Stay Inside the Lines

Okay. We all know how reasonable I can be, right? Words like “laid-back…accommodating… and extraordinarily attractive” often come to mind when describing me in random discussions….right?

(sound of crickets chirping.....)

Hello? Is this thing on?

Fine. Whatever. I know you’re still there…’cause I can hear you breathing, which is actually freaking me out a little.

One of my recent forays involved hitting up Lowe’s (the home improvement center, not the movie theatre…just to clarify) for something I’ve put on three separate lists…all of which somehow disappeared into The Twilight Zone of Kathrynville.

I needed to purchase a door stop.

No, this is not code for some never-before-heard-of New York just-invented-yummy cocktail….I needed an actual door stop. Taylor (18) can’t seem to open the door to the main bath without a big ***BAM!!!*** as the door hits the ceramic tile wall. I equate the sound to what I believe one would hear outside the heavily-barred window of your apartment on a typical Saturday night if one lived in a drug-infested, crime-ridden, gang-oriented neighborhood…just to give you a loose example....ya know, for emphasis.

So, I made it to Lowe’s and found the aisle with the door hardware, where I instantly determined that someone was evidently unhappy with the lack of options in door stops: they had screw-in, spring-out, wall-mounted, brass, white and brass with a little bit of white on just the very tip…they had 3” ones and 5” ones and ones that doubled as corkscrews and tire-pressure gauges. (Okay, so maybe I made up that last part…but you get the idea.)

This was practically the whole freakin’ aisle.

All I wanted was a freakin’ door stop.

I looked to the left: no Lowe’s associate. I looked to the right: ditto.

Another customer approached me and inquired if I knew where they sold the telephones.

Telephones? I said, “Um. In the electronics department?” (Note: There is no electronics department in a freakin’ home improvement center. On some level, I’d like to think I knew this…but this whole gang-related door-stop dilemma had me too bewildered and flummoxed to think clearly.)

I wound up with the “Economy Rigid Door Stop” for a nifty 89 cents and got the hell out of there….before someone else could ask me where they sold the dog food.