Furniture Shopping, or the Fourth Circle of Hell: Part I

Thus we descended into the fourth chasm,
Gaining still farther on the dolesome shore
Which all the woe of the universe insacks...

Here saw I people, more than elsewhere, many,
On one side and the other, with great howls,
Rolling weights forward by main force of chest.

They clashed together, and then at that point
Each one turned backward, rolling retrograde,
Crying, "Why keepest?" and, "Why squanderest thou?"

Thus they returned along the lurid circle
On either hand unto the opposite point,
Shouting their shameful metre evermore.

  -- Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy - Inferno

About a month ago Jules and I moved into a new place. I'd use that as an excuse for not having posted in awhile, but the real reason is that I've just been extremely lazy.

So yeah, we moved into a bigger place into a cooler town. You can tell it is cool because people like to actually go there, as opposed to the apartment I used to live in where people tried to go the other direction.

You have one or two shootings and a carjacking and all of the sudden everybody thinks you live in a dangerous area. Sheesh!

Anyway with moving into a larger place comes the problem of having to furnish the new areas.

Different Tastes

I discovered the hard way just how different Julie's and my tastes are in furniture a few months ago. We were out on a Saturday afternoon running some errands. Normally I'd try to weasel out of running errands on a Saturday afternoon, but in this case I was persuaded by the possibility of going to see The Transformers movie.

We had taken care of all chores except one with about an hour to spare before the movie. Jules wanted to go to Bed Bath & Beyond to put a couple of things on the wedding registry. The movie theater was right next door so with an hour to spare I figured it wouldn't be a problem.

First, let me just say that Bed Bath & Beyond is really not a bad store when other people are paying. In that sense it is like Williams & Sonoma. It is one of those stores I would never, ever, in a million years spend my own money in because you can find the exact same items for half of the price with a little legwork, but the selection adds a lot to the convenience factor and I think that's why you pay a little extra. They also have some cool square china, which I'm a big fan of.

Julie, however, is not. Julie is very into traditional designs when it comes to furniture, plates, and... uh... well pretty much anything from an aesthetic standpoint.

Me, I hate traditional stuff. I like to be reminded when I walk into a room that I live in the 21st century, not 1950. If they sold robots or jetpacks in furniture stores I'd put them on the registry.

Julie had put a shower curtain on the registry via the internet that she wanted to take a look at in person. One look was all you needed to tell you this was the ugliest shower curtain in the store. The puddle of vomit and various clawed out eyeballs nearby were also a tipoff. It was like Medusa, except looking it in the eyes provoked a gag reflex, immobilizing you as you tried to expunge from your body all trace of having seen the monstrosity.

Also, nothing else that Julie had picked out matched this thing, probably because "Projectile Vomit Inducing Ugly" was SO last year.

However, we were approaching a half hour or so until Transformers started. The question became: do I mention this to Julie?

In the end I couldn't help myself. I mentioned that the towels she had picked didn't match that shower curtain.

With those words any possibility of attending the afternoon screening of Transformers vanished. Like the tortured souls in the Fourth Circle pushing great weights up against each other for eternity, we held dozens of different colored towels up against different shower curtains in an effort to find the elusive perfect match, ever just beyond our tortured grasp.

At one point we were becoming so frustrated that we started asking hapless, unsuspecting nearby shoppers, who looked at us with confusion and horror and we proffered them towels and curtains, tears streaming from our eyes.

I still have yet to see Transformers, by the way.