shukriya

Last week, I gave up on my search for used furniture and decided to buy a new mattress set. I ordered a relatively inexpensive set (from Mattress Discounters, which I found amusing because they went bankrupt 2 years ago, and were being advised by my group at Blackstone). Anyway, cheap mattress = mushy mattress. I prefer firm beds, so now I'm kicking myself for being too stingy. I've also managed to give myself psychosomatic back pain as a result of the mattress. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

After I got the mattress, I needed to go buy bedding. So I headed to a department store, where I instinctively headed for the shoe department before the home department. I am a sucker for shoes, and especially shoes on sale! I convinced myself that I needed this great pair of black boots. As I headed to the checkout counter, I was greeted by a reincarnation of Mr. Bean. The sales associate was a strange older man, with a bowtie and a British accent. And a penchant for small talk.

Oh small talk, how thee frustrates me. Sometimes I just don't want to deal. Please just take my credit card and let me be on my way. He took my card, looked at it, then asked if I was half-Greek. He explained his question by telling me "Sophia is greek for wisdom." Hmm. I'm glad you know the etymology of my name. I didn't quite understand the half-greek though. Why only half? What did he think my other half was?

I told him no, that I was from India. Oops, opened another avenue for questioning. "Where?" Standard answer: "My mother is from Bombay."

He looked off into the distance, as if picturing an exotic land of elephants and spices, and said "Yes, yes, the west coast." (I was tempted to nod and give him the West-Side! hand signal, but refrained). I nodded, and then signed the receipt.

"Thanks!" I said.

"Shukriya." he responded. What? Man! It always catches me off guard when people do that. What was I supposed to say? Was I supposed to respond in English or Hindi? Break into bhangra? I did what I thought best. Booked it to the bedding department.

I am back in NY this weekend for a little R&R, and to pickup the very many items I absentmindedly left here when I moved up to Boston. I took the Chinatown bus (again), but was very pleasantly surprised when I learned they moved their terminal to the South Station bus depot in Boston. No more waiting on the sidewalk in Chinatown! Yay! (N.B., they did increase their prices to $15.)

After a fun night out partying with some friends in the city, and an unnecessarily early train ride back to Long Island this morning to help my mom pick out a cell phone, I find myself in the best possibile situation: sitting with my wireless laptop in front of the television in my parent's room, updating my blog.

I watched Bring it On, which never ceases to amuse me. Also, during my channel surfing, I discovered that Kirk Cameron has a Catholic inspirational talk/interview show on the Church Channel. I mean, it's not really called the Church channel, but you know what I'm talking about. It's always sandwiched between something like the Food Network and movie channels.