One wonders sometimes

how things can go so terribly, horribly wrong.

You remember my dilemma with the bookcases? Weeeeelllllll it seems things have gotten worse. My sons came over yesterday to put the rest of the stuff together. Brent, the oldest, got here first. He's my Peter Pan son. I love him dearly and in some ways he most like me and in other ways the complete opposite. He got the shelves out of the box, worked on it for about five minutes, got frustrated and flounced down on the couch saying he didn't know why I asked him to help - he hates doing this kind of thing and now I put him in a bad mood.
You see, my sisters call me a quotation mark Draaaaammmmaaa Queen quotation mark. I laugh at them, laugh at myself and admit I might have a wee bit of it in me. Brent, on the other hand beats my drama queen with his Drama King without the ability to laugh at himself. He sulked for the rest of the day. I told him at one point to just go home but he said he was only staying to help with the heavy stuff and then fell asleep.
Ryan arrived not long after and worked on putting the main entertainment shelving unit together. It took him over four hours - working by himself. I offered to help a few times but he just said "out" so out I went and finished reading Creation in Death. I learned that was the best thing to do when Ron was trying to put something together too.
Later on I ordered pizza for the 3 of us. Brent woke up long enough to get pissy because I wasn't ordering it from his favourite pizza place - which I don't really like and is the most expensive.
Ryan finally got it done. It was in two parts and the two of them put it up. Although seeing how large it was I started having those dreadful suspicions again that the measuring thing was going to bite me in the butt again.
They put it against the wall and said "done."
At which point I said "Not exactly".
"There is another one?" Ryan said.
"Um." I answered. "Not one."
"Two???" came his reply.
"Weeeelllll, how about three?" I confessed.
You see - I had two more on either side of the big one the TV sits on and there was still the third bookcase.
"I'm not doing those today!!" came his emphatic answer
"No, no I don't expect you to." I said
It had taken him almost 5 hours to do just the one and I wasn't about to ask him to do the rest. Besides, seeing the one big one there, I don't think two on either side will fit. Those show rooms at Ikea are so much BIGGER than my living room.

So then, with food in his stomach - he somehow managed to get over his pissiness and eat the pizza I wanted, Brent and Ryan worked on setting up the cable and VCR. It was at this point another problem cropped up. You see, the SurroundSound/DVD cable was quite short. It just barely reached on the other stand. This one is higher and the DVD is further away from the television.
It wouldn't reach. I have to go and get a longer cable. This means no North and South. This means no Robin Hood. This means no music real loud (which is how I like it) because the DVD is also a FM radio station. There is a snow storm going on outside.
So - I have boxes upon boxes all over the living room and hall. I have two more entertainment/shelves that probably won't fit. I have a bookcase that won't fit. I have no DVD. And somehow I managed to break the sound on the computer.
I have to have the kitchen cupboards all cleaned out by the day after Christmas. I will have no kitchen for a month starting January 4th.
On the positive though - I did stop at the mall on the way home from work on Friday and got most of my shopping done. Mind you at this point I don't want to give Brent anything except a lump of coal and if we didn't have a snow storm raging, I'd be very tempted to take his gifts back.

February - I can hardly wait till you get here.

'til later