Around April of this year, the spring broke on our garage door. This made it impossible to open the door, so the spring had to be replaced as soon as possible as both cars were stuck inside the garage. Unfortunately, this happened around 6PM on a Saturday, so it was very difficult to find someone who was willing to come out and take a look at it the same day. After calling a number of companies, I found A Plus by searching Google Maps for garage door service near my ZIP code. I called Chris and was surprised to find out that he could come out the same day, and replace the spring for a very reasonable rate. Chris and his brother came out and took care of the problem within minutes.

Chris helped us out once again after our garage door was destroyed by Hurricane Ike. This is apparently a very common occurrence due to high speed wind gusts from the hurricane. I called Chris around 9:30PM the day after the hurricane, expecting to find out that they were too busy to help, and that we would be stuck without a working garage door for a few more days. Much to my surprise, Chris informed me that he had a 16′ door in stock, and that he could install it as well as several struts to make it “hurricane proof” on the following day.

On Sunday, Chris’s brother came out to the house and replaced the door. It took about two hours to take out the old door and install the new one. All of the old mounts and rails were removed, and two brand new springs were installed along with the garage door and mounting hardware. Once the door was in place, Chris’s brother installed three additional struts which will keep the door from flexing during high speed wind gusts. Chris’s brother was very professional and did an excellent job answering all of my questions.

I highly recommend A Plus Garage Doors to anyone who is looking for a excellent garage door service at very reasonable prices. Please visit their site (aplusgaragedoorsandrepair.com) or give Chris a call at 281-491-0651 to get more information.

We chose the Katy Freeway location since it’s relatively close to our neighborhood. We came in around 6:30PM on Friday and were seated immediately. The restaurant had a good amount of people in it, but was not crowded by any means. It took almost 15 minutes before anyone even acknowledged us at our table, and it took even longer to get the usual chips and salsa. The salsa was also very cold… as if they’d just pulled it out of the refrigerator. Good salsa should never be served cold!

When we finally got the menus, we were very surprised to see that the food was cheap compared to other Mexican restaurants in the area. With food prices the way they are today, it’s very rare to see a fajita dinner sold for less than $12, so it was surprising to see that La Fiesta had fajitas for $9.50 or so. We placed our order — fajitas for me, a quesadilla for mom, and some queso to enjoy with our chips and salsa.

The food came out a short while later. My fajitas were pretty decent. The meat was cooked nicely and had a good flavor to it. One thing I did notice is that the portions were very small compared to other restaurants. I wouldn’t consider this a “filling” meal were it not for the chips and salsa that were included. Most restaurants include a round container full of tortillas with an order of fajitas. La Fiesta did this as well, but included only 3 tortillas inside the container. This made the meal pointless, and I had to ask for more tortillas at least three times during our meal.

Mom’s quesadilla didn’t look very good either. I originally thought that they brought out the wrong meal since her quesadilla looked more like two tacos on a plate than a quesdailla. Quesadillas should always be served as part of a very large tortilla, which is cut up into small triangular slices; like so. La Fiesta’s idea of a quesadilla seems to be putting taco fillings into a tortilla, wrapping it up, and calling it a quesadilla. Not good.

All in all, our meal came out to about $26 before tip, which I think is pretty cheap for a dinner for two at a “sit-down” restaurant. Even with the food being as cheap as it is, I don’t think we’ll be coming back to La Fiesta. There’s nothing fun about mediocre Mexican food, so I’d much rather spend a few dollars more at a place that offers good food and good service.

Special Emergency Message - Please read carefully
This spam is classified as one of used by terrorists to gain funds for operations in
international terrorist organizations. The Department of Homeland Security, US
Secret Service and FBI have been provided copies of this spam. You are advised
to divest yourself of this spammer as quickly as possible in order to avoid being
included in this international investigation.

This unique note was attached to a complaint about a Nigerian scam email, which was being sent out via a customer’s hacked webmail account. I looked through the headers and found that the message was sent from an IP address located somewhere in Ghana or Nigeria.

Who knew that Nigerian and Ghanaian scammers were contributing to Al Qaeda’s coffers?

As a customer of these establishments, this really pisses me off. There are at least two dozen stores that sell electronics in my area. Knowing this, Best Buy chooses to reward me for doing business with them by having a loss prevention employee harass me for a receipt as I’m walking out of the store. This would be perfectly acceptable if I was spotted opening boxes and stuffing their contents into my pockets — but I’ve never done this. At Best Buy, I walk in, take what I need, and walk straight to the check-out area. I pay, take my item, and head for the door. Regardless, Best Buy’s loss prevention people still ask to see my receipt every time I’m trying to leave the store.

Until a few months ago, I had no problem showing my receipt, and leaving the Bag Nazi with an antecdote (”didn’t steal anything today”, etc.) on my way out. This was all perfectly acceptable until one day there was a lengthy line of at least 15 people waiting to have their receipts checked.

At that point, I decided that I had better things to do with my time, and that I would not be waiting in line just to have some guy glance at my receipt and mark it with his highlighter. This was something I’d never done before, so I made a plan while I waited for my turn to pay for my purchase. I would maneuver around the line at a regular walking pace, step out of the store, and walk directly to my car. A clean getaway.

And that’s exactly what I did. So, what happened? Did the Bag Nazi stop what he was doing so that he could chase me through the parking lot? Was the police called? Did Best Buy release the Geek Squad so that they could run me down with their black and white Beetles?

Nothing happened. The Bag Nazi looked in my direction as I walked by, but said absolutely nothing. The police weren’t called, and the Geek Squad remained in their area of the store. All in all, it seems that nobody gave a damn that I walked out without showing my receipt.

This made me wonder about the Bag Nazi’s purpose in the store. Common sense dictates that he has no right to detain me unless he can prove that I have committed a crime. If he does decide to follow me out of the store, he has no right to forcefully detain me while I’m walking to my car. Once I’m in my car, he has no right to hold me on Best Buy’s property against my will. The worst he can do is write down my license plate number, call the police, and get laughed at when he tries to report a shoplifter despite not having any kind of proof.

With that in mind, it seems that the purpose of the Bag Nazi is simply to deter theft. I can see how the “I’m going to check your receipt” trick might work for middle school kids who want to walk out of the store without paying for some Xbox game. But does this really work with real shoplifters? Would it work for the the guys who make a living out stealing items from stores? I doubt it — it’s not like a real shoplifter would even give the Bag Nazi a chance to ask for a receipt. A real shoplifter would make it out of the store and halfway down the road by the time the Bag Nazi even realizes what happened.

My solution now is to just say “no thanks” or ignore the Bag Nazi on my way out of the store. I’ve done this over a dozen times now, and have yet to be harassed, detained, or arrested.

Problem solved.

1. Florida is a lot bigger than you might think. To put it into perspective: it takes about 7 hours to pass through Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. This somehow makes me feel like I’ve made a lot of progress, and that one more state can’t take too much longer. However, once you’ve reached Pensacola, you’ve got another 7.5 hours of driving to look forward to. Driving through Florida makes up over 50% of the driving on this trip.

2. Finding an open rest stop in Mississippi is almost impossible. I’ve done this trip three times now, and every time I went, there was only one open rest stop throughout all of Mississippi. The rest were blown down by Katrina or something, and have yet to be rebuilt.

3. You can easily drive the entire ~1000 mile trip without stopping at a motel for the night. I like to leave Houston around 3AM, get all the boring Texas driving out of the way before sunrise, and then enjoy a nice trip during daylight hours. If you time things properly, you should be able to make it to Orlando before sunset. If you need to take a nap, Florida’s rest stops are a great choice. See below.

4. Florida has the best rest stops by far. Well maintained, clean facilities. Night-time security at almost all locations. You can tell based on the rest stops alone that Florida really loves its tourists.

5. Taking the I-12 shortcut in Louisiana is not a good idea. Taking I-12 instead of I-10 will bring you away from New Orleans, and shave about 25 minutes off the trip — but the drive is very dull, and I-12’s shoulders are full of roadkill. Given my previous luck with roadside fauna, taking this shortcut is not a good idea, especially at night.

6. Louisiana has very nice rest stops. The Atchafalaya Welcome Center is actually located in the middle of a swamp. Very peaceful, very well built. What’s especially nice about this rest stop is that truck parking is far away from the car parking. Anyone who’s ever tried to take a nap while parked next to a noisy diesel truck should know what I’m going on about.

7. Thought gas prices were high in Texas? Try leaving the state. Gas in Houston was around $3.39/gallon when I drove to Orlando back in April. The same fuel cost about $3.75/gallon when I filled up again in Ocala.

8. Florida really loves its toll roads. It’s almost impossible to get anywhere in the metropolitan Orlando area without taking a toll road. Hell, you have to take a toll road (Florida’s Turnpike) just to get to Orlando. On the upside, the roads are very well maintained, and roadside services are top-notch.

9. Pollo Tropical really kicks ass. Why they haven’t opened locations back home in Texas is beyond me. You can’t beat a TropiChop after a hard day’s work. This tidbit isn’t really about the drive, but I’m running low on ideas for the rest of this entry, so I’m going to include this.

April 2008 - APRILSHOWERS - works for transfers and new registrations.