Boaz

A few weeks ago, Donna and I were out looking for the Mount Pisgah Cemetery (in Graves County) where my Great Grandfather and Great Grandmother Peeples are buried. After we left, we headed home and passed a post office which brought back memories. It was the Boaz Post Office. You see for the first 21 years of my life, my mailing address was in Boaz Kentucky. We didn't live close to Boaz, it was ten miles away or so. When I would say that as my address, I would get strange looks from people. They'd say "Boaz, where is that?". It also is pronounced as one syllable and not two - I had this discussion with a lot of people though. When we went to a post office, we generally went to one of the Paducah ones. I do remember my mom taking me to the Boaz Post Office to buy stamps. I used to collect stamps when I was young and I bought several commemoratives and plate blocks there.

I was in the area today, so I went back to look around more closely. There isn't a whole lot there, in fact the Post Office is it. There aren't even any of those neat green signs telling you that you are in Boaz (for example, I live between Hamburg and New York which are clearly marked with those signs). I pulled out my Kentucky Place names book and got a little more info.

Boaz (Graves County) A hamlet with po was until recently (note: this book was written in 1984) was located at the jct of KY 849 and the Illinois Central Railroad tracks, just yards east of the Mayfield Creek and 9 miles North of Mayfield. The Post Office (est on Sept 20, 1869) was named for Joshua Boaz, one of the largest property owners in the county who in 1854 gave the New Orleans and Ohio (now the Illinois Central) Railroad passage through his plantation. The station became an important shipping point on the railroad and the community that developed around it was incorporated in 1888. In the past few years, the community has begun to shift to the Viola-Boaz Road (over 1/4 mile to east) where the Post Office was relocated to.

When I hear the Boaz vs. Bo-az discussions, I of course think of one of my favorite Bible accounts. Boaz and Ruth ended up being the great-grandparents of King David.

I pulled up to the post office and got a picture and headed for home. I went down Wice Church Road and passed Straub Cemetery Road. These roads reminded me of a couple of adventures I'd been on when I was young, but I'll leave that discussion for another time.

Midnight Delight...

For Father's Day, Donna asked me what kind of dessert I wanted. I turned a few things over in my mind. I had recently gotten an email ad for Cold Stone Creamery ice cream cakes. The cupcakes I got for Donna from there for Valentine's day were excellent, so I thought I'd give it a try.

You have the option of ordering online. You first specify where you want to order from. Then you decide what cake you want. They have some types already listed for you. You also have the choice of making your own cake based on the type of cake and ice cream you want. Then, you specify the size you want and finally the date and time you want to pick the cake up. I chose one of the already listed types - Midnight Delight. This was chocolate cake with chocolate ice cream and a chocolate shell with chocolate sprinkes. I chose a small round cake (6 inches in diameter) and specified it's pickup on the night before Father's Day at 5:00pm.

When Saturday came, I went to pick up the cake. It was ready when I got there of course. The first thing I noticed was it looked smaller than I expected. It ended up feeding us for three days (plus an extra piece for Jonathan when he came to visit) so it worked out OK. The cake did not disppoint. It was easily one of the best desserts I've ever had and definitely the best ice cream cake. It was rich so you didn't want to eat huge slices of it. The only drawback is cost. The small one we ordered was a little over 25.00. It was excellent though and I'd recommend you consider giving one of these a try for your next special event.

Customer Service

Last weekend, Donna and I went to Nashville. We wanted to see our new nieces Charlotte and Catherine plus Brody and Amelia. We also wanted to see how my cousin Donna was (she had an extended stay there at a hospital). We had a really good time spending time with all of them.

On the way to see Donna, we stopped at Krispy Kreme. It was free doughnut day and they gave everybody a free doughnut (I got a chocolate cake one and it was great). I ordered a dozen more donuts. I asked for six of my favorite (chocolate ice-creamed filled) and six glazed. The lady went to get fresh doughnuts from the back and I paid for them and left.

We decided go to the Shoney's for dinner. I hadn't had a piece of hot fudge cake in a long time - I used to love it when we had a Shoney's in Paducah. We went to the Shoney's on Donelson Pike. It was busy (seafood buffet night) but not totally swamped. We were seated promptly and brought drinks. We ordered and waited. And we waited some more. I noticed our waitress was very exasperated and reached the point where she actually loudly complained and even cursed. I saw the assistant manager call her aside and tell her not to complain in front of customers. I saw numerous customers call the manager and assistant manager aside. Finally after 40 minutes, we got our food. It was cold which mean it had set out for a long while. We didn't feel comfortable there after listening to the waitress complain. I didn't bother ordering the hot fudge cake. So we left after we ate.

We went back to the hotel. I had solace in that I had my doughnuts waiting for me. I opened the box and was devastated. Instead of chocolate ice cream filled, it had chocolate covered glazed. I ate them and they were OK, but just not the same. At this point I went ahead and sent emails to both companies letting them know the issues I had and went to bed.

When I got up the next day, I had an email waiting from Krispy Kreme apologizing profusely for the problem. I hadn't heard from Shoney's but it was the weekend so I figured it might be a few days. We got back to Paducah and on Monday, I got a phone call from the manager of the Krispy Kreme we'd bought the doughnuts from. He apologized profusely and said I was to ask for him the next time I was town and he'd give me a free dozen doughnuts to make up for this. A few days later I received a coupon from the main Krispy Kreme office for a dozen free doughnuts that I had up to a year to use.

You might be wondering what Shoney's did. In a word, they did NOTHING. I have yet to hear anything from them not even a "Sorry, you just need to get over it". In this day and time where people are not spending money as freely as they used to and competition is fierce. it certainly isn't a time to skimp on customer service. You can guess what place I'll go back to and which one I won't. I'll have to get my hot fudge cake fix somewhere else.