All righty then. Inspired by the start of winter break, I decided that for Rob's Xmas gift, I would build him one of those lovely entertainment centers that I've heard so much about and have admired for quite some time. This won't be much of a surprise for Rob (although he doesn't know it yet) because those pieces of wood are freakin heavy and I seriously doubt I'll be able to conceal them in the garage where it's too cold to paint and I can't carry them inside on my own.

There are folks who can recreate stuff after seeing them but once. My mom's that way with knitting and crocheting. I studied the fabled entertainment centers from several angles and after looking at the instructions figured how could I go wrong? Say with me now: "Let me count the ways..." :)

First, despite my instincts telling me to shop at Home Depot, I stopped by Lowe's first because they're a right hand turn rather than a left hand turn. I found glass blocks, some on clearance actually, and figured that as some go on the inside they'd be okay if they don't match. That plus the guy looked reluctant to sell me something other than a case (10 blocks to a case). He points me toward the lumber guys and I dutifully trot off to see them. I explained what I'm doing and as I started to give dimensions happened to glance up and see the salesman laughing. He told me that I didn't want lumber, I wanted shelves. He directed me back to the pre-made shelves. Note: if Rob had been with me, we'd have been out of the store in no time flat after yet another example of someone telling us we don't want to do what we already said we want to do.

But, being me, I trudge over to the shelves with my very heavy cart of glass blocks and actually find them to be quite a bit cheaper. I decide to line up the glass blocks on the top to make sure they'll fit and realize that the shelves are too narrow along both edges for the blocks to fit. Trudge back to lumber. I explain the problem. I demonstrate by placing the blocks in the way I want on a door that happens to be lying on a table. He walks me back over to shelves where I demonstrate by lining up the glass blocks again. He finally sees my point. We walk over to the actual lumber where I see the type that looks like what Broos has, only the salesman is steering me to the type of lumber that's $20 for 4 by 8. I'm thinking, Hmm! That can't be right! So I get him to write down all the lumber information so I can pay for it (he won't cut it before it's paid for, he said laughing again). Exit Lowe's.

Directly across the street is Home Depot. I wander into the lumber section and find two salespeople. They ask what I need and I explain, wishing I'd had some glass blocks handy to demonstrate. The female clerk defers to the male clerk and he nods, "Sounds cool." He finds the type of wood I need (although by this time I've decided to go with the spendier type anyway, it's still almost $3 cheaper per board here) and offers to go cut it up while the female clerk takes me to paint so I can buy supplies. She directs me to Steve, the god of paint. Steve is busy mixing and flailing, but when it's my turn he walks right over to the shelves and picks up some primer and then tells me to go pick out paint while he finishes mixing. About a half hour later, Steve comes looking for me in the paint aisle where I've been pacing and gnawing my fingers. "Er, you don't have black," I said feebly. "Oh, I mix it up for you. I'll pick something out for you," says Steve. He grabs a can, then decides the primer won't work the way I want, and he exchanges it for the right kind and mixes some color into it so it's no longer plain white. Steve has also decided I'd be happier with a gallon of paint because two quarts cost more than a gallon anyhow, and this way I'll have more than enough (He explained it in math but cheerfully switched to English when I glazed over).

So, paint in hand I wander back to lumber and find my boards cut nicely, with the leftover bits next to them on the cart. I go off to pay for them and explain to the clerk that I'd been told there's a fee for cutting. "Did he give you a written slip?" she asked. "No," I said. "Then it's free," she replied. She called over one of the guys to help me load all this stuff up in....the Eclipse.

The Eclipse isn't the biggest car, but it has advantages over my Legacy as its back seats fold down. We put the paint in with the glass blocks and the spare pieces of wood and as the clerk's tying the hatchback down two other guys walk out of the store. They looked into the Eclipse and jaws drop. "Wow. That needs to be in a commercial," they said in awe. I wish I'd remembered to grab my camera when I got home because it was an impressive site to see all that stuff inside the car. :)

Of course, I haven't got saw horses so I'm still not sure how I'm going to paint those shelves. And it occurs to me it might have been much simpler to ask Broos for measurements than to guess, but oh well. If I hadn't have had issues with the network printer because I installed a new firewall that doesn't seem to work with it, I'd have printed out the photos that I should have in the first place. Maybe I will and then take them to show that jerk at Lowe's who laughed at me. Hah! :)