the tonedef blog

Tuesday night Band Mom used the new oven again. This time she made some yogurt curry chicken. It sounds odd, but its damn good. It wasn’t as good as the last time she made it though, although I think that was because of the chicken not the chef or the new oven.

But Wednesday night Band Mom had a meeting, so I was in charge of dinner. I got to take advantage of the double oven. Now I don’t “cook” so much as heat things that are already made usually, but still…I made some stuff that Band Mom had purchased from Schwan’s. In the top oven I made some macaroni and cheese and in the bottom some meatloaf.

The double oven option is definitely a cool option on the new stove!

So we did finally get the stove as mentioned in my last post. I made a quick Wal Mart run to get stuff we needed and some frozen pizzas. Band Mom got to play with her double ovens to cook 2 pizzas and some breadsticks at different temps for differing times at the same time. I think it may have been worth the wait.

So we now have a delivery window of 8-10 AM on Monday. I woke Band Mom up at 8 to make sure she was coherent when they showed up. I left for work at 8:30. No stove yet. Band Mom didn’t take Thing 1 to the bus stop this morning to make sure she wouldn’t miss the delivery.

Well I got a call at 10:30. Still no stove! If it doesn’t show up soon I may have to post bail for Band Mom…

12:30 I got a call from Band Mom. THE STOVE IS FINALLY HERE AND SET UP!!!!

Too bad we don’t have anything to cook on it since we didn’t get to the store this weekend…

Sunday morning I woke up early and took Pooh to church by 10. I then stopped at Burger King and picked up some breakfast for Band Mom and I. I got home and roused Band Mom.

When she came downstairs she checked the answering machine from the night before. No message from Sears to confirm our delivery window. Now she’s pissed. She calls to find out what our delivery window is. Then she really lost it. We don’t have one as there are no deliveries on Sunday! She spent the next hour or so on the phone berating multiple Sears employees and trying to resolve this situation. She finally got the local store manager to credit us for all of our delivery fees (including the extra for Saturday deliver, and the extra for haul away). Doesn’t help us cook, but it probably kept that guy from being killed by a mental bolt shot through the phone lines. And the promise of a stove being delivered on Monday!

So the rest of the day was spent bitching about not having a stove to anyone who would listen for Band Mom and me watching some DVR and playing video games. I got the kids a little after noon from my folks. Then since we didn’t have a stove, I headed out at dinner time and picked up some Chinese food.

If that stove is not here on Monday, I feel sorry for any one who works for (or near for that matter) Sears

Saturday I got up early and picked up McDonald’s for everyone including Juju. Then everyone started moving. Last night there was a message on our machine that our delivery window would be Saturday between 1:30 and 3:30. At 11 o’clock Band Mom took a call from Sears that there were problems with earlier delivery and installations and that they would not make our delivery window. Well that’s a problem, since Band Mom has to take Pooh to work at 3 and I have to get the kids to my folks by 4 so that I can go and valet at 5. So Band Mom flips out on the people, and they say well they can deliver it the next day (remember the next day is SUNDAY). Band Mom asks if they are sure there is Sunday delivery. They say oh yes, we’ll have the same delivery time window, but should get a call to confirm that later today or early Sunday morning. Oh well, we wouldn’t be home for dinner anyway so no big deal…

I drop Pooh at work and come back home. Band Mom is getting ready and then my folks stop to pick up the kids and my dad lets me borrow his black sport coat since I don’t have one and wanted to dress nice to valet tonight. Band Mom and I head to the hotel for 5. Trav ended up backing out of valeting so the hotel owners brother in law was going to be my partner for the evening, since the owner didn’t feel Band Mom should be a valet. (Why the fuck not? She’s better than me?…just kidding ’cause she is.)

So Band Mom offered to help if there are needs else where since they are short staffed. Of course the need never arose so she just got to hang out and eat dinner and bs with friends while I worked my ass off. Okay, that is a bit of an exageration. Actually more than a bit of an exageration. We started the valet service at 5 and stopped accepting cars at 9. Four hours. And we parked a total of 7 cars. I parked 4 and my partner parked 3. Whoa slow down. I’m used to a desk job. I don’t know if I can take the pressure. We spent most of the time sitting and bullshitting hoping that someone would stop and take advantage of our services. I was so bored I would have parked a pedal bike if one would have pulled up. One nice thing I did get a free dinner out of it. They sent out the nights special for both of us. Lemon chicken, asparagus, and mashed potatoes. Excellent, thank you!

The final car that we parked left between 10:30 and 11 o’clock. Now the valet service cost $5. Then typically, the valet also gets a tip right? Now I was doing this more as a favor than a job, but a few tips would have been nice. After only parking 7 cars total, I wasn’t expecting much, but we parked some of the cheapest bastards ever I think. I made $4 more in tips than my partner and I made $4 in tips total. Gee, thanks mister, I can go get a pack of gum now! The owner did compensate us for our time though. Actually, he over compensated us. So, it does pay to do nice things for people after all.

When I was done, I took Pooh home and dropped her off, then I headed back to the hotel since Band Mom wanted to hang out for a while and after the night of boredom, I needed a beer or 8. There was karaoke in the bar and we ended up hanging out til close. Then we headed home and went to bed with visions of a new stove dancing in our heads.

One really interesting thing that happened during the evening. Around 6:30 Band Mom got a call from our neighbor. They wanted to let her know that a Sears delivery truck was in front of our house and the delivery people were going to leave our stove on our front porch. WOW! Band Mom lost it. They WERE NOT going to leave a $1000 stove on the front porch! Especially since we had already had our delivery rescheduled. Oh yeah and definitely since we paid extra for haul away service of our old stove. How, exactly, were they going to haul away our old stove (which was in the house) when they were just going to leave our new stove on the front porch since it was now 3 hours after our delivery window and NOONE WAS HOME? Poor delivery guys…

Fridy was our 6th day with no stove. It is scheduled for delivery on Saturday though so not much time now. Anyway. Band Mom had to take Pooh to work at 4 today and then she had a meeting at the hotel about some stuff. So Juju was going to babysit Things 1 & 2 for us. I stopped at Wendy’s on my way home from work and got dinner for those 3 and myself. I got home ate and got my shit together for the show tonight, printed set lists and lyrics for the few songs that I needed cues on. After I ate I headed to Rock’s to load up the gear for the show.

Rock, Trav and I got everything loaded at were at the hotel well before 8 (which is when we were planning on being there). We started setting up while Band Mom and some friends were eating their dinner. We were set up in no time and kinda chit chatted and hung out at the bar for a while. While we were hanging out Band Mom asked Trav and I if on Saturday we would be interested in valet parking for the hotel as they were short staffed and the valets weren’t going to be there. Not that I wanted to, but I said sure as a favor to the hotel. (Be sure to read tomorrow’s entry for adventure’s in valet parking.)

Joe & Kimmy showed up a bit before their start time of 9. They played a really good set. If you remember they also opened for us the night before Thanksgiving. They definitely improved! Not that they were bad the first time or anything, its just I don’t think they’d played in a crowded bar environment before (being only in high school kinda hard to get the late night bar shows). They both seemed more confident this time around and it came out in their voices.

Then it was our turn. This was to be our first full show with Michelle on vox. It was okay. We had fun, but there is still a lot of work to do with our show. One thing though, the acoustic show songs seem to run much faster than when we played electric (maybe ’cause Rock doesn’t solo as much???). Rock and I have been making set lists for how many years now so we set this one up with 12 songs per set for a 3 set night after the opening act figuring that would be plenty, if not too much and we’d have to cut some. Boy were we wrong. The first set was over in like 40 or 45 minutes. We were kinda hoping for an hour plus. Oh well, we broke anyway and figured we just need to slow down, relax and the next 2 sets would be okay. It helped a little, but we still added a couple of songs to the second set. Then we ended up not actually breaking and just going right into our 3rd set. That put us ahead a little more and we had to add some stuff to set 3 to make it to 1 o’clock anyway.

After we finished and packed up, we finally got a chance to sit at the bar and have a couple of beers before closing time. Some non band drama happened later in the night so I ended up staying till close waiting for Band Mom to help with the drama. We ended our night in the lobby of the hotel chit chatting and not getting home until almost 3:30. I was beat and couldn’t wait to hit the pillows.

After work today I had to meet Band Mom and the girls at Sams Club. Band Mom got in an eye appointment at their optical center since she was all out of contacts and hates her glasses. So I got there and took the girls around the store. We stopped at the pharmacy to get a refill for me, then wandered around getting free samples from all of the people handing them out. When Band Mom was done I took the girls and picked up some McDonalds for our dinner. Band Mom was meeting someone at the GW so she had her dinner there.

After dinner, I spent most of the evening playing MotorStorm both offline and online. Then I used the setup disc I had for my PS2 network adapter to configure the network connection on my PS3 so that I can play PS2 games online with my PS3. I got it all working, but then I figured out to actually do anything I need to open ports on my firewall. Which I will do someday, but not today. So I ended up playing The Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers which I had pretty much forgotten I even owned.

Band Mom got home a little after 11 finally. She had some news and we chatted for a little before I headed to bed.

Wednesday after work I met Band Mom and Things 1 & 2 at the library. Band Mom had a meeting (originally scheduled for the morning, but bumped to take her mom to the eye doctor…Everything’s good there by the way) at the library, so I stopped to get the girls. We ended up looking around the library for a while. Nobody actually got anything, but we killed enough time to leave at the same time as Band Mom.

For Band Mom’s 4th day of no stove cooking, we had a pot roast (crock pot), mashed potatoes (microwave instant kind) and apple sauce (from a single serving cup). Maybe we shouldn’t have bought a new stove. Band Mom is doing pretty good coming up with no stove meals. I jest of course because sooner or later something fried or baked would be pretty good!

Just because we have a stove purchased and on the way doesn’t mean its any easier to make dinners until that stove actually arrives. While shopping on Sunday, Band Mom made sure to try and get foods that didn’t need a stove to cook them. So Tuesday’s dinner was chicken salads. We decided that this would actually become a regular dinner as it is healthy and both Things 1 & 2 loved it. Ingredients were simple: a head of lettuce (no cooking required), tomatoes (no cooking required), cubed cheese (no cooking required), cubed chicken (microwavable), hard boiled eggs (steamer) and dressing. We should have pulled out the deep fryer (do we even have one anymore) and added french fries for a true Pittsburgh Salad…Mmmm, French fries…

Monday had Band Mom scouring the Internet for a good deal on a stove. Remember I told you we kinda liked this one. Well Band Mom had found the same thing (slightly different model) for 5 hundred dollars cheaper (for today only) at Sears. The only difference is that this one didn’t have the 5th burner in the center of the stove for simmering. No big loss. The real selling points were knobs on the side and double oven.

So after work, I went home and met up the the fam and we headed to Sears. We ordered the stove. It will be delivered on Saturday. We still have to go the week with no working stove, but knowing that one is definitely coming makes it easier. Thing 2 also lucked out and got a new pair of tennis shoes while we were there as well.

When we were done with that, we stopped at USA Steak Buffet for some dinner. After dinner, we made a quick stop at my folks so I could refill there kerosene heater once again. Then it was home where I did some client work before heading to bed.