For Christmas Santa brought everyone airplane tickets for a week in Florida. We’ve been back for a few weeks now and I’m finally getting around to posting the pictures. There’s nothing like Florida in the winter. It’s good to get out where it’s warm when it’s freezing at home. And luckily we missed the Florida “cold-spell” that happened.
There was no DisneyWorld this time. That’s right… amazing isn’t it? Instead we did SeaWorld and Universal Studios — both of which are much better than their California counterparts. We also saw the Blue Man Group which everyone loved. And we went to Gatorland! None of us have been there before so it was entertaining.
Then there was plenty of swimming in between everything else. We used the timeshare exchange again and stayed at the Marriott Grande Vista and it was perfect. They gave us a fantastic room with a great view. We will definitely stay at this resort again. Pictures have been posted on Flickr and you can see the slideshow here.
Working in the retail business means I often stand back and look at my shopping behaviors. With the Christmas shopping season now gone I wanted to make a few notes on how my shopping behaviors changed for this season. This year I can honestly say that I had a big shift in the way that shopping was done.
It all comes down to three things: Amazon Prime, my iPhone, and RedLaser.
I’ve had Amazon Prime for a couple of years now. It is very convenient to look something up on Amazon, click the “Two Day One-Click” button and whamo! Two days later it shows up on my doorstep. And during the holiday season it is really worth it. We had boxes arriving every other day. It’s even convenient to send to people who are out of state. I don’t have to buy a present and take it to the post office to ship — I just buy it from Amazon and have them ship it.
By my estimates about 60% of this years gifts came from Amazon. That’s a lot more than in years past. Why so many more than before? Easy… my iPhone. I made an earlier post about all the things I could do with my iPhone. The following are all the things I did just with my shopping this year using the iPhone, RedLaser, and the Amazon app:
- During a conversation with someone about a gift idea I looked it up on Amazon, clicked one button and ordered it. Showed up two days later.
- In looking at a gift at a store I wanted to see reviews on it. So I looked it up on Amazon and read the reviews (which were good). I also saw that the price in the store was slightly better than Amazon (rare) so I bought the item.
- At Target I went to get an item that they had on sale. They were out of them. Looked it up on Amazon and they had it for the same price. I ordered it right there.
- Several times while looking at items in the store I used RedLaser to scan the barcode to see if it was cheaper online. Sometimes it was and I’d just order it instead of buying it.
- Several times I used the iPhone to look up a store to call them and get hours or information.
So what can I learn from all of this? For me, having inventory at the best price is what it takes. With an online shipment only two days away and free shipping it makes it hard for the brick and mortar store to compete, especially with things that are the same everywhere — books, movies, electronics, video games, toys, etc. (Oh… and did I mention that you don’t pay sales tax when ordering from Amazon?) Welcome to 2010 ladies and gentlemen.
For my birthday this year a received a knife sharpener. I admit, I’ve never had a knife sharpener before. I’ve been putting up with the gradual dulling of the kitchen knives for years.
I must say… I never new what I’ve been missing. Seems silly, but there is nothing like a sharp knife in the kitchen. It’s awesome! I can cut through fruits and vegetables without sawing action and without making a huge mess. I even completely broke down a whole chicken into pieces for some delicious Chicken and 40 Garlic Cloves a few weeks ago. Awesome.
But with every good there is bad. With every yin there is a yang. And so last night as Elena and I prepared guacamole the inevitable happened. It’s really Elena’s fault. She said something to the effect of “these sharp knives are awesome! I can easily cut through the avocado!” and it brought down the wrath of karma. Not more than two minutes later karma kicks in and the screams of “Andrew! Andrew!” ring out and we’re scrambling around to not get blood in the guacamole and put pressure on the wound. Eventually, all is fine.
So this morning it’s time to prep the pork for today’s slow cooked meal. I pull out the first piece to remove the fat from it and blamo! Hacked right into the knuckle on my thumb. Same routine again (although I did not scream “Andrew! Andrew!”). Made sure there is no blood in the food and put pressure on the wound.
So karma attacked both of us in less than 12 hours. Just more proof that Elena and I were made for each other. Why else would karma pick on us within a 12 hour span for the same thing?
There have already been a number of news postings and coverage of Sesame Street’s 40 year anniversary. Been around for a long time. I have fond memories of sitting down in the family room of our home after school, sitting in the “big gold chair” and watching Sesame Street. Use to watch it all the time. Then finally I turned 16 and decided that was enough. Ha!
So I thought I’d put together this quick list of classic Sesame Street moments for myself. I remember all of these.
I’ve finally gotten around to posting the photos from our California vacation. Back at the end of September for UEA week we went down and spent a week in Southern California. We traded the timeshare week again for a stay at Marriott’s Newport Coast Villas. It is a great place and we could easily go there every year. Elena’s parents stayed with us and we had a great time.
We of course went to Disneyland for three days — it was all setup for Halloween and it was great. Love the Haunted Mansion Holiday. But we did a bunch of other stuff as well. We went to the beach, went shopping, spent time at the resort in the pool, took a Duffy Boat ride in Newport harbor with my brother and sister-in-law, and overall had a really great time. Once again we didn’t want to leave at the end of the week. I have to admit, the smack back to reality at the end of a vacation seems to be getting more and more difficult.
On the drive back we spent a night in Las Vegas. Las Vegas is exciting and all, as long as you don’t have to go walking on the strip. I swear, they’ve got to do something about all those people standing out there handing out cards. It is horribly annoying. But the kids stayed at the hotel and got to swim in the pool on the top of the building, 38 stories in the air with a great view of all the neon. They thought that was pretty cool.
Love the vacations. Need to take them more often! Have no idea where the next one will be. To see the slideshow, click here.
Ack! I haven’t posted anything in over a month! Seriously lacking here. We did get back from vacation recently, so that post will be coming as soon as I get through the pictures. But in the meantime, I decided I needed to get something posted. I’ve been going through DVDs recently and I watched what has to be one of my favorite Disney cartoon movies - The Emperor’s New Groove. I can watch that one over and over. The animation is nothing special, but it’s has to be one of the funniest Disney movies.
It didn’t start out that way. It was supposed to be a big time musical/drama/comedy typical Disney production. They even had Sting write six different songs for the production. All of it was scrapped when things weren’t going they way they wanted with test audiences. With a brief extension of time they completely re-worked the plot so we have what we have today. Knowing all of that, it makes it even more amazing that I consider it to be so funny. The voice acting is perfect for the comedy and it is very well written.
So with that, I leave you with the following fine snippets from the movie:
“Why do we even have that lever?”
“I’ll turn him into a flea, a harmless, little flea, and then I’ll put that flea in a box, and then I’ll put that box inside of another box, and then I’ll mail that box to myself, and when it arrives… I’ll smash it with a hammer!”
“Um, what’s with the chimp and the bug? Can we get back to *me*?”
“What are the odds of that trap door leading me out here?”
“Don’t listen to that guy. He’s trying to lead you down the path of righteousness. I’m gonna lead you down the path that rocks!.”
“Oh, look. A golden-throated small-winged warbler. Just one more for exotic bird bingo. I am loving this.”
“Squeak, squeakin’, squeak, squeakity.”
“Don’t tell me. We’re about to go over a huge waterfall… Sharp rocks at the bottom? Bring it on.”
“I’m telling you, we did not order a trampoline!”
“I’m sorry, but you’ve thrown off the Emperor’s groove.”
Over Labor Day weekend was the annual Lawrence Fest 2009 convention, this year held in Eden, Utah. Every Labor Day weekend my parents and all my brothers and sisters and families get together for a few days. It is a great time. This year one of the activities was to create a painted rock version of ourselves (my wife’s brilliant idea). It turned out great! Everyone made their own version of themselves and we took a group photo. Can you tell which one is me?
We also went to the Flowrider in Ogden for our Saturday activity. It was a lot of fun. Indoor surfing — that is if any of us could actually surf. Lots of body boarding though. We had the whole thing for an hour to ourselves and had a blast. The little kids did it once and then they were done, but the rest of us just kept going and going. I’ve posted a video with all of the wipeouts. It’s pretty funny, and sometimes looks painful — especially my wife’s wipeout when she tried to do the stand up board. Sorry dear! Only bad thing is that I took the video, so there are any shots of yours truly. But I did get out there many times! To see the video, click here!
A great time had by all. It seemed too short, but it was good to get everyone together.
I have decided I have a new term that just bugs me — “knowledge transfer”. For whatever reason, people seem to think that information can just be knowledge transfered around from one person to another and that all will be OK.
It is a frequent phenomenon at work. I had conversations today about sending a person out to a location to gain “knowledge transfer” of the system that is being developed. Only for that person to then come back and “knowledge transfer” to people here. It makes it sound like some kind of Borg download or Vulcan mind-meld is going to happen and then all will be fine.
Hate to say it… but it is never fine. Didn’t you ever play that party game where something is whispered around a circle and by the time it gets back the saying has completely changed? Same concept… so naturally same result.
Ack! Rant complete.
Arrived at work this morning and started checking the news and what do I find? Big news… Disney is buying Marvel Entertainment for $4 billion. That’s right… BILLION. I have to admit, I have mixed feelings about this one. For being a Disney shareholder, I think it is an excellent move. Marvel has a lot of characters and properties. All of them vastly different from Disney properties and so I think the merging is definitely complimentary.
But as a fan of Marvel, not sure what I would think. But I do think Disney is a different beast than it was 10 years ago. Their acquisition of Pixar has left me impressed. Pixar continues to do things the way they have always done, but at the same time, they have been able to influence a lot of things at Disney. Hopefully that will be the same for Marvel.
So I look forward to walking down Main Street USA and being greeted by Spider-man, Iron Man, Captain America, The Hulk and all them fine characters. Should be a grand day! (A day that is a long ways off because of Universal’s claim, but still… sometime in the future.)
In Your Eyes
