I didn't know that bears like marshmallows. Good thing we don't shoot the marshmallows outside - the marshmallow gun is reserved for indoor use. We tend to use our mouths for targets! We actually bought our marshmallow gun at Bed Bath and Beyond.

Talley Sue, I'm so sorry to correct you, but you don't quite have the facts all straight on common-law marriage, and I don't want anyone to be misled. I am an attorney, and although I can't give out legal advice, I can clarify this a little. Common-law marriage does not refer the formation of the marriage, but to legal status as married WITHOUT an official marriage. It comes up way, way later in probate, property, and custody matters, or where the couple turns out not to have been eligible to marry back then so that the marriage was technically void (like being first cousins, or someone underage -- or, in some places pre-1967, of different races. Yes, really!). Few jurisdictions still recognize common-law marriage, but in those that do, the benchmark is NOT anything they do to marry. Rather, it is that a couple has held themselves out as married -- indicia include things like that they lived together, shared a surname, referred to themselves as married, jointly owned property, had kids etc. -- consistently for a long period of time -- so, the idea was, there's no point now in quibbling now about whether they had an official marriage way back when. The point for this forum is that there is definitely NO such thing as an instant common-law marriage or a common-law marriage CEREMONY -- i.e., that you can just say some formula to each other and declare yourselves married without meeting any state requirements, and then you have a common-law marriage. Those requirements vary from state to state, but all states have them, so check and see what they are where you live. Your state might not require that there be any officiant; perhaps that was what you were thinking of, Talley Sue?

Frankly, I can't see a lot of difference between Americans and Canadians - we are pretty much the same, except when it comes to shopping and then we are considered "international" - and of course our ridiculously high airline taxes. When the Cdn. $ is weak against the American $, Americans buy everything they can from Canada provided it is the same product as is sold in the U.S. (skin care etc.) - either in person or on-line - and without the horrible tax/customs/shipping hits that Cdns. are forced to pay if a product can be shipped/mailed here. Actually there are many U.S. cosmetic lines that are not allowed to ship products to Canada period since our dollar rose in value - although it is weaker now. Yes, Canada is a different country - but there are good and bad things about each of our respective countries. Everyone gets excited when a U.S. store opens here - no one who understands finance expects the prices to be the same - but we would like access to the same merchandise. Hudson's Bay (thankfully the name has returned to the original from "The Bay") carries a small selection of items under the Lord & Taylor brand. My gloves were "liberated" last January and I had to buy new ones. I looked at the Lord & Taylor gloves carried in Toronto and they were garbage - a feeling shared by other glove purchasers. I mentioned this in NY while shopping at L & T and was told that many Cdns. have said the same thing. Now Hudson's Bay has purchased Saks (although I expect it is the holding company that did the purchasing) - but do I expect Saks Canada to be the same as Saks in the U.S. - absolutely not. It would be nice if more than one store in Canada carried many of the skin care makeup lines that are offered for sale in so many U.S. stores. Pretty bad when only Holt Renfrew carries a line - makes it tough when the store is sold out and associates are no longer able to check with another Holt's location and have it delivered to the customer's store. Personally, I buy most of my clothing and my husband's at a specific consignment shop in Toronto - although the owner can only carry what the stores have been selling and a lot of it is rather unattractive - depending on your taste and "look". Food is also extremely expensive here. I really miss the linens that were made in the U.S. - they lasted for many, many years, unlike the stuff we get now. But I do not fear products made in the U.S. and judging from what I have seen Americans do not fear products made in Canada (including food and pharmaceuticals). My dog's food is made in the U.S. - costs practically double here, but he does well on it.

For decades my trips to Walmart were few and far between for a number of reasons I've outlined before. About 2 months ago a new "Super" Walmart went up not too far from from me. I decided to ignore the order given by one-who-shall-remain-nameless who ordered me to stay out of "her" Walmarts and I ventured in to look around. The big advantage is that it's open 24 hrs so I can go in during the middle of the night and avoid a lot of the traffic, although you do get the restock traffic which can be as bad. At least in this area Walmart has been forced to clean up their act a lot from what I've seen and heard, especially since Target changed the smaller stores to P-fresh. They've also converted a few stores to "Super" Targets. Target has clearly made a concerted effort to take some grocery business from the competition and with the prices I've seen, they will accomplish that. So, back to the comparisons: Carts, not much difference. Walmart's of course are new at this store so they *should* be in good shape. Target's were replaced not long ago and the plastic carts are all fine and seem to hold up a lot better than I thought they would. So equal ground there. I'll say this for the new Walmart, it's still pretty clean, and quite well maintained so far so on that level, comparable to Target. Although I suspect there's some corporate big dogs in there controlling things during the break-in period at least when I've been there. Some very definite non-Minnesota accents floating around! Pricing? Well, I've noted pricing so far on about 40 items in the local "big gun" grocery store (Cub), Target and Walmart and was quite surprised. I knew Target beat Cub on a lot of things and thought it'd be interesting to see how Walmart compares. They run a lot of TV ads comparing receipts from Cub & Walmart and claiming to be so much cheaper. I note they don't compare to Target and it's clear why. About 1/2 the items I've compared so far are identical in price. There's a number of things where Walmart is a penny or two cheaper. But there were also several things where Target was 25¢ to a couple dollars or more cheaper. I'm going to say that all in all they're pretty comparable (especially depending on what you buy, how much and how often of course). FWIW, over the past few years, a couple of the local TV stations have done their own price comparison of the stores and 2 out of 3 times Target beat Walmart quite significantly. The station's claim was you'd save $400/year at Target over Walmart in their comparison. The last one had them essentially neck in neck but an ever so slight edge to Walmart. Two big differences though that I've seen. Meat and produce. Hands down better at Target in both departments. This has been a good year for grapes so I thought I'd get some while I was at Walmart last time, but after tasting one, and spitting it out, I guessed the season was over. Two days later, at Target, I bought 3 pounds of delicious grapes. I bought apples at Walmart and thought they should be good, after all they were Honey Crisp. Bought 3, threw two. I buy apples at Target year round and never had a bad one yet. I guess I should add a third difference. Clearance items at Target. (Never really see anything on clearance at Walmart.) I like checking what's on clearance. I often seem to find something of interest and for things like cleaners and personal care items, when I have a coupon, I couple it with something on clearance and it's cheap for a good quality item. I dislike paying full retail for things like toothpaste, deodorant and the like when it's on clearance so often. Couple other things I noticed: Walmart was cheaper on can coolers, but $2 higher on the same brand name underwear. Plus Target had a "value sized" larger count package available that made it cheaper yet. The first time I was in the new Walmart, people were nearly tripping over themselves asking if they could help, which was *highly* unusual for my normal Walmart, uh, shall we say, "experience". But that situation is pretty much the same as at most of the other places around here these days. (The strategy is for every employee to make contact with every customer they can, and you don't just tell them where things are at, you bring them to it for the "personalized" touch and to help cut shoplifting since people will think they're being noticed in the store.) But I've noticed that is wearing down each subsequent trip in there. Maybe the employees are getting sick of it. Could have been that they just started the job and were excited to have the job at first, IDK. Hard to say, but I'm curious to see what will happen with that. I haven't gone to other Walmarts around here for a long time so I can't say if they vary prices from store to store but they do vary at Target and I do find that a bit annoying. They're all within a few miles of each other but the prices can vary. So will I be a Walmart regular? (Whether or not I'm "ordered" to stay out! LOL) I guess I might pick up a few staples during the middle of the night if I'm up. Not too sure I want to go there during the day. Target can be busy but still not the issues that I've encountered before in the W place. Have to wait and see I guess.