power shopping

Friday was a very tiring day for a number of reasons. One of the people I’ve worked with for 2 years had her last day on Friday so we had our big goodbye. We also had a scare with one of the pieces of equipment in the lab, but everything was fine in the end. I had a doctor’s appointment in the morning and stayed late to make up some of the time as well. So when I got home, I was quite surprised when Dan said “So … instead of going shopping tomorrow morning, do you want to go tonight?”

We were planning to go air conditioner shopping today and were going to go to the big Reno-Depot in NDG. There were a few other things we wanted to do as well and it turned out that we could go them all if we went to Marché Centrale. We wanted to get an LCD monitor with our tax refund (something we’ve been planning to do for years but have been waiting for the prices to drop). Dan had a particular monitor picked out had was looking for the cheapest deal. He phoned a certain computer/electronics store in Marché Centrale and not only did they have that model, but as the box had been opened, it was discounted. This isn’t the first time we’ve bought electronics at a discount because they were either returned or the box had been opened. Dan seems to have a knack for finding these kinds of deals.

When I was in Toronto I had bought some very nice clothing at the H&M store there and I knew that one had opened in Pointe Claire (which would mean taking a bus to the West Island … not likely) and another one was opening in Rockland mall just near Marché Centrale. Dan hasn’t had much luck finding clothes he likes here (at least ones we can afford) and I told him he should try H&M when it opened. I didn’t think the one in Rockland was open yet, but when we phoned, it was! So we printed out the addresses, hopped on the next bus, and made our way to Boul. Acadie.

Dan has been to Marché Centrale a few times but I have never visited. We ended up walking from the Metro (a good 20 minutes) before we reached Rockland mall. The street is really busy with traffic and the sun was setting right in our eyes, so we were quite happy to reach the mall. The Rockland mall is pretty ugly from the outside, but actually quite nice inside. Dan said it had been renovated and looked better now. By this time it was already 7PM and everything would close at 9. I looked at the women’s clothing but wasn’t too impressed. The H&M in TO was three floors large and had some very nice semi-formal clothes, but unfortunately all the clothes in this store were summer-casual and not what I was looking for at the time. Dan, on the other hand, did some power shopping and within 20 minutes had picked out three pairs of pants and several shirts. It was the fastest I have ever seen him shop!

We hadn’t had anything to eat, so we stopped in the food court and Dan suggested we could go to A&W for old time’s sake, but it turned out they didn’t sell any beef products including bugers! Really, what’s the point of having an A&W if you don’t sell Teen Burgers? So, Dan had a sub and Quizno’s and finally succeeded to get some of those pickled peppers they used to give in Edmonton and I tried that Thai Express place, which wan’t bad for fast food.

Stage two involved going over the new Acadie Circle (which actually looked quite nice for a highway overpass) to the electronics store and Dan and the sales guy had a long talk about the monitor. They opened the box, plugged it in, discussed the warranty and specs, etc.. I wandered around and found the cheap DVDs and bought A Fish Called Wanda for $12. Dan was worried about taking the monitor home on public transit and suggested we could take a taxi. The only problem was that we couldn’t find a payphone and there was no taxi stand nearby. The backup plan was to cover it with a large bag or carry it in a box, but they didn’t have any in the store. There was a Canadian Tire across the street and we still had 10 minutes before closing, so we ran over and found some plastic garbage bags, covered the box, and caught the bus. When we got home we watched the new movie with our big fancy new LCD screen. I think we’ve had our quota of mall/outlet store shopping for the year.

And as for the air conditioner? Well we never made it to the Reno Depot in time, and still haven’t decided if we should get one…