What I save in work, I spent in gas

 

Before: a mess



Before: hard to get to the recyling

A couple weeks ago, Nightingale and I found ourselves in Schaumburg, at the WoodField Mall.  Our financial advisor Martin was having a client appreciation event at Maggiano's in Schaumburg.  Note:  Martin picked this place to placate his suburban clients and even though he lives in the South Loop it apparently never occur to him to find a place in Little Italy that could handle such a crowd.

When Martin sent out his initial email outlining all the client appreciation events for the coming year, I skipped this one for the obvious reasons: 1) it's in Schaumburg and 2) it's at Wood Field Mall.  However, he was on the hook for 30 seats and had barely filled 20.  So I asked my cousin -- who loves all things suburbs -- and his wife to join us so that we could have a pseudo family gathering on Martin dime.

I got there a little early because for some reason you can make it from OBT to Schaumburg in half the time it takes to get from OBT to Portage Park even though it's twice the distance.  Fucking Suburbs.

To kill time I stopped by my new Opium Den favorite store Home Goods.

Saw this at Home Goods

Nightingale wanted a sofa table to put behind our kitchen sink.  We have this gap of about 4 feet between the island and the wall.  Why they didn't put it against the wall when they re-did the kitchen is kinda a mystery to me but these things are usually can be explained at the intersection of time and money.

I showed the picture of the above to Nightingale and she thought it could work even though the shelf was twice as deep as we thought we would require.  However, it is a nicely put together table and I certainly couldn't build one like it for less than the $125 asking price.

Becuase I didn't have the presense of mind to buy it right then and there, I had to make a separate trip out there the next day.  Fortunately my GPS said I could make it there in 20 minutes or home in over an hour so it was a no brainer.



Now it's pretty

And I can get to the reycling

The other thing I've learned about shopping at Home Goods is if you see something you like, you should grab it because it will be gone quickly.  I was at Home Goods a couple months ago and saw this shelf pictured below.  It would have made a nice addition to this open space we have in the kitchen above the radiator.  In my hesitation to buy something I was uncertain of, it was gone within a day.  Lesson learned, hopefully.



Wish I had grabbed this last month