us made it even better!
posted by Sarah Reilly 4:52 PM -

Happy Birthday, Tina!
posted by Sarah Reilly 8:23 AM -

Shopping
I was supposed to go Christmas shopping last night with Lisa, Dar and Kris. While we were at the mall, I bought myself a nice new snowman cardigan with a matching turtleneck, and some Montana Mills bread, and various other non-Christmas-gift type items. Hmmm... I think maybe I should feel a little guilty...although, I actually only said I would go Christmas shopping, not Christmas buying! Besides, I think it's a little difficult to coordinate the Christmas shopping needs of a group of people - so it's much more fun to go to stores everyone loves and buy stuff for yourselves! (Kudos to Lisa and Kris for actually buying an item or two for other people.)
posted by Sarah Reilly 8:22 AM -

Blog-less
I don't have anything to write. Except that I'm in a really good mood for some unknown reason. Not that I'm complaining... :)
posted by Sarah Reilly 5:29 PM -

I guess I'm either too optimistic or unable to grasp reality. A plane crashed this morning, in Queens. My immediate reaction was to call Denis and make sure that the location of the crash was nowhere near his parents' place - after all, they are along major flight paths for both JFK and LaGuardia... My second reaction was - well, it's an accident. I mean, not to be crude or anything, but it just didn't do enough damage to be along the same lines as the terrorist attacks. A number of people I've spoken to have immediately assumed it's more terrorist stuff. No offense to anyone, but it might as well be if you believe that it is. That's what terrorists want. They want you to live your life afraid of everything - and if you do, they win.

What happened this morning was a tragedy. But I believe that it was an accident. If something's wrong with a plane that's going to cause it to crash, that's going to happen not long after takeoff. It puts an amazing amount of stress on the aircraft - it's accelerating, and gaining altitude, and usually turning - all at the same time. What were the weather conditions? Was it windy? There are so many things that could cause a plane to crash - the miracle is that it doesn't happen very often, despite all those things. So, instead of trying to pin the blame, I suggest we all take a deep breath, pray for the victims and their families, and go on living.

posted by Sarah Reilly 11:55 AM -

I'm getting an iPod! Denis was trying to keep it as a surprise, but he's not good at keeping things secret from me... If he wanted to really keep something secret, he'd have to not say anything at all about it - I'm just too good at guessing! He's really cute about it, though - he actually pre-ordered it the day after I blogged about wanting one. And it's coming today!!!

Between the iPod, the Harry Potter movie this weekend, and the Thanksgiving turkey crafts we'll be doing at work later this week, I predict that I will be having a very good week. (OK, maybe I'm a little spoiled...)
posted by Sarah Reilly 9:35 AM -

After spending two days stuck on the couch with an awful head cold, I (a) never want to see the couch again and (b) feel some strange urge to buy term life insurance. I probably saw about a hundred commercials for life insurance from various places. Of course, since I spent most of the first day watching movies on HBO and Cinemax, the commercials were all on the second day. Ouch! I think they maxed out while I was watching "Hello Dolly" on Bravo. Since advertisements are theoretically geared towards the expected audience, I was apparently watching this movie along with untold numbers of senior citizens.

I'm apparently not so much of a TV addict as Tina and Jenny are - if it had been anything but The Tick last night, I would have turned the TV off...but I just couldn't help myself - I had to watch The Tick...ok, maybe I am a little addicted!
posted by Sarah Reilly 8:58 AM -

New Blogger
My friend Lisa is now blogging!
posted by Sarah Reilly 6:38 PM -

Deep Thoughts
I think I'm having the post-Halloween blues. I woke up with a headache and things have just gone downhill from there... It doesn't help that my job is uncertain right now and my master's project has gone nowhere in two months. I'm completely out of shape, since I fell off the diet and excercise wagon months ago. I feel I've pretty much lost control of a bunch of things in my life - which is silly, since I can change everything but the uncertain job. (And I suppose there are even ways to change that, too.) I guess it's time to make some changes...if it just weren't so darn hard to do, I would've done it months ago. But hey, nothing worth doing is ever easy, right?

(Sorry for the depressing post, but hey, that's what a journal's for, after all.)
posted by Sarah Reilly 1:35 PM -