Shopping Finds: This week at Costco... deals!

Okay, for those of you who DON'T already know this... any price at Costco ending in .97 cents means that that item is on clearance. In general, this is about 30% off Costco's original asking price, but sometimes its as much as 80%...

And so... check out this week's .97 deals:
- Rock & Republic Men's jeans $49.97 (from 99.99)
- RnR Women's jeans $59.97 (from 99.99)
- RnR Women's tees $9.97 (from 24.99)
- Fun Pillows (awesome round pillows that are sooooo soft) $3.97 (from 6.99)
- Beautyrest Twin Mattress Cover $14.97 (from ???)
- Budweiser BBQ Sauce $3.97 (from 5.69)
- Ketchup, Mustard, Relish 3-pack $4.97 (from 6.20)

... PLUS, we also have Perogies on roadshow (aka: constant samples) -sigh- oh for simple pleasures.

Things I know because I am cheap: Being Creative at Tim Horton's

There's nothing a Tim Horton's employee hates more than customizing an order that not only takes a long time to say, but also takes a long time to punch into the system, and then also forces them to give second-hand instructions to the other people actually assembling your food/drink.

So why not take every opportunity to make them work for their minimum wage?? After all, at the very least it will give them a story to tell the staff that come in to cover their breaks over lunch-hour, and trust me, a heroic story about a mean customer (soon to be you) is enough to keep you going in that place...

So next time you're strapped for cash, hungry, or just want to piss somebody off, try ordering one of these babies:

1) London Fog a-la-Timmy's
-- Order: "A Large Earl Grey Tea with 3 milks, 1 sugar and a vanilla flavour shot, bag in"
-- Cost: Tea+Shot

2) The cheapest sandwich you'll ever buy (best ordered in-store, they get confused, trust.)
-- Order: "A white bun, toasted, with bacon" (if you're really daring, ask them to "add mayo" at the end... they can't type it in so they get REALLL flustered)
-- Cost: White Bun (~85 cents) + Side of bacon (50 cents)

3) Mocha-Chai Latte
-- Order: "A Large Chai Tea with 2 milk and half hot chocolate, bag in"
-- Cost: Same as Tea

4) Apple-Cinnamon Steamer-like deliciousness
-- Order: "A Large Apple-Cinnamon tea with 2 milk, one cream and 2 sugar."
-- Cost: Same as Tea

5) The Soup Combo
-- Order: "A soup combo with (anything but chicken noodle--they re-use it for like 3 days), a regular coffee, white bun, and honey crueller"
-- Cost: This whoolllle thing costs like $4, its the most "discount" on any combo in the whole place

6) Liquid sex for under 2 bucks
-- Order: "A Large half coffee, half hot chocolate with 2 cream and a hazelnut flavour shot"
-- Cost: Coffee+Shot

... well good luck with those, fellow Canadians! Happy drinking, and eating, and all I can say is I really hope you're not in the drive-through in front of me.

No Matter What You Do You Will Always Be Remembered As: Submitted for the approval of the Midnight Society

Ooookkkaaaayy, turns out his name is "Ross Hull", but I thought I should bust out this classic example of 'you'll never live it down'. No matter how many times I see you do your shitty weather predictions, I am always going to think of at best? Student Bodies, and at worst? The Midnight Society from Are You Afraid of the Dark?

...did it ever occur to you that the reason why you were never scared of the Tale of the Crimson Clown might actually be because those glasses doubled as monster-proof, fear-retardant face shields? Well, because of you, and your stupid Society, my childhood was haunted with night terrors and bad dreams. Thus, I will never EVER be able to watch you do the weather without having flashbacks of horrible, frightening nightmares.

THANKS A LOT, ROSS HULL. what a jerk.

Reflections: On interrupting

Okay, I don't think Elisse (et al.) can actually BLAME me for interrupting them when they're speaking.... which apparently I do quite a lot.

Okay, yes, it is annoying and disrespectful and i TRY not to do it, although it's so so hard to do... but, like, I interrupt even MYSELF. What the hell. Read my other posts, I was realizing this as I wrote that last one... I don't even let MYSELF get a whole sentence out without an interjected (bracketed phrase) :semicolon: or --dashdash.... or ellipses.

Although that's like my signature grammar mark (loser? yes.)
...
I think it signifies... mmm.... boredom? time lapse... it cues people to read my written phrasing properly, since people BARELY EVEN KNOW what a comma means nowadays. If I ever write I novel, its going to be filled with ellipses. and I don't care what my editor says, I am not taking them out.

AND, I'm going to insist on recording the audiobook myself. and not doing voices. and not having an annoying voice like Laurel Merlington. That woman should have her throat ripped out. Just listen to this bitch: http://www.lauralmerlington.com/demos.html. She ruins so many long drives.

Reflections: Roswell is not a very good show...

For the past several weeks (okay, 2 and a half), I have been diligently watching episodes of the 90s teen sci-fi-drama Roswell every night before I fall asleep. I did this following a 5-seasons-of-buffy marathon... and comparatively, the show is basically crap.

HOWEVER, it does have its merits in being a nearly perfect splice of the concepts and characters from X-Files and Dawson's Creek.... with the narrative pace of All My Children (aka: none). I compliment the show's creators on their profound efficiency in taking two clearly successful recipes, and merging them, while saving money on writers by taking the plot of what would (in a normal show) be one episode and dragging it out over nearly 22 hours of screen time.

For all my bashing it, I have a disturbing need to watch it. And I say NEED: I feel like a crack-addict if I sleepover somewhere else or are too tired to watch it--actually, i turn it on anyways, and just have to wake up to the mega-annoying titlescreen music playing on loop at 5:09 AM and turn it off. BUT, then I wake up in the morning feeling unfulfilled... what have I become!?!?!? I am pathetic.

I actually got the idea from Jenna, who cured insomnia with endless episodes of "i've already seen it three-times-over" sex and the city before bed... but it doesn't seem to be having the same effects on me...

On the bright side-- an opportunity to indulge my pathetic new Trekkie-ness: FanExpo Canada is August 28th - 29th. At best, it could be a chance to get James Marsters' autograph, at worst, it would be a sweaty conference hall filled with societal rejects dressed as fully-illuminated characters from TRON. I don't think I'll go, since I'd be going by myself, and I think that would be.. well, "The Ulitmate Loser" doesn't really cover it.

On the dark side (not of the Force, don't go there... wow, I already did. Too many FanExpo thoughts inspired by "at worst...", what can I say? No, I don't have a working pod-racer. Yes, I do occasionally photoshop my face into pictures of sci-fi/fantasy tv shows circa actor-from-reno-911 in the movie 17 Again. Guilty.)-- Brendan Fehr (Michael from Roswell) seems to think that making his initials into a "logo" for his website is cool (at left. See: Not cool)... and his "Rant & Rage" section of his personal website devotes 1/3 of its text to praising Our Heavenly Father... usually "ranting" involves a little less "praying to jesus". However, interestingly, the photo gallery includes a section called "Personal Photos" which are actually just pics that he like, took with his digital camera while on vacation. Seeing a celebrity (okay, a D-list celebrity even... whatever) in amateur, monkey-arm, sweaty, vacation pics is very... surreal. Like it shouldn't happen. Perez Hilton bursts celebrity bubbles, but this all-too-real glimpse at a celebrity's actual life (like he ACTUALLY went on there himself, and uploaded those from his camera--like his WEDDING PHOTOS even!!) is very disturbing to me. Celebrities are not supposed to HAVE sweaty vacation photos. I guess that comes in the definition of 'celebrity', I doubt you'd see Nicole Kidman on her laptop uploading her wedding pictures onto the web and "ranting" about Jesus in a blog entry... but who knows? Social Media is changing everrrrryyyythhhinnnngggggg....

Did you know that in 2011, the owner of facebook has plans to invent an app that, once you click on "wall-to-wall" it actually transports you back in time to when you clicked "post" after typing on their wall? True story.

WHO KNEW!?!?!?!: The Skarsgards

Are you for SEER!?!?! These people are RELATED!? and not only related, but FATHER and SON!???? One might think that I'm overly obsessed with Alex Skarsgard since most of my posts are about him, but it's not true! He just has so many frightening off-screen little-known facts.

FOR EXAMPLE... Bootstrap Bill AKA The ugliest fat husband in Mamma Mia AKA Stellan Skarsgard is actually his real-life father. TRUE STORY. I guess you can kind of see the resemblance in those pics though. Through the nose? maybe? Well, there must be one. Because imdb doesn't lie, they have too much at stake.

Check it: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0002907/bio

PS: Credit goes to my sister Rachel for this one, she noticed the name "Skarsgard" in the opening Mamma Mia credits and then googled it... yes, she sits at home alone on her days off doing things like this, who wouldn't?

Reflections: Buying Stuff Online

It occurred to us today, as we diligently tried on 9 items each at XXI (Forever 21--but I think the numerals look prettier, as does the company obviously who have started to drop the "forever 21" words from their bags/storefront altogether. Is the store XXI different from Forever 21, you may ask? No, no it is not.) that it is ridiculous to think that people buy stuff from forever 21 online ALL. THE. TIME. HOW!?!?!?!

1) The crap is made in all parts of Asia by all kinds of child labourers: and as such there is little quality control (resulting in rock bottom prices!) and absolutely no such thing as "consistency"

2) The clothes are literally manufactured a maximum (thank god) of FOUR INCHES DIFFERENT per large/large, medium/medium of different items. How could you ever know what size you are for REALZ??
Answer? You couldn't.

So, the moral is... DON'T buy stuff online from Forever 21, or H&M, or Urban Behavior, etc etc, because although they may be some of my favourite stores due to their relatively high coolness/cheapness ratio (any item under $5 = insta-buy in my world), buying online from them will only result in dashed hopes and dreams.

You wait patiently for your package to arrive, only to discover that the Vietnamese made THIS particular medium 3 inches smaller around the ribcage than that other summer dress from the same company. Thus you are now out $13.50, and have an ill-fitting (or non-fitting) new item.

BETTER idea, is to buy stuff that you DON'T have to try on, stuff that's a sure bet. Posters. T-shirts. Books. DVDs. CDs. mmmmm.... fantastic. Might I recommend All Posters, Threadless, and Amazon. Once, I also bought 50% off clearance stuff from HotTopic.com, but they charged me $200 worth of duty charges from Puerto Rico, Mexico and halfway across the globe because they had to ship it to their warehouse before mailing it. Fair? Helllll no. So they're cut from the list.

OR, better yet, buy ME stuff from MY list.... http://www.amazon.ca/wishlist/1M0M18GCIIPK4

Happy Shopping!!

Mmmmmm.... breakfast

I just had (essentially) the photo at left for breakfast, made for me by my mother (minus those nasty-looking things--what are they? Gyros?).

I woke up out of bed approximately 4 hours earlier than usual for the promise of food cooked for me instead of by me. and NOW.... as an added bonus: I get to be nagged for those WHOLE FOUR HOURS to put away my laundry!!! Boy, do I LOVE living at home.

I think that what you don't pay in RENT living with your parents, the living situation makes up for in the money your parents should be paying to programs like counseling, mood-suppressants, yoga and costco-sized packages of stress balls, but instead--they take out on you. I should start tallying up my services in "Minutes Screamed At" and billing her at a set rate. buttttt somehow I don't think she'd go for it...

No Matter What You Do You Will Always Be Remembered As: AMANDUUUUHHHHHHH

Carlisle? No.

When I watch twilight, and I see Edward's badly bleached blonde father figure (they had millions of applicants and had to get 2/3 cullen blondes to be natural brunettes? please. ANYWAY...) what comes to mind is not a commanding, stalwart vampire father figure, but a drunken, moronic teen jock from the movie Can't Hardly Wait.

For all those of you who haven't seen it, here's the real Peter Facinelli:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQHXaN2CO2I

No Matter What You Do You Will Always Be Remembered As: ORANGE MOCHA FRAPPUCIANOS

Oh Eric.

Never a vampire has existed who is so incredibly sexy and charming and yet so incredibly burdened by the bit-part casting of his past.

You may have watched True Blood for the past three seasons and thought, how do I know this man?? Well, wonder no longer.

Here is what I will think about every time I see Eric on screen forever and ever until the end of time from now on:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47Rf7UWqW-c