Days left to my birthday: 23

I hate to start the week off like this but I just have to let this all out.

D made reservations for us to take the MIL to the horse races on Sunday. So, Sunday morning we pack the MIL, the BIL, D and myself and head out to the PNE for the racing (which started just after 1pm). The hostess had told D that we could park in the racing parking lot and we wouldn't have to pay for parking or for entrance to the PNE. We pull up to the parkade and D tells the attendant that we're there for the races. "Sorry sir, unless you're with one of the teams, you'll have to pay for the parking". Instead of arguing, he pays the $15 for parking. We walk over to the gate and he tells the attendant that we're there for the racing. "Sorry sir, you still have to pay the PNE entrance fee". $15 per person and $5 for the senior. $50. D is starting to get irritated but says nothing. I'm having a caniption. We walk up to the race track and take the elevator to the restaurant. We knew that the buffet was going to be $15 per person (which is actually a really great deal) but we weren't ready for what came next. We walk up to the desk, D asks for our reservations. "That's going to be $25 please". "Oh," says D. "Did the price go down?" Blond bomshell behind the counter "No sir, that's the cover cost." "The what??" says D, getting visibly irritated. "The cover charge." says bomshell "We charge $5 cover for every reservation." Holly shit people. I was LIVID. I totally lost it. "You mean I have to pay $5 just for making a reservation? Why don't you just charge $20 for the food and call it a day? No one mentioned anything about a cover charge! And now that I'm at it, whoever we talked to also told us that parking and PNE entrance were free! We had to pay for all that!!! And WHERE THE HELL IS MY FREE PROGRAM?" Oh boy. Everyone there was looking at me like I was freakin' crazy. WTF man! I spent $90 before even eating! Never, ever, ever again.

Once I got past the money, I was a bit better. I managed to win one race (thanks to D's uncle who joined us a few minutes later and has a permanent horshoe up his ass). I asked him what to put my money on and his suggestion won me $40. No fortune but all of the money I'd lost up to that point. After the races we took a walk through the PNE and just before leaving we stopped into the casino. The uncle with the horshoe decided to play a couple of hands of blackjack. D also decided to put in his last $20. At a $10 table, that lasted 6 minutes. I gave him another $10 and he managed to stay in for a few more and then busted. After watching uncle play for a while I decided to play my luck and sat down next to him with my last $20. In ten minutes, I'd made $60. I walked away while I was ahead and managed to walk out with $80 at the end of the day. Not too shabby.

I did take some great photos of the sand sculpture competition and of a very, very very cool car. You can check out all the pictures here.

Sorry again for the rant. Should be back to regularly scheduled programming tomorrow!