Does VIP really stand for "Very Important Person?"

Today was quite a packed day. The past 2 posts I've done I think are pretty long and kind of get boring, but I'm thinking today's is going to be just as bad.

I went back to sleep until 9 this morning after I took Lucy for her usual morning romp around 7:30. When I woke up (for the second time) I told Kristi she should probably start getting ready. We had alot to do, and it takes her a little while to get ready so I like to keep her moving on busy days.

After a little bit we went to Home Depot to pick up our supplies for the day. On our agenda were things like painting the shutters and front door black, staining the mailbox post, along with some other random yard work. Our bill at Home Depot was pretty expensive because of all the things we bought.

Once we got home we ate leftovers and then I took down the shutters and the front door and put them all in the garage. We used a baby gate at the front door to keep Lucy inside, and we turned the thermostat off. I think Lucy enjoyed being able to look out the door at first, but by the end of the day she was fairly upset about having to watch us with no interaction for literally 6-7 hours. I can understand the frustration when most of your day is spent like this:
I cleaned off the shutters and door, and while I was doing that Kristi came out to help. We tagged teamed on painting the shutters for a little while and then I started on the door while she finished up. We bought 2 cans of paint at Home Depot and hoped it was enough...you can tell we haven't done much painting. If anyone needs some semi-gloss black exterior latex paint, we've got enough to paint your house.

After the first coat we needed to wait a few hours to put on the second, so Kristi went inside to clean and I started on another project. I have never liked the pinkish beige color of our mailbox post, and I had this great idea when contemplating what to do with it. I thought that I would strip all the paint off and then stain it a dark color. While at Home Depot I had bought the strongest paint stripper I could find, and so I got to work putting it all over the post (after taking the mailbox off of course). By the way, paint stripper burns...I had to run in several times to wash my hands off. I even tried to use nitrile gloves, but the stuff burned right through those like the sun through a leaf when a magnifying glass is involved.

While I was doing this, Kristi's mom and grandmother showed up to look at some of the work we had done to the house. They only saw it right after we moved in and so they wanted to see all the new light fixtures, as well as what we were doing the outside. She brought some Diet Coke and Diet Dr. Pepper along which was awesome because I had just run out of Diet Coke.

When they went inside I started to scrape the paint off the mailbox. I had visions of the paint stripping off in sheets revealing a nice wood surface...yeah right. After struggling to get the tiniest bit of paint off I discovered that the wood had been treated with some kind of green chemical, hence it was green. I started to think that maybe I should have left the mailbox alone, pinkish beige and all. Here's a picture of pathetic progress I made:

Unfortunately I didn't leave the mailbox alone, so I wiggled it back and forth and got excited when I realized they didn't cement the post in. I gave Kristi a quick rundown of what was happening and then went to Lowes to get a new post. Cedar posts were only 30.00 and I had lots of stain to choose from already. I carefully selected my post as well as some Quickcrete. This stuff amazes me because you don't even have to mix it before you pour it in. I then went home to discover that this post was a bit longer than the old post. My parents are at the beach, but I knew that my dad had his circular saw in their garage, so I told Kristi I would be back once again and went over to get it. All I have is a little hack saw, and there was now way I was going to try to get through the post with that.

When I got back Kristi had already started on the shutters' second coat, what a great wife. Once the post was in the ground it looked pretty good, and I started to think that maybe it deserved a nicer box than the one we had. I talked about it with Kristi and we decided we would look for one later that night. I cemented the post in and then started on painting the door again. Kristi finished the shutters so I gave her an overview of how to stain the mailbox post with paper towels (we were out of brushes), and she started to do that.

I finished the door around 6 and Kristi went inside to get ready for date night. I figured I would go ahead and do some weedeating while the stuff dried, and so I got out my new handy weedeater and line. For some reason it would not start, and I was getting pretty angry. I'm not sure if I flooded the engine or what, but I got so frustrated after spending so long trying that I decided I would wait until tomorrow to try again. If it doesn't start tomorrow I am going to have to talk to the lady and see if she'll give me my money back or something. I honestly don't understand what could have happened though, because it started perfectly fine 2 days ago. I'm sure I'll figure it out when I am less frustrated. I ended up just cleaning up all the trash instead of weedeating. I also took some pictures of everything we had done; our house looks weird without shutters and a front door:

When Kristi was done I got ready quickly and then put the door back on its hinges. It wasn't very tacky and I figured it would be fine to do that. The shutters were still pretty tacky so I decided to put those back up after our date.

Kristi had decided on Copper River Grill for dinner. We had one in Columbia, and she loves their salads...the one in Greenville is on Haywood Road where O'Charleys used to be. We stopped by Home Depot on the way and picked out a sweet dark bronze-ish mailbox, and also some silver numbers to put on the post.

When we got to the restaurant we thought it was strange that 2 hostesses were outside. As we were walking up they asked us if we had been invited to the VIP party. While I consider myself quite the VIP person (is that redundant?), we had in fact not been invited...obviously due to an egregious oversight on someone's part. They informed us that we could not come in, but that they would be open bright and early at 11 on Monday morning. First of all, 11 is not bright and early...second, why would that be comforting? I felt like saying, "Oh, well we will definitely be here Monday morning then," but I realized that these people just work there and had nothing to do with it. What a weird thing though, I couldn't figure out if it was someone's party, or if it was just VIP night...I seriously think it was just VIP night.

Instead of Copper River we ended up going to California Dreaming, which was wonderful. I enjoyed my food and we got a really nice table. We were both starving because it was past 8:30 when we got our food, but I enjoy eating late. It makes me feel very swank and important.

We came back home and I put some water sealer on the mailbox post as well as hung the shutters back up. The black looks great, way better than before, and the mailbox is going to look really nice too. I plan on putting up the actual box tomorrow because it requires a little assembly.

Tomorrow morning I have to wake up at 6:15, which I always hate. I think I am just Stage Manager tomorrow, so unless someone doesn't show up my job should be pretty easy. Joe and I are gonna go to a rock concert tomorrow night, which I am super excited about. I won't spoil it for you though since I'm going to write about it tomorrow...