then to carpet the whole world

Now I’m quoting Stuart Smalley. What’s next? I was thinking last week, what if nothing funny or interesting happens to share in the next blog (more pressure) what will I do? But then I remembered, this is me.

Last weekend was the stoning of the fireplace. And something else. Oh, the taper came. More dust. But a wonderful job. Any evidence of arches has been eradicated. Tiling while exhausting went pretty well. We alternated between cutting and placing. Late on Friday night we started making mistakes. Well, I did. Math has never been a strong suit for me. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I didn’t HAVE to take any math classes after 8th grade. And believe me, I didn’t.

Saturday morning while trying to finish the tile, it was raining and I was in charge of the cutting. The wet saw and the rain, made for an impromptu wet t-shirt event. My poor neighbors, this is something no one wants to see. NO, I did not take a picture, but Tom did. I’ve been unable to devise a plane to delete it from his phone, sick bastard. Anyway, freezing and drenched we finally finished. I think it’s lovely and I couldn’t be happier (unless the stone had been free or made in America) Apparently we don’t have any stone here so we had to go to China. I guess I missed that. There was a rather heated discussion or two. Nothing worth mentioning. But I think my friend is right, instead of having to go through “pre-marriage” counseling, couples should have to do a renovation project together. If you can get through that, you got a shot. Sunday night I commented to Ben, “Remember when we used to do nothing on the weekends?” He responded, “Yes, I miss that.”

The week blew by with lots (too much) paying work to do and taxes. I’m not discussing the taxes because frankly, I’m a little bitter about it.

Thursday and Friday brought “Mr. Sandless” and it’s official, I’m living in an episode of HOARDERS. Everything left in the living and dining rooms is pushed into already cramped spaces. My office is a mess, you can’t walk in the den and the dining room table is on it’s side in the kitchen like a beached whale. Throw in the dog and you’ve got a nervous breakdown. Poor Stella. We sent her to doggy day care at Uncle Tom’s and then over to play with Miayumi and the girls – but eventually she had to come home.

Ben(I can’t even begin to explain this) while getting dog food picked up a pair of puppy slippers. I was just going to use socks. Four little puke pink slippers and an attitude. This is not a happy dog. I keep trying to think of a good way to describe Stella clomping around with these ridiculous clown shoes. Lift, flop, clomp, Lift, clomp, flop – dirty look, lift, flop, clomp. I told him we just wasted $10 dollars. He felt it was worth it just for the comedy factor. He may have been right. He went out of town, I switched to socks. As you can see, she ain’t happy. But the living and dining floors are done and looking very good. I still have the two bedrooms to do. Shit.

Late Saturday I started to paint. I was thinking if I have this color right it would be three in a row. This never happens. I’m usually in the basement with multiple cans of color, mixing them together like some kind of demented scientist. After getting one wall done, I realized that I may be putting my lab coat on…again. Ben hates when I do this. I ignore him. It’s a system that has worked for us for over 30 years. The paint is too blue or not gray enough or too light or too dark. It’s weird, because in the tray it’s prefect – on the wall, not so much. In the morning, I try to “fix” the color. I add more gray, more white and roll out the wall. Nope, I mix again. Roll out the wall and still no. So, frustrated and broken I did what every one who no longer smokes does. I went to Starbucks for a coffee and a apple fritter. Imagine my disappointment to return home only to find that Ben had rolled in, and I had to share my fritter. Now I’m really unhappy.

This is when things went to hell. Really, it did get worse. For reasons I not sure of, my mother-in-law is coming to dinner – With all the kids and their others. I have the whale in the kitchen and the rest of the house looks a little like Berlin, after the war. Just to keep things interesting, the Direct TV guy is here to run the cable for TV. I’m baking a cake and cleaning, the TV guy is drilling holes in the floor and Ben goes to Room and Board Outlet (open only 2 days a week, read: zoo) to get our new sofa which the matches the leather love seat we have exactly! BUT, because the universe hates me, this perfect sofa is now sitting in someone’s not blue living room. This generated the first of no less than 5 phone calls. I’m looking on line, he’s at the store, will it match, how much, what about the other one, you don’t like the fabric, that one’s too big, they don’t have that one. It came down to a leather one that ALMOST looked like the love seat we own, or a fabric sectional that had the potential to become, as my accomplice stated, “Lumpy Sofa 2 – the sequel.” I was given 10 seconds to choose over the phone, (Ben actually started counting) because by God he was not coming home with out a sofa! I, of course, froze. I couldn’t think. I couldn’t decide… so I LEFT IT UP TO HIM. I know you can’t believe this. I couldn’t either. But at the same time the TV guy, who’d previously spent like 20 minutes looking for the cable line that he put down the new hole from the living room to the basement realized that the reason he couldn’t find the cable was because he drilled the hole through the exterior of the house instead of into the basement and said cable was now laying in the driveway. Nice guy, not too bright. At the time of the countdown sofa decision, he had just informed me that he didn’t know how to get the cable where it needed to be and he “didn’t want to keep drilling holes in my house.” Great. Now I am completely defeated. I’m seriously thinking of moving. Possibly to an undisclosed location.

I’ve got you on the edge of your seats now, don’t I? Which sofa did he buy? Did the cable get connected? Did the cake burn? Was it me, who murdered the Direct TV rep in the living room with the wrench? Will I get a room of my own in jail? How will I redecorate it?

SPOILER ALERT – Well, the TV dude survived. We walked around the house until I found the old Comcast cable that went into the living room years ago. He used that. Brilliant!

Ben survived R&B Outlet and brought home the almost matching leather sofa. Because as he put it, he just couldn’t risk the kids continually bitching about a lumpy sofa a year from now. This was the right choice. Although I think we are single handedly driving the US economy recovery. It’s beautiful and I won’t have to or want to replace it ever. Ben said he just wanted me to be happy. And I thought, oh how sweet…until I realized what he really wanted was for me to be happy so he never has to go through any of this again. I respect that. And it’s almost the same thing.