Fuel for Shopping

One of life's little pleasures: Pulling out last summer's shorts on the first warm day of spring, putting them on, reaching into the pocket, and pulling out a $20 bill! Okay, well, the first little pleasure is discovering that the shorts still fit; the second one is finding the money. I remember this happening a couple of times in college, and it made me so happy I almost cried. $20 bought a lot of beer back then.

Before I left for my business trip back to the US, I remembered that I wanted to bring a couple of gift cards that we received as wedding gifts. They were from Bed Bath and Beyond and Williams-Sonoma. Since those aren't in KL, I set aside the cards and figured I'd use them the next time I was back in Houston. I went to the kitchen drawer where I had put them, and only found the BBB card. Where the hell did I put the other card? By some miracle, I didn't have to tear apart the house to find it. I thought I'd check the keepsake box that I put our wedding cards in.

I opened up the box, and there was the Williams-Sonoma card...and four other gift cards....and two checks!

Neurotic aside: I hope no one thinks "Oh, how ungrateful. You forgot about the gifts that people so thoughtfully gave you!" Just to clarify, everyone did get a thank you note, so we definitely are appreciative. (Except that we have yet to figure out who gave us a lovely serving platter and the pasta bowl set that we really wanted. The fact that, since I don't know who gave them to us so I can't thank them, continues to haunt me. People can think a lot of things about me, but it makes me insane to think that any of our friends think that I am rude. While we are on that topic, I've always been of the mindset that thank you notes serve a couple of purposes: 1) to thank the person for the gift and for their thoughtfulness, and 2) to acknowledge that you did, in fact, receive the gift. I've always read that if you don't receive a thank you note for a gift you've sent, that you should inquire to make sure that the recipient received the gift. No one has asked us, and since we didn't really expect gifts, I have been really hesitant to ask anyone about it. While we appreciate the gifts that we did receive, we didn't necessarily expect gifts, so asking about the dishes is like asking "Did you get us a gift?". Horribly uncomfortable for me, so I've been hoping that someone will approach us about it.)

The reason we set aside the gift cards is that we wanted to use them to buy housewares and such, rather than use them for groceries or something like that. We wanted to be able to buy something for the both of us and be able to enjoy it for years to come. Since it took us a while to settle in and figure out where we might go in KL to buy things like that, I put them in a special place that I figured I would remember, so that when we were ready to use them to purchase some things for our home, we would take them out and buy some lovely wall hangings or something like that. Then I completely spaced out.

So...I brought them all with me to the US! Now that we are settled, we have some good ideas about some things that we can use and things that we would like, so I'm off to shop for wedding gifts this weekend!

I guess being more excited about a Williams-Sonoma pepper grinder rather than beer money is more proof that I'm becoming a grown up against my will. And if anyone has any suggestions about what do to about the dishes, let me know.