Delta Airlines' "Complimentary" Bag Check

No Joke.

My 18-year old daughter traveled to visit some college friends for the New Year holiday. She was planning to carry-on and at the last minute Delta offered her a complimentary bag check. COMPLIMENTARY. What? How? Really? Please tell me how a bag - any bag - ends up like this! It looks like it was run over, dragged and lit on fire! A claim of course has been filed, but the poor girl... In preparation for her trip, she had spent several hours at the mall the night before leaving, to get new makeup at Sephora, a couple outfits and some Forever21 (costumey) jewelry - all with her own money. All of her brand new makeup was gone, all the new jewelry, her curling iron, an expensive Victoria's Secret bra, a $72 bottle of Juicy perfume and a some other items I cannot recall. Everything still remaining in the bag was dirty and many items ruined.

I tweeted this lovely experience and hashtagged Delta. No response. When we called, we got rerouted to a call center where the lady clearly has been instructed not to pass along any of the information she gets from upset patrons, but to redirect them to a website where you can claim your misfortune. A website. Thanks.

Oh, and the funny part? My daughter had to buy a new bag (thank you, Ross Stores!) and when flying back today... They made her check it!!

Unbelievable. Thanks, Delta!! #DeltaAirlines

Holy Winter, It's Cold!!

Listen, I have lived in New York City where walking to work in the snow backwards due to the strong winds was not out of the norm on any given Winter day. But let's be real... that was in my mid 20's and I don't live in the brisk NY weather any longer.

Now in The Middle of Nowhere, South Carolina - and originally being from the sunshiney town of Orange in Southern California - we are COLD. C.O.L.D. We got word the low would be 10 degrees on Wednesday this week (yesterday). So we were prepared to stay in drinking hot tea, with our electric blankets and such. Until we ran out of oil. Not cool (no pun intended).

Our house was built in the '50's and is heated by oil. I (ashamedly) let the oil run completely out - and on the coldest day of the year. Lovely. Anyway, thank God for electric blankets and space heaters - and of course for my little lap dog Dolly.We survived the night and good ol' boy Steve came out today with his life-saving oil truck. Yaye. I can feel my fingers again.

Lap-Warmer & Personal Heater, Dolly

Never Been So Happy To See Steve The Oil Man!!

January Rant

Well, Christmas has come and gone, along with my in-laws. The decorations are put away, the tree has been taken down, my husband is back on the road and the new year is upon us. What a whirlwind! The kids are back in school, so I have been happily getting acclimated to my 'normal' routine again. In the last couple of weeks, I have been inspired to make new lunches for my family. We now have 3 favorites.
1. Kelly's Egg Sandwich. It will always be number one in this house. And its doused in Tapatio, which we go through by the gallon, no joke.
-Thomas Original English Muffins
-Kraft American Cheese Slices
-Roma or regular Tomatoes
-a heap of pepper
and a puddle of Tapatio
-The egg of course fried to your liking - we like over medium/hard.

These were made for my BFF with cream cheese, sans Tapatio... unheard of in my house!!

2. I have three words for you. Green. Goddess. Sandwiches. YUM. I saw a picture of these online and looked up the recipe, only to find the ingredients to be some of my favorites. Yaye. If you like garlic and basil, this one's for you!
Click here for the (easy) recipe!

I only had red tomatoes available so it wasn't entirely green, but still so good!

Not too fancy looking, but what a great sandwich!!

3. Tuna Melt Sub. Both my daughters like Subway's tuna sandwich with melted cheese on flat bread, so I wanted to make a better version. I use:

-a can of tuna for two sandwiches

-whole wheat sub rolls

-tomato slices (for mine)

-and homemade honey mustard

(1/4 cp mayo, 1 Tb honey, 1 Tb mustard, 1/2 Tb. lemon juice)

To die for.

So, aside from cooking and eating and cooking some more and eating some more, I have been hiding in my house as often as possible, as I am growing my gray hair out! At only 36, I finally gave in to the silver strands. I have been taking Biotin (10,000 mcg, though I have read 5,000 is enough to start) religiously for about 3 weeks and am finally noticing how much more manageable, soft - and even longer - my hair is! For those of  you who have contemplated the switch back to o'natural, I'll be right here holding your hand! It's a long process, walking around with the ever-growing skunk stripe, but once its all one color, I think I'll be happy with the result... if I can make it 'til then! Generally, I think some (younger) women with silver hair look awesome! I have switched to an argan oil shampoo and conditioner, as well as a spray oil for frizz. Any advice on hair masks for grays is welcome!

This is my husband and me, when I used to dye my hair.

This is at 4 months grow out.
It's a long process but I know it will be worth it!

This is also at 4 months. I made the terrible
mistake of cutting my bangs in August, so my
hair is always pinned up, but took this to
document the growth.

You can't really see the gray here, but
you can tell my dark hair dye has faded to
a mousy lighter brown. :(
Can't wait 'til it's all gray!

So, despite the creepy look on my face with no
makeup, this is my hair to date, 5 months in
with no dye. 

Well, I wish I could wrap this up with some really great pics of my past-shoulder-length, beautiful silver locks, but I'm just not there yet! Will keep you posted! Cheers to a great start to the new year!!