Remember when I told you about Kraft's Single Best Town contest? Well, it's back, and this time they've given me the opportunity to give a little something-something to you.

Money.

Oh, yes. MONEY.

First, a little stroll down memory lane . . . Last month I asked you to enter to win a Love and Theft concert for your hometwon by telling Kraft the Single Best Thing about your hometown. The responses were pretty amazing, and now Kraft has picked the ten semifinalists. Mosey on over to the Kraft site and vote for one of them, mmkay? C'mon back when you're done.

Ready?

Perfect.

Now, on to how you can win one of two $125 Amex gift cards. It's simple, really. Leave a comment below telling me what your Single best afternoon looks like in your hometown. Would it be a day marveling at the wonders of a museum? A stroll through a shopping district? A day at an amusement park? A tour of all of your favorite restaurants? I'll randomly select two winners from the comments on this post the night of March 24th. Each winner will get a $125 Amex gift card.

If I'm answering the question, I'm somehow managing to combine a funnel cake from The Farmers Market, a few hours at Phipps Conservatory, a milkshake from Dave & Andy's, a bike road along the Eliza Furnace Bike Trail, and some splashing at the Water Steps on the North Shore. (Don't even tell me you're surpised that my Single best afternoon would involve food and lots of photo opportunities. ;-) )

And go!

Disclosure: I have partnered with KRAFT Foods to help promote the “Single Best Town” in America program.  I have been compensated for my time commitment to the program, which includes writing about my own hometown experiences and hosting a giveaway where the prize has been provided by KRAFT Singles.  However, my opinions are entirely my own and I have not been paid to publish positive comments.

I am a bargain hunter. I can smell good prices from miles away. Alexis has a closet full of still-a-little-too-big stuff to prove it. A $6 pair of Gap jeans. A $4 Gap sweater. An $8 sundress. Oh, yes. I am good at seeking and destroying clearance racks.

One skill I haven't mastered, however, it the art of consignment. I know there are great deals out there, but I never seem to be in the right place at the right time. When I received an email from the folks behind the Snuggle Bugs consignment event, I decided it was a sign. It's a sign that it's time for me to conquer this new frontier of bargain hunting.

There's only one problem. Snuggle Bugs offered me a preview pass for Friday, March 12th. I can't go on  March 12th because I have to work. Funny thing, you can't spend money if you don't earn it first. So. Are you in Pittsburgh? Got kids? Want to go peruse some bargains before anybody else has a chance to buy up all the good stuff? Leave a comment and I'll randomly select a winner at 9:00pm March 11th. The free pass to get into the event will be emailed to the winner. The pass also happens to include a $5 coupon, so it's like you would be getting paid to go.

The details:

What: Snuggle Bugs & Company consignment event

Where: former Value City store at 292 Curry Hollow Road, Pleasant Hills

When: Presale runs Friday, March 12th from 10:00am to 8:00pm

If you don't win, you can always check it out after the presale. Snuggle Bugs & Company will run March 13th-20th.

And . . . comment!

It's been about a month since I first tinkered with a free trial Squarespace account. What started as just a few minutes of playing around and trying to figure out if I hated Squarespace ended with me burning Blogger to the ground. It all happened in a matter of hours. I created a layout, imported all of my posts from Blogger, and pulled the trigger that switched the .com over to the new platform very quickly. I haven't regretted it for even a second.

Now that I've had some time to get used to Squarespace, I think I've sorted out the good and the bad. It's not perfect on this side of the fence, but I am liking it. Definitely.

First, the bad:

1. The cost. There is no arguing that getting Blogger for free is better than paying to use Squarespace. More on that in a bit, though.
2. Spell check. Squarespace has a built in spell check feature, just like Blogger does, but I happen to prefer to use the one built into Firefox. Something about how the new post window pops up renders Firefox's spellchecker useless. So, rather than getting little red underlines as I go, I have to remember to run spell check at the end. Annoying.
3. Comment threading. I didn't have it at Blogger, and I don't have it here. I'm probably going to install some 3rd party commenting tool, but it would be better if Squarespace would just get its act together. Comment threading is a pretty basic feature, IMHO.
4. Automatic draft saving. Blogger had it. Squarespace doesn't. I've lost (and had to rewrite) more than a few posts because I had been timed out of Squarespace before I had a chance to save my progress. First of all, I don't really see the point in getting timed out and automatically logged out of Squarespace. I would rather it just left me logged in at all times, but if they insist on that little layer of security, at least save my posts for me automatically. Again, annoying.
5. No Gravatar support. Blogger made it possible for most anybody to make sure they had an avatar next to their name when they left a comment on my site. Squarespace makes it pretty much impossible for anyone to do the same. My preferred way of solving that little dilemma would be for Squarespace to start supporting Gravatars.

I could probably come up with a few more "bad" things about Squarespace, but it would require some nitpicking for sure. Truly, it's very easy to use and, overall, has been a good thing for me. Here's some of the best things about it:

1. Customer Support. THEY HAVE IT. If something was wrong in Blogger (such as the never-ending mystery of my occasionally disappearing comments), there wasn't a thing I could do about it. You get what you pay for, and I wasn't paying for customer support. Squarespace, on the other hand, has answered questions in a matter of minutes each time I've asked. I once submitted a support ticket at 2:00am. It was resolved at 2:12am. I'd call that a win.
2. Spam control. Again, THEY HAVE IT. I didn't have a lot of trouble with spam comments on Blogger, but I did have to occasionally turn on word verification to get rid of a spam-bot. So far, I've had two spam comments on Squarespace and both were easily deleted and the IP addresses attached to them were blocked with just one click.
3. HTML and CSS. I dont' need to know them anymore. I used to spend hours playing in HTML and CSS to force my Blogger site to look the way I wanted it to look. I still believe you can do anything on Blogger, if you have the time and know-how to do it (Which, by the way, I don't. I am just stubborn enough to try to figure things out, though.). However, on Squarespace, I don't need to know how to do it. There are easy-to-use site building tools in place that make it possible to modify the site appearance without having a clue about HTML and CSS. This makes me happy.
4. Multiple blogs. If I had wanted to do an ad-free page on Blogger for the express purpose of doing reviews, I know it could have been done. However, it would have been a giant pain in the ass. It took three seconds for me to create a new page within Squarespace. It took an additional four seconds for me to add a blog to the page and then configure the page to not display ads in the sidebar.
5. Control panel. The Control Panel within Blogger is fairly easy to navigate, but it looks like it was created by a group of drunk 4-year olds when you compare it to the equivalent within Squarespace. Everything on the back-end is just crazy simple here, and I mean that in the best way possible.

In short, Squarespace > Blogger. There is no doubt about it.

Earlier in the week, the never-ending conversation on Twitter somehow turned to a discussion about restaurant.com. There was a lot of back-and-forth, but the short of the long is that it's a website that allows you to buy gift certificates for various restaurants for pennies on the dollar. LITERALLY. Pennies on the dollar. Just enter your zip code and the site will give you a list of available gift certificates for your area.

I've used restaurant.com quite a few times in the past. Any time we have family coming to town, I jump over to wantnot.net and search for a discount code and then pick up three or four gift certificates for practically nothing. For example, I've picked up a $25 gift certificate for Sports Rock for $2.00. Yes, $2.00. There is almost always a discount code available, and as the end of the month nears, the discounts go deeper. (As of right now, the discount code SAVOR will get you 80% off, but the code expires at the end of February.)

There aren't a lot of restaurants to choose from, but given the huge discounts, I'm generally OK with that. Also, you have to really read the fine print for each restaurant. Some of the gift certificates are more like coupons (i.e. $25 gift certificate, but you have to spend $50 to use it). Some of the gift certificates are only valid on certain days of the week. Some of the gift certificates can't be used to purchase alcohol. Regardless, if you know what you're buying, you can get a heck of a deal on a meal out.

I've used the gift certificates at Red Star, Sports Rock, J. Clark's, Claddagh, Red Hot and Blue, and a few other places. Never once have I had a problem with them. We've even made it out of a few places only paying the tip (we always tip based on the amount that the bill would have been without the gift certificate and then kick in an extra buck or two) putting the total cost of a meal for three at under $5.

I call that a win.

If you want to stop me in my tracks as I'm on a Delete! Delete! Delete! mission in my inbox, ask me what the single best thing is about my town. It turns out that it's a hard question for me to answer, but I HAVE to answer it. After some deliberation, I think I may have figured it out. I think I know the one thing that makes Pittsburgh better than any other place on Earth. And, in the coming weeks, I'll tell you my answer.

But first, Kraft wants to hear what you think is the single best thing about your town. Head on over to the Single Best Town site and post a photo and description of what makes your town great. If you do, you'll automatically be entered in a contest to potentially bring Love and Theft to a block party in your town. You've got until February 28th to enter.

Now for some legalese:

Disclosure: I have partnered with KRAFT Foods to help promote the “Single Best Town” in America program.  I have been compensated for my time commitment to the program, which includes writing about my own hometown experiences and hosting a giveaway where the prize has been provided by KRAFT Singles.  However, my opinions are entirely my own and I have not been paid to publish positive comments.

Did you catch the part about me hosting a giveaway? YEAH, BABY! A giveaway is coming soon and it's gooooood.

Now, go! I mean, obviously Pittsburgh is the Single Best Town, but somebody has to say why over on the Kraft site (since I'm not eligible), right?