Pounds and pence

We've been here just over four months now and I can say, with a certain amount of embarrassment, that I'm only just feeling confident about what these coins in my wallet are worth (also, purse = wallet here...so confusing when trying to buy a new wallet. I mean, purse. I  mean, um, gah, this money is too tall for my bill holding device!). I took a peek back through my posts to try to find the one I wrote about becoming a cultural toddler, but I can't find it, so to recap: I knew I'd have a steep learning curve when we arrived and that the currency would be a big part of that curve. I mean, for starters, they have 20p coins, not quarters. And the shapes are all off-kilter from what I spent thirty years learning. And they sound different when they hit the ground. If I dropped a bit of Canadian change, I had a pretty good chance of making an accurate count of what was there. Here? Not so much. But I'm trying.

Well, here we are, four months in and I've stopped giving shopkeepers helpless looks when they tell me the total. I now reserve those looks for the post office personnel (that's another story). On a good day I can confidently shovel out either the exact change or something approximating the best combination to get the minimal amount in return.

Or at least I thought I could. 

Last weekend, in Edinburgh, James and I were at Hula Juicebar getting fuel for the day and a rare event occurred: the task of paying fell to me. I pulled out a mitt full of change and proceeded to come up with a combination that used up as much of the smaller amounts as possible to lighten my load. James lovingly watched on. When I'd handed over the change, feeling quite good about my little victory, James remarked, matter-of-factly, "You could have done better." Apparently there was a more optimal combination that I missed. Seriously? That's how we're starting the day?? Yup. 

In an incredibly mature counter-move, I mumbled under my breath, "That's what my mom said" and sipped my juice. In some aspects, it seems, I'm still a bit of a toddler.

A wrinkle in my plan

I've brought my iPad with me on the train in the hopes that I'd be able to turn out some amazing entry that's profound, introspective and thought-provoking, but James is sitting across from me in a wrinkled shirt. It's like he's absolutely clueless that I detest wrinkled clothing. He's not. He knows I can't stand when he wears a rumpled shirt. Or when the bed sheets have such wrinkles that I lay awake at night wishing I could pull them off of him and give them a thorough ironing. He knows. He's watched my tortured agony when I'm forced to accept that ironing our sheets is not the best use of my time and I must grit my teeth and make the bed "as is."

With all of this knowledge at his disposal, he still chose to pull the freshly-laundered-but-not-yet-meticulously-ironed shirt from the hanger, and believe it was a wise move. Foolish, foolish James.

Point of Interest: Martha Stewart has an entire ROOM in one of her houses devoted to ironing. She has huge machines that iron sheets. I think I've mentioned this somewhere before. She's my ironing hero, second to my dad, who taught me how to iron (Sorry dad, Martha has a whole room for ironing. You taught me to iron in the laundry room - true, that is a room, but with multiple uses so it just isn't the same). James clearly doesn't have an ironing hero...if he did, he wouldn't commit such a heinous crime against good taste.

God, and he won't stop talking so that I can finish this before I lose Internet connection. C'mon James! Yeesh.