Palmer's World

I had an odd experience at Wal-Mart the other day.  My buddy Matt tipped me off to these Lego roses.  He said they were $80 but when I went online to Walmart.ca it said they were $55.  I thought it would be a nice Valentine’s Day gift for the family to build together.

When I asked an associate to unlock the Lego cabinet for me, I did see the price was listed as $80 so I asked if I needed to speak to the cashier to get the price listed on Walmart.ca.

He told me that generally the answer is no and that I would have to order online, arrange to pick it up in store, pick a time which could be 2-3 days later because they have to wait for the order from Walmart.ca to come into their system and then they take the item off the shelf and put it aside for me.

This sounded quite odd to me.  He also saw that this was going to be a Valentines Day gift so he went to the customer service counter to see if there was anything they could do.

They could not.  I was bewildered to find out that Walmart.ca isn’t really the same as Wal-Mart the store.  There was nothing they could do for me.

A miracle happened when the original associate came back and said “I talked to the store manager and they said they could honour the price!”.  The folks at the customer service counter said “Great!” and I walked out of there with my new Lego set.

But the entire thing is strange to me…a colleague explained to me that these online stores are almost becoming their own company now and they have access to different sales and marketing pricing techniques.  That’s fine and all, but in what world do we live in where the associates give me a hard time about buying an item that is listed on Walmart.ca (not some random reseller…I’m talking about the actual store’s website) and they can’t price match what’s on the website?  Something’s a little messed up in this equation.

We haven’t had a large snowstorm this season until now.  35cm ended up dropping on us.

I’m not entirely sure why but I love bringing the kids to school on a sled during a snow day.  The school buses are always cancelled and there less kids in school but we walk the kids to school every day anyhow so why not have some fun?  Plus there’s a foot of snow to trudge through so I think Ezra would take about an hour.

Today the kids decided to try out the GT through the snow.  It was slow moving and I was a hurting unit after dropping them off.  There was just too much snow and I had to blaze a trail through a foot of it.  I thought I would get a reprieve in the park where they usually plow early but they had not gotten to it yet this particular morning.

I remember my shoulder really getting sore at one point so I had to rethink the way I was holding the rope.  I ended up just taking two ends of the rope and putting them over both shoulders which worked out quite well.  The kids had a fun time.

I had a meeting at 9Am to rush back to so I dropped the kids off at the front door and headed back home.  But in the parking lot across school I saw the neighbour and her three kids trudging along.  One poor girl was trying to go through the foot of snow and was having a hard time.  Even though my body was beat from towing 80 pounds of kids to school, I yelled “Hop on the GT!” and I towed her to school as well.

I swear two days later my body was still sore from all the sled pulling and snow blowing!  And I hear this upcoming weekend will have a lot more snow coming our way.  I can’t complain too much.  I enjoy when winter really hits us and there isn’t a bunch of freezing rain and green grass.  Spring will get here eventually…for now it’s time to enjoy the snow!

Sierra and I were playing with my new synthesizer, the Arturia Polybrute one evening.  I’m not sure if I’m going to keep it…I bought it used off of Reverb and it has some issues.  But it’s been fun trying it out.

Ezra wanted a photo with his heart shaped sponges which he was blowing across the floor with his little candy fan.  I think he looks like a model here!

I’m not sure why Disney on Ice showed up here in Ottawa in February when I think it typically tries to come around March Break, but no matter!  Vero convinced me that we should bring the kids again and after seeing the show, we had zero regrets in doing so.

Elsa and Kristoff from Frozen

We (wisely?) explained to the kids that we spent so much money on the tickets that we couldn’t afford any treats when we got there.  This was to avoid heartache when we passed by the $25 cups of slush and $35 bags of popcorn that Poppa graciously bought the last time we were there.  Maman did pack some popcorn for us which hit the spot.

We had some great seats and it was packed but not sold out at the french show.

I’m not sure why I enjoyed the show more than the last time we went, but I found everything about it to be better.  I found it wasn’t as dark in the arena as last time, the music wasn’t as loud, there was a lot more to the show than just skaters.  They had acrobatics and a lot more flying around as well!

The storyline was based on pirates trying to find Tinkerbell and we had to go on an adventure to find her before the pirates.  The audience was brought through different scenes/stories involving other Disney characters…Moana, the Little Mermaid, Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast…all the modern Disney characters as I refer to them.  I find it interesting that they do have Mickey, Minnie, Donald and Goofy but they play second fiddle to the main acts which are all the more modern characters.  I guess they know the parents and their children grew up more with Disney movies from the 1990s onwards.

There was a moment (not filmed) where the hosts asked a guy across the aisle to play a guitar for everyone in the arena.  He was hesitant so Ezra, Sierra and Maman were trying to get the hosts to pick me out of the crowd.  Imagine that!  Too bad I was stuffing my face with popcorn or maybe they would have picked me.  My moment of fame, gone in a flash due to popcorn.

It was a great afternoon out and I really feel Disney on Ice improved a lot of aspects of their show.  I would be exited to see it again.  Everyone had a great time.

 

A few months ago we asked Sierra if she would like to have a friend over for a movie one weekend and of course she said yes.

Armed with chips, popcorn, mini cans of Orange Crush, everyone was ready to figure out which movie to watch.

THANKFULLY, we found this gem called How To Build A Better Boy on Disney.  They were excited as it had some actors that appear in other Disney movies that they enjoy.

Speaking about enjoyment, I’m pretty sure Vero and I were enjoying the reactions TO the movie more than the movie itself.

“Do you think they are going to kiss?  EWWWWW.”

“Oh my gosh, look at that car he is driving.”

Quite entertaining to say the least and everyone had a good time.  Except for those who were roasting because I decided to make a fire.  It cranked the heat up a bit too much!

It’s been a few years since Winterlude was in full swing but it’s been a great winter so far.

This year we decided to skip the Snowflake Kingdom and hit up Sparks Street to get a Beavertail and check out some ice sculptures.

I have to admit that I prefer the ice sculptures in Confederation Park.  I remember there being a lot more room and a lot more sculptures.  I didn’t bother going down all the way on Sparks Street so maybe I missed out on the lion’s share.

Mike and Melissa met up with us which was a nice treat.  Mike was telling me about this awesome fat tire bike he bought which was also electric!  I was thinking maybe this would be a fun bike to have in the Larose Forest.

The kids were getting tired of walking around Confederation Park (nothing much there) and City Hall (we were trying to find the way down to the canal).  But when we got onto the canal a new wave of energy hit all of us.  Vero and Sierra strapped on their skates and it was a grand time.  I got the spirit of Winterlude walking along the canal and seeing people whiz by on their skates.

Ezra helping me push the wagon on the canal

It was a beauty day to go out as it was around -6. We parked at the National Arts Center and while it was a maze getting out of there, it was a decent parking spot to get all the Winterlude action.  Good tip for next year.

Drive Me Crazy

I still can’t believe this song is finally done.  I wrote it back in 2008 and got around to finishing up this year.  Read more on the dedicated page.

There was quite the storm in the afternoon so we decided to bring the snowboard to bring the kids home.  It was a good idea in theory but Ezra complained pretty much the entire trip because of Sierra on the back, or him not being in the front.  It takes the fun out of it when someone is complaining!

I had a good laugh when I saw the guy on the Canadian Tire money listed as the new fentanyl czar.