Who spiked the punch?

It wasn't until today that those jokes about "who spiked the punch?" finally make sense to me!

At the office today the sales team hosted a casual potluck buffet luncheon to get us in the holiday spirit. At which there was a punch bowl...

And after only one glass - I feel a little, um... peculiar... Which leaves me asking only one question:

Who spiked the punch? :)

PS. I was planning on doing some work this afternoon, but I think it's probably in the company's best interest that I do not. I heard that the customer service team is having a little gathering of their own. Perhaps I'll head down the hall to check that out. Maybe they'll have punch too...

Shopping for the Shopaholic

It being Christmastime I have been spending a fair amount of my free time shopping. And one thing is for sure - shopping in the US (all the time, but especially around the holidays) is a shopaholic's dream come true!

Parking: Even when I go to the mall during peak times (Sat/Sun early afternoon) I haven't had any trouble finding a parking space. Don't get me wrong, there have definitely been more cars in the parking lot recently, but it hasn't taken me more than 2 minutes to find a spot - ever.

Crowds: Once inside the mall, it isn't crowded in the stores or the aisles. There aren't long lines at cashiers, and it isn't too hard to find a sales person to help you. The malls I have been going to around here (Holyoke & Westfarms) are less crowded during the holiday season than Yorkdale is off-season!

Hours: The stores are open a fair bit later here to help serve their customers better. For example, Yorkdale Mall's idea of extended holiday hours is closing at 9:30pm each night instead of 9pm with 2 extra hours on Sunday. My new favourite mall Holyoke Mall is open until 9:30pm regularly and has extended their hours until 11pm during the holiday with 4 extra hours on Sundays.

Returns: In Toronto stores never accepted returns during the holiday season because they were struggling to serve all the customers making purchases. In the US this isn't the case. You can do all the same transactions during the holidays as you can any other time of the year.

Cyber-Space: We have been taking full-advantage of all the online vendors available to US residents. Back in Toronto there was a limited number of merchants that ship to Canada. And then there was always the hassle of paying duty and taxes which pretty much ate up whatever savings you made from ordering online in the first place. But since we've moved State-side we've been buying lots of goodies online - books, CDs, and electronics are our most frequent purchases, but we've also had some great savings with kitchenware and luggage. And each time we make a purchase it's from a different vendor - there are just so many to choose from! Another major benefit of online purchases is that they don't bear any tax! Which brings me to my next point...

Taxes: Okay this one is HUGE - in Toronto we were paying 15% in GST & PST, which was later reduced to 14%. In Connecticut the state sales tax is 6% and in Massachusetts it's 5%. So you're already saving about 8-9% just on tax alone. And in addition to this, there are several handy exemptions to these state sales taxes. In Massachusetts there is *no* sales tax on gas as well as shoes & clothing under $175. I think it's fair to say that I use this exemption at least once a week ( I work in MA so it's very convenient for me to gas up here). In Connecticut any clothing under $50 is tax-free and of course like in Ontario, groceries aren't taxed either.

Taxes - part 2: For the most part, taxes on income are lower in the US leaving you with more disposable income to go shopping with. 'Nuff said :)

Happy Birthday Christopher!

Yesterday was Christopher's birthday! To celebrate the beginning of his 30th year I treated him to an evening at Mohegan Sun. We decided to go on Saturday night because Christopher had his tax exam that afternoon and would be up for some fun to de-stress a bit. Plus, we had never been to the casino on a Saturday night so I thought it would be fun to go when it was busiest.

For dinner we went to Todd English's Tuscany. It was pretty good - reasonably good food for that pricepoint. I had the mussels and thought they could be better though. And if you order the Herb Frites be forewarned - they are more like tiny hash browns than french fries. The potatoes are cut into tiny cubes - pretty tasty, just not what I had expected.

After dinner we wandered around the shops trying to get ideas for last-minute Christmas gifts, but found nothing. I'm not exactly sure who does a whole lot of shopping in those stores in the casinos. Their prices don't seem to be that good and alot of this stuff is just bizarre. Like a rhinestone-encrusted matching bra & panty set hardly looks comfortable, but then again I suppose comfort isn't their main priority.

Christopher played some Pai Gow Poker. This is my favourite casino game. When we were last in Vegas I played this for 2 or 3 hours while Christopher was in the poker room and when he came to get me I was up about $5, so I just tipped the dealer my $5 and walked away dead even, plus having ordered fancy drinks all night. This is my kind of game! (I know - I'm pretty lame when it comes to gambling) I'm glad to have found my game - you can play Pai Gow for quite some time and not be down too much money. It's a nice slow-paced game where you are only playing against the dealer, but the dealer has to tell you how to set up your hand if you ask. And it doesn't matter if you show your cards. People will commonly ask each other for advice.

Other than Pai Gow Poker, I like watching craps and seeing the excitement of the people cheering and the dice being tossed. But it makes me really nervous to play. The first time I played I quickly won about $130 and then decided to stop. When I asked Christopher how long I had been playing for, he said 'um - about 15 minutes?'. I was shocked - it felt like ages! I was just so anxious with every roll of the dice I suppose.

On Saturday I had a fun time watching Christopher play craps. There was this crazy old lady at the table and she was really entertaining to watch. Earlier on in the evening I had watched her get kicked off another one of the craps tables so I was kind of leery of her because I didn't want her to spontaneously get angry at us for some off-the-wall reason (you never can tell with these gambling addicts).

The woman spoke with an accent and was constantly talking - saying stuff to herself, the shooter, the dealer, anyone who would listen! And the poor dealers - she was often just tossing chips onto the table and muttering her bets. Because she didn't speak up and address any dealer in particular as she was doing this, very often the dealers wouldn't place her bets quickly enough and she would get upset, and other times they just couldn't understand what bets she wanted made with her accent.

Some other funny things she did:

• pulled out her cellphone and took a picture of the dealer (I don't think this is allowed at all)
• took a banana out of her pocket and placed it on the rail as she was trying to fish something else out of her pocket
• pulled out a fistful of chips from her coat pocket that she didn't know she had
• unwrapped some chocolate covered strawberries she had (yes - in her pocket!) that she had undoubtedly liberated from the buffet
• say things like "show me the money!"
• leave to go the bathroom - instructing the dealer and pit boss to continue to make all her bets for her (and she had a system going - this wasn't just a "let it ride" type of woman)

All in all it was a fun evening and a nice break for Christopher during a strenuous exam schedule.

G-Dub's Hood

This past week I was in Washington D.C. for work. I have only been to DC one other time - back in Grade 7 for our American History trip. This trip was almost cancelled because of the Operation Desert Storm - I remember how lame I thought this was when they announced this to the class, and how happy we all were when they told us the trip was back on a few weeks later.

The weather was great this past week - it was a little cold, but the sky was blue and clear each day. One afternoon I had some time to walk around and check out some of the sites. Everything is so well signed in the city and the streets are organized with letters & numbers (N-S streets with letters and E-W streets numbered). Even without a map I never had any problems getting around and seeing all the sights.

I enjoyed a late lunch one day at a tapas restaurant called Jaleo. It was delicious and the prices were totally reasonable. I had a huge bowl of their steamed mussels for only $6.95 - so yummy! If you happen to be in DC I highly recommend this place if you're in the neighbourhood.

PS. I know I've been a little behind in my posting, but I've caught up. Check out what we've been up to for the past few weeks below.

December in NYC

December is a super-popular (read: expensive) time to be in New York. Lots of tourists come into the city to do their Christmas shopping and see the holiday decorations that all the big department stores (Macys, Lord & Taylor, Bloomingdales) put in their store windows. I had a business trip to NY scheduled for the last week of November/first week of December so I was lucky enough to be able to see some of these sights.

On Wednesday, November 29th was the lighting of the Christmas tree at Rockefeller Center. Since this tree came from Connecticut I thought it would be fun to check it out (funny how I'm slowly starting to think of myself as from CT). Unfortunately the rest of Manhattan had the same idea! I have never been in such dense crowds - it was nuts. The NYPD had to shut down access to Rockefeller Plaza as well as many of the neighbouring streets for safety reasons - there were simply too many people inside and if they allowed more people in, it would only get worse. When I arrived, they were no longer allowing anymore people in to see the tree, just out. It was sad to see the disappointment in little kids' faces when their parents told them that they couldn't see the tree. But I suppose that's better than children getting trampled on by the crowds.

After my tree-viewing attempt I decided to head out and grab some dinner. My friend who lives in the city recommended a few restaurants to me, and the one I tried that night was Sushi Samba, a Latin American-Brazilian-Japanese restaurant. Its claim to fame I suppose was that it was mentioned on one episode of Sex in the City. While the food was good, I don't really get the whole fusion cuisine thing. I mean, there are so many great styles of cooking - does combining several together really make things taste better? I guess I'm just traditional - I like authentic Japanese, Indian, Greek, {fill in the blank} food they way they were meant to be.

On Thursday night Christopher came into town to meet me and we spent the rest of the weekend doing touristy things in the city. We went to FAO Schwarz, saw the coolest model railroad at Citigroup Center, checked out Rockefeller Center & the holiday decorations in all the stores, walked across the Brooklyn Bridge, had cheesecake at Juniors & shared a giant Reuben at the Carnegie Deli, saw AvenueQ and watched the Raptors beat the Knicks at MSG! The whole weekend was super fun - the weather was unseasonably mild so walking around town was very pleasant. It only rained a tiny bit on Friday afternoon.

We were in NY in August and it was really hot - December is definitely a more enjoyable time of year to visit the city!