| Sunday, February 11, 2007 |
| One of those Days |
Ever have one of those seemingly simple lists of things to do, a list that should take a couple hours, and it becomes a nightmare task of endless running around? Yeah - me too.
About two years ago, I made the mistake of getting a set of luggage on Ebay. Eight pieces for something ridiculous like $100. I knew instantly that some of the pieces I would never use, but for $100 - what the heck right?
Wrong. The stuff was good looking enough, and certainly worth the little money I paid for it, but after Southwest, United, and British Airways "lovingly cared for" the most popular sized bags just four or five times, the zipper was trashed and a wheel was broken. And let's face it, it just felt cheap.
I'm leaving for San Diego for a week tomorrow, and have a bunch of other little trips coming up, not to mention a trip to China this fall, so I decided to invest in two pieces of really good luggage instead of eight pieces of cardboard. After looking around a little, I realized that this might actually require a trip to perhaps my least favorite place on earth - the mall.
Then to add insult to injury, I decided to stop and have a little lunch in the process, but the thought of the Food Court at the mall just took my appetite away, so I decided on a restaurant instead. I chose badly. VERY, very, badly. Because, dear internet - I had never been to a Rainforest Cafe. Had I known it was a Disney version of "The Junglebook" meets Chuck E. Cheese, I NEVER would have gone in.
But I did. God help me, I went in. There was a huge line waiting to get in, so I went and sat at the bar (on a stool shaped like a zebra's ass with a tail - THAT alone should have said something), ordered an ice tea and looked at the menu. The food looked decent, so I ordered a Chinese lettuce wrap salad. Then it happened. Apparently, every 5 minutes or so, the entire restaurant is rigged with bad animatronics and "comes to life". An elephant trumpets out of one corner, while monkeys drop from the ceiling, and devices mist rain everywhere. It was the most awful thing I had ever seen. And it got worse. Much worse. I did not realize that the Rainforest Cafe was Birthday party central for every soccer mom and snotty brat under the age of eight in Maryland. There must have been six birthday parties going on. One toddler wandered into the bar and groped her way along the grimy foot rail looking at the bubbles in the bar's fish tank base, smearing her little paw marks all over it. Thankfully her Mom grabbed her, but unless she immediately wiped hand sanitizer on that kid, I hate to think how sick she's gonna be.
Lunch arrived, a garishly over sized salad that could feed an entire family. I ate about a third of it, and left the rest. The bartender, Jess, was actually pretty nice, and I asked her if they had any wet wipes I could use, because although I'm sure they try to keep their restrooms clean, after seeing all those kids in there, there was NO WAY I was going to risk finding out - especially after Jess said, "Yeah, one of my favorite things about working here is that they have separate rest rooms for the crew". Nice.
Great start to the rest of the day. Two hours, four luggage stores, two annoying sales people and almost $400 later, I had two VERY nice pieces of rugged Briggs and Riley luggage with lifetime warranties that include free repairs for airline damage.
Next stop? An ATM to deposit some checks for our Home Owner's Assoc. I always go to the ATM at Whole Foods in Mt. Washington, because I can get groceries, and drop off checks. Much to my annoyance, they swapped out the ATM with one that only distributes cash - no deposits. I called the bank on my cell phone and found out that there were two other locations sort of nearby that took deposits. One at the branch on York Rd., next to the Senator, and the other at the 7-11 in Waverly on 33rd.
Because getting robbed in broad daylight is not something I enjoy, I opted for the branch on York Rd.
You know what's coming - right? It was out of order.
On to a VERY scary 7-11 stop in a less than nice part of town to deposit a couple of grand of checks.
Only THEN, could I get groceries, pick up the dry cleaning, deposit checks at my OWN bank, drop a package at the Post Office and come home. At 5:30 PM.
I had originally thought all of that would take me till about 2:30 or 3:00.
I want my Saturday back. |
posted by Broadsheet @ 8:20 AM   |
|
| 2 Editorial Opinions: |
-
I've learned the hard way that expensive luggage pays for itself.
-
My God. What a horrible day. At least I would've liked a picture of the zebra stool, though. FUNNY!
|
| |
| << Home |
| |
|
|
I've learned the hard way that expensive luggage pays for itself.