Got Da Bad Code...

As I used to say to my kids when they were little, I got da bad code (translation: I have a bad cold). Sniffled all night, which meant I didn't sleep too well. I know, poor me.

It was cold here yesterday! And the weathermen were right, even though I made fun of them when they said we might get some flurries. I mean, who believes them when they say we're going to get flurries this early in the year? But flurries they were. It was chilly. Ugh.



But that didn't stop me from shopping yesterday. Sniffles, sore throat...minor inconveniences when JC Penney has it's Buy-One-Get-One for 88 Cents sale. I went in the morning by myself for a couple of shirts and some more running clothes (those Under Armor kind of shirts that wick away perspiration; they work really great. Of course, I'm too wimpy to run right now, but I will get out there next week when I can no longer see my breath in the morning ;-). Then went again in the evening when DD (the teenager) informed me that she had an all-day outdoor field trip today and that her current winter coat was way too small (she grew three inches over the summer) and she needed a new one.

She's a teen. Which means she's picky. Which means she had a specific idea about a specific kind of coat that she wanted. I had a specific idea about a specific price I wanted to spend and a specific level of warmth I wanted so that my baby didn't end up with da bad code later in the winter.

We disagreed in many stores. Penney's. Macy's. Sear's. Target. Old Navy.

I was not a happy camper, but I kept trudging from store to store with my child because I remembered what it was like to be her age and to really want the cool clothes so that I could be cool like the other kids. I wanted a compromise with my daughter because when I was her age my mom took me to Gotshalk's shoes in Bridgewater, MA and bought me the Nike's with the purple swoosh because they had just come out and everyone had them and I wanted them, and she bought me those god-awful ugly khaki pants at Burlington Coat Factory because all the girls were wearing them even though my dad had just lost his job or was in danger of losing it at that time because I was crying and my life (as I said through my tears) really sucked. Well, I didn't use that word, not around my mom, but I made the point. You know how it is in middle school--you just don't fit in, and you just try so hard to do so.

So we were off to find a compromise. I, however, had sore feet, and a temper growing shorter by the minute, so I told DD we were going to one more store and that was it. We stopped at Meijer, of all places, and found this coat:



And it was on sale, and the faux fur lines the whole coat, so it was warm. We made a deal that she'll wear her old coat (which is lined with down) on really cold days and this one to school (she doesn't have recess anymore, so I'm not too worried about it as a school coat, so the other, old coat is a snowboarding/snowman building/still a kid coat).

The end of the story? She loves me, the coat only cost me $22, which left more money for shopping ;-) and everyone is happy.

Except I still have da bad code, but at least I have some new sweats to wear all day!

Shirley