"I'm never shopping THERE again!" Share your story!

[CuriousParty]

The real pain with this is that my BF fails to realize that its an allergy.  I'm allergic to a lot of fresh fruit and vegetables, not to any life and death situation but it makes my throat itch/feel weird/numb where they made contact, and he was thinking I was using it as an excuse to not eat them.  That's a little ranty, but let's say I think I've been succeeding in trying to show him exactly what this is and educating him on it.

He still thinks I can suffer a little throat itching to make his rather salad loving parents happy, though.  That's a brainhurt.

I have this, I can't eat raw apples or pears.  I can eat the cooked fruit, though, so my allergist explained it's not food allergies, but rather is a reaction related to my pollen allergies.

Have you explained to BF that repeated exposure can take it from "a little throat itching" right up to life-threatening with little to no warning?  I noticed the lip swelling/throat itching and eventually linked it to apples but went right on eating them because I really liked them, and they're so easy to carry around as a healthy snack (plus for a while I thought maybe it was the wax or something on the apple, and if I cleaned them, or peeled them, or something...). 

Then my throat started to swell shut.  Got my attention right quick.  No apples, check.  When the pear reaction developed, I stopped those right away.

ETA: Pod VorFemme

[Lorelei_Evil]

Vermont Country Store usually carries Pears soap.

[Redwing]

Check Dollar Tree for Pear's Soap if you have one nearby.  I often see it there.

[BabyMama]

There's a local deals site that seems to be operated at least in part by the newspaper. Every few days they offer a different discount deal.

I've bought a few and had good luck. But then I bought one last year for a certain restaurant. It was good until December 31. Unfortunately the restaurant I bought it for closed both their locations (saying they were searching for a new site.) I asked on their FB wall how I could use my certificate. They said it could be used "for catering." Yeah...it's a $10 certificate. That seems worth it for everyone

I've e-mailed the deals site twice now (before the expiration date) if I can get a refund credit for the amount I paid, or something. No response. I'm annoyed enough to not buy anything through them again.

Generally you've paid w/ a CC or paypal or the like--dispute w/ them too.

It's been more than 90 days and I paid with my debit card, so unfortunately that ship has likely sailed.

Have you unscented-soap people tried natural unscented soap?

[Kaora]

I use the fragrance-free Dove soap (at my dermatologist's recommendation for dry and sometimes itchy skin), and discovered a year or two back that they use "unscented" to mean it contains a "masking fragrance." In my world, as a competent user of English, "unscented" and "fragrance-free" would be the same thing. Not theirs.

That totally belongs in the brain hurty thread...doh!

From my point of view, yes, I'd agree.  But I can also see how they can get away with calling it Unscented because it smells Just Like The Soap!  Which does make my brain hurt, and me a little irritated.

...

I have Atopic Dermatitis oatmeal soap and curel have been helping lately. Dove products drive me up the wall with itching. 

I understand, trust me.  I'm usually fine except during the winter, as I have almost no contact allergens.  I use Cetaphil's body wash because it cleans me nice and does wonderful on my skin.  They even make a lotion that goes with it. Though it does have some tree nut oils, so if you're allergic to that, Aveeno would be my next recommendation.

I also love Pear's Soap, but haven't found any in town recently.  Sad.

The real pain with this is that my BF fails to realize that its an allergy.  I'm allergic to a lot of fresh fruit and vegetables, not to any life and death situation but it makes my throat itch/feel weird/numb where they made contact, and he was thinking I was using it as an excuse to not eat them.  That's a little ranty, but let's say I think I've been succeeding in trying to show him exactly what this is and educating him on it.

He still thinks I can suffer a little throat itching to make his rather salad loving parents happy, though.  That's a brainhurt.

Have you pointed out that allergies progress - a little throat itching this year might be a lot of throat swelling (and visible hives) next year - or even an unexpected major allergy attack with hives at some point.

Calling an ambulance to pick up a dinner guest kind of ruins the ambiance.

Yeah, I've been educating him on that.  Most of the allergies I suffer now are the usual cat dander and rose type allergies, but Claritin keeps that under control for me.  As a general rule, I stay away from a lot of uncooked vegetables, but most fruits are fine with me.  I love me bananas, I just don't like strawberries because of the little seeds. Lettuce I can eat, but they insist on having cucumbers as a topping-- which is another can of worms entirely.  I tried them once, I ended up with bad heartburn for a couple of weeks (GERD too, oh yay.)

Again, I can eat pickles until the cows come home, and I love my bread and butter!  Maybe its some specific enzyme... but its probably best to leave this topic alone now.

[Minmom3]

Clipped!

He still thinks I can suffer a little throat itching to make his rather salad loving parents happy, though.  That's a brainhurt.

Does he NOT realize that repeated exposure risks the reaction becoming worse and worse, to the anaphylactic level (possibly?)  Wow.  That's frightening for you.   

I no longer eat kiwi.  I adore kiwi, have since I first tasted it.  However, for a year, I lived near to where it was grown, and could get massive amounts of it at roadside stands for Very Little Money.  One day I sat down to a snack of 2 double kiwi and some cheese.  Yum, yum, yum, right?  Well....  My lips swelled up, they got tingly and a little numb, and the skin inside my mouth wasn't too happy either - and it didn't go away for nearly 3 days.  That was alarming, as I've never had a food reaction before in my life.  Easy fix, however, I just don't eat it anymore.  I avoid fruit tarts that have it on them, and if there's a small slice of it on something, I pick it off and tuck in.  So far, so good.  I'm NOT going to push my luck and pig out anymore on it, and anybody suggesting I need to eat it to keep the peace is going to get an earful.

[Zenith]

I used to use pinetarsol but the price of the soap bars (and cetaphil bars) went to 15$ each here and would last maybe 3 weeks. Far to expensive so I found that I don't react to palmers shea butter/coca butter body wash so what I do now is halve the palmers bottle and add 3-4 caps of the liquid pinetarsol to each and shake. Add as much or as less as you want. Works a treat if you let it soak on your skin for a few minutes before washing off. A big bottle of liquid pinetarsol costs me 25$ and lasts over a year and the palmers stuff I buy a bottle about every 2 months for 5$. Much cheaper an smells nicer as well.

Just make note that adding pinetarsol to liquid soap gets it expanding everywhere so whatever liquid soap you use, Split the soap between 2 containers before adding pinetarsol or it WILL make a mess and this stuff can stain. I suppose you could use liquid cetaphil as well but I've never tried.

Got this idea from a pharmacist, he got fed up with how much $$$ his family were going though because they all had some form of skin problems and he found a happy workaround.

[Giggity]

Can we take the soap stories to another thread, please?

[Amara]

Hahahahahaha.

I remembered this discussion here when I came across this article on The Consumerist that seems to speak of yet another reason to avoid Ashley Furniture: http://consumerist.com/2013/01/09/ashley-furniture-wants-to-charge-restocking-fee-for-out-of-stock-item/

[turtleIScream]

I have said this in my head many times, largely because I'm kind of picky and have high (probably unrealistic) expectations. But, I recently came across a business I can safely proclaim I will NEVER use their services again.

My husband surprised me for Christmas by arranging for a deep-clean of the house while we were out of town. I am actually pretty good at keeping up with tidying, up and general surface cleaning, but not so much the deep cleaning, so this was a great gift! Or, it was supposed to be. We got home, and I was underwhelmed. The house just didn't feel or look CLEAN. I thought I was maybe being too picky (after all, I had no input in the decision, and was unsure what expectations my husband laid out), but then he walked in, and was also disappointed.

Some of the items left undone:
Furniture was only partially dusted (the left half of the china cabinet was dusted, the right was not)
Our beds do not have bedskirts, and sit up high. They did not even attempt sweeping under the beds.
There was a leaf in the middle of the living room floor. The area rug was vacuumed, but the wood floor was not swept.
The light fixtures had cobwebs hanging from them.

My husband looked over the original agreement, highlighted the requested services that were not completed satisfactorily, and contacted the company. The company apologized and arranged for a second visit to correct the issues. They came yesterday, and the work was better, but not thorough. They will not get a third chance, and we will recommend against them to anyone we know looking for a cleaning service.

FWIW, we have had a different cleaning service in the past. We had other complaints about them (smoking on our property, breaking items while cleaning without telling us), but the house was always spotless. So I felt I had a reasonable expectation of level of cleanliness.

[WolfWay]

I live in an area prone to high crime. My house is part of a complex of similar houses that are collectively enclosed by a high wall, with a security gate that controls access to the complex. Most of the houses have a contract with a single security company that has armed response. This particular security company offered the complex a special per house discount rate because 36 of the 41 houses in the complex have contracts with this company. The complex has been grumbling for a while about slow reaction times, but they finally dropped the ball BIG TIME.

The weekend before last, someone broke into unit 24. Their alarm (which was linked to the security company) went off. Fortunately the owners weren't home. The next door neighbor (who was woken by the alarm) saw someone in her garden too and set off her panic button and decided to time how long it took for the security company to respond. They never arrived.

The next morning my dad (who also lives in the complex) heard about the whole thing and contacted the security company to find out why their armed guards didn't respond. Oh, says the guard who was on duty for our area that night, I went to number 34 instead of 24, looked around, didn't see anything wrong and left.

Hang on, this guy went to a quiet house only slightly further up from the two houses where alarms were going off and didn't go to investigate the houses where the alarms were actually going off? This sounded very fishy to my dad.

Unfortunately for the driver, my dad owns the access control pc for the security cameras in the complex, that the guard totally forgot we had, and when he reviewed the tape, not only did the driver NOT go to number 34, NOBODY from the security company even arrived in the complex at any point that night, despite two alarms going off.

So now the entire complex is going with a competing security company, who when they heard the price of the special rate useless security company were giving us immediately dropped their per unit price to match.

[MissRose]

I am considering not visiting my local IHOP again.  The food is good, but the service is very slow even for the simple order I had which took 20 minutes, and the place only had a few customers seated at the time.  I gave them 2 past tries thinking they were flukes but this 3rd time cements the fact I won't go there again unless I have unlimited time to wait around.

[BabyMama]

That reminds me of this weekend. My sister and I took DD to the Mall of America for the day. DD wanted to eat at the Rainforest Cafe. It had been probably 15 years since the last time I ate there. So we get in line and tell the hostess there are three of us. There aren't many people waiting around outside or in the store, and I can see a couple empty tables inside, so I'm hopeful. She tells us it will be at least an hour wait. BUT. If we pay $25 to join their "members club", we can get seated in 10-15.

Sorry. I don't think I want to eat at a place where I have to pay extra to eat at.

[JenJay]

Yesterday DH and I were running errands and one of the items we wanted was an OTC supplement for our cats. We checked PetCo and an employee there told us they didn't carry it but most vets would. There happens to be a vet clinic not too far down the road from our home so we decided to pop in and ask. Now I completely understand that a vet may not be comfortable selling medications, supplements, etc. to an animal they haven't personally examined, but the tone and attitude are why we won't be back.

DH walks in, waits a few minutes while someone else is gathering their pet and paying for services, then steps up to the receptionist's counter.

DH: Hi. I was wondering if you sell *supplement* for cats?
Lady: Are you a current client of Dr. VetName?
DH: No, I was told *supplement* is an OTC, and...
Lady, interrupting and annoyed: Then why are you asking?
DH: I'm sorry?
Lady: We don't sell anything to anyone who doesn't bring their pet here. Why would we?
DH: Okay then, thanks.

And he left. The thing is, we have 3 cats and probably would have used this clinic if they'd been friendly. Obviously the location is convenient. Again, it's understandable to have a "won't sell to pets whose health I haven't verified" policy, but to be so snotty about it?! No thanks.

[JenJay]

That reminds me of this weekend. My sister and I took DD to the Mall of America for the day. DD wanted to eat at the Rainforest Cafe. It had been probably 15 years since the last time I ate there. So we get in line and tell the hostess there are three of us. There aren't many people waiting around outside or in the store, and I can see a couple empty tables inside, so I'm hopeful. She tells us it will be at least an hour wait. BUT. If we pay $25 to join their "members club", we can get seated in 10-15.

Sorry. I don't think I want to eat at a place where I have to pay extra to eat at.

They want you to pay extra for the privilege of paying them for food?!

That reminds me of the mattress place we were at a few weeks ago. The one we selected wasn't in stock in the back so it was going to be an additional $100 for them to have it sent - not to me, to the store. I told the salesman "I'm not going to pay you to obtain something so you can sell it to me. I'll give you my number and you can call me when you get some in."

Of course it turned out they just so happened to have ONE left. Right. We did still purchase from them because it was a good price for a good mattress (well, after we talked them down to a good price) and I imagine the employees are instructed to tack on as many fees and up-sales as possible, I'm sure he was just doing his job.