so you can see why i am going to keep the princess muffin in its wittle-bitty muffin box forever as souvenier.

the cuisinart coffee maker was defective, so my old man called cuisinart. they said - sure, send it back, and we will fix it & return it. 2 wks, $20 shipping. uh... it's defective, people. we don't want to do w/o coffee for 2 wks and pay you $20 for the priviledge. so i called macy's to return it there, but since it was purchased 7 months ago and their return policy is 6 months, the clerk said, we can't take it back. i asked to talk to his supervisor. she said, we can't take it back. i asked to talk to her mgr. she said there was no mgr in housewares for the day, so she'd transfer me to the menswear mgr. he said, we can't take it back. i asked to talk to his boss, and he was fixin' to give me a phone number, gave me the first three digs, and then he goes, wait, the asst gen mgr is right here. you can talk to her. so, i talk to her, and she says - sure, bring it on back. persistence pays off.

got the new coffee maker home, opened the box, setting it up... la-la-la... yumm... smells like cinnamon. must be the filters? mmmm.... hey, what's that - there's some dust here in the machine. open the grinder,and what to my wondering eyes should appear? cinnamon! in! the! grinder! criminy - they gave me a used/returned coffee maker in exchange for my used/returned coffee maker. put it all back in the box, pkg it up, and plan to return it today for another - specifically unused version of the coffee maker.

since we had no coffee maker, we had to go out for breakfast. this is a great hardship on me b/c what i love the most is to hop out of bed & jump right into a cooking project. right. so, we went to cracker barrel for blueberry pancakes & oatmeal. la-la-la... waiting for the oatmeal... yumm.... there it is - oatmeal! put some brown sugar on & take a big bite... ick! ick! yuck! salty! bad salty! ick! that's right. you heard me correctly - the oatmeal was salted. why would anyone salt the oatmeal. flag down the waitress & send it back. she comes back in like 5 mins w/ another bowlful saying they are all back there tasting it & cannot agree on the salt issue. took a cautious nibble taste of the new bowl, and bam! salt. sent it back & asked for another muffin instead. replaced a healthy bowl of oatmeal w/ a calorie & fat laden muffin. yes!! whatever. since my food was messed up, my old man had been handing me blueberry pancakes & bacon & whatnot off his plate, so i am not actually hungry at this pt for another muffin, so i asked for a bag to take it home. this is the best part of the story, b/c the waitress brought me the absolute a-#1 cutest little carton you ever did see, and it holds exactly my little princess muffin.