My love should be home in a few hours.

A few hours after that I am leaving for a week of work classes/training.

He went to France, I am going to San Antonio.

Almost the same thing, right ?

hurry up and be sunday

Today will be spending some quality time at waxing salon followed by a pit stop for a caffeinated beverage to sip while having a pedicure.

And lest you think me a total princess I also need to stop off and get a bag of potting soil to re-pot a tree into a ginormous pot that I hauled up the stairs yesterday.

Not to mention the table repairing, furniture moving, washing machine filter cleaning, and generally all around kicking ass from earlier this week that you may or may not have already forgotten about.

I haven't.

And neither has my lower back.

Heh.

Despite all of this girl-power rah rah it really is time for that guy that lives here to get on home.

I miss him.

And not just because he keeps the catbox clean and makes sure I ingest something other than toast and gingerale.

This week it seems the universe would just like to double check that I am still capable of functioning in the big bad world all by my lonesome.

Yesterday I opened the washing machine before going to work (at 3:00 in the morning mind you) to find that it did not and would not spin out. It is always ever so nice to have a sopping pile of moldering laundry stinking about.

Gross.

When I called the repair line the woman advised me to clean the pump filter as though any reasonable person would know they were supposed to open a hidden door on their washer and let out all the lingering water and leftover nasties.

"It's right in the owner's manual."

Oh. That thing. That is somewhere. Here in my house.

Somewhere.

But thanks to the internets and a couple of grody old towels it is all clean now and we will see if the problem is magically solved.

Also my table is repaired and ready for pick-up this afternoon. I sent an e-mail to the seller requesting to be reimbursed for repair costs and received a prompt reply and the money.

Well, well. Take that universe.

Now if I can just get it back into my car, across town, and up the stairs we will be in business.

If tomorrow the engine in my car explodes or all four of my tires simultaneously blow on my way to work at 4 AM I will not be the least bit surprised.

Allow me to tell you a little story:

Once there was a girl who ordered, from a carpenter, a sofa table.

Upon its arrival the table was found to be broken in several spots. One of which being the place where the legs screw in.

So unless rather than a table the girl wanted a really big TV tray, this table needed to be repaired.

An e-mail to the seller was less than helpful and firmly supported the idea that the girl try and put the table back together with some wood glue and clamps.

He also advised it would be helpful to use a small drill bit and a long screw to reinforce the gluing.

Here the girls head nearly exploded as she wondered why, if she had a drill and bits and screws and were a bloody carpenter, she would pay someone else to make for her a table rather than doing that shit herself.

But I digress.

Anyway.

After a trip to Home Depot and an hour of trying to piece the table back together the girl, who hates puzzles and is not good at them, decided to call a furniture repairman who advises her to bring the thing on down. Anytime. Today, tomorrow.

Ok !

Perhaps this is our stories hero, no?

Now develop a picture in your mind of the girl, just over five feet, maneuvering from her third floor walk-up apartment and down to the parking lot, a nearly seven foot long table top. This she shoved into the trunk, through the backseat, and into the passenger side front seat of her Hyundai Elantra. All the while muttering curses under her breath and sweating like a whore in church in the 100+ degree Texas heat.

Very nice.

And through this whole mess the girl did not cry, not a tear, even though she is, after all, a girl and prone to reacting in this way to such things.

That is she did not cry, not a tear, until sitting down on the couch with a ginger ale and leftover take-out and opening a fortune cookie bearing the message : You Love a good challenge.

At which point the girl started laughing, a bit maniacally, and was soon sobbing and snotting through bites of cold rice and tofu with basil and mixed vegetables.

Great story, huh ?

So now the table is in my car, and I pretty much hate the fucking thing for being such a pain in the ass. But I am going to drive it way the hell across town and see 1) if it is fixable and 2) how much, mister ?

Total suck.

Also adding to my total suck is the fact that I am here alone and feeling quite sorry for myself and wondering why it is that after more than a year I still have not one single friend in this whole town.

And also thinking that probably the man I live with will find his one true love in France and make top secret plans to marry her later this week. (Boy does like to move things fast, you know.) Or at least spend the week with her hidden away in his hotel room and ignoring my calls.

Heh.

(Sadly I am only half kidding that these are the things that cross my mind. Maybe more like one third kidding.)

And so, my friends, I leave you with this little glimpse into my damaged psyche and am off to catch another hour or so of sleep before I trek deep into South Austin in search of the end to my table dilemma

Nighty night.

Good Morning.

False start this morning at 3 AM. Checked to make sure my love had arrived safely in the City o' Lights, and made a reservation for a sweet little January stay in New Orleans.

Then went back to bed around 5 for a couple more hours sleep and a Saturday start at a much more reasonable hour.

Now am slowly drinking a very large, very strong cup of coffee, charging the battery on my tiny pink iPod, and trying to come up with a plan of action for the rest of the day.

My new table is in several pieces in the middle of the living room carpet ( thanks UPS ! ) and it seems I need a bottle of wood glue, more caffeine, and a healthy dose of better attitude if it is going to be repaired and of any use.

(Please let us not talk about why I am going to be going all this old house ghetto style rather than returning it for repairs with the shipping insurance money. Ok ?)

Other things I need to do today include washing all my dirty scrubs ( all five pairs of them), eating cold* vegetable soup before it goes bad, and trying to get out of PetSmart with only a bag of cat food and not another cat.

If any of those things sound like a barrel of laughs to you you are welcome to head over and join the fun.

Please bring vodka. Or at least a drink from Sonic. Or, ideally, both.

*Yes, I am that lazy. Did you really even have to ask ?

I am exhausted from a flip-flop sleep schedule week.

The table I ordered to go with my new sofa arrived today. It is handmade and beautiful and all busted to shit from the transit here.

Grr.

My love is on a flight to Paris right this very second and will be gone for a week.

I do not like any of these things.

Maybe tomorrow I will wake up feeling much less foul and come back with a list of things that I do.

Caffeine and Carbohydrates

Our refrigerator and pantry are bursting at the seems with tasty morsels.

Even so today have ingested (listed in chronological order) :

1 large cup coffee, 1 bowl puffed honey rice cereal with milk, mucho iced tea, 1 grilled cheese sandwich, bottle of sparkling mineral water, 1 slice of toast with peanut butter and chocolate chips

For dinner another bowl of cereal maybe and call it a day of great ! nutritional ! value !

Today my love called me and I told him I was feeling sad and he came home for a quick lunch before his afternoon work engagements. He is sweet like that.

There is no real reason for feeling sad except a touch of the lonelies and maybe that I could use a close by friend or even perhaps two.

Dreaming of visits with not so close by friends and scheming a mid-winter Cajun lover's getaway.
Nothing much else happening and soon it's early to bed for too too early make me wanna gag to rise.

Night night.

Licking up the last crumbs from a slice of pumpkin bread and sipping on a cup of coffee with milk. Both of these things could have been made here at my house in my kitchen with things already on hand for 1/10th the price paid for them at the coffee shop next to the yoga studio.

But I am after all a good American and nothing if not a consumer and lover of convenience.

(In my defense it is so ungodly hot that the idea of turning on a burner let along the oven is incredibly unappealing.

Oh.

And I am a lazeabout.)

Once the caffeine kicks in there are grand plans for flying into action and throwing together some keep in the fridge for the rest of the week types of dishes and finishing up the laundry.

And lest you think I never do anything except sit at home drinking coffee and doing laundry you should know that this weekend we had some friends over for all-the-fixin's burgers, monopoly, too much wine, and homemade ice cream.

Next weekend we could do something along the same lines. Just let me know what time to be there.

XOXO

mundane

started making coffee.

got distracted by the phone.

started vacuuming.

took a shower.

had lunch with my love. (oh Indian food i love you !)

came home.

remembered coffee.

now drinking iced coffee, listening to the last hour of music on public radio before the news comes on, and folding laundry.

maybe i should pick back up and finish the vacuuming next.

party up.