The best-laid . . . rugs

A couple weeks ago, Robert and I found a few carpets to take the place of the solid-blue pieces we'd gotten from Steller for the living room and den: The solids were a great color, but they showed every footstep and crumb and had no . . . soul.

So we picked up some knockouts on sale in Chattanooga: a fairly old Tabriz for the living room, a newish Kazakh for the den (at the bottom, probably made by Borat's uncle Yanoush) and a nice old Heriz runner. The reds, the blues, the peachy oranges. . . .

We planned to have them shipped after we got here in late September -- but then I came down for Fay, and the schedule moved up and . . . bang, here they came in a big, heavy bundle that the burly UPS guy actually asked for help with.

I wrestled them into place as best I could (these things are not light) and figured that when Gregory came to clean house on Friday he could help me with all the furniture-moving to get them down.

I called Steller's, and got hooked up with their ace installer out on Riviera Drive (a terrific guy), and went out to get pads cut, and wrestled the pads back home.

And then Gregory's infected finger (a splinter from years ago, gone very bad) kicked in, and instead of coming here he went to the doctor to see if the finger had to come off (thank God, it didn't.)

Well, I thought, at least get the runner down. But, as you see just above, there were problems even with that pad, and no hope of my arthritic fingers working the knife.

So, roll up the big ones (after admiring them almost in place) and wait for Robert's tremendous carpet lore to come into play.

Though I still can't help but think of that classic Jack Warner quote: "I don't want it right, I want it Tuesday."