Join Me in Snarkville

I got back from Victoria, BC yesterday afternoon.  I felt a little overwhelmed as I got back into the US and turned on my cell phone and it wouldn’t stop getting e-mails.  WOW, I get a ton of junk.  But that’s not important let’s move on.

I took the Victoria Clipper over to Victoria.  It is a two and a half hour trip up there and it was a blast.  I met the head of the group department for Victoria Clipper who will be important to my little Sea Socks cruise.

Once we got to Victoria, we went to Butchart Gardens.  It is an old family gardens, huge, in bloom and frankly not my thing.  So, when the tour ended, I headed off to have lunch (VERY good fish and chips).  However, since I went to lunch quickly, I ended up eating with the Victoria Clipper guy AND the head of Marketing for Butchart Gardens.  Needless to say, I also didn’t PAY for my lunch (probably good karma to make up for my dinner the night before).  I also didn’t spill anything on myself.  It is so rare, that I felt I must share.

We stayed in the Empress Hotel overnight.  My room was delightful — including a walk in closet.  If it wasn’t so dang expensive, I’d suggest everyone go stay a week — but alas, if you have that kind of money, please adopt me.

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Or not. Yes, the Queen has arrived safely in Seattle, one of her very favorite cities. However, in the journey she has managed to prove yet again she has no royal training. But I’m getting ahead of myself, let me back up. And while I’m making the beep-beep backup sounds, might I suggest a cup of coffee or a trip to the potty this will take a while.

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yep, yet again I’ll be braving the skies and flying to places far away.  I happen to be going to one of my favorite places, Seattle for the rest of the week — so I’m taking Snarkville on the road.

I’d love to say that I had a special set built for the On the Road edition — but we all know that Snarkville’s budget doesn’t extend to such things.  So, what may be different with the “On the Road” edition — frankly, I have no idea.

I’m hoping to live blog a few things — we shall see if they are any more exciting than waiting for room service.

Now the Queen must think about packing.

…that the Queen has a few opinions? Shut up, I just have a few. But I’m willing to share them this morning with you. Feel lucky? Well, I’m sharing my opinions in the form of my reviews of stuff.

Early post note: In re-reading this post, I feel there should be a warning that this is far less than my normal snark — in fact it could be downright positive. We don’t think I’m losing my edge, do we?  So to prevent that, I thought I start with my open letter to shoppers out there.

Dear fellow Cart Driving Shopper:

   I appreciate that you, like me, are in fact trying to find things in this store.  I appreciate that you, like me, will be purchasing more than you can carry in your own very hands.  I appreciate that you, like me, may need a few minutes to choose between the various items on the shelf to decide which will make it home with you.  However, while I can appreciate all of these things, I can no longer stand quietly by and ignore you complete and total lack of a clue.  You see, when driving your cart, you must appreciate that there are others that exist on this planet Earth with you and thus may need to to occupy an aisle at the same time as you.  Here are a few pointers to remember when driving your cart:

1. You shall not try to take your half out of the middle.  Almost every aisle in both Target and Costco (plus countless other locales) have aisles large enough for at least two carts to pass each other — provided one of you (namely, YOU) don’t PARK your cart in the smack middle of the aisle.
2. You shall not park your cart across the entrance of an aisle.  Yes, I know it must seem so normal that this is where you might think a cart should go to stay out of YOUR way, but it will hamper me from making my right turn down the aisle with shampoo that I need.  And no, I’m not going to walk completely around the aisle to avoid making you move (as much as you look at me like I have four heads).  My shampoo is on this end of the aisle, this is where I am, dang it — you are in my way.
3. You shall not grab two carts in an effort to split up and not in fact, split up.  This will cause you and your hubby (and your assorted 19 children — you do know what causes it right — STOP IT) to walk side by side and block an entire aisle.  This can be made only slightly more annoying by the fact you then will check out in the express lane because you bought TOOTHPASTE.
   
4. You shall stay WITH your cart.  And by “with” I mean within a body length.  Yes, I completely understand parking OUT OF THE WAY, but parking in the middle of the aisle to run four aisles over is not proper cart procedure.  Also, it is often easier to to stay out of other people’s way if you are actually WITH your cart.
   
5. If you routinely use the express lane (10 items of less) and none of those items is larger than your own hand, kindly consider instead of a cart next time, carrying a basket.  This could save all of lots of trouble, since it would be your ass and not your cart in the way — at which point, I’d be consider highly uncouth to mention that you might visit Weight Watchers  at somepoint.
6. Finally,  should you have failed at any of the above and meet ME with my cart (which will have stuff in it, be properly aligned to the right side of the aisle, be continuing to move in a forward direction) and you are in my way (with your empty cart, parked for a LONG time in the center of the aisle and you are more than 8 feet away from it), do NOT get all pissy at me when I move your cart out of my way.  There is nothing in it (not like I’m shopping out of your cart) and you were too far away from it to notice the entire line of people you are single handedly holding up.
   

Loving Yours,

The Queen of the Carts

(Ah, yes — now I feel better) — onto the reviews and less snark.

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I’m sure everyone, except our dear Polly, have been sending me cool thoughts and I’m pleased to report that the Queen is not melting much. I seem to have started to figure out the way to keep the house cooler and the temps are dipping below 100.

In a case of serious jealousy, the Prince is currently in motorcycle school, in the morning without the heat and on a MUCH cooler day than me. Here’s hoping that despite the fact he disregarded the sunscreen I left on his pile of clothes that he has the good sense not to get burned.

So, yesterday, when the Queen went to the DMV, she learned something rather cool about Snarkville. We must have the best run DMV ever. At 4:15pm on a Friday afternoon, my DMV took all of 15 minutes to make me wait, fill out the paperwork, and get my shiney new license in process. Of course they will be mailing me my actual license, but I am now official. I can ride my scooter at night. I can have a passenager. I can ride on the freeway. I’m so thrilled.

What you may ask is our plan to stay cool today? Well, let’s say it involves two of my favorite places — Target and Costco. Then I see a nap in our future, since Duke decided that this morning was the morning to get up at 6am (never the days we go to school — no on those days he sleeps until past 6:30am).

So, as you might know the Queen is not thrilled with all this heat. It appears we will be in this heat wave at least through Sunday — but the “cooling” looks like the 90’s. So, I’m not convinvced this will ever end. Hence, in a desperate measure, late last night I threw out to my friendly neighborhood Mother’s Club an e-mail asking for ways to beat the heat — particularly since Duke and I will be bonding Saturday and Sunday while Prince is off melting in motorcycle school. (more…)

An Open Letter to my House:

If I don’t come home tonight, I want you to know why.  It isn’t because the Prince pissed me off or that Duke had to run around in circles before sitting down for shoes and socks for the upteenth time.  No, my dear sweet, Franken-house, it is YOU.  You are hot (not in the good way).  You are now a bit muggy.  And you are a wee bit messy.  I need to be away from you for awhile.  I think we both might need our space a bit.  Perhaps when you cool off again, you will call me and I’ll come home.  Until then, I’m thinking I’ll be at Knit Night — they have AC.

Yours,

The Queen

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When the Queen is running late because her phone is ringing off the hook, which is a good thing, and she drives 30 minutes to pull Duke out of school to run down with like SECONDS to spare to the pool for lessons that he WANTS to take so badly, close down the pool because the teachers are sick. Then make *ME* explain to a nearly 3 year old that he isn’t going to swim today and he has to go back to school.
Yes, Duke was upset. Yes, the Queen was upset. Yes, Duke got over it. The jury is still out on the Queen.

Doesn’t this new site feel so much like the ‘burbs? Like we left the harsh city and went to the country — and are drinking lemonade?
Don’t think I’ve gone all soft on you folks, I so haven’t. But when I was looking for templates for this site, there was shocking few that had what I was looking for. And since Snarkville doesn’t pay the rent around here, I’m not hiring anyone to build one for me — so this may change over time, but it will be by my sweat, dang it.

On to the actual post of the day.  But first — check out this new tool I have: (more…)

Yes, I took Duke to the pool yesterday for his Mommy and Me swim lessons. I was thinking, since these classes were open to kids up to age 4 that there might be a range of ages to enjoy the water together. Alas, no. Duke, nearly 3, was the oldest in the class by about a YEAR plus. He was one of two who were walking — though the girl was really a new walker. In addition, when they were showing the babies how to sort of sit on the side, Duke was jumping into my arms and climbing his own butt right back out to do it again. SO, just as I’m about to say, screw this, I’ll get my money back and move along, the pool shocked me. The teachers invited Duke to move up to the LEVEL ONE class, which involves ME sitting by the side of the pool all nice and dry. I’m thinking this is pretty cool. Today, though Duke will not know it, I’m going to wear my suit under my clothes, just in case he refuses to go with the nice ladies (which I’m frankly doubting but it makes me feel better) — but if he digs this plan, I see poolside knitting during class in my future. Teehee.
In other news, Duke had no accidents yesterday at all. However, the biggest news is that he went to school with TWO stickers on his hands because he stayed dry all night long. Yup, you heard it here first, the boy stayed dry. He even slept a little late this morning and when I finally got him on the potty — let’s just remember the scene from League of their Own when Tom Hanks pees after a bender — yup, same thing — I thought the boy was going to overflow the potty. But all was ok.
So enough about Duke, what about me? Well, the Queen had a quietish day and doesn’t have tons to report. She is up to her eyeballs in the Sock Cruise and is about to be up to her eyeballs in the Joshilyn Jackson Fan Cruise. Do you have any other theme cruise ideas to share? No, that’s ok, I’m not scheduling another one until fall at this point.
BUT, BUT, I do have one little announcement. It seems the Prince has decided that I’ve had enough attention with my little blog adventure here and has started one of his very own. If you’d like to “meet” the snarky man I married, please click here. However, I warn you; he can be pretty funny on occasions (when he doesn’t try too hard) and you might do well to remember me :). I’m just saying. (oh, and he has some awesome photos of a visitor we had in the jungle backyard last night. I don’t know when Duke will be starting his own blog — but I’m fairly sure that the animals aren’t ready to unite in theirs.