Vacation planning 2009

Going a year without a vacation has been challenging, even though we knew that we were working toward our dream Italy vacation, plus a lovely little interlude in Germany and Austria in December. But the year's deprivation has put me on vacation overdrive, and I'm gung ho to start planning our next trip. Last night, B and I sat down and started brainstorming possible vacation destinations for 2009. Here they are, in no particular order.

OUT WEST
Las Vegas and surrounding national parks (Grand Canyon, Zion, and Bryce).
If we choose this trip, we'll have to go in May so we can see the Academy of Country Music Awards, which is (or at least was) held in Vegas. Plus we can visit a college friend of mine who is in law school in Tucson.

Vancouver and Banff.
Debatable if both could be visited easily in one trip. Banff was a secret honeymoon contender and looks amazing.

Western ski towns (but not to ski): Lake Tahoe, Denver, Vail, Aspen, and Jackson Hole.
Maybe we would run into Harrison Ford in Jackson Hole. But will we be able to take ourselves seriously if we tell people that we're vacationing in Vail?

California coast (LA to SF and above).
Including a trip to Disneyland, natch.

Portland, Oregon.
Beautiful, green, and friendly. They have great public television programs, so the city must be nice.

IN THE MIDDLE
Cedar Point roller coaster park in Ohio.
A vacation in...Ohio? Road trip, anyone?

Chicago.
Everyone who goes tells me that I would like it.

Great Lakes and their vacation resorts.
Like in Dirty Dancing, only a different part of the country.

TO THE NORTH
Toronto and Niagra Falls.
Water and Canadians everywhere!

Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island.
The original honeymoon destination.

Alaska, or somewhere where we can see the northern lights.
Maybe as a cruise?

Train from Quebec City to western Canada.
I don't know if we're "mature" enough for train travel.

TO THE SOUTH
Southern cities: New Orleans; Savannah, Charlston, and Atlanta; or Memphis, Nashville, and St. Louis.
There's this town in Tennnessee where the fireflies light up in unison. Weird to plan your vacation around fireflies, but where else can you have such an experience?

Texas.
One pair of cowboy boots isn't enough for this country girl.

One of the big horse races: Kentucky Derby, Belmont Stakes, or the Preakness.
A trip of a lifetime. Unfortunately, you have to apply in writing for Derby tickets. Anyone have a Derby connection they can call in for us? I can go hat shopping on a moment's notice.

F1 race in Miami/Florida Keys/Key West
We ruled out Nascar, but F1 might be interesting.

The Ozarks.
In beautiful, scenic....Arkansas?

Albuquerque and Taos.
A chance to buy more art for our home (some of us think of shopping opportunities first).

EVEN SOUTHER
Costa Rica, Belize, Honduras, or Panama.
Beaches and mosquitoes.

Cabo San Lucas.
B’s personal favorite. We could hobnob with Joe Simpson.

Brazil or Argentina.
Apparently, Buenos Aires is the Paris of South America.

Tropical: St. John, Turks & Caicos, Curacao, or a cruise to Bermuda.
Who doesn’t like the idea of an island getaway?

POSSIBLE ONLY IF WE WIN THE LOTTERY
Sad but true. After Germany this winter, we're probably going to be done with Euros and expensive flights for a while.

Japan.
Scandinavia.

Ireland.

Hawaii.

Iceland.

Our next step is to create a short list of nominees, potentially with an awards ceremony and mock acceptance speeches, followed by the booking of airline tickets and revelry in the streets. Bring on the bacchanalia.

Brand new bathroom

Our bathroom renovation project is finished with only minor casualties to report.

Here's how we (and by we, I mostly mean B) acccomplished the project.

1. Remove tile from the wall.
The former owners put brown tile on the wall which looked just ok with our red bathroom but which wouldn't work with our new bathroom. Off it came! B used a special Dremel attachment and a chisel. He discovered that the tile had been mounted on plaster, which meant that he had to do step 3.



2. Remove the top from the vanity.
I wasn't even home when B did this, but he said it was easy. We're not sure what to do with it, but it's perfectly functional and still has a sink, faucet, and drain. I was hoping we could donate it to Habitat for Humanity, but the single effort that I made toward this end was not productive--will have to try calling this week.

3. Replaster the indented parts where the tile was.
This multi-day process (plaster, let it dry, then sand; repeat) resulted in a lot of plaster dust blowing around the downstairs. But the end result was great.

4. Paint!
Here's where I got involved. My first choice was a mauve-y red, but the color in the sink was more mauve than red, and in a darkened room the paint chip looked brownish, and I was concerned that the room would not harmonize with the rest of the house. House harmony is important. A better option was green, which is in both the sink and the rest of the house. First, I touched up the corners where the wall meets ceiling using white ceiling paint, and then we taped and started painting.

Two years ago when we first painted the bathroom, we had an epic disagreement over painting style, but we've come a long way since then. Our only minor tiff came when I saw that B was getting paint on the ceiling. We switched jobs--I painted high and he painted low--and we were good to go. (I got paint on the ceiling, too--we're going to have to touch up again.)

We did two coats of a tinted primer (which we will reuse when we paint our hallway a lighter green and cover up the--of course--brown that the former owners chose) followed by two coats of the chosen green, and then we let it dry over night. I was amazed at how well the green covered the red. After the two coats of primer, you couldn't even tell that the walls had been red. This principle is well known to make-up-wearing women--you use green powder to tone down a reddish face. As my problem is usually the absence of color, you won't find any green powder in my make-up kit.

5. Assemble our new space saver/etagere.
We did this step between coats of paint. The etagere is made of bamboo and came from Overstock, and it was mostly a good purchase. The intructions were ok, but B had to perform some handyman work to adapt it to fit in the space that we have. No matter--it looks great now, and good thing, because we had to assemble it in place and can never remove it without destroying it. I hope the future owners of our condo like it because they will be inheriting it.

The new etagere offers more storage than the previous etagere, which I was considering moving to my bathroom. I'm not sure if I can stand to keep it in the house anymore, so I think it will be joining the mosaic table and computer desk at the Salvation Army. Slowly, slowly, we rid ourselves of our particle board furnishings.

6. Reattach the mirror, towel rack, and door.
Easy as pie, for me, anyway. B did the heavy lifting. I held the screwdriver.

7. Attach the new granite vanity top.
This step was a little tricky because our wall corner was greater than 90 degrees, so the granite didn't sit flush against both sides. No worries--we tried to make it equidistant from each edge and hoped that the side- and backsplashes would hide the fudging. And they do.

8. Attach the sink, faucet, and drain, and hook up the plumbing.
I'm not sure what B did, but there was a leak and some angry words. But now it's all better.

And now we have a working sink and a brand-new bathroom! I love the wall color, the sink, the granite, the faucet, and especially the way that they look together. We accomplished a huge value-added renovation at a pretty low cost (compared to most bathroom renovations, anyway). Keeping the existing vanity was a big saver, and it looks fantastic with its new topper.


(The green didn't come through well on the cell phone camera--in person, it looks like the color of edamame pods.)

Oh, so there was a casualty. It's minor. In the middle of painting, the outlet stopped working, and our working light went out. And the outlet is still on strike. I theorized that plaster dust worked its way in there and did something bad. But the good news is that we never use that outlet! Hooray--that means we don't have to fix it!

Tomato tragedy

During my less nutritionally oriented college years, most of the food that I bought at the grocery store, including dinners, side dishes, and snacks, came in boxes. The exception was ice cream--I go for the primo stuff in the pint-sized cartons--but we'll leave ice cream out of the discussion, as its nutritional value is debatable.

After I graduated from college, I ventured outside the boxed world and bought food with expiration dates--what a novel idea. I tried a pepper for the first time at age 24 and realized that it was time to enter a brave new vegetable world.

Since then, I've been incorporating additional vegetables into my diet, but never the tomato. It had a suspicious texture and unusual flavor, and I avoided it at all costs.

I avoided the tomato until our honeymoon in France, that is. One night, B ordered a tomato and mozzarella appetizer, and I was feeling adventurous and world traveler-y, so I tried it--and wow. I couldn't believe I had been avoiding the deliciousness and amazingness that is the tomato. Granted, the mozzarella and aged balsalmic vinaigrette contributed to the bold flavors of the dish, but the tomato held its own against those competitive ingredients.

Since the 'moon, I've been dabbling in--even seeking out--tomatoes. I no longer remove them from my salads, and I even add them to burgers. This summer, we've gone so far as to have tomato side dishes at dinner.

And then this tomato/salmonella situation struck--disaster! I've only just discovered tomatoes, and now I'm supposed to avoid them? I think not! Cherry and grape tomatoes and tomatoes on the vine are allegedly safe, and they're conveiently the types of tomatoes that we buy, so there's no need for a tomato moratorium, so far. I don't think we'd survive without them. The main attraction at last night's dinner was a pint of cherry tomatoes (halved), a couple of tomatoes on the vine (cubed), a ball of mozzarella (cubed), and a delicious balsalmic sauce that B concocted. We ate the entire (enormous) bowl--and it was heaven.

Salmonella be darned! Bring on the tomatoes!

Cavity-free club

This afternoon's dentist visit confirmed it--I am still a member in good standing of the cavity-free club. And I got the dental hygienist who doesn't deliver long and scary lectures about what happens to those terrible, horrible, no good, very bad people who--gasp!--don't floss.

A couple of visits ago, they found a soft spot on one of my molars, and they said that with any other person, they would have drilled and filled (my terminology, not my dentist's). But my dentist said that I just don't have the bacteria that causes cavities, and she wanted to wait and watch. I'm not the living science lesson that B is--his absent wisdom teeth are a sign of evolution--but being free of bad bacteria is good enough for me.

And sure enough, that soft spot cleared itself right up (regenerating teeth? Maybe I am a freak of science...).

Or maybe brushing my teeth 5+ times per day had something to do with my miraculous recovery.

Don't put wet towels in the hamper

I knew better. But during Father's Day weekend when B's running in and out of the house during the morning's deluge resulted in a mini wave pool on the floor of our pantry, we mopped the mess up with a few towels and then threw them into the hamper to get them out of sight.

And then I forgot about them. Until tonight, that is, when I decided that the overflowing hamper was not an acceptable way to live, and it was time to do laundry.

Time, indeed.

Welcome to Mildew-land, ladies and gentlemen. It's a good thing that I bought a big bottle of bleach a couple weeks ago...

UPDATE: B has confessed that he put the wet towels in the hamper, but I think he might just be trying to make me feel better. There's no point in placing blame, anyway, because all of our clothing appears to have made a full recovery. The hamper liner is in the washer right now and should be fine, too.

The bad news is that we discovered another mini flood in the pantry this morning, and I'm afraid that the culprit is likely the dishwasher, not the recent rain. We had a leak before, and B fixed it--but it looks like it's back again. Oh, the joys of home ownership.

Computer defector

A few years ago, when my college PC was no longer cool enough, I bought a laptop. I envisioned myself wearing dramatic scarves in darkened coffeeshops, toiling away into the wee hours on the novel that would earn me "The next F. Scott Fitzgerald!" accolades and would make my fortune.

Reality was less dramatic. I mostly used my laptop for internet surfing and the occasional Spider Solitaire game (Minesweeper is difficult without a real mouse). My laptop and I never set foot in a coffeeshop, and I realized my "show, don't tell" writing skills are mediocre at best.

After a couple years, my laptop started displaying the Blue Screen of Death with dangerous frequency, until the dreaded screen made an appearance every time the laptop booted. I made a halfhearted repair effort with Best Buy, a visit so unsatisfactory that I now boycott the store, and then packed the laptop away in a closet with a sigh. I tend to break electronics equipment and decided that it had been only a matter of time before my bad luck combined with Microsoft's similar destructive tendencies ruined my computer.

But we need a reliable home computer, one that I can't kill, and I am considering taking a gamble and buying a Mac.

Mac users and Apple fans would probably jump in and say that a PC is the real gamble, while a Mac is a sure thing. Macs have advanced well beyond PCs in the coolness factor, and more importantly, they have reputations for reliability and virus resistance.

A few years ago, I was strongly anti-Mac. I had to use Macs at a college internship and struggled with a mouse that didn't let me right-click. The Mac user interface was foreign and therefore confusing, but in hindsight, it was actually easy to learn.

I'm not sure why I've changed my mind and am considering giving Macs a try. Maybe I'm not willing to gamble so much with another PC laptop. Maybe I'm ready to try drinking the Apple Kool-Aid that so many other people seem to dig. Maybe Justin Long is a trustworthy-looking guy, and those Mac/PC ads have worked their magic with me.

Whatever the reason, I want a Mac. I love that the computer and monitor are combined into one, and you can buy a wireless keyboard and mouse--a nearly wire-free desktop! And you can get amazingly large screens, which contribute to the awesomeness of the total package.

B is on board with the idea of jumping on the Apple bandwagon, so now we just need to work some budget magic and make it happen.

Shoe offenses

I like going to weddings. I appreciate the limitless love and hope that they represent, and the food, music, dancing, and entertainment are a great bonus (as are the limitless Shirley Temples). And most weddings are easy--you just show up and go where you're supposed to, and you will probably have fun. The difficult part--deciding what to wear--comes before you even show up and usually begins before you even receive the wedding invitation.

My current sartorial strategy for weddings involves two outfits--one for the ceremony and another for the reception. This strategy only works with church weddings, which are usually 4+ hours before the reception. The upside to this plan is that you can wear something comfortable and modest to the church (I was not raised in a church-going family, but I still feel like I am going to be sent directly to hell--do not pass go, do not collect $200--if I show up at a church with bare shoulders) and wear a more formal frock (which itself might not be uncomfortable but which likely requires uncomfortable underthings, and is therefore not something I want to wear for 12+ hours) to the reception.

For this weekend's ceremony, I'm wearing my new size-10 pants (I'm considering cutting the "1" off the size tag and pretending that they're a 0) and new shoes (which, as it turns out, become uncomfortable after about 2 minutes--perhaps I can slip them off in the church between all of the kneeling without anyone noticing) with a fun Anthropologie top.

I have several hours between the ceremony and reception to transform myself into a frothy blue concoction. Several years ago, I bought the dress from Bebe (a store whose name I still no not know how to pronounce) on a whim, and it has earned its keep ever since, accompanying me to several weddings and events (it even came on our Caribbean cruise with us) and always earning praise from fellow attendees.

The only remaining dilemma involves my shoes. The silver flip flops that I used to wear with the dress have disintegrated and are on my "Bring to Italy and Don't Bring Back" list, so they are not wedding appropriate. The only other option is the pair of white shoes that I wore at my own wedding, but I am not sure if it's kosher to wear white shoes to a wedding. Everyone knows the "don't wear white" rule, but does it extend to shoes? Will I offend the bride with my footwear? Perhaps a more important question--is anyone even going to notice my feet at an evening reception when I'm wearing a mostly floor-length dress?

I don't have time to go shopping (or break in a new pair of shoes), so the white ones my only option. I just hope no one is offended.

Emotional shopping injuries

During the post-wedding photo bonanza, we visited our favorite mall nearly every weekend, to the point that B (who has demonstrated his above-average shopping stamina on multiple occasions) declared that he was tired of going to the mall, and it was time to find other ways of entertaining ourselves.

While I did not feel shopped out--I rarely do--I agreed, and turned to the world of online shopping. The switch was wise, especially now that trips to the mall cost an astonishing $10. Paying for shipping is becoming more attractive.

But sometimes online purchases just don't work out. An item that looks stunning on a mannequin sometimes becomes the most unflattering shirt that you've ever worn, as was the case with the purchase that I had to return tonight. The mall is on my way home from work, so I decided to stop in and see if I could exchange my unfortunate shirt for something a little more flattering.

I swapped the top, picked up a new pair of shoes for this weekend's wedding (and saw a slew of patent leather options in the store--since when is patent leather a summer material??), and then hit Express, a dependable store for long-enough pants. I am slowly acquiring clothing with brown in it, so I needed a pair of brown pants.

I have several pairs of pants from Express and used to shop there frequently, but I hadn't been in in a while. I grabbed my usual size--8 long--and hit the dressing room, only to find a rude surprise.

There wasn't anything in the dressing room. The problem was with the pants. They were tight. Not uncomfortably tight, probably not scandalously tight, but definitely not...loose. Whether I could have fit chapstick in the pocket was debatable. I stood in front of the mirror, staring and trying to figure out what had happened. I came up with the following hypotheses:

• The store has recently changed their sizes, and size 8 is now smaller than it used to be. Unlikely. But not entirely out of the question....right?
• My standards for the way that clothing should fit have matured. Maybe tighter clothes used to seem ok, but now that I have reached the ripe old age of 25 (several times, in fact), the clothing feels inappropriate. Definitely a possibility. There were a few items in my closet (long gone now, of course) that should never have left the store with me, let alone made public appearances.
• We all know what the last option is. I'm not going to say it.

There's only one course of action. It's time to start shopping at stores that charge lots of money but let you think that you fit into a 2 or a 4. I haven't worn a size 2 since I was 13 (and even then--scandalously tight), but I think it's time to revisit that experience.

For the record--I left the store with a size 10 pant. And they're baggy. Kind of...

Navigational bliss

B and I have joined the twenty-first century and have bought a navigational device.

B has an amazing sense of direction, but we get lost occasionally when we go somewhere new. A couple years ago when we were going to open houses every weekend, I frequently had to call LS and ask her to look up our location (if we could even figure out where we were) and direct us to the location of the home. Life ought to be easier, and navigational devices help.

We decided to get the Garmin 350--it's not top of the line, but our needs are simple. We just want to get to our destination without getting lost, and if we make an incorrect turn, we want it to recalculate the route and tell us what to do. The Garmin does both.

I've been watching the price since adding the Garmin to my Amazon cart back in January. The price dropped considerably a couple weeks ago, so I decided it was time to snatch it up.

Our purchasing adventures are rarely straightforward, and the Garmin was no exception. I remembered that if you purchased a gift card from the local grocery store's CoinStar machine (a coin-counting machine), the retailer paid CoinStar's 8 percent fee. Conveniently, Amazon was one of the partner retailers. We had earmarked our elephant bank's coins for the Garmin purchase, and this option allowed us to save a few more dollars.

We placed our order and the Garmin arrived last week, but we didn't have an opportunity to use it until this weekend, when we went to a friend's housewarming party. I've used the Garmin only once (and as a passenger), but I am a believer. No more printing directions from Yahoo maps! No more trying to follow directions that don't make sense! No more trying to read paper directions and road signs at the same time! Our ride over was stress-free and easy--and we didn't get lost.

I'm sure that the Garmin will lead us astray occasionally, just as our paper directions did, but I have faith that I will eventually arrive at my destination. I couldn't say the same when I used paper directions.

We're going to put the Garmin to the true test this weekend at an out-of-town wedding. If we can travel among the hotel, ceremony, and reception without getting lost, we'll know we have a winner.

I'd like to thank the Environmental Fashion Academy...

Inspired by my friend Christine (see blog link to the right), I purchased some reusable shopping bags. I feel guilty every time I bring home groceries in plastic bags, and I decided that it was time to put an end to the plastic madness. I went to envirosax.com and discovered that they have a new line of bags that are awesomeness squared. Here are a few of them:













So technically, this is a kids series, and I neither am nor have a kid, but I prefer to think of them as young-at-heart bags. I ordered 6, and I plan to keep 1 in my purse (for when I'm at CVS or Target or wherever and don't want to carry my purchases in a plastic bag) and the remaining five in the car for the grocery store. The difficult part will be remembering to bring the bags into the store, but it's a change that we will eventually get used to. Plus who wouldn't want to carry around such awesome bags. I suspect my fellow shoppers will be jealous.


There's only one small fly in my save-the-world ointment, and I discovered it before checking out on the website. I looked at the total and did a double take. Was I really about to spend $50--fifty dollars!--plus shipping! on...polyester bags? bags that I technically don't even need because I can get plastic grocery bags for free? Oh, sad truth. It should be mentioned that you can buy bags at our neighborhood supermarket for $1. However, they aren't cute, they don't roll up to small sizes, and they're more like billboards for the supermarket. But they are significantly cheaper.


Environmentalists might argue that it would be better to buy the $1 bags and donate the remaining $7.50 to an environmental charity. And good for them if they want to do that. But I wanted the cute bags! So I bought them. That's me--saving the planet, one expensive but stylish purchase at a time. If an organization ever decides to give out the Environmental Fashion awards, we know who they'll be calling.


I hope they arrive before our next grocery run. I can't wait for their shopping debut.

The great rain coat experiment

My rain coat woes continue.

I'm trying to find a rain coat that I can take to Italy but am so far having no luck. My first try was an online order from REI--it took 3+ weeks to arrive at the store, and the sleeves were too short. I returned it and resumed my search.

My most recent try was another online order from TravelSmith (which has since been removed from my favorite shopping sites list). I ordered the small, which was supposed to fit sizes 6 or 8. Unfortunately (for me, though perhaps not for those who delude themselves about their size), the jacket was roomy enough for me and several friends--it was more like a 12 or 14. And the sleeves were 2 inches too short. I sent it back with a note saying that they had no jackets that would fit (I called, and the sleeves are too short on all of them), and I already paid $14 in shipping, and if they charged me another $7 in return shipping, I would never shop from them again. I'm still waiting for their decision, but in the meanwhile, it's back to the drawing board.

Last night, I was sharing my rain coat drama with B, and he told me that I should get a "bespoke" rain coat. I told him that I didn't know the word, and what did it mean? He jumped up and ran over to our bookshelves, asking along the way where the dictionary was. I had to break the unfortunate news that we don't own a dictionary.

"How is that possible?" he roared (pardon my hyperbole--but I'm doing my best to make a conversation about dictionaries seem interesting).

I should interject here--because this piece of knowledge is critical to the story--both B and I majored in English in college. You'd think that two English majors would own a minimum of two dictionaries. But it just isn't so.

"Well," I explained, "You never owned a dictionary. I never owned a dictionary. So even when we combined all of our stuff, we still didn't have a dictionary."

Another interjection--technically, we do own several dictionaries, but they are not dictionaries of the English language. I own a dictionary of computer terminology as well as a Spanish-English dictionary, which B thought might be an acceptable substitute.

"These definitions are all in Spanish!" he cried.

"Maybe you could tell me what the word means," I suggested.

He explained that bespoke refers to an item of clothing that is created just for you, based upon your measurements. I said it sounded like an interesting idea, but a rain coat would be an unusual choice for that kind of investment. B acknowledged that the price tag would likely be steeper than I was hoping to pay, but wouldn't it be cool to have an article of clothing that fit me and only me--and fit me perfectly.

Yes, it would be nice, but I decided not to give up my (more frugal) online search yet. The problem is that I have two criteria on which I don't want to compromise: The jacket has to have sleeves that are at least 24.5" long, and it can't have a belt.

The sleeves issue is obvious--my albatross-like limbs must be covered. The belt issue is a little trickier.

I think a lot of people think that someone like me (i.e. tall and thin) can wear anything, but it's not true. I learned that lesson when trying on wedding dresses and 90% of them looked terrible on me. I ended up buying my wedding dress in part because it was the only one that didn't look awful. And raincoats with belts highlight the same issue that wedding dresses do, so I am dealing with similar restrictions--no belts allowed.

I found an option with long-enough sleeves and no belt on bluefly.com, but the description didn't explicitly say that it was water-resistant. I decided to take a gamble and buy it anyway (I will do the sleeve/sink test when it arrives). I hope that the third time will be the charm on this great rain coat experiment (and by "great," I mean neverending and painful).