Saturday

I take Carol's 9:15 yoga class, and Carol is actually teaching it, after two weeks away and then last week cancelled for the holiday. And assisting her is the same woman who was assisting when I took her class in early May, but she's not named Karen as I thought. Although again this time I hear someone saying hi to someone named Karen, and when I turn around it's this person that I see. But her name is Purvi. I introduce myself after class just to make sure.

Afterwards I meet Dawn outside and we walk up to Academy of Theatrical Arts to get tickets to their fiftieth anniversary recital. Dawn took ballet there for years, when she lived and worked closer, before we moved all the way across town. They're all excited to see her, and excited that we'll be coming to see them at the recital.

I'm looking for the next Horatio book, since I'm threatening to finish the current one soon. (Ship of the Line. Next one is Flying Colors.) The used bookstore Kultur has apparently closed, moved to Los Angeles. We go to Kramerbooks, but they only have two Horatios, Midshipman and Lieutenant. On the way back to the car we stop at Second Story Books, another used bookstore, but they have no Horatio. We'll try Borders tomorrow.

We stop at Whole Foods for cucumbers for a salad Dawn wants to try making. We buy a bottle of white wine because Dawn likes the bottle. We stop at Safeway on the way home as well, for the regular weekly groceries.

We have quick snack for lunch, then we're off to the dump. Officially it's called the Fort Totten Waste Transfer Station. We have two old cabinets to take, one a kitchen cabinet, a corner cabinet, that's been slowly rotting in the back yard while we've been using it to store bags of potting soil and mulch, the other a little cabinet of Dawn's that used to hold videos, and more lately I've been hacking away at trying to fashion a shopmade router table, which I don't need now with the new Ryobi saw with the extension that I want to see if I can drop a router into. The dump is fairly deserted. Some days we've had to wait in line, but not today.

On the way home we sort of what-the-hell stop at Home Depot. Dawn's mother is coming to visit next weekend, and Dawn seems to think that her gardening needs a bit more show. So while Dawn looks for flowers and plants, I get ten minutes to go check out the tool corral.

I play with the fence on the Ridgid table saw that's way out of my price range, just to see how much steadier it is than the Ryobi saw I've got. I'm pleased that it's not remarkably different. Then I check out the little Ryobi bandsaw. It's a little 9" thing, meaning that you've got nine inches of clearance between the blade and the arm of the saw. It doesn't mean that you can resaw nine inches. Depth of cut is probably like three inches or so, around the same as my table saw. I check out the Ryobi planer, playing with the depth adjustment. I think I'll buy a planer next year. And finally I play with the drill press, trying to figure out the stroke adjustment.

I go back to meet Dawn and help her grab some hanging plants to high for her to reach. We're on our way to get in line when I think of needing a deck box or something to replace the cabinet that we just threw away. We see a lot of Rubbermaid ones, but no prices. We decide it's probably in our price range and grab one.

When we finally get through the line to the cashier, it won't scan though. The cashier pages for help and has us wait while she checks through the next customer. Then she has a problem with him trying to charge something to his store account. Then her entire register computer just flat out dies. We read the gardening circular to pass the time.

At home the thing snaps together in a jiffy. The instructions are on the giant box itself; there's no printed manual or instructions inside. The instructions are just pictures, even, no words. There's a picture of a screwdriver and a hammer, and a block of wood with "1x4" under it. Like who has 1x4s just lying around? I find a strip of MDF that's about right and use that. And then I stretch the plastic hinges while I'm screwing on the straps that hold the top. I have to yell for Dawn, who's inside toasting walnuts, to help me. Finally it's done. And it fits pretty well in the yard, where the old cabinet was. Looks a lot better.