Saving my pennies.

Posted on March 12, 2013 by borysSNORC

Now, I am aware that not all houses suffer from the strange and unusual phenomenon that I’m about to describe, but our house definitely does. The curiosity to which I am alluding is the frequently acquisition of random piles of coin… and lots of them.

I am one of those people you see holding up supermarket queues, usually rifling through her purse to try and give the cashier some coins so I can get back notes, and not end up walking around with a purse that is heavy enough to cause spinal curvature. In my experience, many men do not engage in this fleeting two second exercise to minimize the amount of coin they are carrying around, and as such generally whip notes out of their wallet for every new purchase. The numerous coins they then accrue from every transaction go from pockets to floating around the house, dumped in neat little piles here and there. Which means that doing the laundry, emptying the car console, turning the sofa cushions, or even just wiping down benches can often prove very lucrative.

And having spare coin in the house can be really handy too. Every vendor at the farmer’s market looks on in delight as you ‘apologize’ for your $20 purchase all being paid in gold coins. The Small Child once received a pretty bag full of gold coins to blow at a video arcade on his birthday which he thought was the best thing ever. And of course, there’s that ‘I really don’t want to pay you for X,Y or Z, but I have to, so I’m going to pay you entirely in schrappers’ thing. They can come in handy for that too!

Anyway, lately I’ve been collecting all the coins from around the house, raiding Mr K’s coffee fund even, and throwing them in my piggy bank – in this case the largest spare Tupperware container I have in the house that isn’t in use – because a few weeks ago, I said I’m going to have to start ‘saving my pennies’ for my big Alaskan adventure… and I meant it, literally! What better way to save up some spare spending money than to pool the loose change that ends up floating around the house! At the time, Yale laughed at me and said “I’ve got a handful of coins you can have.” *Sigh* Will they never learn! Never hang shit on a girl on a mission! When my money box gets full, I’ll cash it in for US currency to add to all the USD$1 notes I got on my birthday, and all will be well with the world. 🙂

About a week or so later I was out and about, and Yale told to me “Close my eyes and open my hands.” Now, we all know this either ends really pleasantly or extremely unpleasantly, so I looked at him skeptically and the facial expression he was wearing wasn’t telling me much about which end of the spectrum to expect, but I gave him the benefit of the doubt and put my hands out… from the bottom of his bag, he pulled out a ziplock plastic bag full of coins and unceremoniously dumped them into my hands! I nearly dropped them at the unexpected weight and said, “What’s this for?”

To which he replied, “I said I had a handful of coin to help you save your pennies for your trip.” I had completely forgotten his throw away comment and I stared at this amazing and crazy and silly, yet extremely thoughtful and generous gift. I had no idea of his having been serious when he said he had a handful of coin for me… and I had no idea that his ‘handful’ of coin would equal about three of mine! I have no idea how much was in that ziplock bag, as I just tipped it straight into the Tupperware coin bank, smiling and shaking my head as I did so.

A bag full of random coins. Who would have thought that a plastic bag full of change could be such a wonderful and unexpected gift that would it make a lasting impression as one of the best presents ever! I am still incredulous at the thoughtfulness of such a simple gesture… or maybe I’m just amazed when people actually listen to me and decide to come along for my strange flights of fancy!

I had to take my TupperPiggyBox to the bank today – it was either that or find a bigger container, and then I probably wouldn’t be able to lift it. Today’s schrappers netted $275 to add to my holiday fund. It’s not a huge amount, but it’s better than them being left scattered down the back of the sofa!

The Mystère is solved… and we have tickets!

Posted on March 12, 2013 by borysSNORC

Last week I rang Las Vegas, at some ungodly hour of the morning local time, to try and buy tickets to Mystère for when we get there in July. I’ve been watching the website like a hawk since I booked tickets for the other Cirque du Soleil shows we are planning on going to, back in early February, because Treasure Island only had dates up to and including June showing up on their website booking system.

I wouldn’t have bothered to call except that the June dates were showing limited seat availability (literally only 8 seats in the back rows of the best section of the house!) on a random Tuesday at the end of June? I assumed they probably sell them in bulk to tour operators or to other hotels etc… that or it has something to do with the fact that we are going to be in Vegas for the week of the World Series of Poker finals, which I understand is something that means something to gambling type people, and Vegas is going to be packed. Either way I wanted to get onto it well in advance. So I called the Treasure Island Hotel Box Office and was told that the July dates were showing up in their system but that the lovely lady on the phone was unable to book them which was ‘a bit strange’. She informed me that the dates would most likely be released by the end of March/early April, and she recommended that I should call back then, and that hopefully July dates would be accessible at that time.

Naturally I ignored her advice, and decided to tweet the Cirque du Soleil promotions team to find out when July tickets for Mystère would be available. ‘Lo and behold, I got a response and two days later I checked the website and the July dates were now showing up! Woot! However, much to my consternation, only dodgy seats were showing up as available?!?

Looks like another call to Las Vegas for me! Wouldn’t be so bad except their phone system automatically picked up my call both times put me immediately on hold irrespective of whether you’re calling from across town or across the world! After a few minutes listening to advertising on how the ‘fabulous Treasure Island Hotel can enhance your Las Vegas experience’, a lovely lady helped me out with ordering a pair of tickets for the show… and gave us great seats (third row, front and centre!) even though the website showed these exact seats were unavailable! Also, she informed me about discounts available for students (yay!), pensioners and military personnel that aren’t on the website. That little pink star below… that’s going to be us!

So… a hint for new players – don’t believe everything you see on the website!

Just one pain free day.

Posted on March 11, 2013 by borysSNORC

Ok, I try really fucking hard not to complain about back pain in this stupid blog, else I would be boring even me to death every single day. But today I am OVER it. It’s barely 10am and I am utterly and completely OVER IT! If I didn’t have to go out to get the Small Child later today, I’d be drugged up to the eyeballs right now and just write the entire day off.

I went to sleep with my usual amount of Valium, at a usual hour and have woken up feeling so much worse than when I turned in. My back is not just causing me pain, it is making breathing difficult as the pain is radiating around to my chest and rib cage. The same pain feels like it is radiating up my spine and has taken residence in the top of my head, which feels very much like I have been repeatedly smacked on the back of the head with a basketball since I woke up. My eyes are hurting for crying out loud! Literally aching in their sockets with acute spikes in eye pain when looking in any direction other than straight ahead. It hurts to blink and I’m not even hung over!

I’ve obviously been clenching my jaw overnight because my teeth are aching and the muscles around my jaw and face are painful and tense… which has the disconcerting side effect of making my ears feel like they are bleeding . This in itself, is a sensation which is not at all pleasant after a few hours of it. I’ve got pain in my lower back and in my hips, in my forearms and my wrists! There’s a weird wtf-something-or-other going on in my right foot that is making me hobble! My shoulder blades and collar bones are complaining if I have the audacity to move my arms! And my neck. Holy snappin’ duck shit! My neck seems to have forgotten that it’s primary function is to hold my head up and move it from left to right, as it is currently only doing so under extreme duress and with incredibly painful complaint! I fucking hate my body with it’s ‘snap, crackle and pop’ every time I try to move. It’s sending me round the bend. Who can fucking live like this? Constant pain and, for reasons beyond my understanding, today (just a random ‘any’ day, when I’ve not done anything to cause it) it has decided to ramp up and really test me.

And none of this is conducive to finishing my Latin assignment!

Grounds for divorce.

Posted on March 10, 2013 by borysSNORC

A husband and his wife are having dinner at a very fine restaurant when this absolutely stunning young woman comes over to their table, gives the husband a big kiss, tells him she’ll see him later, and walks away.

His wife glares at him and demands, “Who was that?!”

“Oh,” replies the husband, “that was my mistress.”

The wife says, “That’s it! I want a divorce!”

“I understand,” replies her husband, “but, remember, if you get a divorce, there will be no more shopping trips to Paris, no wintering in the Caribbean, no Lexus in the garage, and no more country club. But the decision is yours.”

Just as the wife is about to say something, she notices a mutual
friend entering the restaurant with a gorgeous woman. “Who’s that
woman with Jim?” she asks.

“That’s his mistress,” replies her husband.

“Ours is prettier,” says the wife.

Common European Language

Posted on March 8, 2013 by borysSNORC

The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the European Union rather than German, which was the other possibility.

As part of the negotiations, the British Government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a 5- year phase-in plan that would become known as “Euro-English”.

In the first year, “s” will replace the soft “c”. Sertainly, this will make the sivil servants jump with joy. The hard “c” will be dropped in favour of “k”. This should klear up konfusion, and keyboards kan have one less letter. There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year when the troublesome “ph” will be replaced with “f”. This will make words like fotograf 20% shorter.

In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible.

Governments will enkourage the removal of double letters which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling.

Also, al wil agre that the horibl mes of the silent “e” in the languag is disgrasful and it should go away.

By the 4th yer people wil be reseptiv to steps such as
replasing “th” with “z” and “w” with “v”.

During ze fifz yer, ze unesesary “o” kan be dropd from vords kontaining “ou” and after ziz fifz yer, ve vil hav a reil sensi bl riten styl.

Zer vil be no mor trubl or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi tu understand ech oza. Ze drem of a united urop vil finali kum tru.

Und efter ze fifz yer, ve vil al be speking German like zey vunted in ze forst plas.

If zis mad you smil, pleas pas on to oza pepl.