THE GREAT SOFA DISASTER

HGTV's addictive properties:  I watch, even when it drives me crazy. Like when, yet AGAIN, another homeowner orders a piece of furniture that won't fit through the front door and the whole thing turns into the home decor version of a scary surgery nightmare:  The saws! The hammers! The spurting cushion foam!

And then I did it too. Rewind to last Friday, now a reminder that the Ides of March don't confine themselves to Romans. I'd ordered a beautiful new couch - The Couch - from Z Gallerie, for which I'd been waiting months, since it was being custom upholstered in a grey velvet fabric. In case I hadn't mentioned it (which I haven't), I just moved to D.C. and I'm furnishing my new apartment, which is really fun, and also really annoying, because you do things like sit on your living room floor for weeks waiting for a couch to come.

And then it only comes as far as the lobby. 

The Couch (wrong color). Love the tuxedo style and nailhead detail.

Just like the Roman generals of that other fateful March, I had to evaluate my strategy - what went wrong? It turned out to be a classic battlefield maneuver:  I was taken by surprise. You see, I did all the reasonable things one does when preparing for a couch. I measured the elevator. I measured the door. I checked these measurements against the couch measurements. What I forgot to check, it turns out, was Z Gallerie. Because the couch I got vs. the measurements I got, were... different. 

The delivery guys, whose helpfulness was directly inverse to the number of stair flights between the lobby and my apartment, began highlighting the failings of The Couch, beginning with the fact that the feet were not removable. It turned out the feet should have been removable, in fact. For some reason, I'd been sent the old design... unlike the happy customer earlier that day, to whom, they assured me, they had easily been able to deliver the couch by popping off 5 inches of feet. The dispatcher that I spoke with on the phone had other ideas about the issue - "It's all your problem," was his thoughtful analysis.

I was so desperate to get it in the door, I began hallucinating.

So I stood out on the stoop and waved goodbye to my beautiful grey velvet couch as the deliverymen callously tossed the (now-unwrapped) cushions directly onto the dirty floor of the truck bed and drove away. (P.S. the truck was actually sporting Williams-Sonoma logos, as the delivery company works for them, as well as PotteryBarn and Z Gallerie.)

So, bloggerland, here are the options for bringing seating happiness to my humble home. Please log your vote in the comments!

Option One:  Full refund. Walk away, or rather sit away, with no couch. 

And start the hunt all over again. A tall order. Or a short one, if you're going by inches.

(I liked this Crate and Barrel sofa - for $500 more.)

Option Two:  Z Gallerie mans up and sends me what I should have gotten to start with:  a new couch. With removable feet. The catch? They refuse to promise it any sooner than 2 to 3 months from now, a bit surprising since I was unwittingly helping them get rid of old stock. Basically, I will have spent half a year waiting on ONE COUCH. What are they doing - still growing the trees for the frame? 

(The Couch. Again.)

Option Three:  Choose another Z Gallerie couch in a stock finish I can "live with."

(Couch in Pearl... velvet? Microfiber? Description doesn't say.)

What do you think?

Image credits:  car/couch, bent sofa, z gallerie sofas, z gallerie.