We Interrupt These Pittsburgh Lessons for an Important Announcement

OH.
Mi.
Gawd.

My flight was five (5) hours late last night.

But that's not the worst part.

Wait for it.

Seriously.

Still there?

I ran out of knitting!!!

[Cue scary music]

I brought two knitting projects with me. I also brought about eight hours worth of work, and two magazines. I even bought a book in Pittsburgh. But, I didn't plan on being finished with fixing the computer on Day 2.

I powered through the first knitting project and the first five hours of worth of work without blinking. Then on Day 3 I couldn't sleep so I started and finished the book. And our flight to PIT was late so I finished the magazines before I got on board. But, but, I still had the booties and the 100 page contract. I was good. That's seven hours right there...easy. I didn't panic when they announced would be late. I continued to keep mom calm as they would tell us we would be delayed, two, three, and then four hours. Remember, we're going home. They need this plane in L.A. They won't cancel. Its fine.

I was smug. I took a walk around the mall at the airport...tried on a few pairs of Gap jeans and wandered through the sale at Victoria's Secret. I ate the dinner I bought before we left my grandfather's. I was fine. I knew I had enough to keep me busy and I was content in that knowledge.

After my walk I started with the contract. I fell asleep twice trying to read this thing earlier in the day so I thought I was good. Read. Sleep. Read. Sleep. Perfect! Not so much. Compared to the five hour delay, that contract was gold...interesting....I was taking notes, getting ready to discuss on Monday. And after finishing it, I even found an amended complaint I forgot that I had with me. 145 pages of fun! That'll take hours! As I came to the last pages, they announced boarding. Awesome, home free.

We boarded the plane and sat down. There was a mom with two five year old girls and a small puppy, unable to get seats together. My mom loves the window seat so she happily agreed to trade with the mom. (Mom makes me sit in the middle seat...I know, a good excuse for elder abuse later on.) The only thing worse to me than being in a middle seat is being in a middle seat without being able to get out of that seat easily. Sigh. Fine. Everything is fine. I walked around before the plane was fully boarded, stretched my legs and sat down as the last people wrestled with their lugged. As a reward for that middle seat, the booties.

Woo! Finishing gifts months before they're due. I rock. I'm awesome. The captain gets on the P.A. and announces that we can't finish loading or fueling the plane because of thunder and lightening. That's ok. We're on the plane...another 30 minutes and we're on our way.

30 minutes.

60 minutes.

Everything is fine.

Until the primary color of the booties started to run out.

It was horrible...like something out of a bad dream...the end of the hopalong cassidy yarn...the yarn needed for the majority of the Ugg booties...the best travel project ever...or so I thought.

As I sat there, mid-panic, watching my skein wind down, I looked over at the very cute, very chic girl in the aisle seat to my right. She had on her Seven jeans (actually hemmed to an appropriate length), silver gladiator sandals, white long-sleeve tshirt, scarf and her Marc by Marc Jacobs white leather handbag and Longtemps carry-on. She quietly read her two magazines.

I was sitting there in pink wrinkled J.Crew capris, now-dirty white sweater, old Vans with my roller bag stuffed into the overhead and my carryon crying for mercy under my seat....filled with knitting, work reading, bagels, my purse and other various items I can't remember after four hours of sleep wondering why I can't be the chic traveler. The one who looks cute and put together even after a five hour delay, not the one who looks like she hasn't washed her hair 'cause the water pressure at her grandfather's wouldn't wash a small spider down the drain let alone a full head of hair.

I always want to be that cute traveller. I want to be amused by two magazines and an ipod. But I can't. I guess its the price I have to pay for having this HUGE brain. Huge brains demand large quantities of yarn. Next time, I'm bringing a bigger carryone.

Greetings from Pittsburgh

As I'm sure Steve will be pleased to hear, I've been able to get my grandfather's PC up and running without re-installing messenger and tapping the aforementioned Steve online and asking him for various solutions to problems only a 92 year old with a PC can cause.

Yeah me!
Yeah Geek Squad!

Yes, despite my feelings about the big blue empire, I have to say the Monroeville Geek Squad are by far the nicest BBY employees I've ever met. Not only did they answer my questions but they offered to install whatever RAM I bought into this 6 year old machine and trouble shoot any addition problems. I heart them. If you're ever in Monroeville, I highly suggest this Best Buy.

Are you enthralled yet? Can you just not stop reading in case you miss something else equally interesting? Yup, such is my time in Pittsburgh. I sit in front of a PC for hours and hours troubleshooting viruses and misplaced settings in an effort to get the computer up and running again.

But, we're up which means we can leave the house for shopping! I know you're wondering what a label snob like me could possibly find in suburban Pittsburgh. Well, let me tell you there is quite a bit to find, and always far below retail!

For the Frugal:
Dollar Tree kicks the 99 Cent Store's booty. I would tell you the swag I scored but that would ruin Christmas.

Target:
Oh, the deals to be had! No one does markdowns like the kids in Monroeville. I got a pair of metallic Converse One-Star pants for $8.36. And, since there's no sales tax here on clothing, the pants really were $8.36. But, I did have to talk gramma out of buying me the ugliest thought of a bridesmaid dress for Elizabeth's wedding. It was sorta cute on the hanger but on me...yeah, not so much. I didn't care if it was $10 it didn't make it any cuter. I was able to distract her with the thought of stealing a dress I picked out for her years ago that she wore for a wedding. She was overwhelmed by the thought of getting that out of her closet; when I saw she was weak I put the ugly $10 dress away.

For the Fashionable:
We have Kohl's (and no for the non-west L.A. readers, we don't have that at home). I was able to see and cry at the Vera Wang for Kohl's collection. Woof. But mom did score $5 Talbot's pants at the Talbot's outlet. My grandfather didn't think it was possible to buy pants for $5 that originally retailed for $68. (Yes, dear readers, its true, he doesn't spend much time with us.) He declared shenanigans on the whole thing, shock his head and walked away. He doesn't appreciate our shopping brilliance. That's why we usually hide all of our treasures. Mom showed him in a moment of weakness. It won't happen again.

For the hungry:

Labriola's is a second generation "Italian store" as my family calls it. Its a small grocery that specializes in Italian foods. If you're a foodie, doesn't matter if your a cook, but if you're a foodie, your head will explode. If you're a cook, your head and your heart will explode simultaneously. Its not pretty. Anything Italian you've seen on a cooking show from these special canned tomatoes mom kept muttering about to beautiful imported pasta...and everything was really well priced. And, and, they had all this super cheap ready-made food...like a HUGE pizza with all homemade ingredients for $6.50. They had biscotti and cream puffs and stuffed shells and ravioli...all homemade and ready for you to take credit for. They had a huge deli counter and fresh cheese and eggs and really I just ate two pizelles as I typed this 'cause I was making myself hungry. (The things I do for the blogsphere!)

So yeah, I'll leave you with that. But, I will ask you to stay tuned. Why, you ask? Well, I reply...all of you people who think you're all frugal and earth-friendly and all of that? Dude, meet my grandfather. He can recycle anything, including 25 year old Stoffers containers AND boxes.

I know, you're hoping tomorrow comes sooner so you can read about him.

Container Store's Travel Sale

With nothing but love in my heart and sincerity in my tone do I tell you the following:

The annual Container Store Travel Sale has begun! Woo!

Seriously.

I'm not kidding.

I've been waiting all year for this. Regina and I went to the store weekly (ok, maybe daily) before her trip hoping the sale would start.

And then she went to London.

And the sale began.

Isn't that how it always goes?

But in all seriousness, if you travel at all, their travel accessories really do make all the difference and the sale makes them even better. They have the legal-size-won't-leak bottles and the best packing system. I used to be the exploding suitcase sort of packer. Now, I'm all organized and can actually see everything in the suitcase. Stop laughing. Yes, I have seen the state of my bedroom. No, that doesn't mean I don't pack all tidy and neat. Shut up. Anyways, back to the travel stuff...

I have a few of these folding thingies and a few of the cube thingies. Seriously, they work. Not only do they keep everything nice and neat and wrinkle free (or at least at the same wrinkle level that they entered your suitcase) and they keep your socks and underwear from running amok in your suitcase, or is that a problem that only I have? Then, when everything is dirty, you can cram it into the cubes and obtain all of this magical packing space for all the crap, er, stuff you've bought on your trip. Its scary how much dirty laundry you can pack into those cubes. And, for the stuff that is oddly unworn and clean (because I'm sure NONE of you over pack) you can keep that safely folded away where it won't touch the icky dirty stuff...very handy for lazy people like me who don't want to do any extra laundry if they don't have to.

The following has also been brought to my attention. My mom uses those space bags for compressing all of the down comforters we have. Did you know they have smaller space bags just for travel? For all the paranoid yarn packers out there, you know who you are, the ones afraid they won't have enough projects to last through your trip. Well, the idea was hatched (ok, fine, it wasn't mine, it was Regina's) that you could put the extra projects into one of these bags and just smoosh it down to nothing so that it doesn't take up all the space in your carry-on ('cause duh! you're not checking yarn). Brilliant! Not to mention, another great place for your dirty laundry...just suck all the air out and you have even more space for all that crap, er, stuff you're buying.

So yeah, that's your helpful tip for today.

Florida - the Recap - Part I

Well, Ellen asked, so here's the recap, complete with the requested pictures.

March 17th marks Todd & my 2nd anniversary. So, we did what any intelligent couple does on thier anniversary, we went to Orlando and Ft. Myers. Duh. That's completely intuitive. Sort of like our trips to South Dakota and Mackinaw Island...isn't that where everyone spends their holidays?

The Florida trip was born out of Todd's desire to go to the Twins' spring training. Its not like he's always wanted to go to Afganistan (NTTAWWT), I mean, Spring Training is an easy dream to realize. And hey, aren't there a few theme parks down thataway? Sounds good to me!

We departed Saturday (3/16) from our respective states and met up at MCO (Orlando's finest airport). Oddly, it was quite nice. There's a bit of shopping, what seems to be a nice hotel right in the middle and quite a few dining options. I know all of this as Todd's flight came in about an hour after mine.

From there we checked into our hotel, the Cypress Pointe Grand Villas. We pondered our hotel options for HOURS as Orlando has FAR too many options. Seriously. Our brains hurt trying to figure this out and we restricted ourselves to hotels we could pay for with points. Imagine if we were actually going to pay for a hotel. I don't think the trip would have ever happened. But, Cypress had everything we wanted, including a full kitchen and the possibility of a large bathtub.

Woo! We got our big bathtub!

Before I go any further, I must tell you that unless you stay on Disney property, you must rent a car. Hell, even if you do stay on property you need a car unless you want to eat only Disney food. Just sayin' is all. Our chariot:

Behold the mighty Impala!

And speaking of food, despite the WIDE array of available frightening chain food fare we were able to find Cuban, Mexican and even Chicago Deep Dish Pizza. Yummy and affordable. Every night for dinner we spent about $30 for the two of us (tip not included). Not bad for good food in a tourist town.

On Monday we began our day at the Magic Kingdom. Somehow we managed to get really lost on the way over. It seems impossible but you know, we live to dream.

Happy Anniversary AND St. Patrick's Day!

Stay tuned! More tomorrow...

Vacation is all I ever wanted

Woo!

Has it really been a month, dear diary. My bad.

So I just got back from Florida and wow, that was not what I expected. Some observations:

• Lots of billboards advertising vasectomies.
• Only saw five (5) bugs.
• Every minimall and resort in Orlando holds a mom'n'pop grocery store.
• Normal grocery stores are easily accessible.
• Churros are tougher to come by at the Disney parks than you would guess.
• Pretzels are easier to come by at the Disney parks than you would guess.
• I liked Disney's Animal Kingdom more than any other Disney park I've ever been to.

Top 10 Things I Didn't Know About South Dakota

10. There are flies *everywhere.*
9. There's a basketball court inside the Corn Palace.
8. South Dakota is for families but not for vegetarians.
7. Buffalo is good.
6. You can buy Lawn Gnomes at Wall Drug.
5. Sturgis is not just an event, its a lifestyle.
4. Every jewelry store that carries Black Hills gold is a "Factory Outlet."
3. There is WiFi in every town, no matter how small, but cell service is a challenge to keep.
2. ...except in De Smet, SD
1. The Badlands are bad ass...amazing...seriously.

Design Challenge

Here's the house.

Put together a few swatches for the living room. I'll post the winning combination tomorrow.

Not much to blog about but I seem to have much to blog

Made the annual pilgrimage to the land of humidity and no a/c, also known as my grandfather's house. As I've mentioned time and again, my grandfather kicks substantial amounts of boo-tay. 91, lives alone, just had his driver's license renewed (after new glasses and a full physical exam) and is on NO medication or vitamins. Yes, we're related...odd, I know.

Anyways, to be completely honest, there isn't much to blog about in Penn Hills. I spent most of my time there trying to triage my grandfather's abused 3 year old Dell full of spyware and viruses. Yes, dear readers we had McAffee software installed with supposed self-scanning and downloading. But sadly the viruses had vanquished McAffee despite my trying to run new scans and upload new software.



But on this trip, I did make two unexpected discoveries:

1. Because of the violent fist shaking and computer crashing, off I went to the evil empire, to try to resolve the bad virus/spyware situation. I chatted with a very knowledgeable and very nice kid who really couldn't have been more than 18 despite his white shirt and black tie status and ended up trotting back to grandpa's house with new software. This stuff worked and only $14.99 this week. (mental note, check at the Westwood store to pick up a copy for home....they were out on Tuesday when I stopped by...) So yeah, affordable software that actually worked.

2. So, the traffic doGs were on our side when mom was dropping me off at the PIT airport. (Anyone who has ever spent ANY time in PA knows all about PENDOT and their love of torturing roads for no apparent reason.) I had a few hours to kill and as luck would have it PIT actually has a pretty happy mall in which to kill time and excess travel funds. Since my nails were a wreck and I had oodles of time before my flight, I stopped into the spa that I always walk by when I arrive but never have time to explore.

Three fabulous things about this spa:

a. When you're waiting for your appointment you can sit in a fantastic massage chair. That was worth the over-priced manicure right there...how long was I there before my appointment? half an hour? Freakin' fantastic to not have to sit with the masses in those horrible chairs or my usual spot on the floor by the gate.

b. My manicure is still rockin', which is unheard of for real nails. Its been days and nary a chip in sight.

c. The ladies who work there are super nice, like genuinely nice.

I will tell you this...a customer was there while I was waiting for my manicure. She wanted to get her brows done. So the nice girl did them. She hardly did a thing, seriously, I watched the whole time. The lady was not happy with the "work" requested a pair of tweezers and insisted on "fixing" it herself. The poor cosmetologist was just horrified...so embarrassed. But here is what I was thinking...what exactly are you expecting from an airport spa in Pittsburgh. You need fabulous brows, hit Chroma or Anastacia, not an airport spa. Now, I know I live in la-la land and not everyone has access to Lisa or Anastacia but there are actual salons and spas in places away from L.A. and if you really care about your brows that much, uhm, then take care of them.

Thank doG for TSA

Fade in Easter Sunday, cute girl with a blue wheeled duffle bag, and one large black tote bad standing in the security line at MSP airport. Sad, yet wearing her bunny ears ('cause Jesus loves the Easter bunny), she puts her coat & UGGS into a bin, her purse into a bin & tosses the tote and the duffle through.

TSA: "WE NEED A BAG CHECK ON 4!"

Cute Guy: "Think its yours or mine?"

Bunny Eared Girl: "Its mine....Its always mine."

TSA: [holding bin with white purse] "This yours?"

BEG: "Unless he happens to carry the same Betsy Johnson handbag, I'd have to say yes."

TSA: [Beginning to walk to the bag check area] "This all you're carrying?"

BEG: [pointing to the parade of bags on the conveyor belt] "No, not at all."

TSA: [Takes bin to the end of the conveyer belt & riffles through purse] "Where are your lotions?"

BEG: "Excuse me?"

TSA: "Your lotions. Shampoos. Your Ziploc bag."

BEG: "Oh, I don't carry any of that when I travel."

TSA: [confused yet glaring]

BEG: "My boyfriend lives here so I just leave a bag o' stuff with him."

TSA: [digging FURIOUSLY through the understated yet stylish handbag...finally the look of triumph on the angry man-lady's face] "What do you call THIS?!"

BEG: "Nail polish."

TSA: "Why isn't in a ZIPLOC?"

BEG: "'cause I didn't know I had it in there."

TSA: "I'll let it go this ONE TIME but next time have it in a Ziploc."

Yes, that's right. I had a bottle of nail polish, forgotten at the bottom of my bag. Because, if there is something to really fear when flying, its not terrorism, stupid loud talkers on cell phones, or even fear itself, but Lippmann Collection nail polish. Those sparkles are something scary.

I get stopped like this every time I travel. And I don't travel with any of the forbidden stuff. I either have my girly crap waiting for me when I arrive, or I'll buy it when I get there.

And the sad thing is, I wouldn't even mind all the torment if I felt any safer flying. But while they're scolding me about nail polish, who knows what could be taken into the airport through an employee entrance or even security.

In search of the Moose

Yeah, yeah, L.A. city girl blissfully taken with the quaint small-town life. The concept of driving more than 10 minutes (without traffic) for food is just something I don't understand. So, anytime we venture to Southern Minnesota, eating is definately an adventure. One night we drove to Iowa for food. Dude, we went to another state to eat. He!!, I can't make myself drive to the valley for good sushi and we're driving to another state? Well, Southern MN is like a foreign country to me so I just take the same attitude....sure, I'm game for anything.

Here's the latest...

Trimont (about 15 minutes from where we were staying) has a town owned restaurant called the Chocolate Moose. Its the sort of place mom'n'I have joked we should open...cook when you feel like it and close when you don't. Well, we were hoping to eat there on Saturday for lunch (when they usually feel like cooking) but it was Easter "weekend" so they didn't feel like cooking. Seriously, that rules and something that would so not fly in the big city. I told T that is a manditory meal (assuming they're open) for next trip. I mean, a town owned restaurant that serves what they want to serve when they want to serve...freakin' awesome.

Since that was Trimont's only restaurant. (Again, I get crabby when I only have one restaurant per block to choose from here, but when in Rome...) We pushed on, to a "large" town in search of food (Makato for any of you playing along at home). We exit the highway to take the scenic route through town. Uhm, yeah, industry and mini-malls are scenic, I guess. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure Mankato is a nice place and I just saw the seedy underbelly. Though, I should have had T pull over to take a picture the best adult shop sign ever. Seriously. "Free vibrating egg with purchase of Easter Basket." I mean, what says Easter and Jesus and stuff better than a vibrating egg? Sadly, I had to use the little girls room, so really, stopping at red lights was optional at this point; I wasn't about to pause for a picture.

Speaking of not pausing for pictures, I did not take one that day. Not one of pizza (not that s.ly has been skimping on the pictures of the famed pizza, and btw, Bicko really does live up to the hype), nor one of our dinner companions, (s.ly & Melba joined us for dinner with drinks followed at Herkimer). And, that was d@mn fine pizza followed by drinks at a d@mn fine bar. I mean, color me happy, they had not one but two kinds of cider. Definately picture worthy. Oh well.

Having a rough time

In case you were wondering, there's no Orange Roughy in greater Minneapolis. Word on the street is that its over fished. I'm just letting you know in case you're looking for it and feel like a moron 'cause you can't find it. I'm here to help.

Our food choices that day were odd yet satisfying...bagels for breakfast, Byerly's for lunch and
Torge's for dinner.

Bagels - I really could have lived the rest of my life and never know about Cinnamon Sugar bagels. Soooo good. From someone who swore off bagels, other than an occasional wheat, this was not a good discovery. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

Byerly's - For the L.A. kids, this is the equivalent to Gelson's. They have really good specialty food...the soups seem to be a particular favorite in this crowd. As a whole, spendy yet worth it. I'll need to take a bit more time to poke around. We were in a bit of a rush so I didn't get a chance. I mean, any market that offers samples of key lime pie is a happy place in my book.

Torge's - The finest Fairmont has to offer. Well, the finest Fairmont has to offer that doesn't allow smoking. Not that you'll ever go there, but if you do, order the Artichoke Crab dip. I seriously made a mistake by not making this my dinner. It was yum and stupidly I had to not only share but be expected to eat my entree. So yeah, next time, this is dinner.

Mas Por Favor

Thankfully I was in Minneapolis so really, even when going to a Mexican restaurant, I'm not expected to speak any sort of Spanish...which in my life is very important. Really, you don't want me to speak Spanish.

For lunch we did the sky room at Macy's. I was impressed. The space was bright and spacious and food was very yummy. If you've never been there, you have different options, Mexican, salad bar, Asian, deli and grill. I had Mexican, T had salad bar and L had deli. Every one's food looked good. (If L wasn't a good 5 inches taller than me, I would have totally taken her sandwich.) And, seriously, for the Midwest, my food was solid bougie Mexican...a great stop for lunch.

For dinner we went to Maza, more bougie Mexican. Its owned by a local restaurant family and located in downtown Mpls. Its casual yet upscale... expensive but without the pretension or dress code. And you know, they delivered. The wait staff was knowledgeable yet not condescending, which is a tough line. The drinks were yum (if you like girly, do the Cucumber Margarita) and the food was well portioned and very different. Though, one word of warning. If you are a hot wuss, meaning you can't handle spicy dishes, think about your choice of restaurant. I tend to fall into the spice wuss category and this was really in my upper threshold. But, in all honesty, this was T's birthday dinner, not mine, and he loved it, so it was the correct choice. And, all of my friends dig food spicier than I do so I wouldn't hesitate to recommend this to anyone.

You definitely get what you pay for. Go there. Tonight. Yum.

Best of the Best

Did you know there are people who drive from Phoenix to Flagstaff for the Champagne brunch at Little America? Yeah. We didn't quite understand that. Don't get me wrong, it was a d@mn fine buffet, but I don't think I'd do that drive.

After brunch, back to Vegas. Again, over the Dam. But this time, for people heading to AZ, there must have been a 3 hour line to get over that Dam. We couldn't get over the line. We wanted to yell, go back, take another route. But there was not time...we were driving too fast. Heh.

Very excited, we checked into the Belagio. Let me tell you, Steve Wynn really did create a masterpiece with this place. From lobby to pool to guest room, this place is gorgeous. You really can't ask for something prettier. We were in a standard room, and even had to take one with 2 queens instead of a king, and still it looked new, it was spacious and the bathroom rocked...I would stay there again in a heartbeat.

However, I would not eat there, order room service or try to talk to hotel management about any of the issues I'm having.

Anyone who knows me knows I come from a service background. I'm pretty damn nice to people and tend to over tip. I understand if they're busy and stressed and really only bother someone only when I really need to. That being said, they locked me out of my own credit card so I couldn't charge things to the room, they didn't honor our dinner reservation and wouldn't seat us...instead placing us on a waiting list, room service ordering was challenging and the manager who promised to make everything right, didn't.

Lets be honest, I paid $160 for a room at the prettiest hotel on the strip with a tub I could have entertained several friends in...I got the good end of that deal. I would stay there again but I would make reservations at Valentino's or any one of Pierro's restaurants (all located away from the Bellagio), and just not expect anything in the way of service, instead, just enjoying my beautiful room and my beautiful hotel.

Looks like a movie set

I know, cheesy, but seriously, the Grand Canyon doesn't look real to me. I mean, look at the back of the picture. I just expect someone to punch through the canvas or something.

It didn't help that it was a perfectly clear day, with highs in the 70s. It was seriously picture perfect, something out of a movie....something you'd expect from la-la land.

***

We took the Grand Canyon Railway to the canyon. For two people that spend far too much of their travel time in a car, this was an excellent option. If you have the means, I recommend it. But, do one of the first class cars. The lower end options looked painful...crowded, no a/c, a whole lot of not good.

We did the dome car and it was very cool. And I'm not just saying that 'cause it was a dome and had air conditioning and it was first class and we had our own "hostess." Well, actually I am just saying that. And, what seemed to be incredibly cheesy entertainment, was actually quite fun. There were singing cowboys, a "robbery" and a wild west show...very fun. But, keep in mind, as the website tell you, this is an old restored train. You might have technical problems. We did. And it was fine. But, that's just something to remember.

Something else surprising...the food at the Canyon. Most everything (including most recently the train) is owned by a private company that does public park stuff. We ate at the Arizona Room. As you can see from the chandeliers, this place rocked. For a national park, I have to admit that the food was quite tasty. Though, I'm sure it helped that the big boss sat down at the table next to us about 5 minutes after we got there. (If you want bad food, you can find it next door, but it was nice to have the choice.)

The Canyon was amazing and I definitely want to go back. Of course, I want to stay at El Tovar which will require more than 10 days advance notice, but that's ok. Someday we'll be capable of making travel plans more than 10 days in advance.

Get your kicks

After fueling up on the breakfast buffet at Mandalay (quite tastey I might add and looked *much* better than the lunch buffet they were setting up), we headed out to Flagstaff.


One thing you should know is that there are two ways to Flagstaff, the slow way or the long way. Not knowing there was a slow way or a long way, we took the direct way which translates to the slow way since you have to cross over Hoover Dam. Now, we've been to the Dam before so we knew we were in for some traffic but we didn't know it would take an hour to go 3 miles. Oddly enough, it didn't really bother us. It just was what it was. But, I'm just warning you in case you need to cross over it for *any* reason.

After surviving the Dam we were lured to Seligman by the promise of root beer in a frosty mug. (Well, one of us was lured by the frosty mug and one of us was lured by the promise of a little girls room. I'll let you guess which of us was lured by which.)

Finally we arrive at our destination. Seriously, if you're going to Flagstaff, I can't recommend Little America highly enough. I booked the hotel based on the website and let me tell you, Karen didn't let me down. The sign for Little America is a bit motel-ish but the service was amazing, the concierge knows her Flagstaff food in every price range, the rooms were really nice and the price was beyond reasonable.

One last thing and sadly, it was WAY too dark to take a picture, but we had the BEST pizza for dinner that night. OMG, fabulous. Seriously, you need to go here. And if you do go, bring me back some 'za.

Oh, and here's the obligatory tub picture:


And a taste of my new obsession of taking self-portraits in every well-lit mirror:

Bathtub Revolution...continued

Yup, its a bathtub. That's why we got the "Honeymoon" Suite. But, in all honesty, if this were my honeymoon and that was my suite, I'd be cranky.

I so dig Mandalay Bay. I've wanted to stay there for YEARS and the pools were all I hoped they would be. But, let me tell you, the room was boring at best. Now, they're totally redoing all the rooms. Of course, the new rooms are more spendy than the old ones (which I learned after booking ours.) But yeah, the tub was nice, the room was huge and boring and the wave pool rocked. I can't wait to go back!

Though, I need someone to explain the $20 inner tubes for the lazy river to me 'cause I know I'm going to pay for one next time and I need to justify it. Heh.

Seriously Freezing

Ok, I'm so not being melodramatic when I say its cold. I once knew a person who would often accuse me of getting cold looking at ice cubes. But seriously, do I need more proof than this?


Guess where this was taken? No, really, look at that frozen water stuff on the ground, now just take a guess. I can wait so take your time...

Would Scottsdale, Arizona be one of those early guesses? I think not. But, that's where I took the picture this morning. Part of Scottsdale Road was closed off and I saw this while waiting in line at the light to turn left. Freakin' ice. It was in the 20's while I was there. Hello? This is supposed to be the high season. People are supposed to flee cold climates for the desert. Asthmatic freak right here...I don't need cold air messin' with me. I paid top dollar of my hotel room for ice? I did not see ice on the hotel webpage when I was making my hotel selection. I want my money back. Well, I'll pay for the jacuzzi and the nice fireplace, but I want the money I paid for a warm climate 'cause I didn't get any of that.

Cowboy up

Ok, when I was told "yeah, sit at my table...its the cowboy table" I didn't take it literally. I guess I should have.



Yup, this was on the wall next to the table. This is the center table across from the serving area of the kitchen...a spectacular view. As much as "Top Chef" or whatever that goofy Fox reality show is called, it is pretty close to how a kitchen is supposed to run. Watching these guys work was like poetry in motion and I really do mean it. "If you have the means, I highly recommend it."*

Unless of course you go the restaurant hungry, then I would say you should sit as far away from the kitchen as possible since you will eat or at least want to eat every d@mn thing that you watch being plated. I mean, everything looked amazing. Seriously. As luck would have it, at this point, we had been eating for about 24 hours straight so a vague sense of willpower (i.e. sharing dessert) was felt at the table.

*Ok, you really should know this quote and if you don't you should be embarrassed and ashamed.

Warning: Vicious Attack Dog

If you go to the ranch, you'll be facing this. I know. I feel the fear through the net. You shake just looking at this wild creature. And then there's the dog holding that odd red & blue tennis-ball-for-feet creature.

Yup, upon our arrival, Laslo was at his appointed back gate station guarding the ranch from evil. When your home is gated you must bark to let all that pass know you are in charge of the property and all neighboring properties. As we all know, bicyclists and construction workers are very threatening.

By Popular Demand

The craptastic photos. Ok, well, not all of the craptastic photos, just a select few.

Enjoy!