I love a good restaurant recommendation

Unfortunately, not all of them are good!

My colleague passed along a few restaurant recommendations for Des Moines the other day, one of which I went to last night (thank you Davina). My colleague spent his night with family in town and I needed to eat so I went to Centro, a restaurant downtown for dinner. It is an Italian restaurant with a nice atmosphere and good wine list.

I was the awkward person eating alone in a corner - but the food was good.

Since I was eating alone, that gave me ample time to eavesdrop on others...one of the things I noticed is that someone at the table next to me ordered a margarita with dinner. Now I like tequila as much as the next girl (and probably more) but when you're eating Italian...why do you order a marg???

Today during one of our client meeting we solicited additional restaurant recommendations. There were 2 restaurants that were clearly the favorites, one of which was the one I went to last night.  My colleague and I decided to to try the other restaurant tonight, Latin King.

Now when you hear the name Latin King - what kind of food would you anticipate?

Italian right? Clearly Latin King screams Italian.

Let's just say the food tonight did not live up to the food yesterday and leave it at that.

Thanks Delta

I get a lot of junk mail because of my various frequent flier memberships with different airlines. I probably get a new credit card offer at least weekly. So when I got a letter from Delta I almost threw it away, the only reason why I didn't was because it was slimmer than your average credit card offer. It was, in fact, just a letter from Delta. As some might remember, I had a "marathon" day on December 20th and one of my flights ran late. Due to the delay Delta went ahead and put an extra 1000 bonus miles in my SkyMiles account.

I'm not someone who gets too worked up about airline delays. Yes, it's frustrating and if it happens I'm usually disappointed, but rarely do I blame the airlines (and I never get mad at the gate attendant). I can hardly blame Delta for bad weather. And if they need to delay my flight a little longer so they can get a fresh crew, that's fine by me! Sure, I want to get home as much as the next guy, but I want to get there safely.

So I would never expect a bonus like this from an airline. But I sure do appreciate it!  Coincidentally I booked a personal flight with Delta today. (It really was coincidental - cheapest airline with direct flights to Miami). I can't really compare Delta's response to other airlines as I haven't faced major delays with other airlines (yet).

Dear Santa (Dad)

Thank you for the Bose Noise Canceling Headphones. They make a huge difference...for my sanity...

Love,
Allie

Seriously - these things are amazing. I wasn't sure I wanted them because they're on the larger size (for headphones) and something else I would have to carry (in addition to my kindle, computer, notebook, assorted papers, etc). They make a huge difference! Occasionally I would turn them off to see the difference and the plane seemed so loud I was amazed I hadn't already lost my hearing on flights!  Plus the little girl behind me playing on a computer without headphones seemed quieter with these on...didn't stop me from feeling the seat getting kick though...