Rachel's Blog
Isn’t this photo of these piglets adorable? I carved out three pumpkins this year to put on my porch and it never occurred to me that I could put anything inside of them to take a picture! Of course, I don’t exactly have any piglets at the house. But I could have borrow a couple of kittens from my neighbor – that would have been a great photo, too!
Halloween’s always been a big tradition with my friends. Every year, we have a potluck party and a contest on who will come to the party in the most outrageous and creative costume.
Last year, our male friend who dressed up as a pregnant nun won the contest. This year, I’m gonna try to win the contest by dressing against my personality. My friends know me as being very conservative and so this year, I’m gonna surprise them by getting a zombie costume. I’ve been looking online and there are some great makeup tricks to use to look like a zombie.
All the stores have Halloween costumes, makeup and props in their seasonal sections. I am going to shop around this weekend and see if I can put my zombie costume together so I’ll be ready in plenty of time for the party.
Riding home with a friend, you end up hearing new songs on the radio if they happen to like a different radio station than what you listen to in your own car. This friend had Sirius Radio and a station I’ve never heard before, that played in the background while we rode together.
The song that caught my ear was called, “Winter in My Heart” by a group called the Avett Brothers. It’s a simple little song, not complicated musically, but it was very touching. I think that is the hallmark of a great song – bringing forth an emotion with lyrics that touch your soul.
My mom’s birthday is today and since I can’t go to Florida to celebrate with her, I wanted to send her some flowers. I figured all her friends would see the flowers and be a little impressed and help make my mom feel special on her birthday – it’s a big one – one of the dreaded birthdays that ends with a zero.
So, I ordered an arrangement of flowers for her from the FTD web site. I found a discount coupon code on one of the coupon sites that said I could save 20% off anything on the site. When I went to the FTD site, there was a special message about free shipping this week, too. Actually its not shipping so much as a service charge and delivery fee.
So I picked out the arrangement of orange lilies that are her favorite flower and tried to use the coupon code to save the 20%. Well, when I used the code it made the free delivery offer disappear. I couldn’t find any way to get it back. So I canceled that order and tried to place a new order to save the service charge and it wouldn’t show that screen again. I think there was something put into my computer’s cookies that flagged the site to make the free shipping deal be excluded. That pissed me off, but they don’t give you any options to get help late at night.
So, I caved and ordered the lilies and charged it on my card with instructions to deliver the flowers today – her birthday. Well, the day went on and on and I never heard from my mom about having received the flowers. I figured she would call me as soon as they arrived. Finally, around 5:00 I called her to say Happy Birthday and she told me that a flower delivery had just arrived, minutes before I called. I forgot that it was an hour later in Florida because of the time zone change. I should have called earlier, because it turns out that the flowers they delivered were not lilies – they were red roses.
I am SO PISSED OFF. If the damn florist did not have lilies, they should have called and told me or given the order to a different florist. Of course, the fine print says that the florist has the right to substitute flowers, but the least they could have done was called and told me they didn’t have lilies. I NEVER wold have sent her roses – she HATES roses. She says roses remind her of death. Every funeral she has ever been to has had a casket spray of red roses sitting on top of the casket. That’s the LAST message you want to send a loved one on their birthday!!!!
I will NEVER use FTD again. I will call a florist in Florida myself and ask them on the phone what flowers they have and make sure they get my damn order right!