Applebee’s Disappoints Again

Posted on May 17, 2012 by Mrs. Bridges

After spending ALL DAY today in a training class at work, then working for a little while after the class, I had no desire to cook dinner by the time I got home tonight.  Unfortunately, we finished they frozen chicken nuggets on Tuesday, and have no “easy” food at our house right now except for sandwich-fixings and Apple Jacks.

By the time I got home a little after 7, I had a hankering for a burger.  It didn’t need to be anything special, but a good cheeseburger (i.e., not McD’s).  Charles suggested trying the Applebee’s right by our house.  Now, I need to give a little backstory on Applebee’s.  We used to go to Applebee’s a couple of times a month for a while in Hattiesburg.  It was decent, fairly cheap food with decent service.  No complaints.  Gradually, the quality of both the food and the service started to diminish; it ultimately became unbearable, and we stopped going.  It was B-A-D bad.  As a result, we haven’t tried either of the Applebee’s locations here.

Since Applebee’s is pretty much the closest “restaurant” to our house, and all I wanted was a decent cheeseburger, we decided to give it a try.  BAD CALL.  Here’s what happened…

We were seated right away, greeted within a couple of minutes by a friendly (but not too friendly) server who took our drink orders, and started perusing the menu.  There were a number of things that sounded good, but being of little faith, we decided to stick to the plan.  Charles had a late lunch, so he just ordered the Queso Blanco, and I got the Cowboy Cheeseburger (bacon, cheese, onion strings, and bbq sauce on an otherwise-normal burger). Chili’s has a very similar burger to this, known as the Shiner Bock burger, and it’s quite good; I figured the one at Applebee’s would be basically the same.

The Queso Blanco came out pretty quickly; the dip was hot, and the chips were yummy, albeit quite salty at the bottom of the pile.  My burger took longer than expected, judging by the small crowd, but it didn’t take an unreasonably long amount of time.  It was a little strange that our server didn’t bring it out herself, as she wasn’t busy at the time, but whatever.  Then I bit into it…and it wasn’t good.

Being a forgiving person, and an excessively tired person, I thought at first that maybe it was me.  I took a bite of an onion ring, and a sip of my drink, then gave the burger another bite.

Nope, still awful.  Inedibly awful.

Of course, Charles saw the face I was making and started asking questions.  So what did I do? I said, “It’s awful–try it!” and shoved it in his face to take a bite.  He couldn’t finish it–he spit the bite out.

Our server finally came by to check on us, saw that I had deconstructed half my burger to figure out what the problem was (the meat–it was practically soggy and tasted awful. clearly frozen at some point, maybe sitting out for who-knows-how-long, nasty), and asked what was wrong.  I told her the meat was terrible, she apologized, took the burger, and I asked for an order of mozzarella sticks with honey mustard (it’s good–don’t knock it ’til you’ve tried it!).

After a few minutes, another runner brought out my cheesesticks with marinara sauce.  No honey mustard.

Allow me to note at this point that there were TWO managers that had been hanging out at the hostess stand right behind Charles this entire time.  They had seen me making awful faces at my burger.  They had seen Charles spit his bite of it out.  They saw me make a face when the cheesesticks came out with marinara sauce, and they saw me put the ramekin of marinara sauce on the edge of the table.  One of them went and got our server from the back, she came and brought me some honey mustard, and the manager went back to hanging out at the hostess stand.

Not ONCE did a manager approach me to apologize for the terrible food and barely-mediocre service.  Our server didn’t seem at all surprised by the inedible burger, half-heartedly apologized, and assured me that it wouldn’t be on the bill (it wasn’t).  She didn’t ask that a manager come by the table to apologize, didn’t offer a dessert, didn’t offer a drink refill, and spent way too much time hanging out with her table of three attractive, tipsy gentlemen.  It was disappointing.

We paid and left, vowing never to return to any Applebee’s again.  We’ll be back at Chili’s in a week or two.

 

**No one at either Applebee’s or Chili’s knows who I am, nor did anyone ask me to write this post.  I had a bad experience, and felt the need to share.  That’s all.**

Posted in Totally Random | 5 Comments

Wordless Wednesday: Jazz Fest

Posted on May 9, 2012 by Mrs. Bridges

Herbie Hancock performing at Jazz Fest–May 5, 2012

Posted in New Orleans, Photography | 2 Comments

2012 Goals Revisited–5 Months In

Posted on May 8, 2012 by Mrs. Bridges

Since I’m doing some catching-up in all areas of my life, I decided it was time to face the music and revisit the goals Charles & I set out at the beginning of the year.  I initially blogged about them here on January 3.

  • I will read more.  Well……………yeah…..this one isn’t going so well.  I can explain! Packing, moving, and unpacking take up a lot of time!  But yeah.  I really need to read more.  Maybe by the end of the month, I will have gotten the house to a point that I don’t feel bad for sitting and reading when there’s still so much to do, and I’ll be able to chill on the patio with a good book!
  • We will read some Bible daily.  This one is actually going quite well!  Charles and I both got a little behind when we moved, but we’re also both getting caught up.
  • I will blog at least three times each week.  All I can do is laugh.  This is why we set goals to be accomplished throughout the year, not a list of things that immediately change on January 2…
  • We will be healthier.  We are making progress!  I’m drinking a LOT more water every day (coming from almost none most days, to be perfectly honest), and even exceeding the “recommended” 64 ounces many days!  We did suspend our gym membership until we get past the extra moving bills (and month of rent + mortgage–yuck).  BUT, we’ve also looked at a couple of routes to walk through our neighborhood, and I’ve made arrangements to walk 3ish miles with one of my coworkers a couple of days each week after work.  I don’t guess I’ll talk about the Crawfish Monica I’ll be making later this week with more heavy cream in it than I know what to do with…..
  • I will find a laundry method that works, and I will stick to it.  Eureka!  I think I’ve actually found a good method!  Thanks to the advice of my fabulous best friend Vilma, I have been utilizing an effective method to keep up with our laundry!  When our basket is full, I turn the clothes right-side-out as I put them into the washing machine.  Once they finish drying, I fold/hang them immediately, as I’m pulling them out of the dryer.  In our fabulous new laundry room, I even have a bar where I’m able to put the hangers!  This way, once the laundry is folded/hung, I’m able to take it right to where it belongs.  There’s no chance of it sitting in a big heap on the bed (or the floor, or the chair, or the guest bed…) forever.  We also don’t have to iron as much!  Somehow, I hadn’t come up with this idea on my own.  Thank goodness for Vilma!

I’m making progress, but I’m rather glad we didn’t put deadlines on the goals.  We had no idea in January that we’d be purchasing a home at the end of March, and that the home-buying process would pretty much take over our lives (followed in close succession by the home-packing-and-unpacking process).  Overall, we’re not doing too terribly, given the situation.  It’s definitely time to up our game though!

Posted in Life | 2 Comments

Time to Play Catch-Up

Posted on May 7, 2012 by Mrs. Bridges

You may have read my post on 12 Things to Make Our Home More Homey in 2012, or noticed that I recently made it into a separate page for your convenience.  Thanks to all the chaos of the past 6ish weeks, I’ve gotten rather…behind.

I got through January quite well.  February was great (read about it here).  I did really well right up to the end of March, when we were preparing to move.

April…well, let’s just say I totally forgot what I was supposed to be doing in April.  Apparently, I was supposed to have wiped down our bathroom vanity every day.  I didn’t.

Nor did I make the bed, or do the dishes, or read my Bible every day.  I read my Bible almost every day, but I did get behind.  I’m still working on catching back up in my daily chronological Bible.  I’m back into the swing of taking care of dishes every evening.  Making the bed is starting up again, but it has gotten off to a rocky start.  And the vanity?  I had to look up my list tonight just to remember what I was supposed to be doing.

And then I realized that it’s May now, so I’m also supposed to be doing a 5-10 minute den de-clutter every day.  And trust me, it definitely needs to be done.

So I’m playing catch-up.  Catch up on my blog, catch up in my Bible, catch up in my kitchen, my bathroom, and my den.  Lovely.

Moving is great, but it sure does suck all the energy out of a girl.  Maybe one of these days I’ll be caught up and not have ridiculously long lists of things that need to be done…then I’ll be able to just relax and enjoy our house!  But until then…I have to go de-clutter my den.

Posted in Home Stuff, Life | 2 Comments

Wordless Wednesday: Prom

Posted on April 25, 2012 by Mrs. Bridges

Throwback!

Posted in Photography, Totally Random, Wordless Wednesday | 2 Comments

So yeah. I’m happy. :)

Posted on April 23, 2012 by Mrs. Bridges

Oh, my blog, how I’ve missed you!

These past couple of weeks have been CRAZY NUTS.  Pure, unadulterated chaos.  They’ve also been pretty awesome, but I don’t feel like I’ve had a chance to take a good breath in at least three weeks.

Quick run-down: March 30, we closed on our house.  The next two weeks were spent cleaning the new house, packing up the apartment, cleaning the apartment, and moving everything that would fit in our cars to the house.  Then on April 14 (holy cow, that’s just over a week ago–feels like much longer!), we rented a truck and had an absolutely INCREDIBLE group of people help us move all the big stuff into the house (and christen the pool).  Last week was spent finishing cleaning the apartment and trying to make the house semi-functional before I drove to MS for a couple of events with my sister.  It wasn’t until yesterday that I was actually able to slow down a little bit and actually spend some time with this beautiful new-to-us house.

And did I ever spend some time with it!  I definitely haven’t finished unpacking or organizing, but I made some huge headway.  There’s still a jumble of stuff here and there, but the house is liveable.  I feel like I can breathe again.

Of course, as we’ve unpacked and gotten to know our house a little more, we’ve found a couple few TON of things we want to do with it, some of which are more important than others.  We literally have a list going on Google Docs to keep up with all of it.  I’ve also discovered that my drive to work every day isn’t affected much (we live a few miles farther from downtown New Orleans than we did previously), but my drive home is a beast.  I haven’t figured out the best route to take yet, and have a sneaking suspicion that there might not be a “best” route.

Every now and then, either Charles or I will find something new in the house.  Last weekend, as our friends were leaving, I shouted out, “Charles! We have lilies! And they’re blooming!”  He then reminded me that he mows and edges the yard, but the flower beds are my job!

I’m just happy that I finally feel like I’m settling in.  I say finally like it has been forever…we just bought the house three weeks ago, but it feels like much longer!  Regardless of how long it’s actually been, I feel like I’m back, and there’s some sense of normalcy, and that makes me happy.  So yeah.  I’m happy.  :)

 

Posted in Brain Dump, Home Stuff, Life, Totally Random | 3 Comments

I have flowers!

Posted on April 18, 2012 by Mrs. Bridges

Check out what we have in front of our house! (click the picture for a larger view)

I have no idea what to do to keep them alive, but aren’t they pretty???

 

Posted in Home Stuff, Photography | 2 Comments

The Secret to Soap Scum

Posted on April 12, 2012 by Mrs. Bridges

I’m going to tell you a secret.  I feel like this is one of the best-kept secrets in the universe, and that maybe I wasn’t supposed to discover it, but I did and it’s amazing.  I’m going to tell you how to get rid of the WORST soap scum.

The backstory:  You may know that Charles and I just bought our first house.  You may or may not know that I spent a full week cleaning it, as the people who sold it to us were apparently NASTY and never cleaned anything.  Right when I began to feel that the end was in sight, I started to tackle the bathrooms.  They didn’t look too bad, so I wasn’t concerned.

Then it happened.  I was cleaning the wall around the bathtub in the hallway with my handy dandy Magic Eraser, and I realized that the soap scum wasn’t rubbing off.  I’ve never had soap scum not rub off with my handy dandy Magic Eraser.  When I tell you this soap scum was thick, I mean it was caked on those walls so thick that the only way I could get it off was literally scraping it off with something (and that something was NOT going to be my fingernail!).  It was possibly the most disgusting thing I’ve ever seen; it ranks right up there with the refrigerator before its bleach-bath.

So I did what every smart, resourceful young adult does–I asked Google for help.  I hunted and hunted, and read countless blog posts, forums, home remedies, etc.  I asked my facebook friends and my Twitter friends for help.  I asked coworkers for advice.  I did a lot of research before deciding to combine a couple of ideas.

So I bought a can of this:

and took a few of these over to the house with me:

 

I sprayed the walls and the tub with a heavy coat of Easy Off, turned the bathroom vent on, and let it work its magic for 10 or 15 minutes.

Then I headed back into the bathroom with a couple of dryer sheets in hand.  I wet a dryer sheet under the faucet, and used it to wipe the soap scum right off.  A little wax-on-wax-off action, with no real pressure needed, and my tub and walls were quite a few shades lighter.  I rinsed the walls and tub down with some water, and was finished!  It probably took me all of about 5 minutes of wiping and rinsing to clean the whole tub and the surrounding three walls.

It.  Was.  Incredible.

I actually went out into the garage, where my husband and brother-in-law were trying to replace the garage door opener, and did a little happy dance.  Just in case my brother-in-law wasn’t already convinced that I’m nuts.

Here’s the disclaimer though–my tub and its surrounding walls are acrylic.  I have NO IDEA how this would work on tile or porcelain, or if Easy Off would mess them up.  I have read in a number of places that wet dryer sheets are great for taking soap scum off of shower doors, but I don’t know about real tile or porcelain.

Another tip–be sure to get the Fume Free Easy Off, in the blue can.  It’s not entirely fume free, but it’s completely tolerable.  Of course, I wouldn’t shut the bathroom door, and I would recommend turning on the vent, but its fumes were no worse than my other normal cleaning supplies.

So there you have it.  The cure for all your soap scum woes.  You can thank me later.  ;-)

Posted in Home Stuff, Life Lessons | 1 Comment

New House Pictures!

Posted on April 11, 2012 by Mrs. Bridges

I told you I’d post them eventually!

Unfortunately, I have not had a chance to take better pictures during daylight hours, as I work during daylight hours.  I considered waiting until Saturday to take pictures, but then realized that since Saturday is the official Moving Day, there will be JUNK all over the place, and who wants to look at all our junk scattered all over the floor?  No one!  You want to see the house!  So here you go.  I apologize in advance for the mediocre quality–these were taken at night with my old point-n-shoot set on automatic.  Captions are below each picture for your convenience.

Our entryway, foyer, or foy-yay, depending on where you’re from. Dining room to the left, office to the right, den straight ahead.

Entry closet.

The office. They left us that desk (yay!). The piano will also live here, along with a bunch of books.

The dining room.  Pretty basic, larger than the office, and connected to the kitchen. (Mom, that’s the light fixture that burned my thumb.)

Looking through the kitchen into the breakfast nook. This kitchen took me a FULL day to clean–it was nasty!

Looking into the den from the breakfast nook. That’s the hearth to the right.

The den.  They left us the tiny refrigerator at the bar, but it’s almost too small to hold anything! I think I might eventually take it out and put a pretty wine rack in its place.  And apparently they never used the fireplace in the full 10 years they lived in the house.  They were really excited to tell us that they found the starter key.

Oh yes.  I’m excited.

Hall/Guest bathroom.  I hate the tub, but at least it’s not still covered in an inch-thick layer of soap scum.  As a result, the walls around the tub are actually a few shades lighter than they appear.

Guest bedroom #1.  And the random table they left.  There is a second guest bedroom, but I somehow managed not to take any pictures of it.  It’s basically the same as this one, but has really crappy carpet on the floors, and is slightly smaller.

Guest closet(s).  They’re identical.  And I love them.

Linen closet! We have two of these–one at each end of the hall.

Master bedroom! I couldn’t get the whole room in the picture (old point-n-shoot camera doesn’t have a wide-angle option, ya know), but it’s a really nice size.  Our king bedroom set will fit easily.

Took this one purely for perspective.  The tub/toilet room is to the left; the closet is to the right.

DEEP tub! I might be able to soak with my lady-parts covered for the first time ever!

Our closet.  Go ahead, I know you need a moment.  And yes, there are more rods and shelves and hooks back in the right corner that you can’t see.  I’m in love.

Screened patio, though the door over there doesn’t close.

The best backyard in the New Orleans area.  The rocks on the right are actually a fountain, and there’s a hot tub behind it (you can see the corner).  We still haven’t figured out how to get the hot tub to hold water, but it’s getting there.  And can you spot the outdoor speaker? The area is already wired! We just need to get a receiver.  You can’t see it in the picture, but to the left of the slide is another patio area, on which they left a really nice table with 6 chairs.  I’m super excited that they left it!

 

So there you go!  When are you coming to visit??  ;-)   I’ll post more pictures (though probably not quite as many at once!) once we get moved in.  And I promise I’ll take them during the day and with my fancy schmancy camera!

Posted in Home Stuff, Photography | 8 Comments

It’s the little things…

Posted on April 9, 2012 by Mrs. Bridges

As we’re spending more time in the new house, and starting to move our stuff into it (after a full week of cleaning!), I’m finding that there are some small things that I’m really excited about.

  • There’s a laundry ROOM.  We currently have a laundry closet, that barely has space for the washer and dryer, so I’m super excited to actually have a little space around the machines, a place to hang things, etc.
  • The laundry room is on the same floor as the bedrooms!  I love our townhouse, and the privacy that upstairs bedrooms have provided us for the past two years, but I am so happy that I don’t have to carry laundry up and down those stairs anymore!!
  • We have a garage!  And thanks to my sweet husband and his awesome brother, it’s useable!  They replaced the old, broken garage door opener last week, and I cleaned out the garage (full of someone else’s junk, dirt, and TONS of cat hair) this weekend.  I can wash my car again, since I won’t have to park under a tree anymore!
  • Our backyard is pretty much perfect.  I realize that’s not a little thing, as it’s decent-sized for the area and has a gorgeous pool & hot tub, but I love it.  The sellers left an awesome patio set too, so we’re almost all set!  If only we can figure out how to get the hot tub to hold water…
  • When I’m not in the hot tub, the master bathroom has a deeeeep tub.  A tub so deep that I should be able to soak in it and actually have my lady parts covered! It’s not a whirlpool tub, but it’s a lovely soaking tub, and I’m quite happy with that.
  • Our kitchen is red.  I LOVE red kitchens.  And the cabinet handles are forks, knives, and spoons.   I’ll post pictures soon.  Not something I think I would have picked out, but I absolutely love them!
  • All the blinds are really thick, which means my demon sweet cats won’t be able to break them!
  • The closets.  They’re all California Closets, and are sooooooooooo pretty.  I’ll post pictures of them soon too.

So that’s all I can think of right off.  I promise I’ll post pictures this week.  I took some last week, but it was dark outside when I took them and many of the pictures came out looking pretty dark.  Thanks for all your encouragement and tips!

 

Posted in Home Stuff | 3 Comments