Keys

What to do when you are trying to stick to a budget and the urge for some "retail therapy" strikes?  Well, Kate and I decided to go to Home Depot and buy a couple of fancy house keys.   

We threw ourselves into the project and even attempted to buy Jer a Star Wars key, which I believe would have provided him with hours of amusement as well as an endless source of trivial conversation as well, but the blank didn't fit our door key type so he was out of luck.  I ended up buying three keys.  Katie chose a leopard print, I picked a tie-dyed one and since I happened to have Mary Ann's house key with me*, we bought her a fancy brown key with hot pink polka dots. When Mr. Home Depot guy was finished duplicating, he gave me back both of the dull, original keys and I stuck them in my pocket.  The entire purchase was well under ten dollars, a success by any budgeter's standards. 

(*Clarification:  I don't usually run around with other people's keys, but Mary Ann has been up north on an extended visit and I have been on cat duty.) 

Back at home, I grabbed the key out of my pocket, put it on a huge keyring and hung it by our front door so that when I go for walks, I can just grab it and go - and that's exactly what I did after supper when Katie and Jerry left to do some errands.

After my evening stroll I saw Mary Ann was finally back, so I stopped in to hear about her trip and presented her with her new key - which is adorable in every way and was suitably admired by its new owner.  It was only after I'd hiked back down to our place and tried to get in that I realized the key that I had put on my big-honking keyring wasn't to my front door, but was the original key to Mary Ann's door. 

So there I was, locked out of my house.  Kate's car was parked in the driveway and had the garage door opener in it, but it was locked too.  I was out of luck.   I  sat out on the deck for a while. It  was drizzling out and mosquitoes were buzzing but, on the whole, it wasn't a bad place to be.   Still, I had hoped to use this free time to catch up on some reading and my books were inside.  I decided to break in. 

I walked around the lower level to see if any windows were unlocked.  BINGO!  One was and (BONUS!) it didn't even have a screen on it.  I pushed and shoved and tried, without success, to open it.  Now I'm the first to admit that my mechanical aptitude is nil, but burglars make it look so easy. It's not though - at least not for me. (I have no doubt that Jerry could have opened that window in under sixty seconds.  This knowledge only made me feel more incompetent.)

Having totally and completely failed at Plan A, I defaulted to Plan B - go get my spare key from Mary Ann.  I don't know why I didn't think of it sooner!  Soon I was letting myself in, just in time to see Jer and Kate turning into our driveway. 

That evening when I was getting ready for bed I found Kate's old front door key in my pocket.