Ice cream iniquities

Some things in life aren't fair, and I've recently discovered another injustice to share with the world. This iniquity is among the worst because it is related to ice cream.

B and I have a favorite ice cream stand that offers reliably large portions and delicious ice cream. However, after our last visit, I noticed that one of our portions was a bit more generous than the other. Tonight's visit confirmed my hypothesis.

The teenage girls who work at our ice cream stand appear to have taken a fancy to my husband and have decided to show their appreciation through extra large scoops of ice cream. We both order the same size, but his ice cream is noticeably larger.

I proposed a number of experiments to test my theory. B proposed several of his own that mostly consisted of his acting silly without attempting to prove anything. Sniff.

I'm going to have to continue to ponder the best experiment to prove my theory, but until then, B is going to place both of our orders, and then we'll see who gets the bigger ice cream.

Finally, a camera decision

You might recall that I've been camera shopping for some time now. I've been taking my time because digital cameras are big investments. I wanted to be sure that I got the right model.

I'm partial to Nikon because they created my film SLR, which took dreamy pictures despite my limited photography skills.

I had been trying to decide between a superzoom point-and-shoot model and a digital SLR. The most appealing aspects of the superzoom were its size and weight. It would be an easy camera to schlep around the Canadian Rockies. On the other hand, I suspected that I'd be paying a lot of money for a good but not great camera that might not do those scenic vistas justice.

An SLR, on the other hand, was amost guaranteed to take amazing photographs. However, I dreaded the back pain that would reliably come from carrying around a heavy camera, and I couldn't ignore that an SLR would be a more expensive purchase.

I found myself unable to decide, and so I ignored the problem for several months and waited for my mind to make itself up. And this weekend, my mind decided, and off we went to the mall to buy the DSLR.

The Nikon D5000 was our camera of choice. It's a step up from Nikon's entry-level model (the D3000) and has an overwhelming number of options. I'm not sure if I will ever understand all of them, but I've figured out the basics since yesterday, when we brought the camera home.

At the store, we bought the camera, a couple of memory cards, and a UV lens cover--all I needed to get started. After we arrived home, we bought a camera bag, a backup battery, and another memory card from Amazon.

I've taken lots of pictures, all indoors due to the enormous raincloud that has settled over the area this weekend, and am really happy with all of them. As soon as our bag arrives, we'll venture outdoors and really see what she can do.

Vacation news

Not much new on the Banff front. I've booked a couple of activities, including a boat trip on Maligne Lake in Jasper and a ride up the Jasper tramway. My guidebook threatened a two-hour wait for the tramway and didn't mention the possibility of advanced reservations, so perhaps the online reservation system is new. I'm all for time-saving strategies, especially when they have liberal cancellation policies.

I still haven't booked our final car rental. I'm avoiding this task because I'm not ready to accept the large sum that we will likely spend on a car rental and insurance, which I always say I will skip and then buy at the last minute because I'm paranoid. Another reason why we stay in cities and take trains while vacationing in Europe.

Speaking of Europe, the euro has been tanking against the dollar. On the other hand, the Canadian dollar (CAD) and US dollar are flirting with parity. Parity occurs when two currencies trade on a one-for-one basis. Once upon a time, the thought of the USD and CAD approaching parity would have been cause for riotous and condescending laughter (by Americans). In other words, we haven't chosen the best time to vacation in Canada. However, one US dollar still buys at least one CAD and only $.75 worth of euros, so we're still coming out ahead.

So will Europe be our next destination? Unlikely. B and I both have a lot of vacation days this year, four weeks' worth or more. However, the Banff trip is not going to leave much in the vacation budget for 2010. We find ourselves in a unique position--plentiful vacation days and a piddling budget. Right now, I'm considering a couple of options:

• Renting a house on Mount Desert Island in Maine. Mount Desert is where Bar Harbor and Acadia National Park are. Weekly rentals are reasonably priced (that is, they are less than our monthly mortgage payment) and come with kitchens for preparing meals. I've been wanting to visit Acadia for a while now, but I'm not sure if I want two national park trips in one year.
• Visiting Chicago. I desperately want to see a taping of Wait Wait Don't Tell Me, which is taped on Thursday nights in Chicago and aired on NPR stations on Saturdays and Sundays. And the city is full of interesting attractions, both indoor and outdoor. We would either fly or drive for this trip--probably fly.

No decisions yet - one vacation at a time.

So this is love: My visit to the library

Sometimes ideas get stuck in my head and refuse to leave until I indulge them. Luckily, most of my whims are harmless (except on my budget) and involve vacations, cultural outings, and other activities.

Recently I decided that I wanted to read the Kathy Reichs books upon which the TV series Bones is based. I enjoy the TV show, mostly for the characters, as I see a lot of myself in Temperance, or maybe the other way around, and a bit for the science (not very much for the dead bodies). I assumed I'd like the books, too, but I didn't want to buy them new, just in case they didn't live up to the awesomeness of the TV show. I decided to pursue other options for acquiring them.

First I investigated the used options on Amazon but didn't find anything in the price range that I had deemed acceptable. Next I turned to the used section of bn.com. This site had many options; however, the shipping costs were prohibitively expensive, and I couldn't find any sellers offering discounts for multiple books. For instance, a book might be $.50, but shipping is $3.99. If you buy a second book from the same seller, you have to pay $3.99 in shipping for the second book, even though the seller is likely to package the books together.

I suspect my reluctance stems from an illogical but unavoidably human trait about not wanting the other person to get a better deal than I was getting, even if the deal was still good for me. I decided to move on.

My next stop was ebay. I became aware of ebay eleven or twelve years ago while in college but never got around to establishing an account or buying anything. When my apartment was broken into a few years after college, the police officer warned us all against ebay ("It's full of stolen items!"), and I continued my indifferent boycott.

I decided that books were unlikely to be stolen items and were a safe purchase. Any burglar who tried to make his living by stealing mystery novels would quickly learn his lesson.

And it was on ebay that I discovered book lots. Book lots, where have you been all my life? Apparently, you've been on ebay, and I've been ignoring you.

Knowing about these magical lots would certainly have been useful these past couple months as I have been collecting all of the Amelia Peabody books by Elizabeth Peters and reading them in anticipation of the next novel coming out next week. Alas.

Back to Kathy Reichs. I found several lots, some priced by reasonable people, others priced by burglars who haven't discovered that used books are not the pot of gold that they had hoped for. I chose one of the reasonable lots, sent it to B, and asked him to work his ebay magic.

He put in his bid, and then we forgot about the lot until several days later, when he checked his account and saw that we had lost. I could have looked for another lot, but ebay was more work than I wanted. Ebay needs a complex wiki-style taxonomy, and until it exists, the site is simply too frustrating for me. I can deal with many inadequacies on websites but poor organization is not one of them.

Out of ideas and unwilling to spend more than $2 per book, I decided to do what I should have done in the beginning--go to the library, where books are plentiful and free.

One night last week (one of the non-rainy nights, of which there have been few lately), we hopped over to the library, applied for library cards, and got lost in the stacks for a while. Ok, we didn't get lost; the library is teeny, even by my small-town standards. But they had Deja Dead, the first book in the series, as well as The Geography of Bliss, which I've been meaning to read, and a Rosamunde Pilcher novel that I haven't read.

Reading three books in three weeks is ambitious, especially since I was only halfway through a lengthy Peters book at home and have more on the way, but I reasoned that I could always renew or return and try again later. B picked up a book about basketball that he secretly wanted to hate but has actually been enjoying immensely.

While at the library, I learned that my collection of travel books rivals my town's. I suppose if one is going to have an addiction, buying travel guides is one of the more tolerable ones.

After arriving home, I enthusiastically dove in to the Reichs book. I quickly learned that the Tempe in the books is not very much like the Temperance in the TV show, and I was woefully unprepared for the graphic descriptions of violent deaths that characterized the first 75 pages of the book. Perhaps the remaining pages feature similar accounts, but I don't intend to find out. I no longer feel the need to finish a book for the sake of finishing it.

I put down Reichs, grateful for having lost the ebay auction. I picked up Bliss and have been learning about happiness ever since. The book is making me want to travel even more than I already do (dangerous).

The near-constant rain that has been plaguing New England these past few weeks, on the other hand, is making me want to stay home and read, so I am glad that I am prepared for hours (days?) of this activity. Spring came early this year, and so, apparently, did the April showers.

While I wait for the rain to end, I'm sitting in our comfy armless leather chair, which during the winter months lives as close to the fireplace as I can get without actually sitting in the fire, devouring my books one at a time, listening to Jimmy Buffett and dreaming about the sunshine.

Maybe next I'll learn how to do hair

This weekend I visited Sephora again. I had to exchange some blush that I purchased online.

I bought the Sephora brand blush a couple months ago and have been happy with it, but as I reached the bottom of the container, I noticed that pieces were breaking off. I didn't spend $12 on a small blush container to lose the last quarter of it in my sink. I wanted to exchange the unopened replacement with something else.

At the mall, B and I were alerted that we were approaching the Sephora store by the small army of men gathered outside, lounging on the railing and trying to look casual. B joined the ranks and I headed in.

I feel weird browsing around a store and then bringing my return to the counter, as if the sales person will suspect that I simply brought in my receipt and grabbed a replacement item from the store to return something that I didn't actually buy. Of course I would never do this, and it's likely that the sales people at the counter don't pay attention to my behavior before I reach them, but I waited in line with the rest of the buyers, only to hand over my blush and then start browsing.

I attempted to look like I knew what I was doing, but I suspect I fooled no one, and a sales person was quick to ask if I needed assistance.

"Yes," I said. "I'm looking for blush." I showed her the blush I returned, explained why I didn't like it, and asked for a recommendation. She corraled a fellow sales person, who thought for 5 seconds and then led me to the Clinique counter and showed me a blush.

"It seems a bit brown," I said. I don't do brown. She disagreed, and put some on her hand. There was not even a hint of brown.

"I'm not crazy about the sparkles," I said. She said that it had the same exact luminosity as the blush I was returning. I was skeptical. She brought me over to the display, and I put some of the sample on my hand. Sure enough, they could have been the same color. (And perhaps they are...)

I laughed and apologized and said that it was clear that she knew far more than I and that I was sorry for doubting her expertise. She laughed with me (or was it at me...) and said it was fine, and she offered to put some on me so I could see it, since I wasn't wearing any blush.

Except I was. I said so. She ignored me and proceeded to put blush on half my face, demanding all the while that I smile. She told me to go look in the mirror. I walked over and saw myself, but with a much rosier cheek than I'm used to having.

"Isn't it a bit...too much?" I asked. "That looks like a lot of blush to me."

Not at all, she explained. Rosy cheeks bring attention to the right part of my face. Or something. I forget the argument. She also said that I wasn't wearing the rest of my make-up. I was, but I decided to remain silent with my protest.

I walked back to her and she blushed up the other half of my face. Again, I was taken aback by the color in my face.

"You mean," I said, "you're supposed to put on enough so that you can actually see the color?"

She pursed her lips and looked at me like I was some hungry animal that refused to eat the food placed in front of it. She then explained where and how I was supposed to put on blush. I realized that no one had ever explained this information to me. I felt almost as if I should latch on to this woman and beg to be taught everything she knew.

Instead, I thanked her for her help, took the blush that she offered, did my exchange, and returned to rescue B.

"Do I look like I'm wearing too much blush to you?" I demanded. B said no, but it's possible that he said that to protect my feelings (as he should). I was again left wondering.

I decided to experiment with this concept of having more than a hint of color in my cheeks, and while I can't quite reproduce the Sephora sales person's skillful application, I think that I have perhaps struck a compromise between her method and my previous method (which, truth be told, was not exactly methodical).

I'm still working my way through the crumbly Sephora blush, but I'll try to remember to report back my satisfaction with Clinique.

I wasn't prepared for the violence

Back in college, I used to go to hockey games with some frequency. I wasn't much of a hockey fan but was unable to turn down free entertainment. Games were exciting but the occasional check was the extent of the violence that I saw.

College hockey was a child's tea party compared to the American Hockey League (AHL) game that we recently attended. Several minutes into the first period, two players got a little too close to each other and exchanged words. I waited for the refs to get in the middle, as they do in every other sport--but they made no effort to interfere. Moments later, gloves and helmets were thrown to the ice, and then the fisticuffs began!

The crowd jumped to their feet, clearly excited at this development. They shouted and demanded that the young men seek vengeance for the slight that had occurred.

I didn't hear the sentiment phrased quite like that; the overwhelming chorus came from the party of blood-thirsty seven-year-olds in front of us shouting, "Fight! Fight! Fight!"

I wondered if the fight was just for show, but upon closer inspection, I determined that the players were throwing real punches! I've never been in a fist fight, but their ferocity looked like it would hurt.

The punching continued until the gentlemen fell upon the ice, and then the referees interfered and stopped the fight. I assumed that everyone had got the excitement out of their system and that play would continue as usual.

Play continued, but the fighting was not over. There were several more fights and many more near-fights throughout the rest of the game. The penalty boxes got plenty of use.

During the calm periods between the fights, I interrogated B about all of this fighting, which made me very uncomfortable. (I can't even handle fake movie violence.) My understanding is that fighting isn't allowed in college or the NHL but for some reason, it is encouraged in the AHL. This policy discrepancy doesn't make any sense to me, but so it is.

If you go to a game, prepare yourself in advance.

Badly done, Toyota

I have always been a big fan of my Corolla and of the Toyota brand in general, but I am starting to question my fangirl status.

If you've been following the news, you can't have missed the news about the Toyota recalls due to a tendency to accelerate suddenly.

Moving forward, indeed.

As investigations mount, the news that's coming out is damaging. Scores of people have died--and the numbers keep growing as cases are reinvestigated. Others are sitting in prison because their out-of-control vehicles killed someone.

The news and the breadth of this recall makes you wonder how long Toyota knew about these problems before deciding to do something about them. Which ruined life was the tipping point for them?

My car is not included in the recall, but I've come across reports of people who experienced the sudden-acceleration problem in other vehicles that are not included in the recall. If a company put finances before ethics and was willing to ignore a fatal problem like this one, isn't it conceivable that they would try to limit the financial fall-out by not recalling all of the vehicles that are actually affected?

I'd say it's possible.

As I drove home this evening, I wracked my brain trying to think of a time when my car accelerated suddenly and uncontrollably. My car has over 113,000 miles on her, and I've been in the car for most of them. I can't remember a time when she accelerated suddenly without my touching the gas.

But Toyota's reluctance to address this issue in a timely manner leaves me wondering about both the safety of my car and my loyalty toward the company. I used to trust that the company would do the right thing, but now I actively distrust them and assume that they are doing the wrong thing.

Toyota, you have a long way to go before you can count on me to buy another of your vehicles.