Sunday, August 05, 2007

Cell Phone plans, Garage sales, Sprinkleicious doughnut, new bed, Italian food

Man I love Macy's. It's an American department store, kindof like Sears or The Bay in Canada. It's reaaaaaaaaaally awesome. That's where I bought a bazillion things last week, and I went back this week too. But first a story of this morning, a pink doughnut, and about 1,000 good deals on Garage Sale stuff.

I had a suuuuper busy day today. I stayed up until about 4:30am last night researching Cell Phone plans. I came to the following conclusion: essentially ALL of the major Cell Phone providers will end up charging me something insane like $70/month to have a decent Canada-inclusive cell phone plan where my "evenings" start at 7pm (10pm EST) and so it is decent to call Canada with my "evening" minutes. BUT... even at the insane $70/month price tag, I STILL don't get Canada calls for free!!!!! It's insane. So they are still 20 cents or 9 cents per minute or so with these plans. Totally useless.

After a lot of researching, it seems like Metro PCS is the best idea. It is $35/month for unlimited calls, anytime, to anywhere in the USA. No minutes, no contract, no "nightime" minutes. So that is fantastic. But the best part? Long distance to Canada is 2 CENTS PER MINUTE!!!!!!!!!! So that is PERFECT. Finally a decent plan. But the catch is... the phone will essentially only work in San Francisco and area. It is based on the new 3G network and thus is only operational in Metro areas (San Francisco Bay Area, Detroit, New York maybe too... that's about it)... but since 95% of my time is going to be in this area, it totally makes sense to use this. It's a bit useless for traveling to other places in the USA, but I can keep my Virgin Mobile service for that, or just live without a cell phone for those times when I am traveling in the USA. No worries.

So that is pretty fantastic. I slept in a bit this morning and then went on the Garage Sale hunt.

First I found a silly movie projector desklamp, good times. Then I got a bunch of important stuff, a paper towel roll, an awesome Henkels Knife holder, a dish drying rack, some wine glasses etc.

I then went to 7-Eleven because their Simpsons Movie promotion is almost finished and I wanted to try one of the famed "Pink Sprinkleicious" doughnuts before they were no longer doing those. They have modeled them after Homer's favourite doughnut on The Simpsons so that is so awesome and I wanted to try one.

These pictures are taken by someone else, but this is what it looked like at the 7-Eleven I went to.


Haha


A bit of Simpsons humour


A box of Simpsons pink doughnuts (don't worry, I just bought one, not a whole box) :)


Awesome


Simpsons doughnuts and "Buzz Cola", also a Simpsons promotional item

Anyway I didn't manage to get to the actual "Kwik-E-Mart", the 7-Eleven store that they actually changed into a store like on The Simpsons. There was one in Mountain View but I didn't get there yet and apparently they took down the decorations last week. But I managed to get to another 7-Eleven today and at least get a few of the cool things they were selling.

Ok, after that I went to Sleep Train, and then to 1-800-Mattress. These two places were both very "used car salesman" style, and they were trying to sell me last year's model which was SUPER overpriced, but were trying to make a deal and blah blah blah. I felt kinda pressured but didn't really know what to expect because I've never bought a bed before.

After that I went back home via a hardware store and bought a bazillion other things I've been needing, a plastic drop tray for the disk rack, a cork board, a kitchen garbage can, a desk lamp, etc.

Then I took off downtown and went to Macy's. This is where the story gets more exciting (well at least for me, haha) I got my bed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Wahoo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The salespeople at Macy's were SO much easier to talk to and to deal with than the annoying people at the bed places. They were much more straightforward and the prices at Macy's were already decent. I got a nice bed and they didn't try to pressure me into buying one way more than I wanted to spend, and they were really nice and let me try out the beds without bugging me for quite a while, and they only gave me advice when I asked or when I looked like I needed help. It was awesome. And, because I opened that Macy's card last week, I got another $100 off the bed!!!!!!!!!! Man what a deal!!!!!!!!!! So it was an excellent deal, and I got a really nice bed.


Sealy Posturepedic "Adams Farm" Plush Mattress Set, Queen

It is reaaaaaaaaaaaally nice and wasn't super overpriced like the ones at the mattress store. Good stuff. And the sales lady was way nicer. I told her she was much better than the mattress store and she said, "Yes, we are not trying to sell used cars here!" haha. They were awesome and I was happy to spend my money there instead of at the place that pressured me earlier. Sweet.

To celebrate finding my bed, and since I was already downtown, I wandered through the Men's Macy's store and then walked up through Chinatown to North Beach and got some fantastic pasta at an Italian restaurant called Piazza Pellegrini. It was really good, Farfalle with cream sauce and smoked salmon and some other good stuff. They had an olive oil and vinegar dip for bread, and the boss was very friendly and drinking wine while hanging out behind the bar. I chatted to him a bit and told him I was in Italy a month ago, and his restaurant was just like being in Italy! I got a nice Cappucino too and watched a DVD concert of Andrea Bocelli on the flat-screen TV behind the bar. Awesome.

I then took a nice walk all the way back through North Beach and Chinatown and back to downtown, and then caught a bus home.

So it's been a long day of sorting out stuff, learning about buying beds, and figuring out that Macy's is basically the best place to buy anything, ever. Oh yeah, and I love North Beach.


My desk, already being put to good use


A whole bunch of stuff I bought today


Awesome Coca-Cola jukebox money bank I got, a Radioactive Man comic book from 7-Eleven, a collectors Squishee Cup from 7-Eleven, and some of the other stuff I got today

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