I slept last night, but not very well. While I was taking my shower, there was a terrible thumping sound. I jumped out of the shower, yelling, thinking James might have fallen. He thought I had fallen in the shower stall.

What actually fell was the back shelf/rod in the closet, the one we hang our dress pants, my jeans, and the winter coats on. The suitcases are kept on the shelf, which pulled right out of the wall because it looks like none of it was fastened into one of the studs. The wall anchors just gave way and pulled through. And here I was Friday thinking how good it looked now that the big suitcase was tipped up on its side.

It doesn't look as if anything got hurt, except for a lid on a box on an adjacent shelf, but I can't tell yet because this would mean cleaning the pants and the coats out of that corner and I simply wasn't up for it today. I hope nothing happened to Matilda (my doll that Papà brought me back from Italy), as she was in the corner under the coats.

When I did sleep, I had nightmares: in one, there was a pet monkey (not a chimpanzee, a real squirrel monkey) and it was killed. (Don't ask me where that came from; I haven't watched anything with monkeys in it.) I got up at eight feeling shellshocked and went back to sleep until 10:30 and dozed until almost eleven (we went to bed at two; James was working on the Quest jet down in the Man Cave and I was chatting with Emma and listening to Christmas music). Then we had to hustle before it got too hot to go out grocery shopping; it was already in the 70s and sunny, with only a brisk breeze to save the day. I took Tucker for his walk while James got himself a burrito; I ate a BelVita bar in the car.

We stopped at CVS briefly to use a coupon for BreatheRights, then went to the Battle Ridge Kroger because I needed buns for my lunch (the Smyrna Kroger makes terrible buns) and the usual: milk, bananas, yogurt, burritos, and a few other things, and I bought gasoline. Then we brought the stuff home and put it up, then released Tucker from "Durance Vile" and took him with us in the truck to go to Petco and pick up more dog food, a new antler, and a few snacks. There were no dogs in the store for him to interact with, but I took him to visit the cats, all of whom chilled out except for the one who hissed at him. It took him a few minutes to realize "these are cats!" and once he barked I took him away promptly. We also visited the budgies—"Wow, look, more brothers!"—and the ferrets. And he knew what the mice were, too; they took cover soon after he showed up.

When we got home, I tackled a major irritation: the chifforobe. I pulled out James' electric blanket which doesn't heat up anymore, and trashed that and a bunch of other stupid things like receipts. Anyone got any idea what to do with a Nook Color? It still works but it isn't a tablet, just an e-reader. It's not worth any money, but I wondered if someone just wanted an e-reader. I have some things to go in the electronics recycling bin, like our old phone chargers (and probably the old Droids, too; they've been wiped), and we took down a box of books James had already read and winnowed out what he didn't want to keep to take to McKay's. We have a Xerox box full to go to McKay's and another one started. Really, the rubbish one accumulates!

Next weekend, of course, we'll have to fix the shelf. We need three hooks, at least one fresh strut, and some screws to fasten those things into the studs!

(I'm now worried about the shelves in the "Christmas closet." Bet they're not screwed into the studs, either.)

Labels: books, chores, dogs, pets, shopping

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 6:50:00 PM

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