Some vendors suck

Rant Mode On:
I won't name names yet since I still want the gift to be a surprise, even if it isn't going to make it in time. I ordered Brian's main Christmas gift (and a little present for me) from a fairly well known (in their circles) online vendor. It was a very specific specialty item, and one I was thrilled to find for him. I'm really excited about it. Placed my order on Dec. 12th, and chose the free regular shipping option (5-7 days). It hadn't yet arrived today, so I called the company. Turns out the little thing for me is on back order. And won't be coming in for several months. So they weren't shipping the order yet. When I asked why I hadn't been contacted given that it is the holiday season, I was informed that they would have contacted me next week. NEXT WEEK!! So I go ahead and cancel the item that won't come in for several months. Then I ask about getting the present item shipped out at a faster service as I'm leaving for the Holidays on Friday. They said they'd send it if I paid for the expedited shipping, with no delivery guarantee, and it was going to cost me 3x the cost of the item to get it here (hopefully) by Friday. The sales guy was absolutely not helpful, refused to reduce the shipping charges, and never once apologized for the problems. At the end of the phone call, I reiterated what I wanted done (cancel item X, send item Y regular) and told him that we will never deal with them again, specialists or not. I'll post a link once Brian's opened his "gift" for Christmas. Guess I'll have to just print out a picture and wrap that, and I can't even do that at work as the site sets off our internet filters! I am SO not a happy camper. I actually had something really cool for Brian for once. Do you realize how impossible that is to pull off? And now he's not going to be getting it until sometime in the New Year.
MURP!!!!
Rant Mode Off
I now return you to your regularly scheduled blog entries...
I have lots of little news type items to post, but I can't do most until after Christmas.

Random photos..

Why I have such a hard time losing weight. Brian was bored and poking around in the kitchen. I left him to it, and this is the result. Yum!


This one just goes to show Bonnie that her totally helpless/clueless hairstyle challenged sister can in fact (and VERY occasionally does) use hotrollers...



Afer the rollers come out, ready for my company Christmas party. It's a totally horrible photo, I'm hoping the "official" photographer got at least one good one of me, he certainly seemed to be always catching me in the eye with a flash!



Noah's Sub update photos again, this one after Saturday's stitching...



And after Sunday's...




I probably won't post any further as I'm this close to actually finishing it in time for Christmas so I want the "final look" to be a surprise!
{fingers crossed}

Cross-stitch photos

Photos of previously completed cross-stitches, since it was nice and bright this morning to take photos without flashes! They're not great, and I'll try to take better in the future, but they'll do for a first run.

This one is Catch the Wind



And this is Celtic Christmas, adapted by me to be done in purples.

Now hiding...

I think my friends here are going to kill me. I said (more than once) that all I wanted for my birthday was snow. Even just a little snow. It can't be my birthday until I've had snow. And that little pretend wink-and-you'll-miss-it bit last week didn't count. So Sunday morning we got snow. Not much, but almost an inch, which is enough to seriously screw up traffic here. We weren't actually here for it, being in Conneticut for the weekend at Anonycon (more on that later), but it counted. I got to see snow where we were too, and the drive back Sunday night was a breeze. We were home in under an hour and a half. I was happy. But here's the part they're going to kill me for. There's another storm coming, this one expected to drop somewhere in the neighbourhood of 7 inches (or more) on us in the next 24 hours, starting tonight. Just in time for my birthday. Whoopee! Now if we could only get the heat working properly in our apartment. We're not freezing, or anything like that, but it does have to get fixed. And we recieved our notice of what our rent increases will be for next year (yeouch) in the mail on Saturday, including the fact that if we're leaving, we have to notify them by not later than Monday. I plan to give them written notice that we plan to stay pending resolution of the heating situation. We'll see. I might have to move into protective custody anyways once my friends dig themselves out of the snow!
Gotta run!