the weekend in review

saturday i got up with the intent of looking for a new computer desk. months ago i gave my brother the old desk i’d bought from ash back in 1995 or whatever, and i’ve been using pieces from a cheap metal storage shelf unit as a makeshift desk ever since. i have this idea of what i want, but i’ve never actually seen it. most stuff i see today is either “contemporary” or “modern” and thus some metal skeleton work with glass surfaces, or it’s a traditional or tinker-toy wooden job. neither of which i want. i want something that is somewhat minimalist, but wood and metal, or wood and glass and metal, and is fairly modern in style. it’s sort of the old “i’ll know it when i see it” thing.
i was also planning on seeing dale watson at the continental club later that night.
anyway, i decided to call the potts’ and see if they were available for lunch since it was about that time and i’d be heading in their general direction for at least one store i could think of. jack was working, but sue was interested. people had taken the rest of the kids, so it was just sue and simcha. i went and picked her up, and it turned out to be simcha’s first time out of the house. sue was a bit concerned jack might want to be there for that, but she called and he said it was okay. i didn’t want to be causing any trouble either. we went and ate at sylvia’s enchilada. (another good thing to do when over in that part of town.)
afterward, we went over to eurway. i’d been there a couple of weeks before and had noted a floor lamp i liked. i went through the store again, and in the end decided to get the floor lamp i’d eyed the time before. they also have a computer station i like, but i can’t use it because the space for the chassis isn’t big enough for a powermac. anyway, my new living room doesn’t have a ceiling light so i decided i needed to have some kind of floor lamp to provide light in the room.
we then went back to their house, where marty and christine dropped off calista. after staying there an hour or so, i made my way over to jamie’s where there was supposed to be xmas decorating going on.
except no xmas decorating was done. i actually met them at jason’s deli because by the time i called they were getting ready to go eat. jamie’s niece morgan was over, as well as hayden and peyton. after eating we went back to their house, although i made a quick stop by lowe’s to pick up some bulbs (which i ended up not needing because the lamp came with some). i ended up mostly playing with hayden and morgan, playing bells and talking drumming with peyton, watching jaime and peyton play guitar hero, and seeing more of the movie mary poppins than i’ve ever seen. i ended up leaving around 11:30pm with the plan of heading home then going over to the continental club.
but i never made it to see dale. i got home and i was tired and i felt like my sinuses were kind of messed up, so i decided i’d just hang at home and maybe go to bed early.
then around 1am jack called to see if i was hungry and wanted to eat. i said “sure” so he came over. he helped me get the base of the new floor lamp on, then we headed to the house of pies on kirby. it seemed like it was much more “house of guys” than normal…not sure why that was. once again they were 86’ed on bayou goo. this makes like the fourth time i’ve tried to order it and they were out. it’s gotten frustrating. they were also out of my second choice, german chocolate cream. so i had to go with the coconut cream standby, which i’m beginning to burn out on. i got back to my house around 3:30am i think.
so today i got up and made quite a circuit of furniture stores. i hit star (no modern style desks at all), the leather shoppe (no desks), danish inspirations (style, but nothing like what i want), spazz (not much), total furniture (not much), simply furniture (not much), and castle (one or two okay, but nothing exciting). i tried dropping by hoeffner’s (sp?), which is all office furniture, but they aren’t open on sundays. after hitting this many, i also began to learn a lot of them get products from the same companies so you start to see the same things popping up. (although most of them have some things you don’t see elsewhere.)
the one i didn’t mention that i went to was cantoni. tamara and i went in cantoni a few years ago. they have some cool stuff, but we looked at the prices and quickly determined we should gingerly and carefully walk out before we breathed on something and had to pay for it. i decided to go and look at their desks anyway. yeah, they’re expensive — but man, they have some really cool looking stuff. it’s about the only place that had desks even close to what nebulously exists in my mind. can i justify paying $2k or more for a desk? (i didn’t even consider the ones they had that were $4-5k.) i’ll have to get back to you on that.
after my massive furniture run, i headed over to ikea. every now and then i go and look at their desks and remind myself that i don’t like any of them. but they invariably have some other stuff that catches my eye and imagination. (after going to so many “contemporary” furniture stores today, ikea didn’t really impress me overall other than volume and breadth of merchandise.) i did buy a couple of packages of window curtains and some curtain rods and hangers. the house i’m in has semi-transparent privacy shades or something, but you can see in pretty well when it’s dark outside and the lights are on. i was getting kind of tired of having to always be aware someone might be able to see me, particularly in my bedroom. honestly, given my physical condition and looks, it’s more for their benefit and peace of mind than mine. i managed to get one set of them put up today. i also realized i bought one too few rod holder packs. right now i dread the thought of going back just for that, so maybe in a few days.