In with the new, THEN out with the old

We bought a new sofa a few weeks ago. We'd gotten tired of sore backs and busted baby lips from the futon, and it was time to complete our transition to "adult" furniture in the den. We managed to find the right sofa for us in just one attempt at just one store. Score!

So the sofa was to be delivered on Friday while I was at work. Great plan, except when the delivery guys got it to the bottom of the stairs, they couldn't turn it. At all. At 82" long, it was a full 2 inches taller than the standard door-frame, and at almost 40" deep and 33" tall, it was unmaneuverable. After breaking a large picture frame and smashing our walls a few times (and disassembling a light fixture), they gave up and abandoned the sofa in our living room.

Great, thanks. We really didn't need 2 sofas in that room.

Anyway, I beat a hasty path home, did some measurements, and found to my great relief that our windows were a full 3 inches larger in both height and width. And since both the upper and lower panes are easily removable, Amanda and I took the sofa outside and fed it through the window.

So now we have a beautiful new sofa that can only ever be taken back out of the room through the window.

But with the new sofa, there was no need or room for the futon. One quick turn to Craigslist took care of that, and since I was there, I also posted Beeboo's first car seat and a 21" monitor. I think I wound up corresponding with 12 or 13 people over the futon. Everyone was excited about it!

The car seat was actually out the door first this morning, sold to a young lady in North Carolina who was looking for a match to her Peg Perego Primo Viaggio. She's having twins and needed to color-coordinate.

The futon followed it out a few hours later, sold to the first person who responded to the ad.

So we're making space around here, recouping a bit of cash, and streamlining.

And we're cutting cable. Again. Again again. I think this is the 3rd time, although by far the least committal. We've cut the plan to "Basic Cable", by which they mean local channels, C-SPAN (1 & 2), and home shopping networks. We realized that we were never watching the cable channels, and paying over $630 / year just to watch local networks.

Now, I don't mind shelling out a few bucks for a clear signal, but not over $500. Hell, not over $200, if I can avoid it. Now we're paying $10.75/month, and we don't have to worry about Tivo randomly deciding not to record a program because the signal wasn't clear enough. Yippee!