Competitive Selling

This past weekend, I purchased a couple clearance items in the Dillards workout wear department. I love that place. They have the softest yoga clothes, and if you time it right, the prices are amazing.

Anyway, I walked off the escalator and was greeted by a sales person (SP#1). I walked around the department for awhile and found a pair of pants that I really liked. Unfortunately, they were only available in one size. And, it wasn't mine. Soon, another sales person (SP#2) happened along. I asked her if they had any more sizes in the pants. She said that they didn't and pointed out a few other pairs of pants.

I was mid-sentence, professing my love of the Dillards yoga wear, when SP#1 made a comeback.

M: "This place has the greatest..." (voice trailing off in confusion as I begin to notice SP#1 and SP#2 arguing.)

SP#1: "I greeted her first. She's mine."

SP#2: "That's fine. I'm going to lunch. You can have her."

SP#1 walks away.

SP#2 (to M): "Well. What was that all about? I'm sorry. That was embarrassing. Did she say anything to you?"

M: (Assuming she's asking if SP#1 was rude.) "No..."

SP#2: "Ugh...she didn't even greet you? What was she talking about?"

M: "No, no. I mean, she said, 'Hello' when I got off the escalator."

SP#2: "Well, if I were you, I'd just go somewhere else completely to purchase your items."

I continued shopping in the department and then checked out with SP#1. Technically she did greet me first. And I wasn't going to walk around looking for someone else.

As I was checking out, SP#2 came back to get her purse from behind the counter. She gave me a brief conspiratorial/slightly admonishing eyebrow-raised look. I shrugged.

Weird. Who knew Dillards had such a competitive sales environment?

I'm A Funner...Or Something Like It

The other morning I was running laps around our condo complex. When I first started, I was just doing a little walk/jog/gallop/skip combination of sorts to warm up. I was also throwing a few stretches in there.

As I was going along, I met guy out for his morning walk. Apparently in my stretches I had cracked my back (or something?) and he exclaimed, "Geez, I could hear your back crack all the way over here, when you were back at the corner." He was probably 20 feet away. Weird.

Then I met another guy out for his morning walk a little later in the run. The first time we passed each other, we just said, "good morning" to each other. The second time, he gave a head nod, and I gave a wrist flick. The third time, he said, "Wow, how far do you run?" And I answered, "Just two miles." But I ran away just a little faster, feeling a little more like I runner than I have in years.

You see, most of the time, I don't feel like I count as a runner. Don't get me wrong, I love running. But, I love running a little bit. I love running two to four miles at a time. I love running 10 to 15 miles in a week. I love running intervals some days and running slow some days. Like I said, I love a little bit of running. The true runners seem to be the ones who run the marathons and half-marathons and train for months and months to run many, many miles. I have no intention of ever attempting to run a marathon. I have no intention of ever trying to run a sub-seven minute mile again. So, by my definition, I don't count as a runner...I'm more of a 5K Fun-Runner. Or a "Funner" as I've abbreviated.

Run VBG Run!

Just wanted to say best of luck to VBG running Boston tomorrow. Way to go! And, in the words of my old cross-country team, "Give 'Er!"

Refrigerator Discovery

After living in our condo for two years, today we discovered that our refrigerator is already hooked up to a water line for the icemaker. Pretty exciting. The icemaker situation had been an ongoing discussion. P&AF wanted to put in a water line; I didn't. Not that I don't like icemakers; I really do. I just figured there were a lot of other things that we could spend the money on, like a water softener that works or wood floors for a yoga room. Anyway, we are currently in the process of testing it out to see if the icemaker actually works. The water to it had been turned off for all this time. So we turned everything on; the moment of truth will come later today. Hopefully the water line isn't leaking as we speak and flooding out our downstairs neighbors.

The only unfortunate part of the discovery is that the reason it occurred was because we were trying to isolate the rotten smell that is coming from the kitchen. The source of the rotten smell was not discovered. So far we have pulled out the fridge, along with everything underneath the sink. The stove will probably be our next avenue of investigation.

Mistaken Identity

Lately whenever I go shopping, I seem to be coming home with the wrong products. I don't know if I have been particularly hurried, or if I am just not paying attention to what I've been doing. This week I mixed up the following items:

1) Needed - Vegetable Broth; Came Home With - Beef Broth
2) Needed - Diced Green Chiles; Came Home With - Whole Green Chiles
3) Needed - Shave Gel; Came Home With - Hair Dissolver Cream

Go Me!

Earth Hour!

We went to the park for Earth Hour the weekend before last to watch the Strip go dark. We had planned to barbecue some kebabs and just hang out. The weather was pretty nice for it. We had to go to our second choice for parks because our first choice was holding a Bad Religion concert. Our second choice was a little park dedicated to firefighters. It's a nice, quiet little park with a good strip view. Unfortunately, after arriving, parking, and carrying our cooler and picnic gear to the perfect site, we discovered that the firefighers park doesn't have any grills. It has a notice requesting that patrons only have fires in designated areas, but no grills or firepits. So, we had to make do with drinking wine and eating the fresh fruit that we brought along. We didn't want to leave and miss the action...or drive our car around wasting energy during earth hour.

Here are some pictures of the Strip before and after Earth Hour. You might be able to see the Circus Circus sign on. They apparently didn't know that everyone was turning their sign off. The Palms also did not turn off all their lights. They thought they did, but only one building went out, I guess. Wynn and Encore also left their signs on. I was most impressed with the Palazzo. It is just so huge and bright that seeing it turned off made a big difference.



The Stratosphere Part of the Strip - Lights On!



The Stratosphere Part of the Strip - Lights Out for Earth Hour!


The Rio Part of the Strip - Lights On!



The Rio Part of the Strip - Lights Out for Earth Hour!

Hike With A View

We recently did one of the "Calico" hikes up at Red Rock (either Calico Basin or Calico Tanks.) I thought there was a pretty cool view at the end of the hike. There was a little rainstorm over the Strip.




Us at the end of the hike before heading back.




It's a little hard to see in this photo, but this is the Las Vegas Strip. At the far left, you can see a tiny Stratosphere.