Transition Shopping

Once I hit the end of the summer, I go into full transition mode. I'll be moving apartments, and most likely roommates, and closing up a lot of loose ends on a bunch of things. And in order not to be caught completely unawares (such as last time when I was graduating in 4 days time and running around the streets of Dallas yelling out "Anyone have any apartments open?" while flailing my arms wildly) I've put in many pre-moving steps to make the transition peaceful and less coup-friendly.

Already many of the steps are in motion, a full three months ahead of time. The first major one of these was my great furniture expedition on Saturday. I have expounded on it many times, but I live much like a vagrant in my current setup. A 15 year old couch, a clashing 4 year old futon, and several plastic-y type round chairs make up my entire decor, and it almost hurts to look at them all at once.

So, in honor of my planning on living an adult life, we went in search of an adult furniture set, ie. one that matched, and contained either the word settee or ottoman. I was hoping for some sort of layaway plan, so I could have it purchased ahead of time and then delivered in one fell moving swoop, so as to minimize my backbreaking labor.

Sadly, the concept of furniture exists in an entirely unique world. First off, it has its own district in Dallas. Frank and I had adapted the Simpsons joke on hammocks earlier in the day:

Frank: "You're looking for furniture? You could try the Furniture Emporium, on 7th. Or Furniture Warehouse, also on 7th. Or Furnitures R Us, right in the same place."
Jason: "Oh right, the Furniture District! Hahahaha."

But....seriously.

Anyways, apparently Frank's house is right in the middle of said district, and we hit it hard and hit it fast. Furniture world is not like regular world. For one, everything there looks like it either came from the 1800's, or an alternate future reality where everything went horribly wrong somewhere around the Art Deco Period. There were things I loved, and things I hated, but mostly it left me just scratching my head.

Because I have paid, maybe in grand total, 300 dollars American for every piece of furniture in my apartment. And that's including the hideous shag area rug and fur curtains in the computation. In these places $300.00 for a 2X2 ottoman covered in a zebra pattern is de rigueur. The entire concept is just outside my grasp, and leaves me saying things like "Well, 1,200 dollars isn't that much for three pieces..." which is as antithetical to the basic Jason credo as you can get.

We also ventured in to a "warehouse sale" wherein scads of people climbed over each other to get the best deals on the most eclectic selection of items imaginable in, strangely enough, a warehouse. This place was no where near my element, partly because of the scads of peoples but more particularly because this sale was unique. Witness our salesperson:

Vance: You see that price? You forget that. You put it out your mind. You make us a offer and we go from that [sic times infinity].

Sadly, this was also where I found my dream furniture, a four piece set that included a sofa, settee, armchair and ottoman and was truly the most hideous spectacle of furniture I've ever witnessed. It was one of those cases where something transcends badness so completely that it's just perfect. I can find no representation of this in visual form (why didn't I bring a camera?!) but basically take this and cross it with this, paint the entire thing a dark maroon/purple and then multiply the badness by about 1500 and you come close to the look I'm going for. I wanted it so badly, I could taste what it would be like to own it. (It tasted leathery and delicious and a little smoky.) But I fear haggling more than anything else in the world and probably would have been unable to keep my poker face up about how much I wanted it and wound up paying 50% above manufacturer's retail.

So I'm no closer to any resolution than before I started, but now I have a profound fear of poorly lit warehouses, patterned fabrics, and fainting couches. Which is something, I guess. I'll keep you updated as we move forward.