Spontaneous adventures at a DIY store

Apologies for not updating this as much as I’d like – perhaps a little refreshing? Each day has been taken up by DIY right into the night, so not exactly the usual humorous happenings. With the exception of yesterday. As it’s the bank holiday, it’s unspoken law to spend four days feng shuing your home.

8:30am: “I’m waking you up because I have our day planned and I don’t want you sleeping in until noon. Honey? Are you listening to me? Let me open the blinds…” *blinding stream of sunlight burns hole in my face*

10:00am: arrived at the DIY store (such fun) to buy the entire store. Stocked up on necessities for the weekend. Actually, this wasn’t quite the ‘I have a list so let’s just pop in, get what we need and leave, it’ll only take ten minutes’ trip I was expecting. First stop? The paint. Excruciating is a word I use infrequently, however I feel it sums up this experience perfectly. Word of warning; don’t ever hand Mother a colour chart.  Approaching Miguel-Angel, Mother requests his assistance in explaining exactly what kind of paint there is, what exactly is in these paints, which brand is considered the premium brand (crucial, obviously) and finally “do you have one of those things with all the colours on them?”.

11:30am: literally one entire hour later Mother has eliminated 286 cards and is pondering over the final three. They all look completely the same.

11:50am: “hmm, I’m just not sure – this one has more of a rose-tint doesn’t it, darling?”

“It’s the same as the first one. They are the same colour. Please just pick one.”

“It has to be right, you know? *turns to Miguel* what do you think?”

12:10pm: dragged Mother away from the paint section (paint pot in hand, thankfully) and headed to the screws and fixings. This DIY store has smartly assigned a knowledgeable sales assistant to each department – therefore avoiding the British; “I dunno about shower heads you’ll have to ask Dave” scenarios. Browsing through the pick-n-mix nails and Mother decides help is most definitely needed. I suggest asking the nice young girl four feet away but Mother looks at me in horror, hisses “no!” and not-so-subtly slides all the way to the end of the aisle to grab young, tanned Fernando. As it happens, Fernando was gay.

14:00pm: more house-y shopping – rugs this time. With little optimism we slump over to the rug section of a homeware store and suddenly; “OH MY GOD! I FOUND IT I’M ONE HUNDRED PERCENT THIS ONE’S RIGHT OMG HONEY THIS IS THE ONE!”

14:05pm: a pleasant conversation with Maria, the sales assistant. “I’d like to buy this rug please!”

“Ok, yes. Mañana?”

“No, today please. I want to take it home today”

“Ah, we can’t do that. We have none left”

“Oh rats. Well alright, I guess I’ll have to have the display one.”

“Perdona?”

“I’ll take this one”

“No you can’t have this one madam”

“Why not?!”

“We need for stock check madam… storage?”

*we embark on a pen to paper translation*

We then attempt to order the rug. Not as easy as you’d think; “Si, claro! But mañana.”

“I don’t want it mañana, I want it today.”

“We cannot unfortunately have orders today, I’m sorry”

“What? No, no, this won’t do. I’ll take this one on the wall. It’s quite simple, Maria. You just count one less. You see? I’ve taken this one, so there’s one less. Surely it’s better for the store to sell me one *dramatic hand gestures again* than for it to sit in the stock room just to be counted?! Just count one less! You understand, yes?”

“Uhh –“

“This is precisely why Spain is in a crisis!”

“Haha, yes – I know, I know!” (Poor Maria’s cheeks were turning rosa the longer this went on but she remained lovely and polite)

“Can you please ask your manager to let me take this rug? I will get it myself. Where are the step ladders? I shall unhook it myself.”

Quite a long time later Maria comes back carrying a set of ladders with a beaming smile (showing entire relief) and Mother turns to me with an extraordinarily smug look on her face. We now have the rug. Of course.

16:00pm: mattress hunting, with the help of Jose. Trying every single bed in the store was barely a challenge for Mother and she continued to experiment in the second bed store. However it became siesta time and regrettably she found the best bed right in the window. Yes, Mother took a short siesta in the display window.

19:00pm: So the quick morning of collecting supplies turned out to be a day. Essential stop at Alcampo for a bottle of wine (or three) before finally heading home. At the checkout and we’re loading the conveyer belt with our shopping when suddenly a strike of bad luck; the conveyer belt jerks forward and a bottle of wine rolls towards the edge… and smashes straight onto the floor, magically missing the cashier’s head. I turn to Mother but perhaps a second too late as I see she has already scooted off for a replacement bottle.

So I guess you could say it was a productive day all around? 

Charlotte-Elizabeth xoxo