Friday, February 26, 2010

The Hunt for Red October

195 there's a story here

WoW what an afternoon! Even when I tried to prepare myself, I failed..... okay let's start from the beginning.

I am doing a newborn photo shoot tomorrow and need a bean bag chair. I knew I would eventually need to find a bean bag, but I was waiting til I actually had my first newborn BOOKED, and that happens to be tomorrow WOO HOO! I had already looked online a while ago when I made my list of 'to get' items. I knew Target had a vinyl one (why vinyl you ask? because babies make messes and vinyl is easy to clean) but online it said it was an online only item. Well crap, I was afraid the search would be a pain. So on my way to work this morning I compiled a list of places to CALL while at work to save myself from running all over town. First call: Target because A - I love target, I'm a target girl and B - because it is a block from my work. Here's the conversation:
me: Hi I'm calling to see if you have any bean bags
her: um....
me: oh sorry I mean bean bag CHAIRS (i did the same with with someone else, I forget there are things called bean bags that aren't bean bag chairs, hee hee)
her: oh hold on I'll check......
::hold music::
her: yes we do! they are in the furniture department and there are also some in the kids decor area
me: thanks!

Sweet!! So that was easy, my list goes into the shred it box, since I won't be needing to call anywhere else. Now fast forward about 3 hours later to when I am finished working my half day. I go to target, thinking this afternoon is going to be an easy one, pick up a few items I need all in one place and head home to get some house work done. I pull down the furniture aisle... YuP there's the bean bags, but I forgot to mention I was looking for the vinyl bean bags... hmmm should I just get this one or attempt to locate a vinyl one? Well it was only about 12:15, I had some time. I could do some more searching and if nothing comes up I could just pick up the non-vinyl one at any target. At this point I was kicking myself for not asking for a vinyl one and not continuing my search via phone this morning.

Thank goodness for google text! I have internet on my phone, but by the time I open up the internet, go to google and type in the store I'm looking for then somehow locate a phone number on their website, the weekend would be over. So instead I use the wonderful google text feature. If you haven't used it and have unlimited texts, I highly recommend it. I first tried wal-mart because it was right across the highway. If you know me very well, you know I do NOT shop at wal-mart, besides the fact there are really none in the cities (I work in a suburb hence why there is one in this town) I just don't like shopping there. BUT when I am looking for something, I am willing to open my search to wal-mart. So I text "wal-mart 55369" to google (just a six letter number that spells google) and 2 seconds later I get a text back giving me the address and phone number of a few wal-marts near that zip code. For some reason the text sent me the tire and auto number and the photo dept number. So I try the first number, tire and auto... it rings and rings. I hang up. Then I try the photo number and get a snotty "hello, photo" (probably a teenager) I explain I'm trying to reach the main number and she says to hold on... I hold then the line dies. Grrrreat! Oh well, I'm right here so I'll just go in. No luck there.

Back in my car, google texting Kohl's: Nope, Bed, Bath, & Beyond: Nope, Home Goods: Nope, Sam's: Nope (that was a kyle find while I was also texting him). Oh and with all the google texting comes memorizing numbers then calling them to find out. I needed to get a few things at JoAnn's so all this continued on my way to JoAnn's. BabiesRUs: Nope, ToysRUs: Nope (I actually just wanted to call toys r us but I had to call babies r us first to get the toys number). Ah made it to JoAnn's, got a few items, checked for bean bags, nope. Party City was near by so I stopped in there, hey I was up for anything. No luck there, but she recommended Wal-Mart, I said "I just came from there" she suggested elk river or coon rapids. I'm thinking "okay lady I live near Minneapolis, I'm not going out to the boonies" if you don't know elk river and coon rapids are also suburbs, my goal was to get CLOSER to home on this wild goose chase for a bean bag chair. So I call another wal-mart, which is in Brooklyn Center... I get hung up on (that's wally world for me) and call back. Then she says no they don't have any. I was headed toward Brooklyn Center just in case at this point and decided just to head toward home and hit the Target by our house. Along the way Kyle had suggested to maybe just get the cloth bean bag chair from target and spray it with scotch guard. This idea was looking like the winner. I made it to Brooklyn Park and saw a target so I got off the highway. This target is kinda in a ghetto area, kinda where we used to live. I remembered there was a Big Lots nearby, so I thought I will try ONE more store then just get the bean bag at target. Big Lots HAD some!!!! Well they had the ones that have the back built into them, which wasn't going to work, besides they were three times the price as the target one. Sutherland's was right next door, so I dropped in there. The sales guy proceeded to list other stores to try, and my response after each one "nope, they don't have them, neither do they, not there either" I told him it's okay, not to waste his time thinking, it was going on three hours of me trying to find what I was looking for.

SO I pulled into target, it's almost 3:00, and had decided I earned some chocolate after all this and was getting a Mounds bar when I checked out! I walked back to the furniture department, which this wasn't a super target so the lay out is a little different. I walk down the aisle and there are the purple princess $25 bean bags... AHHH that is not what I wanted, I wanted the plain jane red $19.99 bean bag!!!! Oh you've got to be kidding me. So I walk around looking for the kids decor area hoping that maybe they just have them there. I see a worker who asks what I am looking for, I state bean bag chairs and she says "yeah we don't really have any, we carry those during back to school" for one I KNOW they have them because I just came from a target that did, and I see that they do have some already, just not the one I want. I go back to the furniture aisle and there is the tag for the red bean bag chair I want... it's shelf sitting empty. I go to a red phone, call for an assistant and ask for them to check the back for this red bean bag. HALLELUJAH!! They have some in back!!!! My hunt is over and I could have saved myself an afternoon, just by getting the first red bean bag I saw at 12:15. Oh well, you live you learn.

but oh wait it's not over yet....

I was almost home and was thinking about this cute little blue rug I got at the first target and thought "you know what, I think I would prefer that in green, kinda like grass. then I can use it with boys and girls. I wonder if they have green" so I stopped at the target near our house to exchange the one I got. I left my blue one at the customer service desk and told the lady I wanted to make sure they had the one I wanted before I exchanged. So I walked to the back. Again a different style target so everything is in different places. Hmmm this is odd I don't see the kid decor section anywhere and that's where this rug was. So I went back up to the front and told her I couldn't find where they were. She scanned the blue one I brought in and said "well it says we have two" I told her I was wanting green so she looked that up, well first she could just find the various sizes then said "they are usually just one number off so let me try a few numbers" after finding that they had purple ones and pink ones she finally came to green "yes it says we have two" hmmmm "did you look along the back wall? they might be there" I said yes but that I'd go back and look again. This time I continued on PAST where it should have been with the bedding and bath and finally found the kids decor aisle near the toys. Well I can understand putting it by the toys since it's kids, but seriously every other store I had been in today had them near the bedding and bath section. Oh well, there it was and I was calling it a day!!!!
green rug

Now I'm home!

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