But we persevered.
Because I wanted to go buy these.
I wanted to get the iced tea glasses (on the left) at Macy's, and how could I pass them up? They were marked down to $29.99 until noon. And they come as a set of 12!! I arrived at the store at 11:50. Just in time. After some assistance from a very nice salesperson (if you can believe it) I went to the register, used my $10 off coupon and paid (pre-tax) $19.99 for these suckers. Not bad, considering we hardly ever entertain -- although there is a family in North Carolina I wish would come up for an extended visit!!
Shopping here in Western NY is so much different than in Northern Virginia. Locals, as a rule, wouldn't really spend their weekends in Potomac Mills mall from Columbus Day until after the 1st of the year, unless it was to go to the movies. It was madness! Truly, utterly packed with people. People coming from out of state to shop at our mall!! And you can only imagine the parking situation. Ick. I don't miss the crowds. Which is why I was surprised I let DN1 talk me into shopping on Black Friday, but there we were.
After living overseas for 7 years and then in Northern Virginia for another 9, you begin to behave a certain way when shopping. While living overseas the rule of thumb is if you see it in the Exchange and it is a new item, you know that if you don't buy it then and there chances are you won't see it again. Now things have changed a bit because we lived overseas from 89-96 and this is all pre-internet shopping, but even still, when we had our Thanksgiving in London we couldn't find any baking soda in the commissary. People horde. Because they all live by the same rule. It doesn't matter anymore anyway, because any of us who lived overseas are not allowed to donate blood to the American Red Cross (mad cow disease and all that). I don't know how that fits with hording, but it serves us right I guess.
The second rule of thumb, and this applies more to Northern Virginia than to Western NY, is that if you want to see a new movie, chances are with 250,000+ people living in your county someone else is going to want to see the same movie. We went to see a Harry Potter flick in 2002 (which one was that?) and the theater was so full at 12:30 in the afternoon that DN2 had to sit on my lap! Don't these people work?!?! So when we moved up here we were still in rush, rush mode. Get to the theater, someone has to go get seats and someone else gets popcorn. But the first few times we "rushed" we realized, hey, no one else is here. So slowly but surely we're breaking the habit, but once learned it's difficult to forget.
I don't know what any of this has to do with buying crystal glasses at Macy's. Other than when I got home I called my mother to tell her about it she said, "Well you've got all of Great Aunt Mytle's stemware here you could have used."
Lovely.
And as for deaths in the family boy we've had our share. My elderly cousin (89) died two weeks ago and my uncle's wife (his third) died yesterday.
Again, nothing whatsover to do with crystal stemware or stupid drivers in the mall parking lot. But then again, perhaps it does.
Hope everyone had a great turkey day. Tomorrow is a special day for someone very special to me -- it's my little Hawaiian boy's birthday (he's not really Hawaiian, some haole called him that to her daughter when the two of us were sitting outside a hotel in Honolulu). The big 22. Bring it on.
No comments:
Post a Comment