Category: Shopping

Unintended Consequences: Free Movies

I learned about free movie streaming from Amazon and I learned it from Netflix!

Netflix started this all, when it raised its prices dramatically, splitting streaming from DVD.  That did it for me, as we weren’t using it enough to justify the new price and I cancelled Netflix.

I was happy to complete the “exit interview” the why-are-you-leaving survey, because I wanted Netflix to know that the price increase drove me away.  There were questions about how I will watch movies now, and “free movies from Amazon Prime” was one of the options.  What?  I’ve subscribed to Amazon Prime for years – the free shipping pays for the membership many times over at my house.

It turns out that Amazon Prime offers 5000 movies and TV shows, as part of something I already pay for.  Score!

Thanks, Netflix!

Cooking on Both Burners

These are all the things I learned today about our 12-year-old gas grill:

1. How to diagnose the problem of the high-flaring back burner and where and how to order a new burner assembly from Weber.com

 

2. How to question my own diagnosis and call Weber and get instant instructions, via email.  On a Sunday.

3. How to disassemble and deep clean the grill, including inside the burners. And how to put it back together again in a way that it works.

4. How to cancel my order for a new burner assembly.

5. How rewarding it is to fix something we already own  Perhaps we were channeling our fathers, who both absolutely loved to do just that, on this sunny Fathers Day.

Weber rocks.  And so does Steve.  And Maddy, who held all the directions and cheered us on.

Card-Carrying Me

My daughters taught me that Starbucks gives soy milk in your latte for free if you use a pre-paid Starbucks card.  It actually takes five paid drinks to get to that level, but then you are there forever.

You can merge any Starbucks gift card onto the same registered card.

All the benefits are here: https://www.starbucks.com/card/rewards

Best App EVER

While shopping for a digital camera at Best Buy, I tried the Consumer Reports app to look for ratings. All you do is hold the phone over the bar code on the box. No reviews yet but they did show that Amazon had it $10 cheaper so I asked for a price match, while flashing the Amazon page, and got it!

Today I was cutting though a different Best Buy and saw the cutest case for my new camera. I thought $20 was a bit steep so I tried the CR scanner again and got it for $9.99! (they did not have Amazon in the cash register list and had to use “other” but it worked!)

There are other bar code lookup apps that will tell prices. Let me know what works for you.

Here is the prize itself:

20110329-062040.jpg

Who you callin’ “Missy”?

I learned something that really surprised me: Petite and Misses sizes are different shapes, not just different lengths, as I have always believed.   I found myself between two sizes in pants, let’s just call them x Petite and y Petite.  OK?  Thanks.   And the very-helpful salesperson at Coldwater Creek suggested that I get size x not-Petite, which she calls “Missy”.  How can that be, I wondered?  But she explained that the proportions are different all around.

So I bought them and had them hemmed (I have learned that we have a great tailor in Goffstown, at the organic cleaners!) and now I have some nice new pants that fit beautifully!  (in the smaller size, to boot, as x < y)

 

It Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time

This lesson learned by Gale:

Remind me when I become a grandmother someday, to do a lot of research and not depend on what was considered safe when my boys were born. I had everything homemade, including the crib bumper. Who knew that crib bumpers are now considered unsafe for babies?

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/01/business/01safety.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&nl=afternoonupdate&emc=aua2