Welcome to AvantaLand

Dear Mayor Hembree,

My family and I drove up to Guntersville from Gadsden last night in anticipation of seeing your fireworks display. We assumed from the map available on your website that the fireworks would be in the same area as the rest of the "All American 4th" activities. We sat ourselves in chairs on the spit near the Ferris wheel and waited. Imagine our dismay when we heard the concussions from the fireworks on the complete opposite side of town and glimpsed bits of the display over the tops of the trees. Tears of disappointment were shed.

When we arrived back home, I double checked the website and the map. I could find nothing which gave a location for the fireworks, other than "new City Harbor docks". While driving through town, we saw no signs whatsoever to point us in any direction other than Paddlewheel Drive. I find it nearly incomprehensible that the planners of such an event would not make the actual site of the fireworks display known, especially when taking into consideration that people unfamiliar with your city, such as ourselves, were bound to be attracted to this sort of activity.

Although it's obviously too late this year, I sincerely hope next year the site of ALL activities will be made known. Street addresses would be especially helpful for people who come from out of town and need to map out a route.

Sincerely....

My Freecycle offers posted this morning, nearly 48 hours after they were submitted.
(Someone just took the palm tree shower curtain.)

Stupid headache.
*grump*

Yesterday the garbage collectors broke our curbside bin, again. I am now listening to really bad instrumental music while waiting for "the next available customer service representative." Thank goodness for cordless phones!

Gah! The ineptitude of long distance companies!!!!

We switched to Telphonic last July (!) because of their great rates and because they support BookCrossing with a portion of my phone bill (can you say "wings for life"?). I just opened my SBC bill, which contains a billing page for MCI, the service we dropped months ago, with outrageous charges for those phone calls I made to Ft. Worth in January about the convention (over $15 for 8 minutes? I don't think so!). For pity's sake! How many times do we have to tell MCI we don't want you anymore?

So, now I'm on hold listening to crappy instrumental jazz/pop waiting for the MCI customer service rep to come on the line. I've been here for twenty minutes. It's now 10:20. I have to be in the office by noon, and still have to get dressed. I'll give them another ten minutes of my life and then spouse will be called in. He will not be happy.

So, anyway, I made it through the day without biting anyone's head off. Not even the parent of that whiny child driving everyone in the office crazy. I even ventured into BX forumland and came away relatively good-natured and unscathed.

Good things: CSI will be on in a few minutes. Tomorrow is payday, and spouse is on his way home. Maybe he'll pick up on the "buy chocolate" vibes I'm sending out.