My first mistake was forgetting to turn the sound off on my phone before bed. I used to have "Harry Potter" play whenever I got an email but somehow I accidentally deleted it. Too lazy to plug my phone back into my computer, I switched to "Sonic the Hedgehog." "Harry Potter" is easy to sleep through; it's a quiet melody. "Sonic the Hedgehog" is not. Needless to say, every junk email about "Deal of the Day" and "Free Shipping" woke me up through the night. (Are you crazy? Reach over and mute the phone in the middle of the night? The light would hurt my eyes!)
Eventually I rolled out of bed (much later than my alarm clock intended) and dragged my butt into the bathroom to get ready.
Mistake # 2: Taking a bath instead of a shower. (Snooze.)
By the time I was ready, it was about 10 minutes after the time I usually leave. Oops. Still too tired, I decided to forgo the tennis shoes and just wear my slip-on knit shoes (the ones that look like slippers).
I got to work on time, which was nothing short of a miracle, and decided that I would check to see if my order had come in at the craft store. Tomorrow night is our big holiday celebration and we do free crafts. I had ordered a crap load of googly eyes for some ornaments my place will be making. I thought ahead and ordered these things 2 weeks ago-- I was overdue for a call.
This is what happened:
Apparently when I said my corporation name, they put it under an organization who USED TO BE under us but hasn't been for like a year or more. So the dude on the phone was yelling at me for putting it under the wrong name, and I was snapping back because, duh, they aren't part of us anymore.
What happened was this: I placed an order for a million googly eyes. Googly eyes came in. Store called place that isn't us. Place that isn't us picked up my order knowing they hadn't ordered them.
This started an absurd amount of detective work that, quite frankly, left me distressed (after all, I haven't been reimbursed for said googly eyes yet.)
Keep in mind, I only have one day to find these things.
After much rigamarole, I learned that the lady who picked them up had delivered them to another place altogether. So I called the other place, explained the mix-up, and the lady said, "Oh... we ordered some too." Talk about a coincidence. How many people around here order googly eyes in bulk?? Answer: A lot.
With all that straightened out, I decided I had better walk over and get my googly eyes before someone else got a hold of them. On my way out the door, I noticed the Christmas tree in the gallery was not lit up. Last week it was looking very dim so poo-- our Christmas tree is burned out.
No way.
If this happened Wednesday, who'd care? But the day before the holiday thing? No way.
At this point, I was feeling emo. What else could go wrong? I scuffed down the street, headed toward my googly eyes, and realized something:
Today was a horrible day to wear slip-on knit shoes.
I walked along the sidewalk, slush seeping into my stupid knit shoes, my socks soaking wet from the snow, and hated myself for not driving (Mistake #4).
I have little legs so a 3 minute walk took me about 8, then I slushed back through the snow, arguing with a fat squirrel who was barking at me from a tree, totally disgruntled by this run-around, when I saw our grounds dude way up on a lift, stringing replacement lights in the trees.
And down from the heavens came a box of Christmas lights *foomp!* in the snow.
Giddy that I didn't have to run to the store, I cut across the totally unshoveled plaza toward my office. Then I remembered my shoes again. Mistake #5.
Two major soakers later, I hauled the skinny Christmas tree through two doors and into my office, ala the Grinch, and plugged in the lights.
And the lights worked!
Overjoyed at the amount of time that saves, I carried the tree back out to the gallery and plugged them in.
And they did not work.
As it turns out, the extension cord was plugged in at the ceiling to avoid trip-hazard wires all over the floor. Of all the track-lighting in the place, that particular track was bad. One seriously whiny phone call later, the exhibit guy came over, and after about four more hours, only 6 of the 27 lights are working but my tree lights up so I don't really care.
Grounds dude came by for another problem we were having and I returned the box of lights he had given to/thrown at me. In my total rush of excitement that my problems were wrapping up (and probably also because a crazy high dose of Vitamin B12 was finally kicking in), I finished putting up the garland that I'd put off for about 2 weeks. Finally this place is almost up-to-par.
Assuming a Christmas catastrophe doesn't occur tomorrow, we should be all set for Christmas Crazy Day!
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