Monday, March 27, 2017

Shopping - Not The Fun Kind

I was planning to have some finished napkin-project bags to show off here today, but that didn't happen. I spent all of Friday evening buying train tickets; I had to work at the yoga center Saturday morning, attend a fiber festival Saturday afternoon with knitting friends, and then Larry and I actually got our act together enough to GO OUT TO A MOVIE TOGETHER, just like all the other married couples do.

We walked to the movie, which was a nice idea, because it was so warm out that day and exercise and all that. Unfortunately, that meant we had to walk back, in the dark, after seeing a horror flick. Not very good planning, really.

So, yes, Larry and I managed to catch "Get Out" before it left the theaters. Now, I'm NOT a horror movie fan. But this was more old-style horror, psychological and suspense-driven, rather than people jumping out of closets wielding chainsaws or whatever it is they do in these scary films other folks watch. So I could handle it and even (gasp) ENJOY it.

What I couldn't handle, though, were all the R-rated previews that came before the movie. People, they were horrifying. All the characters were so nasty and mean and killings everywhere.

R-rated previews make me feel like this

Why, yes, I do watch "The Sound of Music" once a year. How could you tell?

Where was I? Oh, yeah, I didn't get my bags sewn up. Sunday was similarly stupidly busy, but really I don't have an excuse. And, hey, I had all morning to work on them today (I mean, after my amazingly athletic workout), but instead the handyman made me drive all over town looking for 1x5 boards. As noted here before, I do not belong in the lumber aisle of Home Depot. But, wanting this basement renovation to be done some day in the near future, I found myself once again pushing a weird-looking cart and trying to figure out how to bring home the correct items.  "NOT crooked," Andy had instructed me. "I can't make baseboards out of them if they are going every which way. And not too many knots."

Not crooked...not crooked...

I've mentioned I'm short, right? I had to climb up onto the shelf just to wrestle the 8-foot boards out from under the wires that held them in place. After that, I had to maneuver them over to the cart without bonking my own head (or that of an innocent passerby) in the process. Then, and only then, could I try to assess whether or not the boards met my handyman's criteria.

"Do you think these are straight enough for baseboards?" I asked a contractor-looking stranger in desperation.

"No, ma'am," he said. "Look how that one bows out. And that one, too."

Sigh.

Long story short (too late, I know), with the help of strangers, I managed to load 14 acceptable boards onto my (weird) cart, pay for them, and cram them into my Toyota Sienna. And if anyone managed to get a video of me attempting to slam the back gate down on my minivan before all those pieces of wood came sliding back out (NOT successful) ....well, let's just say odds are good you'll see me on YouTube soon.

Where, incidentally, I'll be wearing my new sneakers for my 15 minutes of fame, so there's that...



[Get Out image: Universal Pictures]

7 comments:

  1. Thank goodness for the kindness of contractor looking men! That sounds like a horrible task. Glad you had help!

    ReplyDelete
  2. As I got to the end of this story, I was cringing, waiting for the too-long boards to punch out the back window of your car. Because that's a thing that can happen (just ask my husband). So glad you survived with car, if not dignity, intact.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Whenever I am sent to Home Depot on an errand like that there is this big part of my inside that is just incensed that I have to go through it. Outlandishly inconvenient is what Home Depot shopping is. The one time the kind employees loaded a case of travertine onto my truck for me with a fork lift, and almost broke the whole truck. They stopped halfway down when all four tires were about to pop. Then some nice person left a nasty note on my windshield about leaving my car in the loading dock too long, then I locked my keys in the car, and well, that's not the end of the story, but you get the idea. It's just unreasonable the awkward things you have to get there.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I had to look up "travertine." Blogging is educational.

      Delete
  4. Wait...married couples go to the movies? I'll have to tell my husband.

    Thank goodness for the kindness of strangers at the Home Depot.

    ReplyDelete
  5. And the kindness of workers at Lowe's, where I just had to buy two 36" wide interior French doors. I would never have noticed that one was "bowed" but the salesperson who came along did, and picked out a straight one for me. Whew.

    ReplyDelete