After reading this morning’s post about the fire, you know that I’m truly not complaining about Vince. Sometimes it may sound as if I am but I really am not. OK . . I’m sure every wife believes that I would never complain about my husband! Our problems are (1) His Sicilian heritage and my south Louisiana heritage don’t always blend — sometimes it’s kinda like oil and water and (2) Vince is very slow paced, methodical, thinks everything through and researches things to death. Me — I’m a little more energetic in the way I go about things. I don’t always think things through. I sometimes wonder . . what was I thinking when I did this or agreed to do that? I’m pretty reasonable in things I buy but if I want something, and have determined it to be something I need or something I truly want and can afford, I just get it.
I always feel kinda bad for those printers or cameras or whatever that don’t rate very high on Consumer Reports, PC Magazine or the hundreds of other comparative type studies done. Who buys the ones at the bottom of the recommended list? Probably me!
Earlier this week, Vince decided that he and I would go to Joplin today. Remember that I hate to shop! We went to Joplin last Saturday – Chad, Vince and I. I went back on Wednesday, did a bit of shopping (necessity type things), met Elaine for lunch and came home. Vince and I went back today and I have to go back on Tuesday. Good grief!!
Anyway, I asked him last night — now tell me again why we’re going to Joplin! Answer: Just to spend some time together! Why on earth do we have to go shopping to do that? Can’t he pull his chair up beside my sewing machine (but don’t get in between me and the cutting board or me and the iron!) and we can spend the whole day together?? Not exactly what he had in mind. So, here’s how our day went:
- Stop #1 – Office Depot – We should buy stock in that company! Vince had decided I need a new printer. I don’t know that I need a new printer . . the one I have seems to be working fine. He just ordered ink for it and decided the ink costs too much. (But we now have a year’s worth of ink that just arrived on Friday!) He had done all his research . . for the past week he’s been researching . . and he knew exactly which color laser printer we were getting. We got there and the salesman and Vince discussed it but then the salesman explained about this new HP ink jet that’s as good or better for photos than the laser. (I don’t print photos!) It duplexes (prints front and back without me having to take the paper out, turn it around and print again), it also has a fax and scanner and he pulled up some ratings on it. Pretty impressive so it came home with us.
- Stop #2 – Ruby Tuesdays – Vince decided we’d have our Valentine’s lunch today since I’ll be out of town on Thursday.
- Stop #3 – Hobby Lobby – I bought nothing but Vince found a poster and a frame for his office.
- Stop #4 – Target – I do my best to keep that man out of Target. His big find today was Brawny paper towels — GIANT ROLLS. Last Saturday when we were in Target, they were on sale for something like $12. Vince bought a 12 pack (equivalent to 16 regular rolls). We weren’t out at home but he thought we were getting low. Today they had them marked down to $11 for 12 rolls (equivalent to 16 rolls) so he bought two more 12 packs (equivalent to 32 regular rolls) but when he went to check out (I was in Starbucks by this point!), the 12 packs of Brawny GIANT ROLLS rang up at $6.50 each so he went back and got three more 12 packs (equivalent to 48 regular rolls). Lord, help us all! The best I can figure, we now have the equivalent of 96 rolls of paper towels (although if I were to count, I’d only see 72 rolls of paper towels.) Guess I won’t be buying paper towels for quite a while!
- Stop #5 – Books-A-Million – By now, I’m getting a bit grumpy and am definitely ready to go home. He found a magazine but then we ran into my friend, Diane, and her husband who works with Vince. Diane asked me to go to the quilt shop in Carthage (Block by Block) next week but I can’t so we’ll go the next week so that was a good stop.
- Stop #6 – Petland – I was looking for some hollow bones to put peanut butter in for Speck. They didn’t have them. They did have a whole bunch of puppies, including a dachshund and after the morning we had with Speck, I was tempted to ask if they took trade-ins!
- Stop #7 – Big Lots – I detest that store but I persevered and was nice. Vince bought what he needed and we were on our way home.
- Stop #8 – Gas – We had 3/4 tank but it’s .04 cheaper there so . . let’s just make another stop. And, let’s get a drink here but first, let’s use the restroom. One look at that place and there was no way I was using the restroom there so we decided we wouldn’t buy a bottled drink there either.
Oh wait . . we never go in Walgreen’s any more because there isn’t one in Nevada!
- Stop #9 – Walgreen’s – we needed nothing! He did buy our drinks there and used their restroom.
Finally, we’re on our way home. No stops between Webb City and home going the back way .. until we get to Nevada. Vince remembered the grocery store has cereal on sale but I had already bought four boxes.
- Stop #10 – Woods – Thankfully they had a four box limit per customer and NO! I will not stand in line so we can each get four boxes of cereal.
Remind me to never go shopping with Vince again and if he wants to spend quality time with me . . it will definitely be in the basement next to my sewing machine!