Fred and Valerie

Last Thursday or so, we found out that Wal-Mart was going to be stocking a large number of Nintendo Wiis on the 28th. Because we were going to be out of town for the Hampton Bridal Show, we asked our friends, Amy and Jarrod, to grab one for us when they grabbed one for themselves. Fortunately, for Amy and Jarrod, they managed to get one of the Wal-Mart Wiis, but unfortunately for us, they were only able to buy one.

Valerie and I found this out as we were driving to the Hampton area and we decided to stop by a Wal-Mart in Williamsburg to see if they had any and also to pick up some breakfast. We walked inside the store, went to the Electronics department and there was a woman buying a Wii at the checkout counter. I figured, “Well, that’s the last one right there” and asked the woman if they had anymore. As luck would have it, they did! and we got our Wii. I asked the woman how many they had left and she said they had about 2 or 3 when I got mine. Another woman said they had started with 40!

I managed to get a couple hours of playing time in last night and can say, without a doubt, that the Wii is a revolutionary gaming system. After 2 hours of playing, my shirt was soaked and some underused muscles were aching.

I can’t wait to play some more!

Philadelphia-based lawyer Michael Donovan thinks “restoring small annual fees on cards used by ‘non-revolvers’ would bolster revenues for card issuers, who then in turn might not make life so expensive for those with revolving balances.”

I like how the credit issuers “might” let this benefit their less financially responsible customers. The reality is that the credit issuers would likely just add the new fees on top of their already-too-large profits.

My model behavior might not bring record profits to the issuers, but it’s also far less likely to put me into bankruptcy where I tell the credit card company, “Thanks for all that money you lent me, but I’m never repaying you.”

Gas prices seem to be on a downward trend again and the local Shell station posted a sub-$2 price for the first time in what seems like forever.

Unfortunately, we saw this rather disturbing license plate at night and couldn’t get a good look at the driver.

Like we did last year, Valerie and I spent the holidays driving all over the Southeastern portion of the United States visiting family and friends and we’re finally back home. Our trip took us to Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Georgia and we have the pictures (and more pictures) to prove it.