Verizon drama

I hate Verizon.

Hate, y'all.

2 weeks ago, we got Matt a new phone.  He had an SE and there was still a bit of trade-in value on it, despite the fact that it was realllllly slow.    Since getting my new phone purchased and switched over at the Verizon store was such a debacle the month before, we thought we'd play it smart and order it online and get everything changed over at home. 

There were some problems with the website, so we ended up having to call in to complete the order the next day, but all things considered it was a pretty smooth process.   The phone arrived two days later and that night I had uploaded everything from the cloud and he was up and running within 30 minutes. 

#Winning

Unfortunately, along with the new phone, they had failed to send the pouch/label to send back the old phone.   Rats.   I sat down with the laptop and chatted with a friendly, but slow typing associate and explained my issue. 

"No problem," she said.  "I'll mail it out tomorrow."

#WinningAgain

A couple days passed. Then five.   Finally a full week later, I had the nifty little return pouch to put the old phone in.

But no return label.

#NotSureIfImStillWinning

So I called back to Verizon.   30 minute and several repetitions of my story later, I was assured the new label would be in the mail next day.  I reminded her that the phone had to be received within 2 weeks. 

"No problem," she said.  "I'll mail it out tomorrow."

A couple days passed.  Then five.  Finally a full week later . . . today . . l still had no label.

As I was getting ready this morning, I logged on to my Verizon account and hit the "chat" button.   Jamie answered the call and I quickly explained my predicament.

And then I explained it three more times. 

I should have ended the chat and picked up the phone, but I was trying to do three things at once, so this *seemed* like a smart idea.    He sent me links.   He asked me to check, recheck and check the box a third time.  Nope, still not there.  He couldn't find a record of my old phone.   He walked me through a manual return of the phone. 

Y'all, this went on for 1 hour and 45 minutes.

105 minutes.  And the outcome was "we'll send you a new box and label."

I should mention, this hassle was over $154.  It's not chump change. 

He told me to check my email for verification email with instructions.  It never came.  I waited.  And waited some more.  We're at 2 hours now.

I asked for a supervisor.

Sam joined the chat.  Hi Sam.

Sam allegedly reviewed our entire chat transcript, but you know I had to repeat the whole long story to him. 

I'm.  Going.  Crazy. 

#NotWinning

15 minutes later he gave me some kind of magic confirmation number and told me I could return the phone to the Verizon store.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?  In the last two weeks, I've driven by the Verizon store at least 8 times.   Why couldn't any of the other people I spoke to/chatted with given me this option!??!

So before getting Gracie's haircut, we stopped by the Verizon store with phone in pouch in had.  I had written the magic confirmation number on it.  I was ready to be finished with this whole phone debacle.

However, the Verizon store had other thoughts.  First, I had to wait for 25 minutes to be helped.  I explained the situation to Ben, who was nice and sympathetic, but slightly clueless.  He had to ask one of his Verizon cronies multiple questions during out discussion.  20 minutes later he handed me a Fed Ex slip and told me I could ship the phone back. 

Once again, the little voice in my head screamed out, "ARE YOU KIDDING ME!??!"

"I don't have the box with me." 

" I was told I could drop it off here in the pouch." 

"Don't you have a Fed Ex pick up at the store?"

They won.  I lost.  They did hand me a sloppily taped up box and I took it to Fed Ex.   The nice Fed Ex man took one look at it and asked if he could re-tape up the box.  I smiled and said, "Sure."

Inside I was crying.  Or maybe screaming.   I can't remember.

The phone is en route.  I have a tracking number.  And I have no doubt that my account will NOT be credited when they receive it. 

#TheNonWinningStreakWillContinue

Attention fashionistas: Red is OUT!

It's Homecoming week at the high school.   Despite having two middle schoolers, we have a decent amount of involvement in the festivities.   The middle school has a float in the parade.  Matt (and the rest of the 8th grade band members) will also march in the parade.  The rest of the school will get to watch it after a strategically-timed fire drill.  Then on Friday night, the 8th grade band kids will play with the high school band during the football game.

As part of the Homecoming activities, Gracie announced yesterday that they were having a spirit day on Friday and everyone was supposed to wear red (school color for both middle and high school).  And with that we realized she doesn't have a red shirt.  Not one.  I'm not sure it's her best color (must be the orange hair), but regardless, I was surprised there wasn't a t-shirt from some race, camp or baton competition in her drawers.    So, last night, we stopped at Target on the way home from baton to look for an inexpensive red t-shirt.  None to be found.  One in the boys department, but it had a Storm Trooper on the front.  Not happening.   We were looking for short sleeve (85 degrees here), but we couldn't find long or short.   No red period.   Purple, pink, orange, green and blue . . . . no red.

 I told her I would be out running errands on Thursday and would look some more. I dashed into the mall this morning, confident that a red shirt would be found in a few short minutes.  I walked the ENTIRE MALL . . . every department store and kids/juniors clothing store and couldn't find a single short sleeve red shirt. Honestly, I only found one long sleeve and it was blinged out in a way I knew would make it unacceptable to Gracie.   No red shirts.  WHY!??!    Not a blouse, not a t-shirt.   I found one spaghetti strap cami at H&M,  but as a dress code no-no, I left it behind. So now I'm left wondering, what's wrong with red?   Is it "out" this year?    How can that fly when Christmas rolls around in a couple short months?

After the mall, I tried Academy Sports, Old Navy and Costco.  No red shirts for girls.  And really, I looked at boys, too.   Finally I ended up in the Ross Dress for Less (which was both my first and last time shopping there -- ugh!) where I found a dark red t-shirt (almost maroon--praying Gracie doesn't care) that had an old-school athletic vibe to it with "Love 84" written on it.  It was $6.99 and didn't have a size tag on it, but I didn't care.  I bought it.   And now I'm anxiously awaiting Gracie to come home and hoping she says she likes it.

Fingers crossed.

Meatless chili?

Gracie has baton on Tuesdays, so I usually serve dinner by 5:30 and then we head out at 6. Sometimes Bassam is home to join us.  Other times Matt will wait to eat with his dad if he doesn't make it home until after 6..  It's not ideal, but we are still fighting like crazy to protect the "family dinner."

So a few minutes ago, after checking homework and making a return check to Gracie's school to hunt for her iPad (we found it), I decided I would start whipping the Sweet Corn Chili  I had planned for dinner tonight.   I sauteed up the onions and then opened the fridge to grab the ground beef.  

But where was it?  

I purchased it LAST NIGHT.   I searched the fridge.  Then the freezer.  Then the fridge and freezer in the garage.  Nothing. 

Then before I walked up the stairs back to the house I glanced in the reusable grocery bags that hang on a hook near the car.   And there they were.   Not one, but TWO packages of ground beef.  

So much for chili and tacos this week.  

It hadn't started to smell, but it was no longer the reddish-pink color of ground beef.   Yuck. 

I glanced in the fridge for what I could make on the fly.   Pita bread pizza or cheese and bean quesadillas.   If they want meat tonight it will have to be beef jerky or a Slim Jim, because that is all that doesn't need defrosting.   The kids decided cheese and bean quesadillas sounded just fine!  

Now I'm off to heat up the griddle.  

Celebrating Valentine's a little bit longer?

This is not going to be a terribly exciting post. I'm talking holiday decorations, storage and being forgetful...or worse yet, setting myself up in the most obvious way to forget.  

You see, I love decorating the house for the seasons/holidays.  When it's time to take them down, I take out the Rubbermaid(s) for that season and load everything back in.  This year, as I took down all things Valentine/hearts, I thought I'd be smart and leave the box out for another day or two, because just when you think you're done, something magically appears and you have to drag the box back out to reload.  The storage in our house is not only inadequate, it's also inconvenient, so it's kind of a pain. I congratulated myself on my forward thinking last weekend when it was time to fully put the box back in to the attic.  

Of course, that feeling of pride was short lived when today I pulled out the Easter/spring box and discovered a couple Valentine's items that clearly had "missed the box" last year (I think I bought them on the after-holiday-sales) and for some reason stashed them here.  I'm absolutely sure I somehow convinced myself that I would remember that they were in there (or see them, since the box is clear) and pull them out for Valentine's Day. 

Insert laugh track here. 

Needless to say, I forgot.
 
Given my frequent posts about my children (especially my first born) saying the words "I forgot" so much that it seems like an attempt to send me to the funny farm, I was reminded that perhaps the apple doesn't fall too far from the tree. 

The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day. . . .

It could have been worse.  The woman who hit me was on her way to dinner to meet her son and his family.

To celebrate her birthday.

Although my neck is sore and my car is a hot mess (although it had an oil change not 5 minutes before the accident!), I'm thankful that I was alone in the car and no one was hurt.

Lessons learned the hard way . . . .

Although these cans are the same size, be advised that only one is designed for use in your hair. 

Getting ready in a bit of a distracted rush this morning, I may or may not have grabbed the wrong can and sprayed it liberally in my hair.   

Not only did it do absolutely nothing good for my hair, the reason I'm not using the Dove dry spay as my deoderant is because I didn't like the scent, so having my hair smell like it all day was a real bummer. 

Naturally, this might lead one to ask (including my husband),  "if you didn't like how it smelled, why did you keep it?"    My answer was because at some point I will run out of deoderant and it will be good to have as a backup.   

On the other hand, accidentally using it as a hair texturizing spray might just make me cut losses and toss it.  

When it rains, it pours . . . .

If you are my Facebook friend, then you've probably already heard about this little gem .  .  .

I had to work at the store for Gracie's class at the end of the day, so my plan was to be at the start of carline at middle school, pick up Matt, drop him off and head to Kenrose.

No problem.

Arrived at school shortly after 2.  School doesn't get out until 2:35, but all the crazy moms like to spend their day sitting and waiting, so to get in and out quickly once school let out, I had to join them.  #if youcantbeatthemjointhem 

I turned off my car and spent the next 30 minutes reading.   Hey, this wasn't so bad after all.  When the first kid stepped outside, I turned the key . . . . and NOTHING.  Noooooo!!

Have I mentioned yet it was raining?  It rained all day, so as I glanced up, I noticed that the carline was as far as I could see.  No. No. NO!!!!!  I ran inside the building to see if the safety resource officer was there and had a portable jumping thing-y.  Nope.  She's not there.  Or maybe she is.   Nobody is really sure.   I pass Matt in the hall who looks perturbed that I am inside and try to explain that we won't be going anywhere soon.

We go back out to the car and I tell the school counselor who is running carline that my car is dead.  She asks me if I had left it running.  Ummmmm.....no.  But even if I had, my car is now dead, blocking one of two lanes at dismissal on a cold, rainy Friday afternoon.   This is no time for "I told you so," even though she couldn't.   

While inside, I saw my friend Robyn working the front desk.  I call her cell in hopes she might still be there and can give me a jump.  She is and she can.  She pulls along side me (which is the passing lane--so she can't wait there) and I realize this isn't going to work.  It's going to take forever to get through dismissal and I don't want to hold her up.  She somehow sweet talks the counselor into stopping carline so she can turn around her car in front of mine so we can get me jumped and out of there.   I'm fairly certain the counselor pretty much hates me now, as do the parents who took a moment to shoot me a dirty look as they drove past me in my dead car parked smack in front of the school. #whenitrainsitpours

Seriously, y'all....this wasn't part of my plan for today.  Have a little empathy.

Finally, I got my car jumped and made it to Kenrose by 3:05, albeit as a soggy mess.  

And where was Matt during all of this?  Sitting in the car playing on his iPad, oblivious to my frustration or anything else. 

Sigh.

Have measuring tape, will travel.....

Less an hour or so break mid day, I spent the entire day at the middle school getting measurements for all of band classes for uniforms.   When I signed up to help, I assumed it was a 1-2 hour time commitment. According to the handbook, only boys wear a "uniform" of tux pants/shirt/tie and girls can wear a longer black dress.  Now I as I re-read the email I realized there was no mention of how long it would take.  And apparently the director found a great "deal" on dresses they are going to make available to the families of girls.

Ummmm....have you met middle school girls?  I bet most of them are going to want to pick out their own dresses, but whatever.  

As for leaving out the time commitment on the request . . . . accidental or a well-laid trap?  You be the judge.

Saying goodbye to the tooth fairy . . . .

Matt put a tooth under his pillow for the very last time tonight. 

And you know what?  It made me a little sad.

When the kids went for their 6 month checkups on Monday, Dr. Buzz informed me that Matthew had but one baby tooth left.   Honestly, I had no idea.   He could have said 4 and I would have believed him.

The problem was that that this one remaining tooth was not at all loose, but the adult tooth was coming through the side of his gum.   Ewww!  Until Dr. Buzz called me over and lifted his upper lip, I had no idea.  

Yeah, that's why I'm not winning "Mother of the Year."   Again.

Since Matthew is currently on the "doesn't-need-braces-track," I wasn't about to let this snaggle fang mess things up, so they asked us to come back in today to have it pulled.

His appointment was for right after school, so we decided to do his sealants at the same time rather than get both kids to school even later on Monday.   I had Matt dismissed early today and off to the dentist we went.   They gave him some laughing gas to relax him, but for whatever reason instead of making him happy and relaxed, he was fidgety and agitated.    Really?!?

#thingsthatdidntgoasplanned

Then, once they finally got the sealers on, his mouth numbed up and him relaxed (enough) he got the hiccups.

#youcantmakethisstuffup

Between a pricey bill at the dentist and a visit from the tooth fairy, this was one expensive tooth to lose.  Still, I can't help feel like it's another reminder that my little guy isn't so little.

Wife, mother and locksmith

Despite being up before 6:30 and not having to get on the bus until 8:00 am, mornings can be inexplicably hectic around here.  

For example, this morning, when Matt went to the shower around 7:15 he pulled the door of his bedroom shut, because "Gracie might try to go in there."

Truth be told, she might.

Unfortunately, the door was locked for some reason (crazy to me since they are FORBIDDEN from locking their doors), so when Matt came out of the shower he unable to get in to his room.   I grabbed a wire hanger and went to work on it around 7:30.   For some reason, it wasn't opening easily, so as I continued to twist, turn and poke the metal in to the door knob, I began trying to formulate "Plan B" in my head.   He could probably find something to wear in the bin of clothes in the guest room that are waiting to go to his cousin Oliver.   A little small, but it could work.  While he could wear a pair of my running socks, the problem that remained that was underwear.  The kid could not go to school without underwear.  I decided if I didn't have it open by 8, we were going to Target and I'd drop him at school after we grabbed some.

At 7:53, I finally got the door open.  He dressed in a flash and was at the bus stop at 8:00 am.

And now I'm going to put a piece of tape over the lock like I did when he was 3.  

Halloween defeat

It's October 29th and I think I need to accept that these new orange LED lights I bought to go around my porch for Halloween are not going to get put up this year.

Boo.

Warning: Whiny post ahead

Today was a waste of make up and a long, aggravating day to boot.

This statement might lead one to say, "Why bother with make up then?"

Well, first of all, I'm not at all cute with a naked face.   It's a fact.    My family and boot camp friends see it regularly.   The latter are just as rough looking at 4:45 am, so they don't judge.   And if my family does, they're doing it quietly.  

Second, the reason I put on make up is because I fully intended to leave my house today and there's no better way to ensure you'll run in to everyone you know then to go out looking like death warmed over. 

But it didn't seem to matter today, because I didn't leave my house.  Because guess what came back?   That's right, the big hole in my front house.

Yes, door installation part deux was today.    Interestingly, I was originally told it was going to be yesterday, so it didn't just kill my Tuesday, Monday got screwed up as well. 

The door dudes rolled in at 10 am.  Different installers than last time (because I would have had to wait another week to get that team back) and I had high hopes for a quick and seamless installation.

Hope springs eternal, no? 

They removed the old door, installed the new, took the new door back out again because it still didn't fit right, discussed with me options for how they could fix it (at which point I cried because they all SUCKED!), then did some alterations right in my driveway and tried again (the tears may have lead to this!).  And this time. . . .guess what?  It fit.  And it didn't bang in to my dining room doorway either!  Hallelujah.  So they adjusted and adjusted and adjusted some more until they got it where they wanted it.   Then they went about the process of cutting holes to install the hardware. 

This all sounds like it went very quickly, but trust me, it didn't. 

By the time they wrapped up today, 7 hours had passed (plus the 2 I spent waiting for them to arrive this morning).   They only finished installing one of my two doors (the storm door is still in the garage), there is still caulking to be done and holes to fill.  As for me, my attempts to get anything done at the house were in vain, because when they weren't drilling, they were pounding so doing anything that required thought or concentration wasn't going to happen.   Plus Ronda (the woman who designed our kitchen/dining remodel--also helped me choose the doors), came by to see how it was going  and ended up staying for almost 4 hours.   No complaints there, though, she's a bulldog and kept everyone on their toes. 

So they have to come back.   Not tomorrow, of course.  They have another job.   They're aiming for Friday, which would be lovely except it is going to be freezing with a 90% chance of rain/snow.   My back up date is "sometime next week."    Safe to say that isn't  super helpful information to give to the painter, who thus far has only primed the doors and framework and needs to come back when it is over 50 degrees to paint. 

Okay, whiny post concluded.

I'm going to go remove what's left of my "wasted" makeup and hit the sack.  Tomorrow is another day.

And it's gotta be better than today.

It's door installation day. Hooray?

Crappy day.

Big time.

Today was the long awaited door installation day.  Hooray!  It was supposed to be yesterday, but they had to postpone until today.  Not ideal, but . . . . it's door installation day.  Hooray!  And it's not like they put it in and it's done.  It still has to be painted which apparently will take 4 trips by the painter because of the marine-grade paint we will be using.  But still, it's door installation day.  Hooray!  And we discovered the main door hardware wasn't here.   But I'm told it might arrive this afternoon. Tomorrow afternoon at the latest.  I'm not super happy about this, but . . . it's door installation day.  Hooray!

By 9:00 am this morning, my beautiful solid mahogany door and wood storm door (yes, when everyone else is getting rid of theirs, I'm getting a new one--and it's fabulous!!) have been unloaded on to my front lawn.  The doors are custom made, not because they are super fancy but because they aren't quite standard sized.

By 9:30 am there is a huge hole in the front of my house.

Did I mention it was really cold out today?

At 10:40 am, I had to leave for a follow up appointment with my oral surgeon.  Our sweet designer, Ronda (who helped me select the doors) came over to peruse the progress and stayed while I was gone.

At 11:20 a.m. I returned home to find the door dudes re-installing my old door.

Whaaaaaat?

It seems my custom-sized door was not actually custom -sized.  It was supposed to be ONE STINKIN' INCH SHORTER than a standard door.    How hard could that possibly be?  Had to be the easiest custom order EV-AH.

But apparently not so much.

And of course, some of the trim got destroyed when they pulled out the old door, so they had to put in new trim, which of course is not painted or primed and therefore looks WEIRD.

All I could do was laugh.  Because what else could I do?    They'll make it right.  And it will completely disrupt my life again (in what better be the very near future!).    Of course, we had to reschedule the painters, too.   He was none-to pleased and the later we go, the colder it gets.  And if it's too cold, he can't paint.  

Seriously?  It's door installation day.  Except it's not.   Freakin' hooray.

In other news, I was reminded at our Brownie meeting this afternoon that we have a Brownie event tomorrow night.  And Gracie need to bring 20 "swaps" to trade.

This day just keeps getting better.  We got home at 5:15, I had dinner in the oven by 5:30.  Gracie and I scoured the craft/crap room while it baked.   We ate at 6:00.   I dropped Matthew and a pal at their Scout pack meeting at 6:25 and by 7:30, Gracie and I had whipped up 20 dragonfly clips.

We have several burned finger tips from hot glue and there are likely googly eyes scattered on the kitchen floor, but they are done and they are cute to boot!

Hooray.

An Open Letter to the Bug Guy . . . .

If you say you're going to show up at my house between 12 and 2, please do so. 

I went directly from my run at the Y to run several errands--still dressed in sweaty running clothes with a hoodie zipped up over them to make me look somewhat presentable, even though it was 90 degrees outside  Women shopping in workout clothes is a pet peeve of mine, but I did it anyway because I had so much to do and not enough time to do it. 

Then, I waited.  And waited.  Don't get me wrong . . . I didn't sit on the couch and do nothing.  But I waited.  I watched the clock.  I was stared down by a dog who didn't understand why we couldn't go for a walk. 

2:00 came and went.
3:00 came and went.
And yes, 4:00 came and went.

I had long ago given up on him showing up, but just for kicks called the office.  Apparently there was some kind of mix up with the work tickets. 

It's not a big deal . . . really.     It's not like my house is infested (THANK GOODNESS!!).  But you called.  You confirmed that I would be home.    And I was.

Where were you? 

Passive aggressive rant completed.

The day the lights went out in Brentwood -- again!

Today's post has inspired a new blog tag that I clearly could have used a zillion times since I started blogging.   We're going to call it "things that didn't go as planned."

Okay, a zillion might be an exaggeration, but I'm willing to stand by a half zillion.

See, I'm feeling a bit of deja vu.   Without looking, I'm fairly certain I wrote a very similar post last year or the year before.  Why?  Because today when I unpacked the pre-lit garland that we use to decorate our front door and porch half of it no longer lit up.

HALF!   

Refusing to make yet another trip to Target, I decided to make due with what I had and simply used the still-lit-for-now garland around the front door with some of that wide mesh ribbon.   IAs for the porch rails, I had to settle for simply wrapping them with lights.  I realize this does not photograph particularly well in the day time, but if I get a decent night shot, I'll post it.

The awesome snowflake lights I purchased at Wannamakers in DG did not look as nice as I thought as they might on the crape myrtle.  I think it's the white cord, maybe?   However, it did work on the cypress trees in front of the garage, along with another string of  white lights.  They have these nifty reflective disks under the lights that I think will sparkle nicely.   

In less aggravating decorating news . . .

We bought our tree last night and it's unfurling on our deck as I type this.  I'm hoping we'll decorate it tonight.    Also, while the kids were at school yesterday, I decked their rooms a bit with their own tree.   I kid you not, they were screaming with excitement when they came home.   Wildly grateful children make for good motherhood moments, no?