Brighten up the room

When you're married, there will be times (usually during 4th quarter of a tied game)that a woman says, "Something something something would brighten up the room, don't you think?"

Wait until the game is over, and then go out to the garage and hit your thumb with a hammer. Because that's going to happen sometime during your upcoming adventure, so why delay the inevitable.

First, she doesn't really care what you think about her 'room brightening' project. She was only trying to be nice, in her womanly way. In these things, she only values your male upper body strength. Yes, male musculature is different from female, in case you haven't watched the news lately. Our superior strength allows us to lift heavy objects... and drop them on our foot.

Having been married for thirty years, I know these things. So it was with a spirit of joyous, sweaty abandon that I followed my wife into the mantel replacement project. Well, that's not entirely accurate. More of a "no way to get out of it" spirit I should think.

My only stipulation was that the new mantel be made in the USA. She ordered it after much perusing of other mantels. The big day arrived, the huge box arrived with big 'Made in the USA' stamped on it. Turns out the box was actually made in the US, but the contents were made in China.

It would be swell if the adventure ended with the mantel install, but nope. If you think that, you're probably not married. Next you have to pick out the new marble tile for around the fireplace. Marble comes in about three different colors, each of which is available in 1800 different shades.

So there we were at one of many many (I had no idea, but she did) local stores that sell marble tile. This was frustrating for both of us I think. She kept asking my opinion, I kept saying, "I like the light one." I was not talking shade, but weight of the many boxes I'd have to haul from store to trunk of car, then from trunk of car to living room.

But we eventually got it all straight, and the project got finished, and it does brighten up the room. Hey, little known fact of anthropology? Neanderthals died out because they couldn't figger how to 'brighten up' the cave, had to sleep on the couch, so low birth rate. Cro Magnons invented cave painting, so that's why we're all here.