Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Pushing Furniture

Every six months or so, either Dewie or I get the bug and we must move furniture. If there are no current projects, we will rearrange furniture just for the hell of it. It’s a compulsion that we both have so it’s not difficult to convince one or the other to indulge. Dewie came home from the library yesterday babbling about changing the office into a closet. The closets in our house are really tiny so even with clever arrangements and building in shelves and double hanging, it’s nearly impossible to put the wardrobe of two people inside. She has my attention.
“What are you babbling about?”
“Since we only have the one desktop now, the office is just an empty room that collects crap. Why don’t we make it into like a dressing room so we can have all our clothes in one place instead of spread all over the house?” Now she really has my full attention.
“I need to stare.” This means I need to sit in the room in question and just look at it quietly, applying different floor plans in my mind. This also means that I must have the following conversation with Dewie:
“Why don’t we mov..”
“Shhhhh. In a minute.”
“Ok, but we coul..”
“Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.”
“But I was thinking we coul…”
“Get out.”
After a few minutes I go through the different floor plans with Dewie and we decide to divide the room with bookshelves, make the closet in the back and keep the computer up front for the bills and files and whatnot. It really is a great plan and I can already see that the excitement is going to be more than Dewie can bear so I tell her, “We really need to empty this room before we start pushing things around. The floor plan is going to be tight so we might have to adjust it a little. It will just be easier if everything is not covered with crap. It’s already 4. I don’t really want to start that right now.’
“Yeah. You’re right.” I head off to the bedroom to read before I start dinner in a few hours. Twenty minutes later I start hearing it.
“Chhhhhhhhhhhhh. Bam.”
“Damnit!”
“Chsssssshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhht. Bam!”
“Damnit!”
“Are you moving furniture in there?!?!”
“Maybe.”
“Did you pile everything on top of the desk and try to move it?”
“Maybe.” I sigh and put the book down. I peek in the office. The entire contents of the book shelves, desk, and closet are balanced on top of the two desks and piled in the hallway.
“Deeeeewieeeeee, I didn’t want to start this today.”
“I couldn’t help it. You don’t have to help.”
“Have fun with that. You know if you do it that way you’re going to have to move all that crap every time you move a piece of furniture.”
“Go away.”
I continue to hear the sound of furniture sliding and crap falling on the floor for several more hours. Dewie finally emerges, declares that she’s tired and starts getting ready for bed. I peek in the office and it basically just looks like someone shook the room like a snow globe. “Wow. It looks….worse.”
“It looks like you should shut the hell up.”
As we lie in bed, waiting for sleep, Dewie says, her words dripping with sarcasm, “You know, feel free to work on that office tomorrow while I’m at work.”
“Seriously?”
“It was worth a shot.”

No comments: