After pastry acquisition, I piloted the stroller toward the park, for the dog's morning constitutional. Our stroller's marketing materials use words like "urban" and "aisles". It's got a basket that can hold... well, a cat in his carrier... but it's fairly compact.
And we walked past the hardware store. And they had dirt for sale.
Yesterday, I looked at a potted impatiens and thought "there's my proverbial canary". My mom had a Thai Lily that let her know when it was time to water. It helps. It was a bit wilted, so I watered everything that might tolerate such business. Not the mother-in-law tongue, etc., because I can learn.
The impatiens that were still in the nursery pot down in the yard were wilted to a degree that I thought might be irreparable. This morning when we left for our walk, they looked great.
So. The hardware store was selling soil right out front. And I thought "... if they have orchid mix, I'll get both." A few bags down, I found it. So I grabbed both the soil for my impatiens and my orchid.
With the stroller. And the dog.
I didn't put the soil in the stroller basket because I am still not sure if it is okay to use the stroller as a shopping cart or if that's like using your coat pocket as a shopping cart.
The hardware store is... crowded inside. They've filled it to the rafters and then outside and down the block. I really do wonder how they get all the outside stuff back in at night. I feel like there has to be a chart with step-by-step instructions so whoever does it doesn't get stuck in the middle of hardware store Tetris.
Two bags of soil, one stroller, a beagle on a leash, and this klutz leading the parade. It took fully five minutes to get inside to the register and three more to get back out (soil in basket), but I did not knock anything over.
If you feel like that was a lot of build up for very little payoff, story-wise, I don't think you're understanding how amazing a feat it really was.
Then we hit the park for dog business. I didn't have the dry cleaning ticket or my bag of packing peanuts to drop off for recycling and also it was eight fifteen in the morning, so time to go home.
I've always had a lot of feelings about people who block the sidewalk with their cars. Because I am rigid about the rules. I'm a person who calls parking enforcement. (I've gotten at least one parking ticket in front of my own front door, so, I'm not the only one, clearly. But fair enough on that one, also.)
This morning, I was trying to be agreeable and that's why when my husband suggested crossing the street in the middle of the block, I did it without saying all the things I was thinking about the evils of people in the middle of the road a stone's throw from a crosswalk on a street with sidewalks and bad examples and RULES and whatnot. I just walked across the damned street while feeling really anxious about it.
Turns out, there was a car parked blocking the sidewalk down the way a bit. I was probably staring at someone's flower or the baby or something, so I didn't notice.
There are no curb cuts at the corner where I'd need to cross if we went up the other side. So I'm guessing now that's why he suggested we cross in the middle of the block and not because he has a more moderated relationship with things like light jaywalking.
I did not call parking enforcement. I think I lost 500 busy-body points for that.
And then by the time we got home it was naptime and I was hot and gross because adding two bags of dirt makes going up a hill even harder and so it's been 90 minutes since I left to get a pastry from the place three blocks away and I haven't had the first bite of it yet.