Peeks At My Life Archives - Moms Need To Know ™

The Two Best Cashiers EVER! @Target

May 5, 2013

cashier

I know that, when you are someone who uses coupons, you get used to annoying cashiers. You actually start to get cynical about cashiers no matter if you are making a “coupon trip” or not. Because of this, I wanted to share with you a story that just made my weekend, and reaffirmed to me that there IS still good in this world!

My daughter had a birthday party on Saturday, so we went to Target on Friday night to pick up a Barbie for a gift. My Target has a Starbucks in it and I was in the mood for one of their Iced Tea Lemonades (try it – get the Passion Fruit one and ask for “half the sweetener”…it is AWESOME), so when I paid with my debit card, I asked for an additional $20. The cashier handed me my receipt and cash and I started to walk to the Starbucks.

On the way, Elizabeth asked if she could have a soda, so instead we walked to the area where you can get food & drinks. I ordered her a small soda, then opened my wallet to pull out the cash…and it was gone. Here was my conversation with the cashier:

Me: Wait – I just got a $20…it’s here somewhere!

Cashier: are you sure he gave you the cash?

Me: Pretty sure – maybe I stuck it in the bag with the receipt

(3-5 minutes of me tearing my “iPhone wallet” apart – I didn’t bring my purse in with me – and the cashier looking through my bag to see if I had stuck it in there. I was looking around the floor to see if I had dropped it, etc. Note: there was no line behind me – I wasn’t holding anyone up)

Me: well poop! I guess I dropped it and someone picked it up and left with it that quick. That sucks (pull out my debit card)

Cashier: are you SURE he gave you the cash?

Me: I’m 99% sure. I don’t want to say he didn’t because that wouldn’t be honest

Cashier: Here you go – get your daughter a soda. Would you like one too?

Me: Thanks but no – I wanted an Iced Tea Lemonade from Starbucks. Maybe this is God’s way of telling me I didn’t need to spend $4.50 on an iced tea! (goes to swipe my debit card)

Cashier: (blocks the credit/debit card machine) Don’t worry about it!

After thanking her and getting my daughter a Sprite, I looked around, didn’t see my $20 and decided to leave. The cashier that waited on me was about 15 feet from me and I thought “hey – maybe he DIDN’T give me the money – no harm in asking!“. I went over to him.

Me: Hey – I was just here about 5 minutes ag…….

Him: You left your $20 on the counter…here you go!

Me: Thank you SO much.

I then promptly went over to where the other cashier had given my daughter the free soda and said “Hey! We found the $20! I left it at the register! Let me pay for that soda!”

Her reply? a smile and a “you have a nice night!”

The entire encounter lasted about 6-7 minutes total, but the kindness of those 2 cashiers (her for giving me the free soda and him for being so honest) just MADE my weekend.

Forget the annoying cashiers with whom you have come in contact. What did a cashier do or say to you that made you happy?

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Where NOT To Shave Your Legs!

October 26, 2012

Think nobody would ever say this? Up until today, I would have agreed with you!

Do you know how some people will say “Well – now I have seen EVERYTHING!”? Well – they are all wrong because now I HAVE seen everything!

Today I needed to make a quick run to the grocery store to grab about 5 things. I pulled in to the parking spot and get out of my car and did a double-take.

Sitting in the car next to me was a guy…

with his leg on the dashboard….

shaving his leg.

And from the looks of it, he wasn’t very skilled at it because he had red welts all over his legs.

Of course, I did what any reasonable person did…I threw up a little in my mouth and then high-tailed it in to the store. Fifteen minutes later, I emerged from the store and headed back to my car, certain he would be gone.

I was wrong – he was working on the other leg.

I quickly loaded my groceries in to the passenger side, walked around the back of my car, glanced at the back of his car (because I was certain that he would have a bumper sticker that said “My Other Car Is A White Windowless Van”) and hightailed it out of there.

What’s the strangest thing you have ever seen at the grocery store?

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I Miss You

October 26, 2012

I miss your laughter.

I miss your smile.

I miss you knowing the words to every John Hughes movie or The Princess Bride when nobody else in the room but you or I did.

I miss your love of All Things Disney

I miss you trying to teach me how to sail in that tiny little Sunfish boat.

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My Disney Dream of a Vacation | Getting There

August 14, 2012

This entry is part 1 of 1 in the series My Disney Dream Of a Vacation

If you didn’t notice…I was on vacation last week, on quite possibly the BEST vacation of my life…and I thought I would share it with you!

Our Disney Dream Vacation – Getting there

We arrived at Cape Canaveral the day before because we wanted to start our vacation on a “fresh note” and relax and get ready to…..well…relax! We flew in to Orlando and then rented a car for the drive to Cocoa Beach (right next to the port). To say that the kids were excited would be putting it mildly. While we often go to my father’s house at the shore, this was the first time that they had been to Florida. The 1-hour drive to Cocoa Beach can seem like an eternity when you have 3 kids in the back seat exclaiming “There’s a palm tree!!!!!” every 30 seconds!

We checked in to our hotel and spent the rest of the day relaxing by the pool (while I finished the Giant of PA ad matchups).

I woke up at 5:30 Sunday morning and immediately started working like a madperson, knowing that I only had a few hours until internet connection would cost me $0.75/minute. God must have known how much I need a vacation because not only was I able to find insert sneak peeks for CVS, Rite Aid and Walgreens…I was able to find the Coupon Insert Preview for August 12 (a full 3 days earlier than it is normally available) and get those posts ready to go! By 11:00am we were ready to head for Port Canaveral and get on the ship!

And here is where I give you a little hint for ANY cruise: if you rent a car and are not returning that car RIGHT AT THE PORT (meaning you don’t need to take a shuttle from the rental place to the port), allow at LEAST 90 minutes between returning the car and your embarkation time. Our car was due back at noon, we got there at 11:52am and, because there were about 30 other families in the same boat as us (heh! Get it? “boat”?) as us and there were 2 other cruises taking off that afternoon…we didn’t get to the Disney Cruise terminal until 1:30pm (still an hour before our embarkation).

On the shuttle for 10 minutes and then I see this:

I’m fairly certain that most everyone in the country heard my “SQUEEE!!!!!!” at this point!

We handed our luggage over to the porter, Brad and I had a quick fight about me overtipping (I told Brad that if he was going to fight with me over an extra $0.50/bag that it was going to be a LONG 5 days)…and then we went through the checkin process. As always, Disney showed that they know how to handle crowds. What looked like would be a 45 minute line turned out to be a 10 minute line and we were quickly on our way on to the ship!

To Be Continued……

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How To Get Rid Of Lice | Advice From Moms Just Like You!

June 20, 2012

This is a stock photo but seriously? NO mom (or child) smiles like that while she is checking for/combing out head lice! She must be the Stepford Wife Of Lice!

So if you didn’t notice yesterday…posting on this site came to a screeching halt at about lunchtime (except for my automated program that posts new coupons). There is a reason for that: while blow-drying Elizabeths hair, I realized that she had lice. After noticing it, I checked Thomas & Jonathan and YEP! They had it too!

Lovely…….

Ever see those shows where a character is freaked out about something and immediately starts running around in circles, but they speed up the video so that it looks like they are going 90 miles per hour? That was me! I immediately took to my Skype chat room that I have with some of your favorite other deal bloggers to have a major freak-out. While I was running around the house grabbing every stuffed animal and bedding item, spraying furniture and cars, they posted on their Facebook Fan pages asking for advice for me.

Some of the tips were new to me…and some had me scratching my head (pun intended). One reader from Facebook Fan page would post about the “Listerine cure”, and then another would post about it on another FB Fan page and I thought “Hey – maybe there IS something to not just buying Rid”!.

So without further ado, here are some of the non-conventional tips that I received (Please note: I am not endorsing or supporting any of these as a cure for lice…just passing on those tips that I got from many others)

From Kaesi:

Wash everything hot! Vacuum everything and get rid of the bag or wash the trap container hot. And my parents always used Rid(Rit?) Shampoos and patience to comb through our hair completely.

From Wanda: (and this may not be available in all areas)

Honestly, our health dept has a spray on shampoo that treats 6-18 heads (depending on hair length). It’s only $10.00 and safe to use on any age and no harsh chemicals. It’s called bug out and it works like a charm. I’d check with them.

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Moms Need To Check Out #EEinNYC (I’m Heading To New York)

June 12, 2012

I am typing this while going 80 miles per hour on the way to New York City. No – I’m not the one doing the driving! While I can put on mascara while doing 80, I haven’t quite worked up the skill to blog and drive!

I am on a train on the way to the Essential Everyday in New York City event. For those of you that shop at Acme, Farm Fresh, Shaws, etc, you should recognize Essential Everyday as the name of the store brand at your store.

We will be touring the Good Housekeeping headquarters and test kitchens (I did this tour about 2 years ago and can’t wait to do it again), then heading out to hands-on experience cooking dinner at Home Cooking New York featuring Essential Everyday and other SUPERVALU private-brand products.

Tomorrow we will be meeting with the Marketing and Communications Directors for Supervalu and I will be home by dinnertime.

Posting will be a little light for the next 30 hours, but I am really looking forward to meeting with the people who make the marketing decisions at what most of you know to be by favorite store. Anyone who has read this site for more than a year knows of my deep love of Acme and how sad I was when my local store closed.

Anyway – if you have any questions or comments for the people at Supervalu/Acme/Farm Fresh, etc…leave them in the comments and I will try to get an answer for you (or simply pass on your feedback)!

You can also follow me on Twitter (I really only funny only use Twitter for more than posting posts when I am traveling) or follow the #EEinNYC hashtag to see what we are doing!

Be back in full swing on Wednesday night!

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Which Way Is Up? #ThisIsWhyIDrinkWine

March 18, 2012

There are a few stores that I go to where they know me, or I am just grabbing 1 thing. In cases like that, I just grab my debit Mastercard out of my purse, leave my purse in the car and run in to the store. On Saturday, I wanted to buy a bottle of wine at my “regular” store and did just that

Cashier: Debit or Credit?

Me: It doesn’t matter! (note: because it doesn’t – my bank is awesome)

(rings it through as credit, I sign the computer pad)

Cashier: I’m sorry – I’m going to need to see some ID

Me: My purse is in the car – I don’t have it on me. Why do you need to see my ID anyway?

Cashier: Because the signature you just gave me doesn’t match the one on your credit card.

Me: Of course it does!

Cashier: I’m not going to be able to accept this without ID (holds my credit card up to his computer screen where the signature I entered is displayed). The signatures aren’t even close

Me: Ummm – you might want to try not holding my credit card upside down.

On the plus side, at least I was ALREADY buying wine!

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My Eyes Exploded Today #ThisIsWhyIDrinkWine

February 24, 2012

So today started out like any normal morning….I got up at 6:30am, hopped in the shower, got the kids up, begged them 18 times to brush their teeth, explained to my 5-year old why the orange shirt and purple pants that she wanted to wear wasn’t a good idea, and generally counted down the minutes until I could ~~shove~~ gently push them with love on to the school bus.

And then I got a look at Thomas’ shoes.

Imagine a pair of Skechers, where the bottom of the shoe is pretty much held on by about 3″ of the remaining attached rubber/leather. I don’t know what boys DO to their shoes, but one minute they are fine, and the next minute you need to LEAVE the house so that you don’t miss the bus and get stuck in the drop-off line at school….and you are considering duct-taping your childrens shoes just to get them through the day!

However, this happened to be a day that I knew I had to be at school at 9:30am for an event for his grade (Colonial Expo). Leaving at 9:00am gave me plenty of time to drive to Target, run in, grab ANY pair of “emergency shoes” in his size (I honestly didn’t think they would last the day) and get to school.

And then I saw this:

It gets worse - Nordstrom has an entire page of $200 jeans like this!

For the Love Of All That Is Good And Holy In This World – NO! Just…..NO!

Let me tell you something…I spent the 80s in high school. I once set off an airport metal detector because I had so many “stackable bangles” on my wrist that my grandfather laughingly told that story until the day he died.

There are so many 80s trends in fashion that are coming back. Can we all agree that skin-tight flowered/striped/animal-print denim needs to STAY in the 80s?

Although if Reebok wants to bring back the lemon-yellow high-tops that I can wear with my socks-that-match-my-sweater-over-my-black-leggings….that would be cool!

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Not Thinking About What I Was Saying #ThisIsWhyIDrinkWine

February 20, 2012

background: for 6 days, I have been having problems with Moms Need To Know just NOT working. The site was going down several times per day and all the replies to my emails to tech support were in “Computer Tech/Geek Speak”, not English. Seriously – if you got an email saying “The logs are generating premature script headers and null php handlers for result codes”…where do you GO from there?

Note: It’s 1:00am and I am calling tech support because the site is down and I HAVE HAD IT!

Me: Hi – my site is down for about the 50th time in the last 6 days. I have been emailing back and forth with tech support and today they told me to install Litespeed for an additional $20/month…and 4 hours later, my site is down again!

(insert 10 minutes of “have you tried this”, “yes I have that plugin”, etc)

Them: Oh – it DOES look like there is a problem with your server. I am going to immediately get someone on it to fix the issue! Moving you to a new server requires opening a formal process. Do you want to do that?

Me: If you honestly think that you can fix it, fine – you have 12 hours for me to NOT get another report that my site is down before I do that. Because frankly, I have been going down 5-10 times a day and I am not really enjoying it.

Them: (giggles)

Me: ok – let me rephrase that….

(side note: they fixed the problem!)

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How Do You Load a Dishwasher? #ThisIsWhyIDrinkWine

February 16, 2012

The scene: after dinner, Brad is cleaning up and loading the dishwasher, I am helping to clear the table and generally cleaning up the kitchen for the night

Me: hon’ – these need to be rinsed a bit more before they go in the dishwasher

Brad: the dishwasher will get them clean!

Me: we don’t have a garbage disposal feature in our dishwasher like your parents and my sister…the dishwasher doesn’t get them clean – it just makes them hot!

Brad: Fine – I will rinse them. Are you going to rearrange all the dishes in the dishwasher while I do it?

Me: Well, I am just trying to get the plastic stuff off the bottom rack. We now have no Tupperware pitchers left because you put them on the bottom rack and they melted.

Brad: that had nothing to do with them being on the bottom rack! And why are you completely rearranging the entire dishwasher?

Me: Because you can’t pack dishes in so close that the water can’t even get in between the dishes.

Brad: Fine! From now on, you can load the dishwasher! I’m done!

Me: awesome….meet you here tomorrow night…same time…same argument?

Brad: It’s a date!

(Note: I understand that I am very lucky to have a husband that will load the dishwasher…or so I am told….I kinda believe it is a part of the equitable distribution of work in a family and wouldn’t be married to a man who WOULDN’T load the dishwasher…but for those of you who are about to tell me that I am just lucky to have a husband who will do the dishes…there ya go!)