My heart is set on finding a reasonably priced sofa. Ideally I would like to get a sectional, leather sofa with chase. So far this past week I have been to 4 stores in search of THE sofa. I found a good candidate near my house about 15 minutes away at a furniture store for $798... THAT IS UNDER one thousand bucks, for Leather, Sectional, with Chase!
I want to call it a week and buy the thing. Andrew's coworker tells him about this furniture store up north in a town called Vandalia, MO, about an hour and a half away. Waters Furniture. I check out the website; This looks like a good idea to go ahead an go up to see for ourselves what great deal we can find on a leather sofa. Andrew is set on checking the store out first, before buying any sofa. According to his coworker, the store sells competitors sofas, etc. for way cheaper deals and it is worth checking it out. FINE.
Of course, Andrew is away in training this week... so who not to do the trip out to the store than me. I was planning on Google maps and a diaper bag, toss Kara in the car and driving up myself on my off day, Saturday. SO LUCKY I didn't go alone. This place is in the Boonies, middle of no where and in a small town that is one street long. There is nothing interesting about Vandalia, but its name. I like to say the word Vandalia.
My friend, Carissa and her two kids come with me and Kara and we make it a road trip. We have the directions printed out and Tom-tom for back up. As we are driving along, heading north it is nothing but: a long stretch of road and flat land, abandoned barns, grain silos, dead grass, a house here and there, some Pepsi factory or building of some sort and nothing else. Just totally desalinate. We are both thinking, "Where the heck are we going and this better be one awesome store once we get there." In my mind, I am picturing this store to be like a Home Depot style, with a warehouse of great sofas and chairs! When I had called the store on Friday for information, the sales gal told me there are 10 show rooms to select from. I am thinking, COOL! This is going to be great, Vandalia, here we come!
After an hour and a half of driving we are to make a right on Main Street and be blown away by this really great store that Andrew's coworker suggested we check out. BULL SHIT!
We drive into "town" and it is snowing! Turned right onto Main street, go up to the store... a guy from across the street pokes his head out and asks if we are here to buy a mattress? No? a Sofa sir, He tells us the sofas are here across the street in this building. Come on out of the snow!... Little flakes of snow rest upon Carissa's curls as she shook her head and wiped her feet on the welcome mat. The kids and I follow her in the store and have a good first impression to begin with. It is quaint, and well set up with all the furniture nicely displayed. I am glancing at the price tags, it is all priced at $1200 or more and a leather chair is priced at $900, and so on... WHERE are the cheap deals, and excellent prices we drove all the way up here to see. The "sales man" says look around and we have more sofas in three other buildings (shacks more like it) out back through this back door. There is the silver bldg, brick bldg, and the tan bldg all with sofas in em to check out...
What? this is a weird set up... having to go out side to other buildings and tromp around in the puddles and muddy gravel going from building to building. It was snowing out and we have to go back and forth? And with three kids in toe. This was getting to be ridiculous!
We go to check out the other buildings, which I think is what the sales lady on the phone had referred to as "showrooms"... Oh my God! Say it isn't so! Carissa and I are looking at each other and I am telling her, "sorry I dragged you all the way out here for nothing." She says, it is ok, and the road trip part is fun, don't worry...I guess I had to make this trip out here to give it a shot and consider it for a good deal.
So not worth the trip out north. The furniture was regular priced or more expensive than I had found locally. I had found much better deals in my own back yard, just 15 minutes away.
So we are heading out and it is about time to get the kids lunch somewhere. Driving around we have a Dairy Queen and a local diner to choose from in this town they call Vandalia. We had seen a McDonald's in the next town over so we decide to go there instead. Kara's first McDonald's experience. She ate some of the apple slices, and I peeled off the fried part of the chicken nuggets for her to eat also. I bought her a little kid size milk, but she didn't know how to use a straw. HAHA. I saved it for later.
In the end, Carissa and I basically took the kids for a 2 hour drive out to lunch at McDonald's. We got out groove on, listening to a Bob Marley CD. Her kids knew the words and sang along to, "Baby don't worry, about a thing" song. It was so cute when they sang along. Kara chimed in a couple of coos to! Fun times and ridiculous times.
No comments:
Post a Comment