No Clean, Well Lighted Place Here
It’s 6:00 am, and I’m standing outside my office, waiting for it to open. No, I’m not on trial, and no, I didn’t get a sudden case of overachieveritis. Joe needed to be in work early so even though I knew my office wouldn’t be open yet, I volunteered to take the ridiculously early train with him. Man, I am an a+ wife this week. I really didn’t think I’d have a problem finding a Hemingwayesque clean, well-lighted place to have a cup of coffee and a muffin to kill the 15 minutes before my office opened. Philadelphia is a major metropolis. New York may be the city that never sleeps, but I didn’t think Philadelphia was the city that doesn’t want to wake up.
The only thing open at 5:30 in the morning in Philadelphia? Dunkin Donuts. I think cops get a bad wrap about Dunkin Donuts — it’s not their choice, it’s their only option. Not even Starbucks. And, I googled Starbucks before we left the house. Big fat liars, those Starbucks guys, claiming they’re open at 5:00 a.m. And major teases too. I went to three Starbucks, all of whom purported to be open at 5:00 a.m. , and yes, indeed, they had employees at the counter, staring straight at me through the glass as I yanked on the obviously locked door. I could almost hear their off key “ha ha’s,” as they twiddled their thumbs behind the register.
Life this week has been one big ha ha on me, I think . Our kitchen rehab was finally finished, and what happened? Our sewer backed up, filling our basement with poop. And, when did Roto-Rooter show up, when they were supposed to be at our house at 5:30 p.m.? Midway through the series finale of Madmen. So, first, I watched Joan get dumped, and then I watched the camera that the Roto Rooter man snaked through our sewer pipe like a colonscopy, to see our clog. While he flushed out our pipe with glee, for he was one happy sewer guy, I had to wait until nearly midnight to find out Don Draper’s fate, and to learn that I had been watching an extended Coke commercial every Sunday night of my life for nearly 8 years. Ha ha on me, again. I don’t even like Coke, I like Pepsi.
But, our basement is now clean, and it’s certainly not a horrible thing to be at work two and a half hours early. And Peggy and Stan did get together, so that was something.
So, I don’t have any links for you this early Tuesday morning. It’s not that there aren’t “things I’m loving today,” — just because my basement filled up with poop doesn’t mean it sucked the heart out of me, but I just wasn’t on the internet this weekend. Yureeka! That’s what I’ll do now! Pinterest, feedly, Facebook, you are open! Unlike Starbucks, you do not have a glass door with a lock on it. I still have an hour and a half before I have to go to court – there’s always the internet. It’s always open.