Red Roof Inn

I managed to function pretty well on the weird sleep I had Monday night. But I decided it was time to sleep on a real bed so I spent the day deciding where I should go

Tuesday evening I returned the grinder. My Jaguar has been a real trooper hauling cardboard boxes, paint, floor stain, sanders and grinders. I hope it survives all this. My funds are running thin, so when I returned the grinder and he said the balance was $89 (after a $175 deposit), did I want to swipe my card to pay the balance, I choked. Naive me. I expected a refund. Oh well, it's still cheaper than tile.

While I was at Home Depot returning the grinder, I had 3 guys (Superman, his brother, and a friend) at the house scraping what the grinder couldn't get around the toilets, inside closets, along baseboards. Again, I was dusty and disgusting. My back yard looks like it is covered in ash. The workers didn't know what to do with the dust they gathered, so they were sprinkling it around the utility box in the back. They had the windows open with a fan blowing out the window and the flowerbed below looked like it was covered in ash. One of the workers said it looked like the house was on fire with all the dust coming out the windows. I wish I'd taken a picture of the dust in the house, but the less evidence, the better, right?

I saw that Red Roof Inn, less than a mile from my office had a room for $49.99, so I made a reservation. I assumed it had a blow dryer and coffee maker. Not the $49.99 room. For that, you don't get bells or whistles. But it was clean, and it had a bed and wi-fi. 

Well, the wi-fi didn't work. Or maybe it was the 3 pages of terms and conditions that put me off. A TV! I forgot what it was like to have a TV! Once I settled in, I turned it on to HGTV. Isn't that what got me in there to begin with? I sat down with the floor stain instructions and finally had a chance to read them. Well! We're doing it all wrong. But it is what it is, and we'll just muddle through.

The shower was great. It felt good to be clean and in a normal room. I finally crashed about 10:00, and the bed felt like cardboard with an inch of cotton on top. The sheets were really soft, and it was a bed. I slept pretty well, but actually, I was more comfortable in my car the night before. Nothing beats a Jaguar for comfort, right?

I ran by the house for some food. The fridge is still on the back porch, and rather than buy meals out, I decided to stick with my diet as much as possible. It's really funny - normally I can barely make it to the kitchen to pour a cup of coffee to get started and I'm starving. Yesterday, I got up, dressed, ran by the house, withdrew money from one credit union, deposited the money into another, got to the office, blogged, checked my email, and before I knew it, it was 8:30 and I hadn't had a cup of coffee or eaten yet.

Last night, Superman and I mopped the floors. They are really looking good. I'm concerned because you can see the swirls from the grinder. I don't know if that will affect the stain - I'm assuming YES! There is still a lot of scraping and hand sanding to do. But you know, I'm just about to say, after tonight, let's go with what we have and consider the flaws "character." I'm not into perfection. Perfection has to be maintained. The painted concrete that I had wasn't perfect. As a matter of fact, we started out with 3 or 4 of us splotching it. I gave each pie pans with paint, pieces of sponge, and an area to work. I gave them general instructions and left them to their own creativity. You could tell exactly where each worked by the different type of pattern they did. I took photos of the progression of the living room floor. It was fun looking at it the other day when I was packing and unearthed it.

Before we left, I washed the dust off my hibiscus and lantana in the flowerbed below the window. I watered down the concrete dust they left sprinkled on my granite pathway.

I made reservations to stay at LaQuinta, another hotel close to work. As I was checking in, a friend who lives about 3 miles away from me, and I completely forgot about, called and asked if I needed a place to stay. I told her no because I was checking in. DANG!!! I can't believe I forgot about her! And she has animals I could pet. It's funny, I miss having pets. 

Again, I didn't sleep well. The air conditioner sounds weird, so every time it turned on, I woke up. I couldn't get comfortable in the bed, and I woke up every hour. There's no place like home.

So, you're up to date. I'm thinking I can sleep at the house tonight. My goal is to have the guys scrape while the packing/cleaning maniac and I wipe down everything to get rid of the concrete dust. I managed to find the wood grain in my antique dining table last night. The lion claw feet still need a good pedicure, but it looks better than it did.

The best part of all this, besides the obvious is the physical activity I'm doing. I feel awesome! I actually had to keep pulling my jeans up last night. I had become such a slug sitting in front of the TV or a computer, or at times both, but not doing much. This has been such a blessing. My Chiropractor is surprised that I'm doing so well after being rear-ended in April, and I think it's because I'm so active.