Grr.

 At least there will be clean sheets when I go to bed soon.

Grr of a day. Spent most of it on the phone talking and WAITING to talk to various sales associates at sears. I bought a refurbished cooktop from the Sears Outlet website. It was at a mall 3 hours from me but only 30 min drive from my daughter. She picked it up and met me a week later at a town midway between the 2 of us. Luckily we had a nice lunch (my treat for her trouble and time) and a bit of shopping..because when I got back home, we discovered we’d been given the wrong cooktop, a 36" model instead of a 30" model. Our new cabinets will only allow a 30" cooktop. It was def Sears fault. Every receipt and email proved that I did indeed order a 30" cooktop. Since it was a refurb, the cooktop cannot be exchanged only refunded. And the kicker is I have to drive 6 hours roundtrip to get it refunded. I can’t take it back to my local Sears. Totally fucked up company. I spent hours of precious time calling various people at the dot com site and also the Oakbrook store and even my local store. My local store said at first they’d take the cooktop back but only after charging ME a restocking fee of 15%! For THEIR error! I kept "climbing" their corporate ladder hoping for some resolution. So for my trouble they are sending me a gift card that won’t cover the cost of the gas to drive back and forth from Oakbrook ..and won’t come CLOSE for compensating for the  hassle and frustration of dealing with cranky toddlers in car seats for the 6 hour drive! Oh and they also sent me a coupon code for an overly generous 10% off my next purchase (as if!!)…and not even the coupon code works. The JPEG link is broken. They can’t even get a friggin’ email right!

So…hours and tons of shredded nerves later,  I am out 600 bucks and stuck with a cooktop I cannot use and cannot return without it taking up lots of gas and an entire weekend..only to be STILL without a working cooktop…and the error was NOT mine at all.

GAH.

Cam has an ear infection and has been running a fever for days. Tomorrow will not be a good day for calling in and Frank will try to deal with him but won’t be able to give him the one-on-one I do when the boys are ill. I don’t know what to do.

Time will be short this month and so will be money. Q’s 4th birthday is at the end of the month, as is Easter. Both boys need their picture taken which never costs me less than 200 bucks.  And Frank wants to do Q’s first friend party. I’m much shorter on cash after the loans for the kitchen and the new car. 

I’m struggling with my interactions with people. If only I could just watch, observe and not be expected to react..as if life were a reality series behind a glass screen.

Clean sheets are calling.