As many of you loyal readers know, the wife and I decided to paint the kitchen earlier this year. Now if you remember, in the previous post I pretty much admitted that I have very little talent when it comes to interior decorating, or determining the colors that walls should be painted. In fact the wife asked me one time how I could stand the color of our bedroom, but I had no idea what color the bedroom was! Personally I am OK with the classic white walls and ceilings, but if the wife wants to change the house to make it more homey by painting walls I am perfectly willing to go along with the plan (it is important to note that I said “
go along with the plan.") The wife hinted today at lunch that she had additional plans for decorating other rooms of the house, but of course I was distracted by lunch (as everyone knows, we guys can easily be distracted by loud, shiny or meaty objects,) so essentially missed the ideas.
When I got home the wife asked if we could go run a few errands. I enjoy running errands with the wife, as it tends to make her in a better mood, and with us often times working opposite shifts, the time we spend can be nice as we are actually seeing each other when we are not in a state of sleep induced dementia. We set off on our errands, the wife happily burbling about things she has planned for this coming weekend, and me gamely trying to keep these future tasks straight in my mental honey do list. We headed to Target where I thought we were just exchanging a dvd I had given the wife for Christmas (umm…So yeah it helps to actually check the movies you own!) but soon I found out that we were also getting a few other items. Of course I had no idea that these items were for decorating the house, and that the wife would require my input in making these decisions. So here I am standing in the middle of the curtain aisle as the wife sorts thru the various styles and colors offered. I am starting to feel a bit worried as I know what is going to come at any moment….
(Italics are the thoughts running thru my brain as she is asking me for input, not my actual replies, as I am sure I was probably standing there looking confused while beads of sweat started to appear on my forehead.)
“Honey? What do you think? (
umm do you really want to know?) I really like these panels (
WTF is a panel?) but am not sure about the tabs at the top”
Okay. So in one sentence, she has completely lost me. At this point I started scrambling to figure out what exactly she is talking about, so I shoot a furtive glance at the package she is holding, and compare that to the ones remaining on the shelf. A little voice is in my head saying “Maybe the picture on the package will help” but damn it all the pictures look the same! Don’t panic, use that engineering logic and attention to detail and look closer. I casually saunter over to the shelf for a closer look, grabbing on of the packages and studying the picture for clues, all the while pretending to be pondering the colors and cut. I just am starting to get a handle on the whole matter when the wife pops in with another question…
“You know the curtains we currently have in the living room? (
Curtains? Uh, not really, I mean I know we have curtains, but what they look like I have no earthly idea.) Well those have an inner panel and then the outer curtains over them, and if we get these panels (W
ait, I thought these were panels, and now you are telling me we have inner and outer panels??? What the heck is the difference?), we will have to have two curtain rods. (
WTF? Two curtain rods??? I thought you could just stick the curtains all on one!) If we have to have two rods then we can’t use the tab style curtains (
There we go with the technical talk again… Tab… I see no diet drinks on these!) as the second rod will be visible. What do you think?”
At this juncture I think the wife realized that my close inspection of the package was only to delay the inevitable discovery that I was completely lost and was scrambling to not look completely stupid. The wife being my wife of course knows better, and realizing that I was going to be of little help proceeded to make her selections while I stood there telling her that “I trust your judgment honey!’
In the end I did help pick a color, and style of curtain rod, but I think she felt a little sorry for me so she suggested we stop by the home improvement superextravaganzamart where I think she purposely walked past the power tool aisle so I could recover a bit from the trauma of curtains.
A shot from a series of photos taken in downtown Omaha. This fountain lends itself to many unique photos. Beware tho... Do not try to take a picture of the First National Tower if you are on First National Bank's property (even the public sidewalk.) They send out security to chase you off or tell you to delete the photos or surrender the film. I did neither.
