Do's and Don'ts for Dallas

Since I have now had the opportunity to visit the great city of Dallas three times and each trip has been a little different I decided I would compile a list of those things to do and not to do while in Dallas!! Keeping in mind this is only my opinion!

DO's

• Fly into Dallas-Love Field Airport (check in 10 minutes, security 10 minutes, wait for plane 10 minutes)


• Shop at the Galleria or outlet mall.


• Visit the JFK Memorial and Museum


• Take a trusty GPS


• Stay at the Embassy Suites on Northwest Highway or Hilton Garden Inn off I-35


• Eat at Pappadeaux's Seafood Kitchen


• Eat at Pappas Brother's Steak House


• Drive through Highland Park area of Dallas as it has some very beautiful homes.


• Pay someone $10 to change your flat for you!


• Do go to Sonics during their Happy Hour for a Cherry Limeade (as like Starbucks, there is one on every corner!)


• Eat dinner at Texas de Brazil

DON'Ts

• Fly into Dallas-Ft.Worth Airport - it has the tendency to close down after the smallest of rain storms


• Don't shop at the 24-hr Wal-mart with a clothes snob!


• Don't stand on the spot that JFK was shot as it is a major freeway on ramp!


• Don't rely on the cheap GPS you brought with you as it will most likely have you running around in circles!


• Don't stay at the Holiday Inn down the street from the airport


• Don't eat at Taco Cabana


• Don't eat at Pappas Bros BBQ.


• Never let the engineers from Associated Air pick the steakhouse to eat at as you will run up a very expensive food/bar bill.


• Don't drive around the neighborhoods of downtown as they are very scary!


• Never believe that AAA will show up in 60 minutes to fix a flat.


• Don't eat at Texas de Brazil if you have had a big lunch!

Footloose and Fancy Free!

Okay so maybe not those words exactly. This week marked my first solo business trip in my new role as Regional Sales Manager and all I can say is I want my partner back!!!

Sunday I flew out of John Wayne airport at an ungodly hour - a time when most people are still sleeping before they have to get up and go to church! My flights were both uneventful and I arrived at my destination (Dallas, Texas) without any hitches. I picked up my rental car, checked into my hotel and settled in. The hotel that I am staying at, is 1/2 mile from the airport and the main customer that I will be visiting while in Dallas. So, after unpacking my clothes and taking a bit of a cat nap (to overcome the exhaustion of being up so early) I proceed to head into the city for a bite to eat! Alas, this was not to be the case and upon arriving at my rental car I discovered I had a flat tire! What! Now how did that happen? Again, I remind you, that I had driven the car maybe a mile total. The 1/2 mile to the hotel and around it a couple of times before I parked! There was no way I could have caused this tire to go flat in 1.5 hours and only driving it for a mile. So I called Hertz and asked for Roadside Assistance, where I proceeded to tell the service lady my troubles. Nevermind, that I had to keep repeating myself and ask her to repeat herself because we seemed to have a bad connection or she was not connected to her headset properly. (Not sure which it was and it explains a lot further down) She managed to tell me that someone would be there within 60 minutes. She also mention that they usually arrive sooner than that but she has to quote 60 minutes. Also, during our conversation she informed me that Hertz considers a flat tire as damage and thus I would be responsible to pay for it! EXCUSE ME!! How can I be responsible for a flat tire when I had only driven the car a mile? I also told her that this car would not do for the week rental as I would be traveling out of the state and I would need a replacement. She said, "not a problem, I will call your rental location and request an exchange rental and while you are there you will need to file a incident report on your flat tire. " I re-iterated how could I be held responsible for a flat tire on the car when clearly there was something wrong with it prior to my picking it up in the first place....

So 60 minutes comes and goes...I receive a call from the driver telling me he is on the way and he needs to verify my location! (Nevermind, that I gave my location to the Hertz service lady 3 times) So I repeat the address of the hotel and where the car is parked. 15 minutes later I get a call from AAA dispatch telling me the driver is having a hard time finding me. By that time I had reached my boiling point and the gal at AAA got an ear full! The conversation went something like this: "How hard is it to get to the Holiday Inn down the street from the airport?"; " Airport? Which airport she asks me." "Dallas-Love Field, I am 1/2 mile away from the airport and the Hertz rental center. I have now given this information 5 times to you people....can someone please explain to me why this is so difficult?" " Well you haven't given me this information 5 times and if you don't stop yelling at me I won't send anyone!" " Oh yes you will because Hertz confirmed someone would be within in 60 minutes and your 15 minutes late!" Yet again, I reconfirmed my address and the location of the parked car!

I couldn't believe how hard it was to get a darn tire changed! For all of the time I had spent waiting I could have paid someone $10 to do it for me and drive it back to Hertz (which again is 1/2 mile away!) The driver finally arrived 15 minutes later and I was soon on my way to Hertz where I received the best customer service ever! I spoke with the manager about what had happened and he apologized profusely! He told me he never received any calls from Roadside Assistance about my problem and would have actually sent someone from his office to fix the flat instead! In the end, I received an exchange rental (upgraded) for 50% less that what I was originally going to pay and he made a note on my account about the flat tire not being my fault! I also received a $50 dollar voucher that can be used on my next rental with them! How cool is that! I am so glad things turned out the way they did, because I will be, honest I was prepared to fight dirty!

See, in the past when we have traveled, my partner took care of all these details! I simply had to show up to the airport with my luggage and we were good to go! Not to mention when I travel with my partner there is generally good conversations and much laughter between us so the trip goes faster! This time was much different and not for the better either! This time I actually had to plan, things like the trip budget, customer visits etc. Then I get the trip and budget (hotel, car and air fare) and cash advance approved. ( I also find that I talk to myself a lot!! Hee! Hee!)
I have a whole week of this... Good Lord help me now!

Life is a Rollercoaster

Okay not really, because I don't care for them much. However, I do firmly believe that we are definitely not in control of our life and every once in a while I get a gentle (sometimes hard) reminder of that fact. A few weeks ago my husband and I had a crisis arise. It was in fact, a big one! Matthew came home one night tell me a story about rumors floating around his office about a possible sell of his office. As some of you know, Matthew is an office administrator/receptionist for a corporate branch of Coldwell Banker. He has actually been working for them about 7 1/2 years the first 2 as an licensed agent the remaining time as office staff. Well, eventually the rumor proved to be true. An affiliate/franchisee had sent a proposal to the corporate offices about purchasing the Yorba Linda office. It apparently caught the right person's attention because next thing you know there were a series of meetings and phone calls about the purchase. In the end, the sell of the office fell threw; however, this didn't stop the powers that be from deciding to close the office all together. As you can imagine, Matthew and I waited on pins and needles ever so patiently (NOT!) to see what was to become of Matthew. Several of the agents began looking elsewhere, speculating and creating additional chaos that it did not help Matthew and I in our nerves. The President of Coldwell Banker, finally scheduled a meeting at Matthew's office to discuss with the staff and agents what had transpired over the previous week and what the final outcome was to be. In this case, the office was in fact still closing and the agents were being given the opportunity to transfer to the Tustin office along with Joe and his staff. Yeah! We were going to be okay, Matthew would still have a job and would transfer to the Tustin office. Actually this was good news for us in that it would be closer to our home and we could take advantage of carpooling a few days a week to save some money! The other good thing is that Matthew would be able to move forward with some of his real estate plans that were finally falling into place with a couple of the agents in the office. All in all we were pretty happy and knew that we had dodged a major bullet! We even celebrated at our friend's on the 4th (albeit a bit too much maybe...) but we were very content.



Fast forward to yesterday...



It would appear that my husband will actually not be transferring to Tustin as we believed and is in fact without a job as of the 18th of July! Apparently the individual at the Tustin office who holds the same position as Matthew has seniority and therefore is going to retain her job! Imagine my shock, surprise, hurt and confusion! What the heck just happened?? How could this happen? The President of Coldwell Banker firmly told the agents a couple of weeks before that Joe and his staff would be taken care of and would transfer to Tustin?? I don't believe there is ever a time that one can be prepared for this type of situation. And I will be honest that I was more prepared for it two weeks ago and I was yesterday! The HR gal was nice enough to mention to Matthew that he was eligible to apply for 3 openings in the corporate office but there was not a guarantee he would be hired! Again I say WHAT! I know that he will at least pursue them but at this stage we are not putting all of our eggs in one basket and will be looking at all options. He does have an interview for one of the openings on Friday morning and it is the best option of the 3 so we hope it will work out but won't know for sure at least for a few more days!


I will be honest, this is a very scary time for us. The prospect of not having the second income for awhile it a bit more daunting than I can handle right now! So your prayers are welcome! Job leads are also welcome! As is Money! Matthew's first reaction has been to sell everything we can on Craigslist. I told him to wait! It also doesn't help the fact that we just planned a Hawaiian trip that we can't cancel because we won't get our money back.

In the end, I know that this is totally in God's hands and he will provide; it is just hard to give up that control! But as I said we really aren't in control now are we!!