Spring Cleaning

I took a shovel home from work because it was supposed to be warm this weekend, and I thought I'd take the opportunity to clear leaves, dirt, and dead weeds from along the curb on my block. (That's "kerb" for those of you who speak English.)

What I didn't expect was how unseasonably warm it would be. It nearly reached 70 degrees F, and it's already in the mid-50's this morning. (I dressed far too warmly and need to go home at some point and trade my winter jacket for my unlined raincoat.)

I did the shoveling. I also hung the curtains in my bedroom and living room (they look more like real rooms now) and did one load of laundry. (I got lazy yesterday afternoon and didn't do the second.)

I also (sigh) went shopping with Thing One. The goal was to see if Target or Kohl's would have towels in the colors I still want, and to let Thing One mosey around Earth Fare. (She likes some foods that regular groceries don't carry.) As you expect (glad to see your foreshadowing alarm is still functioning), I didn't get what I went for.

Neither Target nor Kohl's had towels in the colors I want. However, I did buy some napkins (black ones, which aren't shown on the link), placemats (all the store had left was two), a pair of chile rugs for the kitchen (which aren't shown on the website), and a pair of mission style rugs for the living room (which also aren't on the website). My major concern now is where to put the rugs. But what if we can get Froggy to put an electrical outlet in the living room closet? Then I could move the TV stand, stereo table, or computer desk into the closet and rearrange my furniture before deciding where the rug should go!

Okay, so my major concern isn't the only concern.

Sad to say, I'm in for more shopping this week. K-Mart's weekly ad shows two types of towels on sale, and the picture has one color that might be exactly what I'm looking for. Belk has Fiesta dinnerware at a good price (plus an additional fruit bowl for just $1.00 more!)

Then, because Thing One had a curious, roving eye while at Home Depot, I might go back and buy this rug for my bedroom. (Yeah, I still haven't bought my bed yet, but I'm buying everything else around it.) It's very similar (same manufacturer) to this one from Target -- but a lot less expensive.

Seriously, this apartment that I thought was cheap junk is turning out to be quite comfortable and liveable (and well-decorated, if I do say so myself). I might just have to throw a party when I'm done.

The Eighth Deadly Sin

As I changed out of my bathing suit into dry clothes after swimming my laps this morning, I saw that a student had written the Seven Deadly Sins on the wall between the lockers, one per concrete block. Then, he added one of his own. From the top down...

Greed

Lust

Sloth

Gluttony

Pride

Wrath

Envy

Football

What's up, Doc?

I figured I should give you a little report of what I did during my trip. The main thing was, of course, to visit my mom, but I also saw some old friends, had my teeth cleaned and checked, had my not-quite-annual physical, and got my eyes examined.

My eyes, teeth, and most of my vital statistics were unchanged (or not significantly different). The one thing that did change -- and it improved -- was my good cholesterol level, which went up. I'm not sure what I've been doing differently, unless it's having that handful of almonds as a mid-morning snack. Now back to my struggle with portion control.

Truth is, also, funnier than fiction.

This sums it up nicely.

http://www.unshelved.com/2011-1-17

It doesn't say what they did with it, either -- if they even kept it.

Among the 160+ work e-mails which accumulated during my vacation was the announcement for the third annual "Got Talent show".

Got grammar?

Boy, are my upper extremities fatigued by a buildup of lactic acid!

Got back this afternoon from a week and a half vacation in New Mexico, which is why you haven't seen a post from me in a while. I've unpacked, sorted my mail and newspapers, and prepped my gym bag for the morning. Now I just need to psych myself up to go to bed two time zones east of what I had become accustomed to and, even worse, getting up at my usual time for working out then work.

It would be so much easier if I could just teleport everywhere.

Holy shmegeggy!

It wasn't a lot of snow, but it was a lot of shoveling. For 1.75 days, all sense of routine was suspended, and I was shoveling. In fact, I even skipped my morning workouts and just started shoveling first thing.

I swept the snow from my front sidewalk before going to work Monday, and I thought we got about 4". However, the handy sticker on the Manplow I used (and broke, after just four hours) says there was actually 6". You see? It really is bigger than it looks!

I do need to thank the half of my crew that came in to work, and the members of Froggy's crew that helped out. Plus, it was handy that we had a large loader/backhoe and small trackhoe on campus from another project, so that probably helped us clear the roads and parking lots faster than we would have otherwise. Campus is ready to reopen* -- but the rest of The Noog is not.

And before you ask me, like the whiny employees who said, "But it's not my fault I couldn't get to work," no, you do not get to use vacation or sick time for your two days off. First off, how fair would that be to the employees that did come in and shoveled snow while you stayed at home, playing video games? Second, getting paid might encourage the same employees to stay at home the next time it snows. Third, how come the employee that lives 40+ miles away drove here, but you couldn't? (And, sad to say, one employee, who lives just one block farther from campus than I, phoned to ask if he had to come to work.)

* Skippy said yesterday that the headmaster "was literally gushing" that we had campus ready to go. Eww! Is that anything like, "I'm so happy I could just barf"?

Here's another fine mess you've gotten us into!

I meant to write this earlier in the week, but a few days' delay has just helped this become more anhydrous. (Make yourself comfy. This will take a while, but I guarantee that you'll be entertained.)

As I mentioned in my 12/28/10 post "You're never too old to learn", Thing One and I went to J. C. Penney's last weekend, where I bought some curtains and a bed set for my apartment. What I didn't bother to mention was that both types of curtains were on sale at 50% off -- plus a further 10% with a coupon from the weekly circular. The bed set was listed at $169.99, but I bought it on clearance for $50.00 -- less the additional 10%. I paid for the bedroom curtains with a gift card I got for Christmas from the St. Bernard. I paid for the living room curtains with a gift card I got from Skippy and two American Express gift cheques (from an aunt) I had been saving for a rainy day. So, the bed set was the only item purchased with my own money. Do I know how to get a deal, or what?

Well, Thing One wanted to go back to Penney's on Sunday to see if her curtains (which she had ordered several days before mine) had been delivered yet, and to exchange the bathroom rug set she had bought for a different color. I tagged along, strictly for the purpose of making sure she didn't make a wrong turn on the way, since this was the first time she was driving herself there. (If your foreshadowing alarm isn't going off right now, send it out to be checked.)

While in the bathroom section, I noted that the January white sale had already started. Hey, the towels, rugs, and shower curtain were all on sale for 40% off, and some of the towels (navy and red) and the toilet rug (navy) fit with the new color scheme I planned, and the shower curtain matched both the color and theme exactly, so why not buy them while I was there?

Oh, since we're already here... Thing One wanted to look for tablecloths and placemats. I went to browse the lamps in the next department, just to keep myself entertained. Hey, does that say... Yep, Thing One verified my eyesight; that lamp (not this one, but similar) was indeed marked down 80% for clearance, and it was a style I liked (after seeing dozens of lamps elsewhere that I had no interest in), but there was only one with the pink clearance sticker, although there were two otherwise identical lamps on the shelf with it. We saw no salesperson in the department, so we took the lamp back to the drapery department and asked K (whom we might call not our "personal shopper" but our personal sales assistant) if the clearance tag was accurate and if the other lamps also were on clearance even though they weren't marked as such. She didn't know, since it wasn't her department, but she walked with us back over there and asked W (the saleswoman who had appeared) if the other lamps also were on clearance. "No!" was W's quick response, complete with scowl. Oh, well. I might as well get another one, even at full price, since it would look stupid if I had just one lamp on my nightstands (which I haven't found yet). As we carried the two lamps back to K's department, she muttered that it was ridiculous that only one lamp was discounted, and my heart leapt at the thought of... Well, that would be wishing a little too hard, wouldn't it, to hope that I'd get both at the lower price.

"Oh, you've been looking for a bookcase, haven't you?" Thing One asked, and suggested we browse the furniture department. K kindly offered to store our items on the "hold" shelf in the back, and we moseyed on. Hoo boy.

I saw a lot of nice pieces, and I had some questions about a bookcase (on sale at 50% off), but D, the salesman, was busy with other customers, so we looked at mattresses. Well, Thing One wants a queen size bed instead of the long twin borrowed from the dorms (imagine how I feel after 18 months on one), and I could just buy the king size mattress I want and lean it against the wall until I order the platform bed I've been pondering lately (and the mattress would also help insulate the wall while it's leaning there), and the signs do say that all mattresses are the "lowest price of the season" -- and did D tell us that, if I signed up for a store credit card, I'd get an additional 10% off the day's purchases?

No, it would not be out of place right now to hope for D's sake that he's on commission.

Oh, the bookcase? Well, one side of the sign said the sale price was $100 higher than the side D quoted, but that one was wrong since the previous shift hadn't bothered checking all the signs, so the price he told us was the right one. Thanks, D. It's really tempting, so let me ponder it as we continue to mosey.

Hmm, that dinette set looks nice, and it's the right size for the apartment, and the finish would go with the kitchen cabinets, and it's marked 50% off, too, and the set certainly is sturdier than the ones we saw in the discontinued furniture store, and the chairs are large enough for my giraffe legs and hippo butt (I think so, Brain, but what if the hippo won't wear the beach thong?)... Let's check the dimensions of that bookcase, shall we?

The bookcase was a little larger than the two I had perused at other stores, and it was a lot better quality, and the cherry finish would match my coffee table and TV stand, and it really does look suh-weet, and those glass doors slide "like buttah", and, even though it's wider than the other two bookcases I saw, it probably would still fit where I was thinking of placing it, and it's awfully expensive contrasted with the other two, but it is 50% off, and, you know, whenever I leave The Noog, I think it would just fit in that corner of my condo bedroom which I had designated as my reading nook (what better piece for a reading nook than a suh-weet bookcase?)...

By the way, D said, that dinette set also was marked with the wrong price. The actual sale price was lower than the one on the sign. (Or maybe he just liked my smile.)

Okay, I know when I'm beaten. D might as well have been a young Vogon shouting, "Resistance is useless!"

Here's how it all ended up: mattress = 51.5% off, bookcase = 50% off, dinette set = 60% off -- oh, and that additional 10% off those items for opening the charge account -- bathroom supplies = 40% off, lamps = 80% off (K did indeed ring up the second one at a discount), plus that additional 10%, plus the 15% off coupon I had for responding to the online survey after my previous purchase...

I think spending $2,106.50 in one store in one day is practically obscene. I just need to keep reminding myself that I saved $2,786.76; that's more than I spent! (When's the last time you saw a cash register going backwards?)

Does it help if I say that I didn't buy anything at Belk, when we went there next to check out tablecloths and placemats for Thing One (you remember her, the person we really went to The Maul to go shopping for)? I deserve a little reward for that, don't I?

Oh, drat! But at least I got eleven books for less than $70, and that's good, right?

And that's why, in our managers' meeting at work Monday morning, I told everyone that Thing One and I were no longer allowed at J. C. Penney without a chaperone.

Now you'd think that would be the end of the story, and it was, but I didn't get the receipts back from Thing One on Monday night, so I couldn't blog about it then, and Tuesday I got my haircut after work and took Thing One to Sugar's for dinner, and Wednesday was bowling, but Thing One got me the receipts back today, so I'll just blog tonight...

Tonight started off so innocently. Thing One got her first paycheck today, and she wanted me to accompany her to the bank, to make sure she knew the way. "Hey, there's a place called Furniture Liquidators Warehouse," in the same shopping center, "Do you want to go there, since we're here?"

Didn't I already say, "Hoo boy"? Well, it applies here, too.

The store had a lot of furniture I thought looked nice, even though I already have a sectional and coffee table and TV stand (and shortly a dinette set and bookcase) -- and I mean that the store had a lot of furniture that wasn't to my taste but I still thought didn't look ugly. Oh, well, it won't hurt to browse, right? And maybe I'll check to see if they have any credenzas I can use for my stereo. That was just a little idea I'd had. I might do that someday, after I pay for the...

Bingo! (Yay, you got your foreshadowing alarm repaired!) There was a console table... with a cherry finish... in mission-like style... and it was marked 50% off retail... and it was the right size... and it might not fit in Thing One's trunk, but maybe we could slide it upside down on her back seat (or come back on Saturday with my mini-SUV)...

By the way, C, the saleswoman said, after checking with the manager, the credenza also was marked with the wrong price. The actual price is lower (60% off instead of 50%) than the one on the sign. (Or maybe she just liked my smile.)

Hey, since I repeated "hoo boy," why not reuse other statements that apply?

I intend to tell my fellow managers tomorrow morning, "Now there are two cities where Thing One and I aren't allowed to go without chaperones."

By the way, it did fit upside down in her backseat -- just barely. Oh, and Thing One wants to go back on Saturday anyway, because she really liked one or two of their rugs (so I'll need to drive my car this time), and maybe I'll like one of them, too, and Penney's did phone both of us to say our curtains had arrived....

I also could've asked him, "Is that how you're raising your children?"

One of my employees came into my office, without knocking, and without saying good morning, and demanded, "I need coffee, cream, and sugar."

I asked, "What's the magic word?"

After he said, "Please," I started moving.

Did you know you could make s'mores if you set your pool's wave function on 'high'?

Well, that's what the young woman in my dream said. Now I just need one of you to phone your local waterpark and see if it's true.