I asked for soup bowls for Christmas. I explained to Rijid's parents that my current plates were in about six different patterns, so matching really wasn't an issue. His mom apparently took that as a desperate cry for help. In addition to the bowls, we both received a complete set of four large plates, small plates, salad bowls, and coffee mugs.

I have matching service for eight. My kitchen cupboards look just like a grownup's.

Getting there was of course kind of a pain in the ass. First, I had to wash my old dishes. I threw away my old bowls, just because it amused me to throw away dirty dishes instead of washing them. Also, because my old bowls really were kind of pathetic. Half of them were plastic that had been microwaved and gotten all gross-looking. The others were soup mugs with broken handles.

I washed one drainer full of new dishes, and packed up some of the old plates in the now empty box. I violated a lifelong principle of laziness, and dried the dishes with a towel. (Why bother doing work when you can achieve the same effect by doing NOTHING for two hours?) I washed and dried another load of new dishes. I packed more old dishes into the second empty box. Then, I washed and dried another load of new dishes, and packed more old dishes into the empty box.

I got rid of about 20 plates, and an equal number of glasses that I decided displeased me. This freed up enough cupboard space for all the new plates, as well as the lifetime supply of travel coffee mugs that we scored from my parents. (I say lifetime supply, but I think there's already at least one, maybe two missing. Rijid takes them out of the house, and they somehow never come back. I think someone he works with is building a bomb shelter out of stolen coffee mugs.)
***
I had also asked Rijid's parents for curtains, but since the curtains I required had a lot of specifications, I figured it was a long shot.

Let me explain. Rijid works 3rd shift. He comes home at 5am and sleeps till 2. He's a very light sleeper, so we had a blanket duct taped to the bedroom window to keep sunlight out.

The blanket was red, with polar bears. I knew when we did it that it wasn't ideal, and over the past few months, I became increasingly convinced that those damn bears had to go. I wanted a real curtain. It had to be thick, and it probably had to be dark. Rijid had also added a caveat of "nothing girly." Maybe such curtains don't even exist. I'd been checking out curtains whenever I thought of it, and I hadn't found much. All the thickest materials were covered with appalling designs, or even worse, ruffles, and maybe weren't quite thick enough anyway.

Rijid's mom apparently had similar problems. She solved it with a Kohl's gift card.

I thought I could easily turn a gift card into curtains, but it wasn't that simple. Kohl's had no curtain department. Well, fuck. I could buy a lot of clothes that I didn't really need, or I could save the gift card until I actually needed some sort of clothes. Either way, I'd still have to deal with a bedroom full of polar bears.

Then, I saw the blankets. Thick, fuzzy, dark blankets in solid colors. Definitely an improvement. I'd received some cash from my Gramma, and I decided I could use some of that towards a real curtain rod, sew a quick hem, and be rid of the bears forever.

A sales clerk passed by, so I asked if maybe there was a curtain department I just wasn't seeing. She directed me towards the shower curtains. Hmmm.

I found a very pretty translucent silky material with thin blue and green stripes. Why someone would actually want to use it as a shower curtain is beyond me. You'd need a waterproof shower curtain behind it, and then what's the point? I just don't get the layered shower curtain look at all.

But I digress. The point is, it was there, it was pretty, and I had the means to make it mine. I bought blue blankets, because they looked the best behind the shower curtain.

I am very lazy, so first I tried just using double-sided hem tape. I'm not sure if it was the cats or just gravity, but that only lasted about a day. So, I did it for real. I sewed a hem large enough to put a curtain rod inside. I attached the shower curtain. The bottom edge was about two inches too short for the window, but I had cleverly anticipated that, and bought two of the blankets. I attached another six inches of blanket, and it was awesome. My current sheets are almost the exact shade of blue as the curtain blankets, and the blanket on my bed is blue and green. I have the nicest looking bedroom of my entire life.
***
It's just now occurred to be that none of this is probably as interesting to you as it was for me. I have new dishes, and I made some curtains. What a boring entry.

I'll spare you the equally gripping tale of the night I tried to reorganize all the books, and just cut this short right now.

previous--next