That's Just Wrong, Page 18

After dinner tonight, Ron and I went out to run a few errands.

I wanted to stop at Walgreen's and Ron wanted to stop for cigarettes. Since Walgreen's is closer, we stopped there first.

I got my few items and as I was checking out, Ron said since we're here, and Walgreen's sells cigarettes, he might just as well get them at Walgreen's. (Hello?? I thought that all pharmacies stopped selling cigarettes! But, I digress.)

When I finished checking out, Ron asked for his smokes, then pulled out his credit card. The cashier told him that he can't JUST buy a carton of cigarettes on a credit card, he had to make an additional purchase of anything else. Hello?? No.

Yes. She could not let him buy JUST a carton of cigarettes on his credit card; he had to make an additional purchase.

This is beyond absurd.

We asked to talk to a manager figuring she had to be mistaken about something. The manager was "too busy" to come to the front of the store, but he called her on the phone. I heard her side of the conversation, so I know she relayed the message correctly. With the manager supposedly on the phone, she said that while they don't allow cigarettes only to be purchased on a credit card, he would allow it just this once.

Allow it? Do you want my $50 or not??? (I know, a ridiculous amount for cigarettes!)

We said forget it; any other store would be happy to take his $50.

The more I thought about it, the angrier I got. When I got home, I went to www.walgreens.com and found the customer service link. I wrote a note asking why if we purchased an additional fifty cent pack of gum this purchase would be approved, or if we purchased $50 of other merchandise instead of cigarettes, it would be approved. WHY would they not just sell the damn smokes!

This makes NO sense to me. If you don't want to sell cigarettes, DON'T. If you're trying to bolster sales with this ridiculous rule, STOP. You just let $50 in sales walk out of the door on principle.

If I get a response from Walgreen's, I'll post it here.

As far as company policies go, That's Just Wrong.

Lorain International Festival

Lorain doesn't have much to brag about, or be proud of, but they sure make up for it with the yearly Lorain International Festival. They do this festival right and it is a blast every year! This year was the 42nd annual festival and the spot lighted country was Puerto Rico.

I don't even know where to begin. First off, when you walk in, the first thing you come across are the food booths. There are booths down both sides of the main entrance. I couldn't take a good enough picture of the whole thing so you could see the vastness of this site! There are 40 food vendors and we did our best to hit as many of them as we could! So you get an idea, here are two pictures that at least show some of the nationalities represented.

Americana and Croatian:

Puerto Rican and Mediterranean:

We walked up and down both sides of the food vendors. Twice! And here is a sampling of what we enjoyed.

Chicken on a stick, Philippines (you can see I started eating it before I took the picture!):

Jambalaya, Creole:

Noodles and Cabbage, Hungary:

Pierogi Pie, Poland:

Potato Pancakes, Russia (these were deep fried and freakin' awesome!):

Funnel Cake, Dutch (duh! can you go to a festival and NOT get one??):

There is just so much to do at the festival besides eat and watch the people. There is a whole section of attractions for kids. This is a new addition this year and judging from the amount of kids in the area, I'd say it was a hit!

They have also in the last few years added some much needed seating. You are welcome to bring your own lawn chairs, which many people did. They have a ton of picnic tables, some out in the sun and others in the shade. Here are a few in the shade.

After we ate, we took a nice walk up and down the river. If you read one of my recent blogs, you may recognize this bridge. The pictures I took of the bridge before came from the other side, facing south. Now we are on the south side, facing north. You can see a few boats pulled up and parked for the festival right here on the Black River!

I don't know why, but I was surprised to see the Coast Guard boat patrolling the waters. There is actually a Coast Guard Station on the other side of the bridge, right by where Ron and I had our picnic the other day. I've just never seen them on the river before. Hey, I like taking pictures, so I took a picture of them!

Just as I turned my back and we went to walk over to the main stage, I heard a siren. Yeah, he was pulling another boat over! That was awesome! I have never seen a boat get pulled over before. Of course, I had to capture the image to share with y'all! I'm not sure what they were pulled over for, but it didn't stop us from yelling "book 'em, Danno!" Yeah, I know, we're corny and most people probably won't even get that joke. But it made us laugh.

As I was saying, over to the main stage. There are events planned all day long on the main stage. During the day, they change out every 30 minutes. Late afternoon and evening, there will be regular concerts. While we were there, we got to see Zoomba from Sheffield Lake. This is a dancing group from the representatives of Puerto Rico. The beat of the music had a lot of people chair dancing, toe tapping or dancing in the grass right along with them!

After the Zoombas, there was some country dancing.

Ok, the best part of the country dancing was this guy that was dancing on the grass in front of the stage. Look in the middle of the picture, he has on his white cowboy hat, light blue pants and a black leather vest. He was up there shaking his money maker for all he was worth! Hey, maybe the guy visited the beer tent a few times too many, I don't know. All I know is that he was having a great time and we were all having a great time watching him! He definitely knew how to get down with his bad self!

It was a great day. I ate too much, watched a ton of people, watched kids get their faces painted (Ron was going to buy a paint on tattoo for me, but I chickened out!), sat and enjoyed the entertainment. If anyone is near Lorain tomorrow, stop by before the event closes.

Admission is $1.00 for adults. I think there is an additional fee for the children's attractions. Of course, you pay for food, but the rest of the entertainment is free. It's well worth the trip to the Black River Landing. They are open on Sunday 12 - 6. If you don't make it this year, mark it on your calendar for next year. It's SO worth the trip! It's usually held on the last weekend before the 4th of July weekend.

If anyone goes on Sunday, look for us! We'll be there!

Prickley Pear Cactus

I have a prickly pear cactus growing on the side of my house.

About three of four years ago, I was at Mike and Mary Jane's, and Mike gave me a leaf from his prickly pear cactus. He said to just drop it on the ground and forget about it. Yeah, like anything could be that easy!

I dropped it. And watched it. And it got ugly. It shriveled up, and looked dead. I thought the heck with it, I was just going to throw it out. I tried to pick it up but it was rooted on the spot! It might look dead, but it had some strong roots. Obviously, I left it here.

I am so glad I did! This thing is gorgeous when it's in bloom, and right now, it's in bloom! This first picture I took about 10:00 this morning.

This next one was taken at about 12:30 in the afternoon! Holy cow! What a different in just a couple of hours!

I know, I know, I desperately need some fresh mulch around here. Aside from that, isn't this gorgeous?

Here is a close up of the bloom. I think this year, I'm going to take a couple of leaves and put them in the front of the house too. This is the easiest plant I have in the flower beds!

Picnic Day

It's a beautiful day here in Lorain!

After Ron's service call today, we headed to Subway for a sandwich and took it to yet another park here in the area. This is Riverside Park and it's right on the Black River, just before it empties into Lake Erie.

It's not a huge park, but there is a small play area, a couple of covered areas with picnic tables, a few grills and a walkway next to the river. It's a very pleasant place, very peaceful.

The bridge in this picture is the bridge on Route 6 that goes over the Black River. It is a draw bridge and will open up in the middle when any big ships or tall sailboats go through the river. That's quite a sight to see. Here we are looking south and Lake Erie is behind me a little bit, to the north.

After we ate, Ron and I headed over to the walkway by the river. Again, we are looking south, and that is the same bridge as in the last picture.

I love being down here when the bridge goes up! Ron and I were on the other side of this bridge a couple of years ago when the bridge opened and what came in from the Lake? The Brig Niagara from Erie! Being born and raised in Erie, that was quite a sight for me to see. Yes, I got choked up. It was something to actually see her sail as all of my life, that ship was always in dry dock. Way to go, Erie. That was a great accomplishment! She is beautiful!

Back on topic, you can see Ron as I face north towards Lake Erie. You can't really tell in this picture, but beyond the green, straight ahead, is Lake Erie. You can get a good view of it when you're on the bridge from the last two pictures!

C'mon now, the pictures at least are a lot better than they were before Ron putzed with my camera! These are much better than my last batch!

We just spent part of the afternoon walking up and down here on the waterfront. While we're walking, suddenly out of nowhere I see this kid in a canoe. From where I was, he looked to be about twelve! I'm not sure how old he was, but he was already by me when I decided to take his picture.

I'm not sure where he came from, but he was heading from the lake into the river. Now here's a great adventure for a young man. Whatever he was doing, I hope he was having a great time! Now Ron and I are in talks to go rent a kayak and take a trip on the river ourselves. Never being in a kayak before, I'm not sure if we can handle it. I'm much more of a canooer than a kayaker, but we'll see. Could make for a great day!

So there you are. When we finally ended Ron's lunch hour, we drove over that bridge shown in the top pictures. I lifted my camera out of the window and up as high as I could an took a picture. You can see Lake Erie just after the bend in the river. Very cool.

So much for our little lunch time adventure for a Tuesday. The International Festival is coming to the Black River Landing this week. Stay tuned for more pictures.

In Our Own Back Yard

Friday we had a bright spot in between all of the rain we've been having. Ron and I decided to take advantage of it!

We headed out to Lakeview Park right here in Lorain! How often do you ever become a tourist in your own city? I'm telling you, if you don't, you should. The beauty in our own back yard so to speak was astounding.

We go to Lakeview Park often. There is public access to the beaches on Lake Erie as well as picnic grounds, bocce courts (see last post!), a restaurant and this gorgeous rose garden. As many times as we've been to this park, I don't think we've ever walked through the rose garden. Friday we made up for it!

Let me first say that I am no photographer. I have a couple of digital cameras but other than pointing and clicking, I really don't know what to do with them. I think I had some settings wrong since a lot of my pictures were just washed out you couldn't tell what was in the pictures! So, bear with me. They pictures aren't great, but you get the idea.

Above is the entrance to the rose garden. Immediately behind me is parking and on the other side of parking is the beach and then Lake Erie. So, not only are the roses gorgeous, the rest of the scenery is just as spectacular.

There is just about every color of rose in this garden.

The garden is made of up rows of concentric circles. Each section of a row will have another type and color of a rose. Here you can kind of see what I'm talking about with the rows.

It's just beautiful! From the entrance, I turned around and took a picture. You can see just how close we are to the water. Unfortunately, when I tried to take pictures of the water, they were all washed out. Inside of that arch, at the end of that black pier coming from the right is a lighthouse. Yeah, that didn't come out at all!

When we got home, Ron did futz with the settings on my camera, so hopefully next time there will be better pictures.

The roses themselves were indescribably. Here are a few examples:

One is even more beautiful than the next, for sure.

It was a great day in our neighborhood. We walked all through the garden. It was a magical place; a peaceful place. I know I will be back there soon if for nothing else, to stop and smell the roses.

Game Night

Anyone that knows me knows that I love games. I love card games, board games and heaven knows I love computer games, especially Pogo! But, I digress.

Tonight after dinner, Ron and I made a trip to Target. We were just putzing for the evening, no real shopping mission in mind. I do like to walk through the seasonal section, just because. I usually never buy anything, but I like to look!

What we saw first was some hula hoops. Hey, in Wii Fit, I am a champ at the hula hoop, even at expert level. I can do this! So in the middle of Target in front of anyone that wanted to watch, I hula hooped. Well, I tried anyway. I have come to find out that in real life I suck at hula hooping! But at least there are a handful of shoppers and who ever was manning the ceiling cameras that at least good a good story to tell people after watching me tonight.

Target was having a sale on bocce balls! The game of bocce is also called lawn bowling. Sort of a cross between shuffleboard and curling. We don't have the levelest of lawns, but with our new bocce set, Ron and I hit the yard and played a couple of games of bocce.

Ron kicked my ass for both games we played, only because after two games it got too dark to see any of the balls! But again, we were entertainment for the neighbors. I knew one house of neighbors was watching us, but then another neighbor yelled out his window asking us about the game. Yes, whether hula hooping or playing bocce, we are entertaining!

So, we have started to practice. We will take on all challengers. If nothing else, it is a great way to spend an evening.

Tomorrow we plan on going to Lakeview Park. They actually have a bocce court there and we want to take advantage of a really flat surface. We enjoy the wonders of all of Lakeview Park, some of which will be featured in the next blog.

Eww!

I have a lot to say today, so let's get this ball rolling!

Wednesday, Ron had a late afternoon service call. We decided that once he was done, he'd come home, pick me up and we'd go to the Olive Garden for dinner. Hey, I happen to love the Olive Garden, plus we have a gift certificate to go there. Bonus!

Ron called when he was on his way home. I finished getting ready, and right about the time I expected him home, I decided to go outside and wait on the front porch for him. We have a front door that has three locks. We have keys for none of them! So, if we're leaving the house and not just going to sit on the front porch, we come and go via the side door. By the way, here is a picture of the view from our front porch, while I was sitting on the glider! This has nothing to do with this story, I just love my front porch and my maple tree! (oops! I took this picture this morning and now I see that you can see our recycle bag still sitting there! Oh well. At least we recycle!)

Anyway, I left the house through the side door and walked to the front porch to wait for Ron. As I was walking, it had just started to sprinkle outside. Not too bad, I wasn't going back inside for my umbrella.

I went to the front porch and sat down on the glider, watching traffic. The rain picked up. And, then it really got freakin' serious. It started to rain harder than I've ever seen it rain before. Sitting on the glider, I was starting to get wet! I walked to the other side of the porch and I was still getting wet! It was crazy and I was stuck!

Ron finally pulls into the driveway, barely cracks his window down and says something silly like "ready?" HA! I told him that no way in heck was I walking the four feet required to get into the van! He turned the van around and had the passenger door right next to the foot of the steps. I still didn't move until it let up some.

Traffic was horrendous as all streets were flooded and lights at major intersections were out. I am not a good passenger and I was freaking out on my side of the car. Finally Ron suggested just going to a restaurant that was just coming up on the street we were on instead of driving all the way to the Olive Garden. Fine by me! Rosie's usually has good family type food. We haven't had a bad meal there. Until Wednesday night that is!

We shouldn't have changed our original plan. Rosie's was not on their game Wednesday night as both of our soups were cold as were both of our meals. Finally the waitress just stopped coming to our table because she knew she was going to be carrying something back! Not our best night.

Anyway, the following morning, we had these bugs all over our house. We had no idea what they were, but in telling the story to my brother Michael, he thought they might be Mayflies. Sure enough, a little Internet research showed that of course, Michael was right!

These two were from inside of the house looking through the screen at a couple of them.

From tip to tip these things are maybe two inches long! On the north side of the house, every screen has some of these things on them. When I went outside to try to get a better picture, there were hundreds all over the outside of my house, all on the north side! Here is one from the outside.

The strangest thing is today, Ron and I went to go out for breakfast. There are still a ton of these on the outside of our house, but now most of them are wingless and their bodies have changed to a light yellow or tan in color. I'm going to have to do more reading on the Mayfly. It is weird.

But, for now, we are covered in bugs. Eww.

Napa Valley Box Company

I have nothing. Absolutely nothing. It's been quiet here.

There has been nothing blog worthy going on around here. Other than watching my beloved Cubs tank it on the field, it's been quiet here in Lorain. Let's see what I can pass along from my life here.

Last weekend, Ron and I went for a nice long walk at one of the local metro parks. I've said it before and I'll say it again, one of the best parts about Ohio is their metro parks system. There are numerous parks around and they are all fantastic in some way. This time we chose Bur Oak as our starting point.

We walked over two miles and just totally enjoyed the day. Unfortunately, I think that was more than Ron's rib was ready for, and he had a bit of a set back in his healing journey. While the day was beautiful, the only Kodak moments were the four caterpillars that were on the walk way as we were walking out. They seemed to all be the same species; dark brown or black, spiny, with a row of red dots down its back. And me without my camera! I know, I know. The story is nothing without pictures. I tried to find a picture of it on the net to add to this story, but I didn't have any luck. I guess my description will have to do.

Long walk aside, it was a quiet week. I did cut the grass all by myself this week! I was pretty proud of myself on that one. Before you ask, this was not Ron talking me into helping him white wash the fence. I really wanted to learn how to use the riding lawnmower and I did it. I didn't do it Ron's way I'm sure, but I got the job done. I am busting over here I am so proud of myself!

This weekend, Ron got to run away and have a "guys' weekend"! I think all guys need that now and again. A place where they can burp, fart, scratch their balls and just be guys and not worry about things like chewing with your mouth shut or putting a napkin on your lap.

Ron, and our friend Larry, went with Steve to Michigan where Steve races boats. Sort of like stock car races, but with boats. Yeah, that is as much as I understand, so don't ask me for clarification. Ron and Larry were going to be part of Steve's pit crew. Like I said, a guys' weekend.

Friday morning, I ran him to Larry's house so that I could have Ron's van for the weekend if needed. (My car is out on loan!) I figured that as long as I was dressed and mobile, after dropping Ron off I was going to run a few errands. What a mess I got myself into.

My first stop was my local library. An easy in and out. My problem was trying to get out of the parking lot. There is one driveway for inbound traffic and one driveway for exiting. These lanes are clearly marked with signs and painted arrows. It should be a no brainer. I guess I need to start looking for people that can't read signs at the library since not one but TWO cars coming in the exit almost creamed me. Yeah, my fault. I wasn't watching for traffic coming the wrong way. Silly me.

I then went to Home Depot and Lowe's. From a woman's point of view, stick with Lowe's. I spent way too much time at Home Depot walking up and down aisles looking for the part I wanted or an employee to point me in the right direction. Luckily, a guy shopping at Home Depot and I started talking. I was telling him what I was looking for and that I wasn't having any luck finding it. He was more than helpful, we talked about my options and then he gave me some good advice. He directed me to Lowe's.

The trip to Lowe's was a bit harrowing with one car almost hitting me when they couldn't read road signs and pulling into Lowe's I almost hit a woman that was exiting in the entrance lane. She was a bit shocked to see a big red van coming at her and she started screaming at me to watch where I was going. Ok, by now I was in a mood. I rolled my window down, stopped next to her and informed her that if she kept her ass on the other side of the boulevard where she belonged and not in the incoming lane, I wouldn't have had the opportunity to scare her.

At least the Lowe's employees were 100% better than the ones at Home Depot. I must have walked by five employees and not one of them passed me by without acknowledging me AND asking if I was finding everything I was looking for. Awesome customer service. I was directed to the correct aisle, but I didn't find exactly what I wanted. That wasn't their fault; it was mine for being indecisive.

That was way too much angst for me in a couple of hours of running errands. I hate being on the road, I hate driving and I am not all that fond of people at the moment. So, I came home, parked his van, and while Ron was away, I had a Ree weekend. It was marvelous!

I spent quality time with my heating pad, I played Pogo, I watched stupid TV, I read a lot, played Wii (and won EVERY game, thank you!) and just relaxed. I think it was a good weekend.

So, there you go. Not really anything blog worthy, but I made a blog out of it anyway. Now I'm sitting here just waiting for Ron to get home. Maybe this week I can find something fun to write about! Maybe this could be my week to hit the lottery. If that's the case, my next post will come from Cancun. Now that will be exciting!

Lake Erie Crushers!

There is a new team in town and they are the Lake Erie Crushers, located in Avon Ohio!

The Crushers are an expansion team in the Frontier League, an independent professional baseball league; they are not affiliated with Major League Baseball. They are playing in Avon Ohio in a brand new stadium named All Pro Freight Stadium.

Last night was opening day for the Crushers in their new stadium. Ron and I had tickets and we wanted to get there early to scope things out. This stadium is just awesome! It's a good sized stadium with straight away center at 400 feet and both poles at 325 feet. But all seats just seem so close to the action that it really has a small feel to it. The last seat in left field was about two feet away from the foul line. I'm telling you, you can't get any closer to the action without being a player.

By the time we got tickets for this inaugural game the only tickets left were general admission tickets. At $6 a ticket it was still a bargain. General admission tickets however were either standing or sitting on a hill in the grass. Since we weren't prepared for the wet grass, we chose to stand. That was ok with me, especially since we were allowed to stand right at the rail!

We chose our spot out in left field. We were standing right at the wall! Looking straight down, I was about seven feet up from the warning track. I'm telling you, it was a great place to watch the game and we met some great people standing at the wall with us. Best of all, I got to talk some smack to the left fielder of the Windy City ThunderBolts. Trust me, #5 was not the best left fielder I've ever seen and judging from the smack being thrown around by us left fielders, I wasn't the only one that thought that! Poor guy took a beating from us!

Let's go back. I said we got there early. We were able to walk all around the park as it goes in a circle. The general admission grass hill is at straight away center but you can stand against the wall all across the outfield. There are no seats down the right field line but there is a walkway to go straight over to the seats on the first base side. We visited the gift shop, found the food vendors and the bathrooms, and where all the exits are. We were all over every inch of the park! Best of all, we got a partial guided tour from one of the ushers, Matt. Being early does have its advantages.

There was a lot of hoopla before the game. Part of the hoopla was honoring the local Air Force Reservists. There were about 10 or so new recruits that had just taken their oath to join as well as a handful that are getting called to active duty. It was a nice little ceremony honoring both groups. Just before the national anthem, from over the hill in center field came two C130s (that's what Ron said they were!) with the USAF emblem on the wings! It was so awesome I can't even put it into words! They flew so low that I could almost see the looks on the pilot's faces! As they flew away from the stadium, the first plane dipped his wing to the right and the second plane dipped is wing to the left. What a sight!

As the National Anthem was sung, when they got to the "rocket's red glare" a few fire works were shot up. True rocket's red glare! It gave me goosebumps!

The game was extremely entertaining. The mascot, Stomper got the crowd going after the end of each half inning. My hands hurt from clapping all night long. Especially since the Crushers won, 5-2! Way to go, guys!

After the game were fireworks. Ron and I decided to stay to enjoy them. Since a lot of people had left before the fireworks, we were able to move over and sit down. We chose to sit up in the picnic area at a table. I don't think I'd want to watch a game from up there since you couldn't see all of the field, but it was great to watch the fireworks! I'm not usually a fan of fireworks but let me tell you, these were so worth waiting for! It was a breath taking display.

So, we had to stand during the game. Yes, my feet are sore, my legs are sore and my back hurts. But you know what? It was worth every ache and pain! We will definitely go back!

See you at the ball park!

I've Got His Back

Since Ron broke his rib, I have been trying to help him where ever I can. Let me first start by saying that Ron is getting better every day! That is the best news! He's not 100% yet, but he is definitely moving in the right direction.

One thing I did last week was to drive Ron to his service calls. That's not a bad gig, especially when the weather is nice. I drive, then sit in the parking lot and read my book until he's finished. See? Not a bad gig.

Saturday, I thought we couldn't put off mowing the lawn any longer. When Ron is healthy, I try to help with the lawn by doing the hand mower work. He has to start the mower for me since I have trouble pulling the string, but once it's going, I can go around the house, around the trees and signposts and then sit and watch him on the riding lawn mower do the rest.

I tried to learn how use the riding lawn mower during our first summer with the mower. It has been a horrible memory for me. I remember popping wheelies, screaming, wind rushing through my hair as Ron walked beside me trying to tell me I was fine. Yes, a scary experience. I don't know if it was my screams or just the humor of the whole situation, but we actually had neighbors pull up lawn chairs in the street to watch me make a spectacle of myself. Yeah, that's the last time I was on the mower.

Well, again, I'm trying to help Ron. And, inside I KNOW it's a good idea that I know how to use all of our toys, so I told Ron that if he helped me again get started, and then stay close by, I'd try again and ride the riding lawn mower.

I did all of the hand mowing and Ron started with the riding mower. I won't do the tree lines with the riding mower since I feel I am too close to the street plus I feel like I'm going to tip over for some reason by the curb. So, while I'm futzing, Ron got the tree lines done. Sweet deal! Once I was done, I was ready to take over.

I climbed on board, Ron again showed me the speed thingie, the different gears (higher gears go faster and faster. I stayed at number 2 out of 6!), the brakes and everything else I should know. Ok, I'm ready. I let go of the clutch, felt like I popped a wheelie, I screamed, and I was off. Off of my rocker, I know, but really, I was mowing!

Ron has a pattern on how he mows the grass. But, he was nice enough to just let me try to figure out my own. He pretty much said "there's the yard; mow it."

I didn't do it as neatly as he did, and I had to go over a few spots. It seems that I cut my corners a little short so I had to go over a bunch of them! And, yesterday when we went out, I saw I missed another section. Oh well. For my first attempt, I think I did pretty well! At least the grass is cut and all looks good in our world.

After all is said and done, the riding lawn mower might be a little easier than the push mower but not much! It's hard to freakin' turn, it still scares the heck out of me, it doesn't drive in a straight line and it takes a lot longer to do. I'd much rather be the one done first and sitting on the porch watching him finish.

So there you go, honey. I really hope you're back to 100% soon. I have proven to myself that I can do some of your chores, but to be honest, I'd rather not! I'm handing the keys to the mower back to you. I'll stick with my old chores!