An Afternoon in Idiotville

I had what amounts, for me (a single introvert), to a busy weekend.

After work and before cheesesteak on Friday, I started cleaning my apartment. (Okay, and I also finished a book.) I did it more thoroughly than usual; I even mopped my floors. The reason was that it was a special occasion: my first piece of furniture was arriving. Actually, I did the cleaning because I needed Pinocchio's help to carry it into the apartment, and I didn't want him to realize how untidy I actually keep the place.

Saturday morning, I picked up my new possession. (What happened to my goal of not cluttering up my place with things?) It came from a teacher who was selling off a few pieces of furniture. (He explained that his wife just "couldn't make it work" with the rest of their decor. Now am I expected to decorate the rest of the room based on this piece?) It wasn't the sofa I've been yammering about, nor the bed that I really want. It was a coffee table -- with drawers! (The cherry finish is a little redder than you see in the link.) I haven't figured out what to put in the drawers yet (having drawers to hide things in is always a plus), but I've already covered the surface with the TV schedule, the remote controls to my TV and VCR (laugh if you want, but that VCR gets me more channels than I'm paying for), and the scale drawings of my apartment.

I spent the afternoon in Idiotville, Froggy's nickname for The Maul and Big Box Row (my names for the area). I took the school's free bus for students. (I'm not about to deal with the crowd of stupid people plus have to park among them, as well.) I bought my protein bars at GNC then walked down Big Box Row to the European Market for a loaf of rye bread (not as good as the bakery in ABQ, but better than from a grocery store). Apparently, I was subconsciously influenced by all the idiots because I walked the wrong way down Big Box Row at first. On the brighter side, that burned up more calories, and it killed some of the three hours between being dropped off and picked up. I ate at Red Robin (and stretched that to almost an hour and a half), and then had 35 minutes to wait until the bus returned. (Yes, I had a book.)

Now my question is if I can duplicate that effort next weekend. The school's bus also drops off students at a local movie theater, and in that plaza are a Goodwill store (source for cheap stuff), a Dollar Tree (I'm looking for cheap frames for the certificate and picture from our team's victory in the faculty/staff bowling tournament back in December), Provino's Italian restaurant, and Factory Direct Furniture (which, based on the prices from the circular, makes me wonder if the furniture is cheap as well as inexpensive). Can I spend three hours there, even if I account for measuring furniture I might like? Oh well, as long as someplace lets me sit and read until the bus comes back for me.

Sunday was comparatively quiet. I read. I played computer games. I watched a bunch of Scooby-Doo on Cartoon Network. In the afternoon, I finally settled on where I wanted to place those surplus retaining wall stones that were left from my flower bed border. I put them between the corner of our building and the sloping driveway that leads to the downstairs apartments. But now I see that I could use about eight more to finish off that level nicely, and I really want to put two short rows closer to the bottom, and that would be about a dozen blocks, and do I really want to spend my money on landscaping materials when I have furniture to buy? Of course I do! (I want to, but I don't need to. I wonder if I have the willpower to "just say no".)

What with all that, I didn't finish the book I started. I'm kind of disappointed in that, but I finished the weekend with a sense of accomplishment for actually having achieved something.