Saturday, November 13, 2004

Life Lessons: Scooter Riding and Pie Auctions

scooter_pie.jpgWe've learned a few life lessons in the past week. Actually, I [Ben] learned the first one all by myself: Don't ride the scooter in the house. Sunday morning I decided to go for a leisurely ride from the bedroom to the kitchen. I was going a little fast & didn't correctly negotiate the turn around the dinner table & into the kitchen. "Owww, Monica!"

When Monica came running in I was sprawled out on the kitchen floor holding my wrist that was slammed between the scooter & the floor. I seriously thought I broke my wrist & knew I only had liability insurance on the scooter, so I was scared. I survived with a knot in my wrist & a little less dignity.
Second life lesson: always go to pie auctions. We had free tickets to the Harding Grad School chili supper & pie auction. It was a fundraiser for scholarships. Basically, seasoned pie making veterans donate pies to be auctioned & rich people bid a lot for them. Now for the best part--the pie bid winners share their pie with those at their table. We had some pecan pie, strawberry pie, chocolate pie & cranberry pecan pie. Does life get any better than that? All those pies were all bought for about $100 each! So, never pass up a pie auction, & don't ride your Razor scooter around in the house.

Tuesday, November 9, 2004

Perks of the Job

holland2.jpgThe perks of being a travel agent are finally starting to pay off they're sending me on a cruise! At the end of November I'll be setting sail on Holland America from Port Canaveral for a couple of days. It's a special trip for travel agents, so we'll actually be going on a cruise to nowhere for 2 days. The really exciting part is that it will be on a brand new ship, the ms. westerdam. This ship just started sailing in Spring of '04. Holland America is also a pretty elite cruise line - fancy smancy.
This will be my second 'business trip'. I got to go to Minneapolis earlier in October for a training seminar. Basically in this business the more places you go to, the more you can build up your business. You can always sell something that you've experienced better than you can sell something you know nothing about except what you've read in brochures & on the internet.


A lot of people think that you pay more using a travel agent (that's what I thought before I worked here), but you actually get their services for free because tour companies, hotels, car rental places etc. all pay us commission. The only exception to this rule is on plane tickets that aren't in a package because airlines decided a few years ago that they weren't going to pay travel agents commission - hence the $35/ticket service fee that we have to charge.
Speaking of my new career, if anyone is planning any future trips feel free to give me a call or leave a comment on the blog & I'll call you when I'm @ work. I'm looking forward to planning all of your future vacations!

Friday, November 5, 2004

We miss the OC

oc_couch.jpgThe premiere of The OC came on last night and since I work until 7 PM on Thursday nights I had to double check & triple check that Ben put a tape in the VCR to tape it for me. On the way home I was singing the theme song to the show (California by Phantom Planet) except I changed the words to say, " Oklahoma here we come right back where we started from OKLAHOMA" instead of California. Don't get me wrong, we're getting into the groove of Memphis & actually like it here a little. There are just moments, days & sometimes weeks that we just want things to be back the way they used to be.


Obviously we miss our friends & family the most, but it's the little things that we miss too. Now I know you are all probably tired of hearing the differences between Edmond heart of America' Oklahoma & Memphis ghetto of America' Tennessee. Some days we just want to have 200 great Mexican restaurants to choose from & to have a Wal-Mart SuperCenter within walking distance from where we live.We don't, however, miss the 400 mph winds in Oklahoma!


There MUST be a reason that we're here & I'm sure whenever we do move away someday those reasons will be obvious, but it's tough. My mom said that whenever their family moved once when she was little that my grandpa told them, "Just stick it out for 6 months & then we'll see." We've been here a little over 2 months so I guess we haven't really given this place a chance. In the meantime, what is everyone's favorite thing about Oklahoma so that we can quench our homesickness?