powered by SignMyGuestbook.com
powered by SignMyGuestbook.com
Recent News... Just for Pope Gregory... |
2001-12-17 - 11:16 a.m. Travels of a baby barbute Wednesday night was Hamlet. I love having tickets to the Shakespeare Theatre. Yes, it's odd to see Hamlet played by someone who looks like (as Rags put it) the lost member of "The Police," but stranger still is seeing Horatio played by someone who looks a lot like Roland and Ophelia with a startling resemblance to Seonaid. I don't think the people to our left ever use their seats - they were still empty at intermission, so Rags and Kymber moved down. We stood in the parking garage (startling place since they went to color coding the levels in neon shades) chatting long enough the actors blew past us on the way to their cars. Once home, Alan's truck, Rhett, decided for no discernable reason, not to start so it lived at our house overnight and started fine the next morning. Maybe it has a crush on my neighbor's SUV. In the ongoing battle to clean and organize the house, I drug poor Roland to IKEA on Thursday. He enjoys IKEA slightly more than the Container Store (which is to say, not at all). But I was done with the piles of unshelved books. Done, done, done. We take a brief tour around the show room just to double check catalog perceptions against real measurements. (Of course I took a measuring tape. Are you mad?) Hand the list of items to the IKEA rep. So, did you want to look at the � I want that list, exactly that list, in my truck as fast as humanly possible. So what color did you want? There's white or � Beech. Top of the list says 'beech.' Really, I'm all decided Finished. That list, in truck, soon as possible. Roland backs away slowly from Theo on a tear, trying to pretend he's not necessarily with the crazy redhead. Of course, it's not that easy. Three items come from the wearhouse. The rest, please pick that up from self-serve area. Yeah, cause picking up seven 80" tall bookcases from self-serve is easy. Well, we sold so many, we wanted to reduce wait time so we put them in self-serve Lame and lazy. Especially because the carts they give you are too narrow to fit the shelves. Their most popular item doesn't fit the caddy. Stupid. I hate stupid people. We had to put the shelves on the cart perpendicular, so now you have an 80" wide load to push through the aisles but � they've blocked the aisles with Christmas ornaments displays. I made the IKEA folks help us steer the thing through sideways because I was done. In a small display of rationality, I left Roland (who was way more civil than I after the goat rodeo of loading the cart) to pay while I brought the truck around. Guess what? We still had to get them to pull those three non-self serve things out of the warehouse. Roland and another random IKEA guy load the truck while I go back inside to find the next cart full of goodies. I need your receipt. �. We just showed you the receipt, remember -then we gave you the list of stuff you pulled from the cart. � I've gotta have the receipt � It's out in the truck and I am *not* breathe to gather patience Tell you what, why don't we take my stuff to the truck and I'll show you the receipt, AGAIN. A bit of wrangling later, the girl decides she can tear herself away from flirting with her unoccupied co-worker and load my car. I hate stupid people. Roland points out IKEA is not exactly a full service store and that's the part of the much cheaper. All true, but it's safer if you're just quietly rational over there while my Scot-Irish temper is up. I'll be rational later, baby. Yeah, really all for the best not to go to Last Chance tonight. It's very late already and I am obviously three clicks past done and we still have the unloading phase. Friday was a much, much better day for me. Kirsten came over to sew - a play day we'd arranged months ago. Much fun and visiting. At least with Kirsten, I don't worry about the wreck of a house, because let me tell you - adding the bookshelf project made it worse before it got better. Roland got all dressed to go to work. He sat on the couch with his laptop, processing work email until he eventually fell asleep. I assume he called in sick at some point because the poor plague victim just dozed on the couch most of the day. Thjora and I stayed ensconsed in the sewing nest and left him dozing in peace. Of course, there were evening festivities at the new Chez Meng and Brian. As we organize dinner plans I rouse Roland to see if he's ready to leave. Not going. he mumbles and snuggles down on the couch nap nest. I order the poor guy a pizza and got upstairs to change. I riffled my evening wear, but everything was either (a) leftover bridesmaid's dress (b) sequined and annoying or (c) just a decent work outfit. I just don't keep my semi-formal wardrobe in any sort of order. God, I hate shopping. Comfy sweater and skirt did just fine. Picked up A&G and the Kirsten and we stopped for dinner (delay of game for waitress with lack of clue and alacrity) before heading to the new place. The party was fabulous. Meng has their new place more 'done' and decorated in a week than we've gotten ours in seven years. Scary, huh? Ryan bought Ilse some serious red heels to go with her short green dress. (Thjora: Ohmigod, that's Ilse and she has legs) We hung out until 2 or 3 am? Somewhere in there. Brian was serving the wonderful, evil Red Bull and double Vodka's. I only had one early on because I was driving. The caffeine in Red Bull would keep anyone vibrating in place. Tonton did an couple rounds of champagne tasting, trying to decide what to serve at their wedding. (Go with #2.) Saturday was IKEA phase 2 - assembly. It's actually not too bad to assemble the stuff - but two rooms worth of bookshelves takes awhile. Not to mention the pre-work of moving of the books and knickknacks. And it's not like we got an early start after the Meng party. Kirsten wandered over from A&G, bringing bagels, and settled down for more sewing. By the end of the weekend, she developed a love-hate relationship with my sewing room. Love the sewing room. Love the toys. (Another person falls for my cutting table) Hate the sewing room - been in here toooooo long. Meanwhile, we're on the reshelving phase. We knew where everything went on the old bookshelves, but now we must invent an entire new system. So I called Nia, cause she's always hated our random shelving of books - makes her crazy whenever she visits, library employee person that she is. Nothing but her voice mail, but I left a message � Hey! We were thinking of alphabetizing the fiction books, but then it wouldn't drive you nuts anymore, so maybe we won't. � That'll get my butt kicked sometime soon. We compromised and actually did alphabetize - except for one author we put on the taller shelves because it was all hardbacks and didn't fit on the next shelf in the alphabetically order. And because Nia will eventually find the one misplaced and twitch. And I need to make eggnog for a Sunday brunch contribution. So I call my mother to get my grandmother's recipe and she's not home. How can this happen? Mother's are obligated to be home when you need a recipe, but � I had to wait until late evening for a return call. Honey, Mammy never made eggnong So what was the big yellow bucket of yummy egg stuff every Christmas? Boiled custard - it's similar, but not eggnog. My grandmother died when I was sixteen and memories are tricky things. Mom gives me the recipe and I realize that it just won't be the same, custard's not really drinkable. But my cookbooks are buried deep in the pile to be reshelved. But my nephew picks up the phone and roars like a lion for me, so all is not lost. I went back to IKEA to return a few extras we decided not to use and exchange two short shelves for a different width. We picked up the wrong ones from the self-serve area. Argh. It's okay - an hour up and back to listen to Harry Potter in the car. While I was gone, Alan and Gen turned up and the group ordered pizza. I know, because I meet the pizza guy in the driveway just as I was unloading shelves. No, no, don't hand me the pizza - I'd holding a 40 lb box - No, don't block the doorway. I'm holding a 40 lb box. I hate stupid people. Roland brough a minature barbute helmut paperweight at Leeds armory. It was destinted (so he told me) for office d�cor. Upon my return from IKEA, I find the menancing little thing dead center of the new shelves, staring at me - like I expect green glowing eyes any second here. Oh, no - it's not staying there. Roland protests, but I am unmoved. Sunday, we got up earlier than we wanted. I was all for rolling over and sleeping till noon, but I realized I had that Sunday brunch at Jim's (one of my coworkers). Up and reshelve the cookbooks so I can find them. Ahh, Joy of Cooking has a recipe for eggnog. Oh - it takes three hours to make. Damn. I look at the kitchen, covered with mail and pizza boxes and dirty dishes. Bugger - we'll just pick it up at the grocery store. I go back upstairs to find the tiny barbute helmet have move to the shelf at the landing - where it can glare evilly at anyone coming up the steps. Oh, no. It's not staying here either! I hear Roland laugh. You did that on purpose you bastard! Kirsten giggling from the sewing room. We leave Kirsten sewing while we head downtown for a lovely brunch. They played Godzilla versus the Monster from Planet Zero in the background. We chatted with Scott and Jason for awhile (okay, Jason really needs to cook me dinner soon.) Jason had bottles of homemade ginger mead to share. Our host, Jim had bought a copy of Cooking Light to make the stuffed french toast cause I told him about it, but was too much a slacker to copy the recipe. Sunday afternoon was spent in nap/movie cycle and Sunday evening in the reshelving/whining. Pain in the a** reorganizing all the non-fiction, especially because all the books are so tall Why can't art books be short? I think I'm going to hide the baby barbute somewhere it can't startle people. Or maybe I'll sneak it into the freezer where it'll make Gen jump the next time she get out the peanut butter cup ice cream and picks out all the peanut butter cups. (Yeah, I do it too - but it makes Roland really cranky.) Now off to the office Christmas party. Which means I can sneak off early. Woo-hoo! You know, the closet shelf needs organizer boxes. Wonder if Kymber wants to go to the container store?
� � � 
|