I despise shopping.
At least, I despise shopping when I have to decide what to buy. I enjoy window shopping and watching people, needing nothing and leaving with nothing. Black Friday shopping: fun. Grocery shopping: punishment.
I do not enjoy shopping when I have to find things on a list and leave before the clock strikes twelve, and I turn into a pumpkin. (Yes, I do know that’s what shopping is supposed to be.)
And it’s far worse when I kinda-sorta-halfway know what I want, but not really, and I must go into the store to look at the thing and choose between the twenty-three diffferent varieties! of that thing.
Add to that my propensity for getting lost in even vaguely unfamiliar places, and a trip to Lowe’s is worse than going to the dentist for me.
That is not an exaggeration. I enjoy a visit to my hygienist far more than trying to figure out where specialized connecting strips for paneling are located. (Spoiler alert: They’re close to the paneling. But you’ve got to keep an eye out, or you’ll miss them.)
Nevertheless, I mustered the courage to go today. I’ve had a bathroom remodelling project I’ve been meaning to do for years, but I’ve been putting it off; I think, in large part, because I’d have to go to Lowe’s to get the supplies.
I left at 4:00 for a trip that would take a normal human half an hour, but I wisely told my wife I’d be home around 5:30. Turns out I got home around 6:30–an hour later than I’d predicted, but that’s far better than some excursions!
There is no reason it took that long and every reason. At least my time wasn’t as difficult as for the lady beside me in the aisle looking at what I think were drill bits. “Is 3/8 inch bigger or smaller than 1/2 inch?” she asked.
Poor dear! I understood, though. Probably in any other setting, she’d know right off that 3 is bigger than 1, and 8 is bigger than 2, but in Lowe’s, things like that fly clean out of a body’s head!
P.S. Bathroom project will commence next week, Lord willing.
Juan David 