Letters

While Hurricane was taking his morning nap I thought maybe, just maybe, I could sneak in a quick shower since I'd just finished working out. I dont know why on Earth I think I can ever accomplish this as it always turns out bad....

I thought I heard Hurricane fuss, his room is next to the bathroom, but knew that he'd find something to occupy his time just long enough for me to finish. I had put a Blues Clues movie in to play, and put his sipper of milk and magna doodle in his crib as precautions. After less than a minute he had quieted down so I wasn't worried.
He certainly found something to occupy his time, unfortunatly it wasn't with either of those.

See, we have a rather tall bookshelf next to his crib that has all sorts of books, toys and blankets for him to play with on the lower shelves. On the top two shelves are some of my scrapbooking things, and on the very top is a basket full of little foam letters. Over 500 of them....

PURPLE

ORANGE

GREEN

& BLACK

LITTLE

FOAM

LETTERS

I'm sure you can imagine how the shower of confetti happened. It was like a ticker tape parade had just occured in the streets of NYC, or that there had been a major mishap with a confettin canon. There were letters EVERYWHERE, including out the door. The hurricane, we're discovering, is very resourceful when it comes to getting something that's out of reach. If you don't remember the microwave incident just ask lol

He sat the magna-doodle on it's side, used it to climb up the side and or foot of his crib, and proceeded to reach the basket of letters. The reason I know is when I came into his room he was repeating this procedure to reach something else on the shelf, giggling the entire time. Yes, I let him repeat the procedure without me saying a word, since I wanted to see just how the heck those letters got everywhere, and boy did I ever.

Thankfully, all the letters have made it safe and sound back into the basket. (I'm still finding them in odd places a day later). There will no longer be a magna-doodle or anything else that could ever in a million years be used as a ladder-type apparatus put in his crib. His room has also been rearranged so that there is no longer a shelf nearby, or anything else.

What has happened to the human race??

So it takes quite a bit to get my feathers ruffled I guess you could say. But this weekend was just about enough lol We decided to take yet another trip to Colorado, which our relationship is turning into a love/hate thing with the entire state.

We love the fact that we still have a home there so that we don't have to pay an ungodly price for a hotel room nor stay with family down there. We love that we have so many friends and family living down there... we hate the fact that they all need 100% of our time and some choose to get angry when you want to divy up your time between everyone. The culprits will remain nameless. We love all the things to do there... we hate all the people you have to deal with to do those things. We love the variety of places they have down there to eat, shop, etc... we hate the 95% of "customer service" people you have to deal with while going nearly anywhere there. This love/hate issue is why I'm blogging this morning.

Strike 1. It was lunch time so we decided to meet some friends at a local place we used to frequent all the time because they're generally very kid friendly. It wasn't very crowded which was nice. As soon as we walked in the door (the count was 4 adults, 2 toddlers -Hurricane and Peaches, 1 infant -Belle who was sound asleep) the hostess rolled her eyes. We should've known right away that it was going to be interesting. When she brought back our water she placed 2 large full cups right in front of the toddlers. Before Missy & I could react they had water everywhere. It was amusing to us, unfortunatly the waitress was scowling and visibly upset. We were still snickering and Missy asked her if she could please bring us more napkins. As she was walking away she said "maybe you should keep a better eye on your brats and this would've never happened". We blow it off. After all why let one person ruin our good weekend. The rest of lunch was a virtual disaster, nothing was correct, but we decided that complaining wouldn't exactly be in our best interest!

Strike 2. So after lunch the guys took the kiddos, who were ALL ready for a nap, back to Missy & Joe's place. That way the guys could go nap too, or bs, or whatever they wanted. Missy & I decided we needed some retail therapy and a good cup of something. At the coffee shop, which we used to visit at least once a week and Missy is very close with the owner, the guy was having a bad day too obviously. We walked in and got a "whaddya need", head cock and eye roll included free of charge. No politeness in any way shape or form. We ordered our drinks & neither were right. We asked if we'd picked up the wrong order and he said "I gave ya what ya ordered." Missy was feeling a lot more agressive than I was so I let her handle it. She restated what we ordered, and showed him what we got. He pointed to the drinks and said "I gave ya what ya ordered and that's it. NEEEEEXT" and was pushing us aside. "I would like you to remake our order please" she stated in an overly sweet way. "Lady, I made you what you ordered. If you don't like it then go somewhere else". We left the coffee shop. Went across the street & got Belle some new shoes, went to another store, and 45 min later we were back at the coffee shop, Mike (owner of said shop & Missy's b-i-l) by our side. Needless to say we weren't this kids first victims...

Strike 3. So by then I was still trying to figure out why this place was voted one of the best places to live in the country. I've come to the conclusion that roughly half the vehicles manufactured and sold in this country have had their blinkers disabled. They've also been equiped with short tempered drivers who are always in a hurry to go nowhere. The best was when we got flipped off by a lady driving a Mercedes who wanted our parking spot, we pulled in as she was turning up the aisle about 30 cars down. She proceeded to pull up behind us, wait for us to get out, and say "That was my parking spot you stupid white trash #$%&*'s" and squeeled away. What's wrong with our Saturn that gets 44 mpg? Missy & I laughed it off. We also met a plethera of rude cashiers while we were doing other shopping the rest of the afternoon... We even got an "are you sure that line isnt' a little out of your price range ladies?" comment from a sales lady. Just because we were dressed in economical mommy wear (we were in jeans, long sleeve shirts and each had a fleece vest on ( I swear we didn't plan it lol) doesn't mean that we can't afford to shop where we want to. This was a place that I loved to shop at, I have quite a few pieces from there, and will no longer be shopping there. The only polite person we met was an older lady who said "thank you ladies" as we held a door for her going into one of the shops. This afternoon I'm armed with my receipts, clerk's names, and numbers for complaints and I will be making my calls during nap time.

So comes the question(s) of the day... What has happened to the human race? What happened to something as simple as manners? A simple please and thank you? When did we forget to take time to breath, smile, laugh? When did we forget to treat each other with even a pinch of respect? When did we stop being able to have an opinion out of sheer fear of offending someone? When did someone having a bigger house, a fancier car, a better hair stylist, things like that, make them better than another person? Why is one person/family living with a mass quantity of debt to keep up with the Jones' better than another person/family who has made the smart choice to accept what they have and NOT go into a lifetime of debt to keep up? As the Sugar Glider put it, why is this place full of hoity toity people, they certainly aren't better than anyone else just because they pretend to have money. They're all over down there and everywhere else. I've come to realize that a majority of my friends down there were that way. A battle of who went to the best salon, who's nails were better, who car cost more, who's kids were in more sports, everything was a competition it seemed. Now that we've moved away I can see that, and it's even more irritating now than it was then. The more time we spend down there, the more I realize how blessed we are by living where we are now. Where people are polite. Where people take time to sit on their front porches and get to know their neighbors. Where people aren't always in a hurry. Where a back yard fence is to keep the dog in, not your neighbors out lol. Where I have yet to wait more than a minute or two for a light and I think no more than 3-4 minutes for a train to fly through town.

** I'm officially a-okay with not having the choice shopping I used to. Why? Because I've learned that I can get a lot of it online, without a rude sales clerk in tow; either that or I can wait and get it in a few months when we go back to the smog filled area. Maybe that's what's making them all so rude, the smog...

**I'm a-okay with not having the fresh produce and groceries I used to. Why? Because I know when I go through Sara's or anyone elses line at the grocery store, my price will always scan in right, I'll be greeted with a smile, and parking will never be a question. I can get a lot of the veggies fresh from a local farm and they're guaranteed to be in season and not chemically altered.

**I'm a-okay with not having my old coffee shop. The little one here is growing on me, that and I'm figuring out how to make a lot of it on my own at a fraction of the cost. That and I dont' have a grump "barista" waiting on me.

**I'm a-okay with not having the fake friends I used to have. The friends here might have their quirks, but they're real people. Plus the ones that I still keep in touch with down there were real in the first place, they haven't forgotten that we all started out the same way.