the best things in life are free...

I am still going through all the Canton trip pictures {my new call name is Razzi for paparazzi}...but had to let you know the biggest surprise of all! Let me start from the beginning. It's a very good place to start.

It was last Monday when I got a facebook message from my sister Leslie (in Zimbabwe) saying that she had booked her ticket to come home! I was shaking so badly I couldn't even read the entire message I had to have a coworker finish it! Confirmation- It did say she had booked her ticket! I immediately called Lauren to see if she knew what was going on. We both squealed in the phone and tried to figure out how we were going to keep this from Mom. See, Leslie wanted it to be a surprise, so we had to figure out how to pick Les up from the Dallas airport on Thursday at 1pm, the first day we were supposed to be on the Canton trip. (Luckily Dallas is only 1.5 hours from Canton - not that I wouldn't drive to Alaska to pick her up.)

I knew that the only believable thing we could say to Mom was that my boss asked me to come in on Thursday morning for a few hours so I wouldn't be able to caravan with everyone to Canton, but I would meet them there later that day. I played it up on the phone to my mother, " Oh, Mom! Can you believe that I have to work!? I asked for the time off and everything!...I can't say no to my boss- I will just have to meet y'all there..." disappointed, but understanding, my mom took the bait. Hook, line, and sinker :)

On Thursday morning when the rest of the Crew left to find Canton treasures at 7am, I went to "work" aka Dallas. It was all I could do not to speed there, I was so excited to see Leslie! The reunion at the airport went as expected, watery eyes, hugs, and... lost bags. After several attempts to speak to anyone with knowledge on locating her bags without success, we decided to just go on to Canton and meet the group.

Keep in mind that we were not expecting Leslie until Christmas, and my mom has NO idea she is even in the States!

{Thanks Mrs. Mary for helping keep our little secret! This is Mom excited to see me after "working half a day"... little did she know...}

{Leslie was hiding behind the UHaul!}

{I honestly didn't think she was going to let go of her!}

It was an amazing weekend filled with so many special memories. I can't describe to you how blessed I feel having my entire family at arms length. I am tearing up just thinking about it.

Canton Bound...

After months of saving (haha, yeah right) I am ready for the 27 year tradition of the Canton experience with the girls! This is my first year to be able to join the group of Cantonites and I couldn't be more excited to have 2 days off of work FOR SHOPPING! I am practically jumping up and down in my desk chair. I have my list of treasures I will be searching for and the matching t-shirts we will be wearing in my suitcase. I can't wait to share the zillions of pictures I will take over the weekend.

Happy weekend my lovelies :)

See last year's Canton trip told by my mom HERE!

Glitz & Grits weekend {via iphone}

Sometimes I am in love with my iphone...I love that I use it as my watch, (video)camera, calculator, bank, facebook updater, twitter-er, for heytelling, mapquesting, checking the weather, pandora-ing, looking at the tv guide, and sending emails. Not to mention any question I might have about anything at all can be answered with my intellegent little phone....but (we all knew there was going to be a but) when I don't take my camera to events because it's "too big" and say "I'll just use my iphone" I am always disappointed that I made that decision. Maybe you don't feel as passionately about photos as I do (to be honest, I don't know many that do), but things in life only happen once and I like to capture them accurately. These photos below show that Cory, Shelley, Tison, and I had a lot of fun at the Glitz & Grits 2011 event at the Louisiana State Exhibit Museum on Friday night. It just shows it in a rather blurry way :) The catering was by The Cotton Boll. I had no idea they catered! The Cotton Boll Grill is one of my favorite local homestyle cookin' restaurants. The band looked like they wanted to be somewhere else, but we got out on the dance floor and did our thang.

{Artist George Rodrigue's "Blue Dogs on the Red River" were exhibited at the event, although we must have missed the secret room because we went around the whole circle that is LA St. Exhibit Museum and didn't see one blue dog painting! 40 pieces will remain up through the end of the year so I suppose I will have to make a trip back}.

{I know, I know- we are adorable...}

{cake balls = big hit}

{"doin' our thang"}

{and Shelley and I rolled away in this...}

sisters lunch in the park...

Lauren and Hudson picked me up from work today to have lunch at Julie Anne's. It was such so gorgeous outside so we decided the park was a perfect place to have a mini picnic! I love sister time.

Happy weekend dreamers!

let's hear it for the boy!

Let's give the boy a hand! {Anyone catch Modern Family last night?}

The Great Gatsby

My book club friends and I read The Great Gatsby by F.Scott Fitzgerald this month. We are attempting to alternate a new book with a classic book. I remember reading or at least flipping through the pages in high school. I admittedly was more excited about dressing like a 1920s flapper than actually reading the book. Time after time when I picked up The Great Gatsby and read a few pages I would be out like a light! I found that Fitzgerald has a beautiful writing style, but it is just so different than what I am used to reading. That is to say I found the plot moved sloooowly- until the last 3 chapters (which I read the night before book club). Did anyone else find Daisy to be extremely annoying? Have you ever fallen in love with the idea of a person just to find out it isn't reality? Poor Gatsby... I plan to head to the library this week to pick up the movie version because, let's be honest, Robert Redford is HOT!



Have you heard the buzz about a new version of The Great Gatsby coming out next year? It's a pretty strong cast if there is any truth to it!

Also, here's a link to the 1920s style bob I attempted from a YouTube tutorial. I found my dress at the Greenwood Flea Market a few years ago. I just love the drop waist.

You can find our last book club meet up here. Next month we will be reading Black Heels to Tractor Wheels. What are you reading? Any book club suggestions?

Netflix and...Qwikster...

I usually don't have tech talk on this blog, but this whole Netflix situation is really grinding my gears. As a Netflix user for over 2 years now, I consider myself a devoted customer. Even when the prices went up and several of my friends were dropping their accounts with Netflix I decided to stick with them... that maybe with the increase in price they might increase the selection of streaming, continue the user-friendly features of watching movies at home....instead I got an email today from the Co-Founder and CEO of Netflix, Reed Hastings. His email is below in red.

_____________________________________________________________________________


Dear Lindsey,
{It began as most do.}

I messed up. I owe you an explanation.
{at this point I am thinking- who is this? What have they done? This sounds personal.}

It is clear from the feedback over the past two months that many members felt we lacked respect and humility in the way we announced the separation of DVD and streaming and the price changes. That was certainly not our intent, and I offer my sincere apology. Let me explain what we are doing.
{First of all, your "feedback" is your stock points and NOW you are explaining and apologizing? 2 months later?}

For the past five years, my greatest fear at Netflix has been that we wouldn't make the leap from success in DVDs to success in streaming. Most companies that are great at something – like AOL dialup or Borders bookstores – do not become great at new things people want (streaming for us). So we moved quickly into streaming, but I should have personally given you a full explanation of why we are splitting the services and thereby increasing prices. It wouldn’t have changed the price increase, but it would have been the right thing to do.

{Did you know that 75% of Netflix users only use streaming, but that their Starz contract was not renewed?}

So here is what we are doing and why.

Many members love our DVD service, as I do, because nearly every movie ever made is published on DVD. DVD is a great option for those who want the huge and comprehensive selection of movies.

I also love our streaming service because it is integrated into my TV, and I can watch anytime I want. The benefits of our streaming service are really quite different from the benefits of DVD by mail. We need to focus on rapid improvement as streaming technology and the market evolves, without maintaining compatibility with our DVD by mail service.

So we realized that streaming and DVD by mail are really becoming two different businesses, with very different cost structures, that need to be marketed differently, and we need to let each grow and operate independently.
{errrr- WHAT? Two different companies?!?}

It’s hard to write this after over 10 years of mailing DVDs with pride, but we think it is necessary: In a few weeks, we will rename our DVD by mail service to “Qwikster”. We chose the name Qwikster because it refers to quick delivery. We will keep the name “Netflix” for streaming.
{Qwikster- really? You couldn't come up with anything better than Qwikster?!}

Qwikster will be the same website and DVD service that everyone is used to. It is just a new name, and DVD members will go to qwikster.com to access their DVD queues and choose movies. One improvement we will make at launch is to add a video games upgrade option, similar to our upgrade option for Blu-ray, for those who want to rent Wii, PS3 and Xbox 360 games. Members have been asking for video games for many years, but now that DVD by mail has its own team, we are finally getting it done. Other improvements will follow. A negative of the renaming and separation is that the Qwikster.com and Netflix.com websites will not be integrated.
{The websites will not be integrated!!! So I will have two different queues - only confusing the whole process of what I am able to get instantly. If I can get it on instant streaming, why would I rent it and wait for it to come in the mail? Therefore, I will always be opening both websites to compare the two queues.}

There are no pricing changes (we’re done with that!). If you subscribe to both services you will have two entries on your credit card statement, one for Qwikster and one for Netflix. The total will be the same as your current charges. We will let you know in a few weeks when the Qwikster.com website is up and ready.
{Thanks for letting us know in advance...}

For me the Netflix red envelope has always been a source of joy. The new envelope is still that lovely red, but now it will have a Qwikster logo. I know that logo will grow on me over time, but still, it is hard. I imagine it will be similar for many of you.
{Obviously I chose Netflix over Blockbuster, Amazon, and iTunes because of the lovely red envelope....}

I want to acknowledge and thank you for sticking with us, and to apologize again to those members, both current and former, who felt we treated them thoughtlessly.
{Treated or treating?}

Both the Qwikster and Netflix teams will work hard to regain your trust. We know it will not be overnight. Actions speak louder than words. But words help people to understand actions.

Respectfully Yours,
Reed Hastings, Co-Founder and CEO of Netflix

_______________________________________________________________________________

I just love that this email feels like a boyfriend's apology after a fight. It is months late and instead of just straight up saying "Sorry, please forgive me for blah blah blah," there is an undertone of something that is self-serving and selfishly promoting their new business.

Interesting articles about Netflix controversy here and here and I am sure a zillion others if you type qwikster in your search bar.

Have any of you dropped your accounts? If so, what are you using? Maybe I should start renting movies at the library.

Your intense movie lover,
Linz