Watch CBS 11 News Again Tonight

The lovely and talented Tiani Jones with CBS 11 News here in Dallas made another trip out to our office to do another news story.

Today's subject has to do with Fall Travel. It is supposed to air during the 10pm time slot tonight..so, if you get a chance, tune in!

Get A Passport!

It looks like it's actually going to happen! Some time ago the State Department made the announcement that, as of a given date, a birth certificate and a valid government issued picture ID would no longer suffice for travel outside of the country. Formerly, the birth certificate/photo ID combination could be used for travel to Mexico, Canada and most Caribbean destinations.

They pushed the effective date back once already, but this time it looks like its going to hold. I notice that we are taking more and more passport pictures here in our office ($5.00 for the two required pictures - best deal in town).

The appointed date is January 8, 2007. Read the details here: http://www.dhs.gov/dhspublic/display?content=5797

Do you have your passport yet?

"Hot Deals"

No, this post really isn't about any particular Hot Deal. What I'm excited about today is that the deals section of our website is undergoing some great changes.

We get a multitude of emails about different specials every week. I have really struggled trying to figure out how to relay this information to you, our customers, in a timely fashion. I obviously can't just forward all of them via email. Besides the fact that it would leave me doing nothing but sending out emails all day, it would also clog your inbox!

A great idea finally dawned on me and I am having a great time! I won't bore you with the technical details, but it's quick and easy and I should be able to keep the information up to date easily.

If you get a chance, take a look!

http://www.legacytravel.com/hot_deals.html

I Guess I'm Going....

Well, if you follow this blog, you know that I mentioned a while back that I'm planning a trip to Europe in the fall.

Shortly thereafter we moved (our residence...not our business), then my sister had a health concern that had to be resolved before I could commit to going...and now..today..I finally pulled the trigger on the ticket. I'm flying over on miles.

I'm so excited!!

Turns Out We Were Just Vandalized....

I realized this morning that my last entry kind of left our drama hanging out there....

I thought I should let you know that we were not burglarized. We were vandalized. No one gained entry to our store, except the Police doing their crime scene investigation.

The glass in front of our store has been replaced and, except for the crystal bowl full of the glass fragments which I thought were pretty, it looks like nothing ever happened.

Our remote security camera captured the image of the people who did it, so arrests should be made soon.

....and now back to our regularly scheduled programming....

We've Been Burglarized

As you know, Philip and I have been out of town for a week. We've been driving home all day. Right now we are west of Marshall, Texas.

One of our staff members received a call at his home this morning (he didn't get the message until this afternoon) from the Plano Police Department.

Evidently, someone used a rather unorthodox method to gain entry to our store last night. They filled our front windows full of bullets, then went in and rifled through our store.

From what we can tell right now nothing is missing, which is odd.

We're very thankful that no one was at the store and that nothing appears to be missing.

More Later.

Preparing to Move

I've been here in Gulf Shores all week. It really has been a fantastic week. I work for a few hours then go to the beach for a few hours. Even when I'm sitting here working I am looking through floor to ceiling windows directly out to a beautiful beach. I can hear the waves crashing onto the shore even with the doors and windows closed.

My kids have made friends with the kids renting the house next door. Both of them have a friend over right now and are trying valiantly to eat the remaining popsicles and ice cream since neither can be packed to travel home tomorrow.

Tomorrow we indeed travel home. Twelve hours of Interstate lay between where we are today and where we will go tomorrow. Twelve hours is a long time, in case you didn't know.

Today I must "un-nest" everything I've done this week. I've got to set up the Dish TV receiver sent to replace a broken one. What I really don't have time to do is sit here and blog. I have laundry that must be folded and belongings that must be found and packed.

I guess I'll get started. I hate this part of a trip.

More Later.

New Work on the Website

I've been trying to figure out a way to quickly get specials posted on our website. I am frequently sent specials via email, but to manually program a table to display them in a logical fashion on the website was entirely too time consuming considering the fact that "web programmer" is not the only facet of my job.

On the other hand, I think that is what many people are looking for when they come to a travel agency website. Additionally, it is quite handy to be able to refer people to our own website when they ask for "deals".

So, with a little dinking around this morning, I think I've come up with something that isn't too time consuming to maintain.

Check it out!

The Best Travel Deals Anywhere

Today's News

By now I'm sure you've read about the foiled plot to blow up airplanes headed from the UK to the US. Our terror alert level has been raised to the highest level for flights from the UK to the US, the level has been raised to orange for all other flights either within the US or beginning or ending in the US.

From the Department of Homeland Security Website: "Due to the nature of the threat revealed by this investigation, we are prohibiting any liquids, including beverages, hair gels, and lotions from being carried on the airplane. This determination will be constantly evaluated and updated when circumstances warrant."

If you are traveling soon, keep in mind that you'll need to check in a minimum of 2.5 hours prior to flight time. You cannot carry on the items mentioned above and you may be asked to finish your beverage before boarding. Also keep in mind that your identification and proof of citizenship will be intensely scrutinized. Be absolutely sure that yours is in order.

Should you cancel your trip? I wouldn't. In fact, my Daddy is traveling to Europe next month..including a flight to and from London. I'm not advising him to cancel based on current information. I am traveling to Europe in October, and I'm not planning to cancel either. If we cancel our plans based on these events, we are bowing to the terrorists.

If you have a trip coming up within the next 10 days, I'll be personally calling you starting in just a few minutes. If you have any questions, email me or call our office.

More Later.

Whew!

I've been working hard today getting up to date on all of the photo tours for our website. Of course, my hard work was nested around times down at the beach with my kids...all in all a good day.

I believe that as of this moment I am completely caught up on photo tours.

Tomorrow I will be adding pages with the professional profiles of each of our staff members.

More Later.

Vacation Ownership

So, we're in Gulf Shores, Alabama for the week. I think I mentioned before that my Mother In Law owns this beach house we're in.

It's an absolutely gorgeous home and we're very blessed to have been able to enjoy it periodically over the years.

There is a case to be made, however, to avoid owning vacation property...or, at least, if you own it...don't expect to enjoy your time away in the same way you would if you were going on another type of vacation.

For example, last night I spent 25 minutes on the phone troubleshooting with Dish TV only to find out that one of the receivers was bad. They have to UPS a new receiver, which will take three days. When it arrives, we must package the bad receiver and ship it back to them.

Keep in mind that we're supposed to be on vacation here.

Additionally, we had to wait for a telephone man to come install DSL only to find out that there is a bad cable along the street somewhere and they now have to send someone else out to fix it.

Currently my father in law and my husband are crouched in one of the bathrooms taking apart the clogged plumbing to remove a clog.

Oh the joys of vacation ownership.

At an all inclusive resort in Mexico, we'd be out at the pool drinking drinks enjoying ourselves... We won't be able to do that for a while still because as soon as they're done with the plumbling, we must go grocery shopping....

...you know what grocery shopping means....right? Cooking....and that means...cleaning.....

When is the next flight to Cancun?

Strange Road Signs

I am blogging to you today heading east on I-12 at about 80 miles an hour.

I just saw a sign indicating the exit for "Baptist Pumpkin Center". Now, I've never been Baptist, but I didn't think they had special pumpkins.

Upon further investigation, it seems that the road goes either north to a place called Baptist, or south to a place called Pumpkin Center.

I'm not sure that's any less odd than a place called Baptist Pumpkin Center.

Blogging from Love

I am, as I type, flying Southwest Airlines for the first time since I was a child. Last time I flew on a Southwest Airlines Jet the flight attendants still wore go-go boots and hot pants. I'm guessing that a fair number of you either don't know what hot pants are or aren't aware that Southwest Airlines flight attendants used to wear them.

Today it's all khaki shorts and logo'd shirts.

The flight I am on goes from Dallas Love Field to Houston Hobby. My son is serving as a ring bearer in a wedding in Houston tonight.

So far so good. I got online last night and printed my boarding pass after a heads up from the lady who cuts my hair that if I didn't print it out at least the day before I wouldn't get in the "A" boarding group and would forever regret my blunder.

We did indeed board with the "A" group and were invited to sit with an unaccompanied young lady flying to visit her grandma.

The flight attendants, even though they are not wearing gogo boots and hot pants, seem much happier than on most airlines I've experienced lately.

Lots of people ask me how I feel about the whole Wright Amendment issue. Generally, I'll always come down on the side of less regulation for business. I honestly don't have overly strong feelings one way or the other on this particular issue.

Unless they lose my suitcase, however, I'll give acceptable marks to Southwest Airlines.

More Later.

LegacyTravel Dot Com

I hope, by now, you've spent some time on our website. I completely design, update and maintain it all by my lonesome. I realize that our site is not the most technologically complicated site around, but I like it that way. My goal is to provide what people want with a minimum of hassle.

My main challenge with the website is the time it takes to keep it updated to the degree I would like to. I admire people whose jobs consist of one main task. Me? I still work directly with clients, accomplish all IT related tasks at Legacy Travel (not just the website), help with some of the accounting and marketing, sometimes sweep the floor and take out the trash.

My family is going to the beach next week and I am looking very forward to taking the laptop and having a "website-athon". I'm looking forward to a chunk of time when my attention isn't pulled in a thousand directions. Be watching for more hotel tours and more specials content, not to mention pictures and professional profiles of our staff.

It's a sickness, I know.

Stay tuned.

Common Courtesy

I am a runner.

Part of my route includes a 7-11. On especially hot days (which includes all of them lately) I will take a break midway through and have a Gatorade at the 7-11. Adjacent to the 7-11 is a dry cleaners and a vet clinic. Since there are normally cars lined up outside the convenience store, I sit on the curb between the vet clinic and the dry cleaners.

Yesterday I was sitting on the curb enjoying my Grape Gatorade when the proprietor of the dry cleaners came out with his broom and started sweeping the parking lot and sidewalk. He was sweeping it in such a way that the debris was flying right at me. I looked at him and he looked at me and he continued to sweep filth at me.

"MOVE!" He ordered.

Incredulously, I scooted down a couple of feet. He continued sweeping in my direction until I finished my drink and continued my run.

The ironic thing is that I haven't found a dry cleaners near my new house yet. I was just thinking as I ran through the parking lot "Hmmm, I should try them."

Needless to say I won't be trying them now.