Woke up on my own at seven. Got to the office just after eight.
For lunch today Dan, Doue and I went to Rockfish again. I did better today with cedar plank salmon. So yummy.
Dominica ordered a new treadmill today from Walmart. We’ve been wanting one for forever and it is so hot out that we are never able to exercise at all so we finally broke down and bought one. We are pretty excited. That is something that we really have needed. I have no idea why we have never bought one before. Space, I guess.
We were really excited that Walmart down the street from us had the treadmill that we had both independently picked out in stock and we could pick it up at seven this evening for $369. Before I left work, though, we got a message that our treadmill that had been in stock and was ready for us, was no longer available. No longer available? Does that imply that someone walked into the store and they sold them the unit that we had already bought and paid for? We were not happy. Dominica thought that maybe it was an inventory mistake but Walmart really does not make those – they RFID every product. They know exactly how many they have, where they are… everything.
So Dominica did some calling around and found the same treadmill, in stock, in Lewisville’s Walmart so instead of buying online we decided to just drive over there after I got home.
I got home around five thirty. We loaded up the girls and drove to Lewisville and did some Walmart shopping. Luciana fell asleep on the way there and was so tired and warm that when I picked her up out of the Acadia she stayed asleep completely and just snuggled on my shoulder so I had to carry her around the Walmart for quite a while with her like that.
We got some groceries and got some shoes too. Liesl got new shoes because her feet are growing so much and I got some sandals. Back in the sporting goods department we were in for a pretty big surprise.
The treadmill that we had paid $369 earlier today was actually on clearance here in the store. And not a trivial clearance either. Instead of $369, it was an even $200! That’s 46% off! That’s huge. $169 savings over what we paid earlier today. We figured out that they sold our unit at Carrollton’s store because they didn’t want us to come in to pick it up and see the $200 sticker on it so delayed our picked until the sale was over so that we would get a full priced one. Not very happy about Walmart corporate’s behaviour there but we are pretty thrilled at the incredible savings. We were ready to spend so much more money. What a deal we got! We picked up some dumbbells and a chin-up bar too while we were there.
Getting the very heavy and very large treadmill out to the Acadia was non-trivial. We needed a pallet jack to move the thing. While trying to get it loaded onto the pallet jack the jack jumped up onto my foot and then Dominica stepped onto the pallet jack to “steady” it putting the full weight of the jack, the treadmill and much of Dominica onto a blade of steel running over the bone on the top of my foot. Wow did that hurt. (I’m writing this update around noon on Wednesday, the following day, and my foot is still in active pain even when sitting idle!)
Once we got it through the store and out to the Acadia the real adventure began. It didn’t fit in the car so we had to tie it down and hope for the best. We crawled home with Dominica facing backwards to watch to make sure that it did not slide out of the back of the car. Not fun. But we made it home without incident. It only moved an inch or two the whole way. It is so heavy that it did not want to move too easily.
Once home, I had to carry the treadmill alone into the house. That was a workout on its own. But I got it in and the rest of the evening was spent assembling it.
By the end of the night we had a working treadmill in our living room and Dominica did a 2.5 mile walk too. The unit that we got folds up and is roughly mobile, but only barely so. It has workout programs, nice safety features, a heart rate monitor and an automatic motor for changing the incline. So it is a pretty good unit. Hopefully I will get to try it out tomorrow.
We kept the girls up way too late. Luciana did not get to bed until eleven thirty. We are into the groove of me reading her stories before she goes to bed now, just like I did with Liesl at the same age. Luciana is loving that.
Liesl was up until a bit after midnight and got to sleep with us tonight. So she and I went to bed at half past midnight and Dominica went to do a little work before coming to bed.
It wasn’t long before Dominica got me up to go help her and we ended up working until after two in the morning. That wasn’t any fun. I had wanted to have been in bed around ten thirty and ended up not getting to sleep until more like two thirty. It is really a struggle to get good sleep no matter how much I plan for the best.
We’ve known that she was leaving for a few weeks but officially found out today that our friend Nicki is moving to Silicon Valley in three weeks to go to work for Apple. The team at the office is dwindling and dwindling. We are losing roughly one person per month and it is mostly the people who have been around the longest. That is two people at eight years with the team and one with nearly four years all in three months. Everyone wonders who is next. There really are no new people with the team, the newest is like two years or so, and most are three years or more. It is weird, though, because when I started I was the new guy for a really long time. Now suddenly I’m the non-manager with the most longevity! I’m officially the old guy. Very odd.