Why oh why...

is it so hard to find a decent kitchen table?

Yes, this is the source of my frustration for today. And yes, there were other frustrating things that occurred during the course of this busy Saturday - having to pee into a very tiny cup for the medical portion of our life insurance quote, dealing with the freeeeeezing cold wind (is it spring yet?) and the impact it had on my already fragile coif, getting in and out of crowded parking lots in suburban-box-store-land, not being able to find a single thing in stock that we had made the trip expressly to purchase, almost driving our poor Kia into a ditch, old men who want beer but aren't allowed to drink, and walking up to a Royal Bank branch that had no bank machine. WTF? Glad all those service charges I'm paying are going towards keeping me from my money.

Despite all this, we had a fantastically productive day. Don't take me too seriously here with all my venting - while we did have frustrating moments, fortunately for us (and therefore everyone we came into contact with) good things happened too. We got to sign the papers for our new house; have breakfast at Denny's (yes, it takes a very strong and self-confident diva to admit her love of the Slams); visit with my sister, brother in law and nephew; and have dinner with Hubs' whole family to celebrate his parents' 49th wedding anniversary.

But try as we might, we simply could not find the fu(king kitchen table of our dreams.

We've been looking for weeks, nay months, for a simple table and chairs that will suit our needs. And we're not even being all that demanding to start off with! That's the truly frustrating part - if we were on the hunt for an oval mahogany table with six scroll-back chairs boasting a cornflower blue corduroy seat set, all for under $400, we might be facing an uphill battle. But noooooo....all we want is a simple table with four chairs in white or a light coloured wood (our felines take great pride in destroying all things fabric, so we've finally learned our lesson and are going solid wood. It only took two entire leather living room sets and six dining room chairs for it to sink in).

That's really all there is to it. It doesn't matter if it's round or rectangular or oval or square...we just need a godforsaken table. And we don't want to pay a fortune.

We've scoured Wal-Mart, Leon's, Zellers, Sears Home, JYSK, Superstore, Home Depot (you never know), IKEA (we may go back for a second look), United Furniture Warehouse, and The Brick. We are at our wit's end, and are absolutely flabbergasted that it could be this difficult to find something soooo simple.

I feel like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman - I've got the money to spend, but no one will help me! Big mistake....big....HUGE! Ugh.

I'm a list person, always have been, and the fact that I simply cannot strike the 'buy table and chairs for kitchen' entry off of a now ancient list actually makes me lose sleep at night. Ridiculous? Sure. But what can I do? Also on that list are 'purchase DVD racks' (not one IKEA has the ones we want in stock), and 'get cabinet for powder room'. You know what's coming...the one we want is not in stock at JYSK, and there really aren't a huge number of those to flee to should the one you're standing in leave you wanting. Of course they have 10 or more of all the supplemental pieces that coordinate with the cabinet we seek (of course they do, and thanks SO much for throwing that fact in our face) - but we don't want/need/have space for any of those. So now we wait for the new shipment to come in - and cross our fingers that everyone else who's waiting for it doesn't get there before we do. Grrrrr..

Yet again, these frustrations are but a blip in this long road we call life. Yes, we'll survive without a kitchen table for a short while once we move in (as we do have a table in the dining room we won't be relegated to a lifetime of lap meals, heaven forbid). No, I don't think there's some major conspiracy to keep my magical, perfect kitchen set out of my life - I'm just not that big of a wack job.

I will say that I feel I've paid my dues and logged some very decent searching miles. As such, I've decided that this hunt is no longer fun or enjoyable - it's buy time. I refuse to waste any more of my precious diva energy on something that should have been rather easy to attend to.

So my friends, tonight this diva is mentally preparing to throw herself on the first suitable table she finds and bring it home with her. But this will be sooo much more than your average one night stand - here's hoping I can get a few years out of my conquest before it all falls apart or even worse - falls out of fashion. Wish me luck!

And that's your daily dash. How's your diva doin'?