I’m sure you’ll all be thrilled to know that we saved our “Way Out” sign when our new door was installed today. Mom managed to peel it off the old door in one piece, and then stuck it onto a flexible magnet sheet (my suggestion, stated modestly), so that it can sit proudly and firmly–and yet temporarily and without marring in any way–on the brand new, steel door.

How cool is that?

I took the afternoon off from work to help “supervise” the installation of our new doors (three in all). Mom had to go get her haircut, too, which left me the only adult, human family member around to answer questions. (And, just a word to the wise, if you see her, don’t ask Mom about the haircut–the cut itself is fine, but it was supposed to happen at 10:30, but her friend and hairdresser forgot the time and went out, and Mom is stressed enough this week, and . . . really, it’s safer not to mention it at all.)

  Poor Chappy had to spend the entire afternoon out on the deck, out of the way. (Thank heaven it was sunny!) But isn’t it nice? He was rewarded with a brand new door all his very own. It’s more or less impossible to tell in the picture, but the door is blue, and that’s a brand-new doggie door down at the bottom. The installer–who had a sense of humor–teased that they didn’t have the doggie door, didn’t we? When I had ordered it myself and the company picked it up at our house so that the hole in the door would be the right size . . . What did they mean, where was it?? Except of course, he was teasing. (My poor mother almost had a heart attack. Really, I’m telling you. Don’t mess with her this week!)

  I got a treat, too (as if spending the afternoon at home instead of at work wasn’t treat enough). A delivery from Amazon of four brand-new books. Hopefully a couple of them will be tempting enough to bring along on vacation on Sunday. (They are hardcovers after all. Naturally, they all look appealing or I wouldn’t have bought them, but to be schlepped from New Jersey to Massachusetts, they need to look really good.)

I don’t have anything of a fiber nature to discuss tonight. Nothing. I spent the afternoon–between watching doors being hung, calming Mom and Chappy, and cooking dinner (for good measure) catching up on magazines. I think I’m the only person I know who finds most magazines more of a chore than a pleasure–they really only take away reading time that could be spent on real books. I mean, I wouldn’t subscribe if I weren’t interested in what the periodical had to say, but . . . they so seldom have anything resembling character development or interesting plot twists, why bother?

I also feel like I’ve been neglectful of leaving comments at other people’s blogs lately. I’m reading just as many (if not more) as usual, and am just as interested, but . . . does making a comment really take that long? Of course not! So how am I justifying this by telling myself that I’m busy?? Sheesh.

Of course, I’m dreading the whole, after-vacation, catch-up-on-blog reading thing next week. Like I said earlier, any internet access next week will be through the hotel phone line and, well, while I’m going to try to post, I can’t promise how many blogs I’ll be reading! At least it will be more fun than catching up to the hundreds of e-mails that will be in my mailbox at work the following week . . .

Can anybody else tell, I’m looking forward to my vacation?? (grin) All I have to do between now and then is finish emptying every scrap of everything from the kitchen, ditto the bathroom, remove everything hanging from my bedroom walls for safety’s sake, try to keep my mother from winding herself so tightly she springs off into the atmosphere, and, oh yeah . . . pack! (Actually, packing the clothes is the easy part; the hard part is figuring which books to bring . . . because naturally, one is never enough!)

Oops! I almost forgot–happy birthday to my brother-in-law, Mike, today!!

• Tags: Reading, Uncategorized • Permalink:Way Out! //