Saturday, August 25, 2007

Favorite Motto: Nothing Is Ever Easy!

Okay, so to demonstrate how this relates to my life let me tell you about a typical day! We'll use today for example.

Do a zillion things around the house from 7am (when the cat woke me up for breakfast...this is the same cat who religiously does this EVERY day but almost EVERY day forgets to come up and eat dinner at 5:00) to noon. Hurry as fast as I can as mom waits in the driveway for 45 minutes. I assured her 1 and 15 minutes prior that I'd be ready in 20 min. Forgot about the big load of laundry to hang up to dry. Finally get out of the house and go by Walgreens to get 6 boxes of FREE hair color.....which I don't use but, heck, it's free and I have friends who can use it! Well, okay, we really went by to give something to the lady in the photo lab who always works on Saturdays but wasn't there today after all. But took care of the shopping at the same time. But still have to go back Monday when she returns.

Off to Clarksville to return more bathroom rugs that didn't match mom's new bathroom. (We've now bought and returned about 4 different sets to various stores in the area) I leave her in the car with the windows rolled down so she can enjoy the hot, humid air and promise to just "run" in really quickly to the register RIGHT by the door. Well, the cashier informs me that bath items have to be returned to that dept. (For your information, dear readers, so do curtains...found that out last week when none of the curtains we bought worked anywhere in her house!) Okay, so trek way across the store and no one is at the register there. Wait behind two other ladies who swear someone was there and will be back. Finally get that done.

Then it's off to Hobby Lobby with two 40% off coupons that we've toted around all week until we could finally get over there to get a small picture easel. Mom stays in the car, enjoying more heat and humidity. Off to the far back corner of the store, via the scrapbooking section-nothing new there, only to find a very limited selection of easels, none of which will work. Trot up to the front to purchase my one piece of scrapbooking paper which is 1/2 price and suddenly remember we were supposed to look for berries for the table arrangement that Dee's is doing. (They didn't have a single stem of berries in their entire store that worked). I have no cart and I end up carrying 8 stems each of 4 different varieties of berries because who knows which color/style will actually look good. (and, we can just bring them back next week, yay!) So, wait in a huge long line and finally get out of there.

Meanwhile, we are starving to death as it's now 1:45 pm. Can't decide where to eat but finally settle on chicken salads at Steak N Sheak since we have a bogo coupon. Park, wait to be seated, sit, realize we are right next to a booth with an incredibly upset little girl, ask to be moved, and then the waitress says it's taking a little longer for the food to come out because everyone in the kitchen is new except one person (meaning no one knows what the heck they are doing back there except one person). Decide we'll just leave since we didn't really care if we ate there or not, we just had a coupon! Off to Dairy Queen where I "enjoy" my overcooked, overcharcoaled kiddie burger and mom tries to find the strawberries in her strawberry blizzard. Go to Kirkland's in the same shopping center and find the easel we need.

Head to her house and discover that the easel tips back too far and spend the next 20 minutes rigging it so the picture will stand up straighter in it. Hang two pictures, move a bunch of furniture and stuff in her bedroom (still trying to decorate it) and manage to bust the leg and wheel off the 300 lb (???) victorian/marble top dresser so now it's gotta be fixed and we are just hoping it doesn't topple over until then. (And you know what's going to be involved in fixing it? Taking off three pieces of marble, the mirror and turning it over or lifting it up to repair the leg, great, huh?)

Get some things accomplished including putting my car windows up just as it finishes raining.

Start to head home via a quick stop at Meijer for 50 cent ketchup only to discover that I'm at the wrong store as I quickly review my flyer for KROGER. Grab milk which is still $2.50 a gallon so as to make the stop feel worthwhile. Mom was sure she was gonna have to wait another 30 minutes to an hour with the windows down while I bargain shopped! Surprised her with this one!

Hop over to Kroger, get ketchup and gas and head home. Oh, and they had milk for the same price...sigh...

Meet up with Tim and head out to dinner for Mexican and okay, nothing went wrong there and we saved $7 with a bogo coupon!

Come home and he notices that the address listed on our new Verizon agreement is Norton Healthcare. So, call Costco and discuss this with Micha who was supposed to leave 2 hrs ago when they actually closed. He was sweet enough to spend another 20 min talking to me then Tim when I handed the phone off to him and said, "Here, you deal with this!" Further discussion discovers that the hour Tim spend registering his work info this morning to get the discount on our monthly statement was pretty much invalid and he needs to redo it all tomorrow. Nice, huh? (Did I mention the hour I spent with Verizon customer service this morning trying to determine exactly WHY Tim's new phone said Invalid Battery after I charged it all night...finally concluded they didn't have it locked in all the way....one hour later)

So, see why nothing is ever easy? I'm going to TRY to watch the video we rented now....

5 comments:

Old Dad said...

You waste far too much time and gasoline on all the bargains. I am sure the net value of savings is in the minus range!

obsessed scrapbooker said...

I have proof that it IS NOT! :]

Ann said...

I was going to do a post on my blog, entitled 'A Day in the Life' but I'm too tired now after reading your story.

At least now I know I'm not the only one things like this happen to . . .

G Coyle said...

Can I borrow your mom sometime? With her in the car I could live park at curbsides and make running errands so much easier. I now sometimes use the dog. I'm guessing your mom is better company.

obsessed scrapbooker said...

Sure, Gina, when do you want her? ;]