I Heart My Drain Cover

Here is what I received from my dear husband today in celebration of St Valentine’s Day.  It was just what I wanted!

A new drain cover for the drain in the garage!  Score!

I must quickly add that he also gave me orchids, chocolate covered pretzels and Cuties (clementines) for his cutie.

For the past 6 months, every time I parked the car in the garage, I saw the rusting drain cover that had served faithfully since the Revolutionary War, and imagined myself dropping my keys, my phone, my glasses into that hole, which clearly led to the first circle of hell.  A week before Valentine’s Day, I thought, I know! I’ll ask my Dear Husband for a new drain cover for Valentine’s Day.

And then I promptly forgot to mention it at all.  On Friday I was just about to bring it up, when he said, “I went to two big box hardware stores and couldn’t find a new drain cover.  They told me to go to Tiny Independently Owned and Operated Hardware.  The guy there told me he was out of that size.  I had to order it from ‘Hard to Find Items’.”

My Valentine’s Day gift to you, Dear Reader, is to tell you that Hard to Find Items is a business that actually exists.  I don’t know if they can sell you Aunt Rose’s necklace that fell behind the radiator twenty years ago, or a signed copy of the Gutenberg Bible, or my older daughter’s passport*, or the mustard bottle that was last used in July, but if you want a cast-iron drain cover for your True Love, this is the business for you.

In fact there are several such businesses.  But only online.  Gone are the days when you can hold the drain cover in your own hand and consider its weight, color, and beauty before you purchase.    

Family valentine's gifts.  

My gifts to DH and to Younger Daughter included dark chocolate, Dictator Valentine cards,  homemade Lobster Bisque soup (recipe at the end of my post for Valentine's Day 2011), and Scottish-style smoked salmon (a celebration of both my ethnic heritage and my husband's).  

My gift to Older Daughter was to send her a photo of her passport, which she needed in order to apply to go overseas after graduation, because why get a job right away?  Alas, I did not give my son anything for Valentine's Day.  I will have to bake him a pie when he comes home.

I also want to ask, Dear Reader, if there is any item which you have discovered is hard to find.  What causes you to raise your lamp, like Diogenes in search of an honest man?

*I found the passport, because I have the superpower of finding things belonging to my family which they have misplaced.  That includes the mustard which was last used in July.

And Happy Chinese New Year, too!
I am not sure it is pointed in the right direction.