The other day (e:yesthatcasey) and I had to stop at my house to pick up some papers. As I came around the corner and tried to pull into my driveway I was stopped by a car parked in the skirt. The skirt that I shoveled the night before.

I got out and told the people that it was my driveway and that I needed to get in. I ended up just parking them in as I went to go get the stuff I needed. Same old story. In fact it seemed rather uneventful and I would have never even bothered writing about it until I got this letter. Apparently, me bring angry that I couldn't get in my own driveway came across as too rude for them.





Here is my response:
Dear Church,
0. The best neighbors possible would be ones that never park on my property.
1. I am but one secular human, free of miracle and I manage to shovel my driveway by hand. It doesn't require any special service contract being fulfilled. If anything with 20 people you should be able to shovel it infinitely faster.
2. My rudeness was minor and uneventful, I said, "Why are you parked in my driveway." To be honest I didn't even know they were church people. When the woman responded, 'because we are unloading for the church" - I said, "You could just shovel your side of the driveway, its not that crazy of a concept."
3. Normally, I just let it slide when people are parked in driveway for a few minutes unloading, it happens more than you think. However, this time I was in a rush and needed to get in my house. Why should I be inconvenienced and have to park a block away because you guys didn't have the foresight to clear your driveway. I spent the previous evening clearing mine so that I could get in and out during the day when I knew I would be in a rush.
4. I have no neighborly desire to extend any special privilege or access to my property just because you are a church with a small congregation. In fact I am less likely to do so because I am infinitely annoyed that you pay no tax on your huge property while it is barely used for spiritual activity.

Paul

This was a very tasty lunch. I sauteed some onions in white ice wine and then added them to mussels and broth. Then some crispy bacon over the top of it all. I actually ended up eating a half pound of bacon.

So I was excited to find cardpool yesterday when I was purchasing some shoes (e:paul,57112) from dsw.com

I purchased 2 $25 gift cards for $44 which I thought was a good deal. I purchased them around 5PM yesterday. The system said the cards were electronic and would be delivered in 24 hours.

Toward the end of the business day today I got a call from California to confirm my purchase info but wasn't near my phone. Strangely, the number they call from can't accept calls so I had to listen to the whole message to get the number to call from. When I called that one, the system said they had not enabled their voicemail.

Finally around 5 they call me back and say in 3-4 hours the gift card should be ready. I got two of them. One works, and the other one doesn't. It was so frustrating because I bought them under the assumption this would actually work out within 24 hours. I actually thought a full 24 hours was on the ridiculous end of the scale. By the time I received the gift cards and found out the one was bunk they were closed for the day.

At this point I just had to buy the shoes because they was a limited number remaining and I was afraid they would sell out.

In the end it turned out to be a pretty poor experience. I don't think I would ever use their service again. I guess it really depends how this gets resolved but mostly having such a large delay between purchasing an electronic item with electronic delivery and its actual fully functional arrival is not really an awesome experience. I wonder if they will refund me or fix the card.

DSW has a New Years deal where you get $20.13 cents off any purchase of $99 or more if you are a rewards member and type in coupon code HAPPY2013. You also get free shipping for the code SHIPR.

Yes, I already have these shoes in brown but they are the most comfortable boots I ever owned. I decided that the New Year's outfit really needed black boots but I just don't have any.



The crazy thing is just how many coupon codes and rewards points certs I got to use. I pretty much got the boots down to half price. I originally paid like $140 for the first pair. I am becoming obsessed with coupons.



To make it even crazier, I am paying the remaining $59.82 using some DSW gift certs I bought at cardpool.com - its a site where you can buy and sell gift cards. When you buy them, you pay less than the card value so you end up saving a bunch. I ended up saving an additional 9% doing it that way. Technically, I haven't saved yet seeing as the cards come tomorrow but the shoes are in my cart. Lets just hope they don't sell out before the cards get here because I will be so mad if I lose out for 9% of $50.

This year I didn't want any green wires on the outside of the ball so I started with a styrofoam ball and hallowed it out so that I could push the lights from the inside out.



It was so much work, I really had no idea how strong a material styrofoam was. In my head it seemed like it would be easy but it was like two people scooping for 30 minutes.

The wrapped it in foil and decorated with pipe cleaners, ornaments and glitter foam paper. Its like all those years of art school finally had a purpose.