A Bad Decision and An Awesome Decision

This was a terrible idea. Seriously. There was no part of this that wasn’t a bad idea.

We decided to steam clean our carpets today.

Intrinsically, this was not a terrible idea at all. In fact, this was a fantastic idea.We’ve been in our apartment for two years now, and the carpets aren’t exactly looking their best. But if someone spilled garlic salt or knocked over  pencil sharpeners over your head and tracked endless dirty shoes across your face, you wouldn’t be looking so hot either. And with the weather warming up enough that we can open the windows without freezing to death, today seemed like a good day to do it.

No, what made this decision a fucking stupid one was all in the timing and lack of preparation.

You see, the last two days of work have been ridiculous. A full day on Thursday working a Celtic band that ended late. In between loading in the band and getting the lighting ready for the show, doing as much prep as I could for the Friday show. As soon as the band left the space, finishing prep for the Friday dance show. Leaving the space after midnight, not getting home until after 1am. Getting in bed with the potential for four hours of sleep. Despite my exhaustion, my brain doing that fucked up thing where it sits there and thinks, “Okay, I have to go to sleep right now. Now. Now. Now. Why can’t I go to sleep?!” and gets me so worked up that I can’t sleep when I need to most. Finally falling asleep around 4am, waking up at 5:30 to go to work. Loading in and running focus for the dance show. Programming, fixing, work notes, futzing. Professional, exciting  show, super nice, relaxed road LD with his shit together, great crew who helped me get shit done. Drinking enough caffeine over the course of the day to kill a monkey. Running the show, solving a couple minor catastrophes, getting through it with the audience none the wiser. And when the show was over, loading the company out and the full restoration of my plot and rig. Always moving, only stopping twice for meals, for 17 long-ass motherfucking hours. Don’t get me wrong, it was a successful day, and everyone I worked with was great. But by the time I finally stopped moving around midnight I was practically drunk from exhaustion, and when we walked in the door well after 1am I was truly about to pass out. According to Kyle, I was home about 3 1/2 minutes before I was in bed, and I was in bed approximately 15 seconds before I was asleep.

Today, we are both work-hungover in a serious way. This morning, I didn’t even become conscious until noon. Kyle slept until 1pm, and only woke then because I opened the curtains in the bedroom. Both of us felt our feet ached when they touched the floor, and despite the ten or so hours of sleep, I feel wiped out. We’re both pretty cranky; earlier, I threatened to cut off Kyle hands if he tried to touch my boobs again, and he responded by informing me that he would just beat me with his nubs instead. All I want to do right now is put my pajama pants back on, curl up in bed, and spend the rest of the day eating graham crackers and watching cartoons.

And that is why our decision was a fucking stupid one.

Because I certainly didn’t want to have to move three rooms worth of furniture and stuff them into two rooms. I didn’t want to have to vacuum six times. I didn’t want to have to mop up all the water after Kyle accidentally flooded the bathroom floor. I didn’t want my bedroom to look like this:

or my kitchen to look like this:

I didn’t want to spend the afternoon freezing to death because we had to open all the windows and doors to let the carpets dry, even though it’s 47 degrees outside. Nor did I want to spend  most of my afternoon hiding in a fort made of our two couches and a card table in the kitchen because the carpets were still wet and our kitchen is the only room without carpeting and it’s filled with furniture.

(That’s where the lack of planning became wildly apparent.)

There is no part of this that I felt like doing today, but we’d already arranged to rent the steam cleaner, so it had to be done. I will admit, the carpets look much better, and there’s the nice, just-cleaned fresh smell in the house. Plus the cats have gotten a fucking kick out of climbing on everything and exploring all the new hiding spots created by the jumble of furniture.

Besides, our poor decision was quickly followed by an awesome decision, mainly, going bowling with friends Ryan and Christina. Cheap beer, super crispy 25 cent wings, poor attempts at a sport, and two of our favorite people; there’s nothing about that that’s not a fucking awesome idea.

Unfortunately, that was quickly followed by more ramifications of our poor decision, mainly, coming home drunk at 11:30 and having to move the couches from our kitchen, the cat boxes from our bathroom, and the mountain of shit from atop our bed. And let me tell you, there’s nothing fun about moving furniture when you’re tired, drunk, and all you want to do is get in bed and eat chocolate ice cream.

But now, at nearly midnight, I can’t say I’m sorry about the way everything played out. Sure, I’ll have to move two bookcases and a lamp to get to my morning cereal. But our apartment smells nice, our carpets are the nicest looking they’ve ever been, I had a lovely evening out with friends, and now I’m in bed with chocolate ice cream.

Nothing to complain about there.