Monday, September 18, 2006

Sigh...

I've got some stuff that I want to blog about, really I do.

There's the trip to Barnsley Gardens from last weekend, with a few accompanying photos. There's the Turq Trunk Show that I managed to get to Friday. There's even the "before" pictures of the sf bathroom, which I'd like to get posted before the "after" shots are ready.... And would you believe it, I am starting to think that the end may be near. I am going to need help with "window treatments" - and have even got a few fabric swatches to run by you all - but aside from that, the end is in sight! Yippee!

So why am I not doing any of these things?

Because life keeps getting in my way.
Not in a bad way, nothing like that. I just seem to have fallen into some sort of weird TwiLightZone-ish kind of place where everything is at least five times more complicated than it should be. Which isn't leaving me the time that I would like to post about the aforementioned stuff.
Heck, it's not leaving me much time at all! I've gotten some good reading done (see, another thing I'd like to share - I've got some good book recommendations!) but no knitting in days...

What do I mean, "weird place where everything is way more complicated than it should be?" Take today as a perfect example. Ask me what I've done today. G'head, ask...

I started to say "I changed out the toilet seat" - except that would be an untruth. I'm in the middle of swapping out the toilet seat; I started this morning at 8 am and I am still not done.
I told myself that I could take a quick break and blog something quick-like-a-bunny, so as to settle down a bit. I was beginning to froth at the mouth...

How can it take 8 plus hours to change a toilet seat? It goes a little something like this:

  • Go to Home Depot to buy a new toilet seat.
    After much browsing, purchase the one that you think is the right size.

  • Get it home, and realize that it's not the right size.

  • Mutter exasperated things under your breath, and return to Home Depot.

  • Return wrong size toilet seat.
    Purchase correct sized toilet seat.

  • Return home.

  • Attempt to remove old toilet seat. Since the bolts which attach the seat to the porcelain are totally corroded, this will involve a lot of WD-40, a hack saw, and over an hour of time. (oh, and the muttering is becoming more omnious...)

  • Finally get old seat removed. Take new, correctly sized seat out of box.

  • Yell out loud "Seriously?" in your best Grey's Anatomy voice.
    It's OK - no one else is home to hear you...
    The seat is broken in half, lengthwise. How is this even possible?

  • Engage in some mild cursing, and return to Home Depot.

  • Stand in incredibly long line with cranky people and one even crankier cashier (who, ironically, remembers you - and cracks what is perhaps his only smile of the day when you finally get to the front of the line and show him the damaged seat.)

  • Return seat.
    Buy new one.
    This time, you check the seat before you leave the store.

  • Return home.
    Start to install new seat.
    Realize that the nuts that they have given you to attach the new seat to the porcelain part have this large kind of thumb grip on them. This is nice, as it means that it will be easier to hand-tighten. In theory.

    In reality, the stupid thumb screw means that the nut is too big, and can not turn around. (The bolt is very close to the toilet bowl, and the nut must be smooth sided in order to rotate around.)

  • Contemplate using the nuts off the old toilet seat.
    Remember that you had to use hacksaw to cut them off.

  • Curse.
    Loudly.
    Use the "good" curse words - because you are still the only one home.
    (That reminds you, what time is it? You've got a kid to pick up! Crap...if you run out of the house right now, you'll get there only a few minutes late!)

  • Run out of the house right now. Pick up kid, only a few minutes late.

  • Take hardware-storing-hating kid to the hardware store.
    Notice you are NOT going back to Home Depot. You just couldn't face it one more time today.

  • Wander around hardware store for stupidly long time looking for new toilet bolt nuts. (The 12 year old in you snickers at the thought of toilet nuts...) Finally find them, pay for them (after waiting in yet another seriously long line)

  • Return home. Look at toilet. Think "I just can't deal with you now..." Help child with homework. Compose long (and probably whiny/uninteresting) blog post about the day.

Sad, huh?
And, people - it seems like everything has been going like this as of late? Does this ever happen to anyone else? This housewife stuff is not for sissies....

4 comments:

rohanknitter said...

Guess what...I need to buy/install a new toilet seat too. Now at least I will know to: 1. make sure I have the right size (who knew there's more than one size???) and 2. make sure there's no bizarre crack before leaving store.
Hang in there. Hey, our family motto is "we never do anything the easy way."

beki said...

Yeah, I think a new toilet seat is on our ginormous to-do list as well. I'll be sure to let my husband handle that one.
After all that you deserve to use the good curse words. Those are my favorites!

Anonymous said...

Oh, yes, it happens. And it should happen at our house because if you sit on the lid while the kids are in the bath, or to comb hair, etc. and shift your butt even the slightest bit the whole lid/seat falls off.

And as for cursing, I prefer sh*tf@ckd*mnpisshell all as one word. :) But the finished product looks great, especially with a kitty sitting on it.

MéLisa said...

Oh Honey how I feel your pain! Imagine our surprise 5 years ago when our dishwasher died (oh how I miss a dishwasher, sorry I digress) that we would need to ripe off the entire countertop in order to get it the old dishwasher out, which promptly turned into an entire kitchen remodel. Oh yes I feel your pain! Everything that we touch turns to a huge major bigger than anyone could possibly ever have imagined problem, case in point our current house “Problem”. (note the capital “P”) Be brave fellow home owner!