I really want to tell you about Thursday, which tried really hard to be a Friday. And I really want to finish the real Friday’s story.
But, these days, it’s all about living in the moment, so I will tell you about right now. Today.
The plan: Go shopping at Wal-Mart (with my low-interest-rate Capital One credit card because I’ve gotten too carried away lately with auctions and yard sales and home improvement and helping out the neighbor kids so they could earn rolling skating and birthday money). As I’m perusing my shopping list, paring it down to the bare necessities, I remember to put the (never-used) credit card into my purse. Problem: it expired in April.
I spend the next 2 hours tearing my house apart, certain that my OCD would have resulted in my putting the new card away somewhere for when I might need it, which is now. I cuss and swear a lot, which really does not change the ultimate outcome: the new card is nowhere to be found.
Plan B: Use my Wal-Mart credit card (good anywhere, but at a much higher interest rate, and I’ve been trying to pay it down so I could buy my mattress-in-a-box). By now, it’s nearly noon and, 60 seconds before I walk out the door, a down pouring rain arrives. I am planning on hitting the Boy Scout yard sale (it’s practically across the street from Wal-Mart, it’s a good cause…how can I not go?) But, it’s pouring rain, so I figure God is saying, “Don’t do it. Save your pennies.”
Sure.
Five minutes across town, the sun is shining. I’ll just stop in for a quick look-see. I’m there eight minutes, tops. With one pair of leather sandals, one really cool bowl (filled with cabochons for my succulent garden), an awesome basket with swinging handles, and a three-tiered, heavy wooden cart on casters (which fits perfectly in the backseat of my Escort), I am $3.00 poorer. And soulstice-satisfied. And hot and sweaty.
On to air-conditioned Wal-Mart. Bare necessities: milk, sweet corn (got a hankerin’), dog food, cat food, paper products, bleach for the swimming pool (part of Thursday’s as-yet-untold story), and light bulbs for my new ceiling fan. $53.00 poorer, but it won’t cost me a penny, for now, per God.
Then home, hoping for cooler weather (which will not exist further more until November). So it’s time for a wine cooler. (Okay, wine.)
It is seriously too hot to do anything except lounge in the pool, but it’s still threatening thunderstorms, so I park my butt on the back porch, waiting for a breeze. I can’t sit still, and decide to work on my most recent project: extract, and count, my (very many) unglazed terra cotta planters. My friend, Tara, from Friday night, who came to look at my recliner (not to be confused with my “friend” TC (remember her? She affected my Friday night in a big way…story to come…), wants to buy my terra cotta pots. She wants me to tell her how much I will charge her for them. I want her to pay me whatever they are worth to her. They have been (sadly) sitting in the same place under my carport for 10 years, waiting to live in a greenhouse that will never be built. I’ve let go of that dream, and I am totally okay with it.
Final count: 84. Really. I pulled every single one of them (in perfect condition!) out of their dusty, leafy, cobweb-infested home and placed them on a metal cart, seemingly built exactly for this project. Perfect (!). Tara called a minute after I finished letting me know she would take saucers also, if they are available, as well as a clay “chimney” we found on the side of my barn.
Perfect. It may or may not get me the cash I need to live on for the next month or so (vacation [unpaid] with sisters coming up), but I would give the pots to Tara for nothing, just to know they will have a happy, loving home…much like the kittens (from the OTHER neighbors) that showed up (twice) last night on my back porch (and after successfully, for now, crossing my very dangerous street), and whom TC decided would bring joy to her little girls, so she took them home with her. Joy for everyone.
Perfect. Except that, along with the kittens, she kidnapped Frank, just when things were getting interesting. More on that later. (Do you hate it when I tease you?)