Date Night Setbacks

Every week Douglas and I attempt to set aside one night dedicated to doing something fun with one another. We call it date night. Douglas’ work and school schedule has caused our recent date nights to get repeatedly postponed. It’s hard to get upset about that when it is neither his fault nor mine. Everything comes in waves. At the time work and school were creating higher waves than either one of us wanted to ride, though I knew it would all slow down soon.

When the week began we saw that there was a community potluck being held for all the Americans. These potluck dinners are usually lots of fun. Last time the group split up into two teams and played Jeopardy. Many of us did not know the answers but we all made some hilarious guesses.  Douglas and I signed up in advance to attend and bring a dish. Although we knew it would be enjoyable, both of us weren't really feeling the event. We just wanted to spend some quality time alone. That is when the light bulbs inside our heads turned on simultaneously. If we skipped the potluck we could have our much needed date night. The fact that we both felt the same way made the decision that much easier. Besides, there is a different community event held each month. We could catch the next one.

For date night we planned to dine at a delicious Turkish restaurant, pick up some yummy Italian gelato to take home, put up Christmas decorations, watch a movie, and end with some adult fun. The Marine driver was scheduled to pick us up at 6:00 p.m. from our residence. I was so thrilled to get dressed up in something other than my everyday comfort clothes. Douglas was also happy to wear something besides work attire. The night was going to be great! 

First Setback: The Marine driver informed us that the Turkish restaurant we wanted to eat at was closed on Fridays. There are less than a handful of acceptable restaurants in Algiers that serve good food in a nice atmosphere. We resorted to eating at Hippopotamus instead, a restaurant that would have been our very last choice. Even with the condiments I had squeezed into my medium sized purse, our dishes could still be described as only edible. We made the most of it; all the while thinking about indulging in some delicious gelato later that evening.

Second Setback: To our convenience the gelato shop happened to be located right beside Hippopotamus. As we exited the restaurant and turned left to go inside the gelato shop, our jaws dropped when we saw the metal gate pulled over the entrance. It was closed! This now meant no gelato for us. It’s not like in America where you can go to another ice cream shop that is just as good. This was the only gelato shop we knew about. The food portion of our night did not go too well, but the evening wasn’t over yet. We waited outside for a few minutes until the driver arrived and drove us home.

All the Christmas decorations were already laid out on our dining room table. The first order of business was to put up the tree. Our living room space is tight, leaving little room for a tree or even a small plant. We were determined to find a spot for it though. Without the tree it wouldn’t feel like Christmas. Eventually we agreed it would look best directly behind our dining room table. After setting up our pre-lit tree, Douglas and I had to plug it into a transformer box. There was an extra one lying around the house collecting dust. We plugged it into the wall and then plugged a surge protector into the transformer box. To avoid damaging our American products, using a surge protector with the transformer is highly recommended. Before plugging the tree into the surge protector I thought it would be best to turn the transformer box on first to ensure it was working properly. Thank goodness we did.

Third Setback: As soon as Douglas flipped the transformer switch on, we heard a loud pop and saw a flash of light come from the box. The burnt smell from the unit confirmed our thoughts. The transformer blew our surge protector out. Maybe that surge protector was bad. This is what we told ourselves, hoping that it wasn’t the transformer box itself. We had another surge protector that was brand new. Douglas then plugged that one into the box and we watched as the same loud noise and bright spark appeared again. Nope, it was the box! That was it! Two surge protectors now destroyed and a tree with no lights. Just as I was about to forgo decorating the tree at all, Douglas convinced me that I would much rather see an unlit tree up than no tree at all. He wound up being correct. At least we are conserving energy, not that it was ever our intention.

Once we finished the holiday decorating portion of the evening I wanted to lie down, cuddle up with my husband, and watch a new movie on Netflix. A few days prior, the temperature outside dropped severely. It went from high 60’s to low 40’s practically overnight. To make matters worse, our heating unit suddenly stopped working. And to top that off, when one unit stops working then all the units stop working. The inside of our house felt just as cold as it was outside. I typically do not prefer having heat on, but our home was so cold I craved for heat that night. I was dressed in sweatpants, long thick socks, a long sleeved t-shirt, and a hooded sweatshirt with the hood tied on my head. I almost came close to putting on my winter coat too.

While moving around decorating the house, we managed to stay fairly warm. But once we sat down the coldness kicked in big time! We sat on the living room sofa preparing to watch a movie on Netflix. I told myself to focus on the movie. Maybe then I wouldn’t notice how cold I was underneath the thick blanket we had on top of us.

Fourth Setback: Douglas pressed play for the movie we selected and our blu-ray player froze. Yes, it stopped working! Douglas unplugged the system to try and restart it, but even after that we still could not access Netflix. We have DVD’s, but neither one of us were in the mood to watch movies we had already seen. And our cable provider, the American Forces Network (AFN) which consists of ten channels, had nothing to our liking coming on that night.

It was now becoming rather hard to ignore the effects from our cold house. My fingertips were wrinkled and blue, and my nose was turning red. My teeth clattered every few seconds. And the way I was shivering reminded me of standing outside in New York City in mid-winter, waiting for either the train or bus to arrive. There was no way we could continue sitting on the sofa, freezing our butts off. We decided the bedroom would suit us much better. Moving like we were in a race, we cleared out of the living room and proceeded to the bed. I placed one leg underneath those sheets and it felt like I was lying in a refrigerator. We didn’t think about how cold it would be underneath the covers. Douglas wrapped me in the pretty turquoise blue, white and brown afghan that my mother made me a couple years ago.  I rolled onto those chilled sheets and as best as I could I cuddled tightly with Douglas to stay warm.

Fifth Setback: Earlier, when we pictured ourselves in bed at the end of this date night, we never imagined to be fully dressed in layers of clothes and a blanket. Neither of us was planning to remove one layer of our clothing, just to have some much needed “fun” in that icebox of a room. My toes were now numb and my head was hurting from the declining temperature. By this time it was almost 10:30 p.m. All that I could bring myself to do was go to sleep. The only thing that went right the entire night was that Douglas and I got to spend it together. On the upside, this was probably our most memorable date night ever!