Week 24 - At Every Turn

The word for the week was thwarted. I had a normal week and was in the home stretch to a weekend with few commitments so I'd filled in my mental to do list with cleaning the garage and making a purse. And this was all supposed to start early Saturday morning, when my friend Andrea was coming over to dig up plants and take the trundle bed since I'd finally gotten the mattresses back from Connie last weekend. That was the plan until the phone rang Thursday at 9:00 p.m.

The fact that my sister was calling at 10:00 South Carolina time was odd in and of itself. Then she asked if my brother-in-law, who is not my favorite person, and his friend Frank could stay at my house Sunday and Monday nights. They would be in the midst of a road trip to pick up various eBay purchases in Tennessee, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska. It didn't dawn on me to lie and say I wouldn't be home so, before you knew it, I was agreeing. The minute I hung up, I began fretting.

I live in a small house and only have one guest room, which Frank, being 79 years old, would get to sleep in. That meant Bob would be sleeping in either the front room or the family room, either of which is completely open to my kitchen where I'd need to be getting ready for work both mornings they'd be here. It also meant I wouldn't be getting rid of the trundle bed because I'd need it for Bob. I'd also have to cancel the plans I'd made for Monday night to go through the junk in the library's basement, dredge up linens for the twin bed and wash them plus plan and cook 2 dinners. With one phone call, my weekend was no longer my own.

It did start early Saturday, when Andrea and I dug up all kinds of perennials for her yard. She was gone before 10:00 to open her shop so I headed out to run my errands. After lunch, I decided I needed to do something creative with the few hours I'd have (not enough to finish my purse so I didn't want to start) so tried to adhere the big vine thingie I'd bought for my front door (see the pic of the decal on someone's fridge, which is what it showed in the catalog but I immediately thought of my boring door. The vine in the pic is in 2 pieces. Mine will not be.) I had shown the decal to Andrea but told her I was waiting to do another coat of paint on the door and she suggested I put it on the glass of the storm door - genius! I went online and read the instructions, washed the window, got out a credit card to do the rubbing and started. Well, when I started pulling it apart, it stuck to the paper instead of the sticky stuff. I didn't realize that was backwards until I had the entire thing pulled off and was attempting, to no avail, to get it to stick to the door. I emailed the consultant who sold me the sticker but she's out of town. Talk about frustrated! I did some therapeutic baking - chocolate chip cookies with chopped up Chunky candy bars in place of the chips. That helped some. : )

Shortly thereafter the phone rang and it was Connie, who was in Lincoln and had been stood up by her contractor. She was looking to kill some time so asked if she could come up. Good thing input is one of my strengths because I took some shrimp out of the freezer and whipped up roasted broccoli with shrimp and put a bottle of wine in the freezer for a quick chill. As usual, it was fun hanging with her and helped improve my frustrated mood.

I spent Sunday doing laundry, setting up beds and cooking. Bob and Frank arrived late (6:30 when they'd said 5:00) but I'd kept dinner hot in the oven. After the cops got the truck unlocked (Frank had hit the lock button as he got out and the engine was running) we ate dinner, I gave them the 15 minute tour of Wahoo so he could get his tire repaired and see where to eat lunch. Bob offered to fix stuff while they were waiting Monday for a delivery from Minnesota so I left him with mini blinds to hang and plant brackets to install. We went to bed early but I slept badly. I got ready for work in the dark and headed to work for the start of another week. Maybe this weekend will see me sewing, or did I just jinx it by blogging the words. Time will tell I guess.