Now We’re Talkin’

A LITTLE LETTER GOES A LONG WAY
The appliance installers come Friday morning. Our dishwasher and microwave go in. They carry our oven in from the garage, and as they are about to place it in the allotted hole in the cabinet, the installers notice the hole is way too short. They are surprised, since they have worked with our contractor a lot and have never come across a hole EIGHT inches too small before. Our project manager doesn’t get us a carpenter scheduled until the next Friday. So much for our kitchen being ready to cook in this week! I drive up to Anaheim to choose our counter material for our bathroom at the fabricator. I choose a white quartzite. They tell me it will be ready Monday or Tuesday. On Tuesday I find out it won’t be ready until Wednesday. This holds the tile installer up for two days. The painter is delayed because of the tile. He must think I’m a raving lunatic (okay, bioch) as I walk around the house mumble/cursing out everyone. David decides to write a letter to our project manager, his boss, and the owner of the company. The first two are at our house that evening. We go over the list of “to do's” David has prepared. They are ready to solve the oven hole problem immediately, even if it means remaking the entire cabinet. They cross out every item on the list to be tackled tomorrow. Cross your fingers, by George, I think we just might get through this.

NEW CONCEPTS
We’re still getting used to not looking for our refrigerator in the hallway. My youngest left his cereal bowl on the stairs before school so I can bring it upstairs for him. “Our ‘cereal station’ is in the kitchen now.” I say. “No more leaving the dishes downstairs because you ‘ran out of time’ to bring them up to the bathroom to wash them out”. Pretty soon we’ll actually get to use the guest bathroom sink instead of the laundry room sink. We now have a real sink in the kitchen. We also have a filtered water system and instant hot. Yep, living the high life.

FIRST DATE NO-NO
David is on a business trip until 6 pm, so I make reservations for Benihanas at 8 pm. My Godmother is visiting. We go to Borders to find a book for my youngest son. He is set on this scary book David and I told him he couldn’t get last time. He spends the entire time reading it to prove to me he isn’t scared. I refuse to let him buy it. Diverting him to another series is useless. We leave the store empty-handed. As we near the car, something begins to smell. To my horror I realize I’ve left the car running the entire time we were in the bookstore! I guess Mom’s been pretty scattered, heh, heh. We get seated next to a nice looking couple. The woman tells the server it’s the man’s birthday. He says he’s 21. David has told the server it is our eldest’s son’s birthday. Not really true. We are just after the free pineapple. The couple believes us and our son is officially embarrassed. The man asks our son if he is a Charger fan because he is wearing “the sweatshirt”, and tells us no one is a bigger fan than he is. He goes on and on about sports, ignoring his date. He then leaves the table a couple times during the meal to make a phone call. David overhears their conversation when he returns. It seems his roommate has gotten dumped for the first time and needs consoling. I ask the man if this is really his 21st birthday because he looks about 30. He tells me he is 39. At the end of our meal, he starts talking to David about business. I tell him he better take his date out for coffee (in a humorous way) because he ignored her so much. We all say we hope this isn’t their first date, but they say it is.

NEXT POST
The story starts at the bottom. Check back next Monday for more restaurant stories and our kitchen remodel progression! Scroll down for the photos.