A Boring Account of My Day, and Potential Last Words

This week has been tough. And not even tough because anything bad happened or because of illness or misfortune. It's just been tough because I'm a spoiled little baby, and after having 17 days off of work, I found it very hard to transition back into real life--which includes getting up in the morning, wearing pants that don't have an elastic waist, and actually having real responsibilities again, both at home and at school. What! You mean my entire life can't be devoted to watching Mad Men and making waffle cones?! That's rubbish!

So from Monday through Wednesday I was a complete worthless blob. I would go to school and try to muster up energy to be good while there, and then I'd come home and take a coma nap. The coma naps were getting progressively longer, and by the time I woke up from Wednesday's 4-hour one, I knew I had to make a change. But then I didn't want to, and I instead talked to Matt and ate burgers (from the new grill) and watched tv and laughed and tried my hardest to ignore the messy house and the fact that I would have to get up again in the morning. I hate getting up in the morning. I prefer to exit slumber in the early afternoon. (True fact. If I had my druthers, I'd stay up until 4 a.m. and sleep until noon every day.)

So yesterday was my day to be active. And, boy, was I! I went shopping and bought these, the perfect trouser pants from Gap that I'd had my eye on since September. (Shoot yeah, 50% off clearance prices!)

 and here I am wearing them

And I got this shirt, which is kind of like a fancy robe.

I also went to the grocery store and accidentally broke the bag and dropped my loaf of sourdough French bread in the middle of the parking lot. And I ate it anyway. And it was delicious.

And I took down Christmas. That took what felt like eight days, except that it was really like two or three hours. I think Christmas decorations are kind of like having family visit--you're so happy to put them out, and then you're just as happy to put them away.

While listening to to a few podcasts.

And I cleaned. And vacuumed (three times). And I ellipted. And I took a shower. And I did laundry.

And then the dryer went kaput. And I was mad. So I made Matt put on an episode of Mad Men, thinking that the dashing Don Draper would help me to forget about the inconvenient death of the dryer, but then I fell asleep during the episode.

This morning I found a guy on Craigslist who says that he has 30 years of experience fixing dryers and that he'll fix it for $40 plus the cost of parts. Hopefully that's not code for "30 years of experience murdering silly women," because I called him and he's coming to the house soon. Anyway, if I get murdered, you'll know it was "George" the "dryer repairman."*

*Don't worry, the dryer is out in the shed, so I don't even have to let him into the house.**

**Also, I'm going to hide a cast-iron skillet in my jacket, just in case. That's my weapon of choice to use against potential murderers.

This and That

Oh man oh man.  Here's what's been on my mind of late:

• Can I please have this dress?
• And can I please look like this in it?
• New season of Friday Night Lights is making both Matt and Mandy very happy viewers.  I've even gone back and started rewatching FNL Season 1 on Netflix Instant (via our awesome Wii streaming disc).  Oh, Coach Taylor. . .  Oh, Tami Taylor.  I think Matt and I are going to invite them into our relationship.  Not really. 


• Mitch is becoming more neurotic by the week.  Anytime he get a bone larger than a small Milk Bone, he has to go outside and bury it, and he has a look of desperation on his face until he finishes the task.  Right now he's got these big rawhide bones (a gift from Aunt Cassie), and he's a damned weirdo.  I'm not looking forward to thunderstorm season.

• But, wait.  Thunderstorm season is summer, and summer is no school.  Guess I can deal with a little bit of pup neurosis.  (Nineteen more days of school.  NINETEEN!  That's fewer than twenty!  That's four weeks!)
• I've been vacuuming almost daily.  Who knew that housecleaning could be so fun?
• Have you started watching Breaking Bad yet?  You need to be.  The premise: high school chemistry teacher finds out he has cancer and starts cooking meth.  Craziness ensues. 
• I'm really ready for Lost to be over.  I'm sick of all of the questions.  And I'm sick of Kate.  And I have a feeling that I'm not going to be wild about the finale, either. 
• Cris had me take the true colors personality test.  I'm an orange (with gold tones).  I would bet money that Matt's a green.  What are you?
• I'm down to about 25% sick now instead of 50%, so that's good.  Hopefully in the next few days I will be 0% sick.  I'm going to eat six grapefruit for dinner.

Hope your Monday is lovely!

When It's Good to Suck.

As Mitch has shared, I got a new vacuum on Friday.  It was one of those purchases that emphasized just how old and boring I have become, not so much because I bought a vacuum, but because of how happy the vacuum made me.

You see, I spent all of last week in some sort of weird haze/funk.  (Matt called it a "faze," but that seems too close to "phase" which is an actual thing.  And "hunk" doesn't work, either, unless I want to make people think something drastically different.)  I wasn't sad or upset or anything, but I was eating like shit, and I got drunk twice without planning to do so, and I just never felt "with it."  And the house was a mess and I just couldn't muster up the energy to do anything about it.  Plus, I couldn't find my tweezers, or my fingernail clipper manicure set thing, or Mitch's Kong, and it was really starting to anger me. 

Nothing major, of course, but just off.

So I was explaining my haze/funk to Cassie on Friday afternoon, and during our conversation she told me about their new vacuum.  She went on and on, praising the vacuum, quoting reviews, and providing anecdotal evidence of how awesome it is (i.e., "Hugh says the mop water isn't nearly as dirty as it used to be.").  We discussed how, perhaps, purchasing the thing would help me to escape my haze/funk, and Cassie advised me to buy it.

And I did.  (In fact, I didn't even go home from school before I went to Target and snatached one up--they were on sale for $99!)

For two days all I did was vacuum, and think of other things to vacuum.  Matt would be all, "Want to watch another episode of Breaking Bad?" and I'd be all, "Ummmm, can I vacuum the sunroom first?"  He'd be all, "Want to cook dinner?" and I'd be all, "Ummmmm, sorry.  I'm busy vacuuming out all of the window sills.  Check out this suction!"

What do all of these things have in common?

Oh yes, they're all things I retrieved when I pulled out the refrigerator to vacuum the coils. (Martha says this should be done twice a year.)  It was disgusting.  Look at it.

Is that cocaine?

Was there a murder that took place under our refrigerator?

Is that a receipt from 2005? (Mitch's first birthday, to be exact.)

Why did the people who lived here before us buy so much bologna?

And why did I pour about two cups of straight ammonia onto this mess (after vacuuming it, of course)?  Why didn't I think to open the windows?

So, high on ammonia fumes, I continued on my maniacal vacuuming endeavor, forgot to eat, and cleaned the shit out of the house.  I found the tweezers; I found $49 in a bag I haven't used in months; I found Mitch's Kong; I found a pair of shoes I haven't seen in since last summer; I cleaned out the refrigerator; I organized all of the closets; I packed up stuff for Goodwill; I cleaned the bathroom; I did all of the laundry; I reorganized the bookshelves; I dusted.

But I never found my damned nail clippers.  (Matt probably threw them away, fearing that if I had nails that were too nicely manicured that they might attract Seth Meyers or George Clooney.)

This place is sparkling, but I look forward to it getting a little messy again, you know, so that I can use the vacuum some more.

Annnnnnnnnnnnnnd, I'm old.

New Brother, My Ass!: A Post from Mitch

Here's the thing, you guys.  I mean, I'm a dog who enjoys a life of leisure.  Sure, I like to go for walks, and I like to go for car rides to the bank and stuff, and once or twice or year I go on a big vacation trip.  But my day to day life is pretty relaxed. 

I mean, I like to get up, enjoy my morning coffee. . .

. . .and relax on the couch. 

I eat treats and I bark at kids who walk past the house.  The most exciting part of my day is usually when my loathed enemy, the mailman, comes by and shoves stuff through the door.  I hate that guy.  And he knows it, believe me!  I have a scary bark, and I will bite him so hard when I meet him.  Hear that, mailman?  Hear that?

Okay, so, anyway.  There's something else you should know.  I'm an only dog.  I mean, maybe there was a time when I would have liked a dog brother (or moose brother), but I'm too old, too set in my ways for that now.  So you can imagine my angst when Mom came home Friday afternoon telling me to get ready for my new brother.

"Oh, Christ," I thought to myself.  "But maybe it's Reilly?  Shoot, even Fletcher could grow on me after a while."

But no.  Meet my new "brother."

If there's one thing I hate more than the mailman, it's the vacuum cleaner.  So loud!  So scary!  What an asshole, undoing everything I've worked so hard to establish (read: covering the house in my fur, making more and more Mitches)!

And as though that weren't bad enough, all weekend it was like Mom loved my new vacuum brother more than she loved me.  She vacuumed and vacuumed, she cleaned the whole house two times over.  Oh, and vacuum brother just kept rubbing it in how he was Mom's favorite.  And he'd retract his cord all fast just to scare me.  I hate that vacuum.  I barked at him and told him so.

I didn't get to do much relaxing on Saturday, because I had to follow my mom (and new stupid "brother") around the house, barking at my brother. 

Fortunately, though, all that bonding time between mom and my new brother tired her out, and today she spent most of the afternoon lying on the couch with me, the favorite son.  And where was vacuum brother, you ask?  In the closet, where he belongs.

I don't think that means what you think it means.

Today I stumbled upon this post from Pioneer Woman's early days about reading her brother's high school yearbooks, and a slight linguistic misunderstanding.  You should probably read it.  (Also, I wish Pioneer Woman was this racy still.  C'mon, Ree.  Break out the dirty stuff again!)

And her story reminded me of a "misunderstanding" from my own childhood--one that, when I realized only a few years ago what was really going on, was positively horrific.

Picture it.  Christmas 1987.  I'm at Grandma's house in Maryland with my whole [really crazy] family.  I'm six, and I'm a television addict.  (This was also the same Christmas that we were sledding down a hill and under a big wooden fence, until, of course, I lifted my head at the wrong moment and busted up my face.  This was also the same Christmas that my uncles Allen and Mark, who were four and five years older than me, would tie me up with scarves and wrap me in blankets and leave me by myself in a room with all of the lights off, and tell me to try to get out.  I managed to escape, because I was a badass.)

So everyone's there: aunts, uncles, cousins.  Even my great aunt Ellen (who had recently come out of the closet) came, and she brought her girlfriend Regina. 

At the same time there was a commercial that aired constantly on TV for a vacuum cleaner: the Regina vacuum cleaner.  There was a jingle.  It was catchy. 



And I was six, and obnoxious, and thought it was just hilarious that Regina had the same name as a vacuum.  So, for about a week, I ran through the house yelling: "Regina, Regina, the carpet cleaner!" 

And my family members would all laugh, and I assumed that they also found it hilarious that Regina shared a name with a household appliance.  And the more they laughed, the more I yelled.

I don't think that's why they were laughing.

More Birthdays

Birthday wishes to two of my favorite girls: Opal (2) and the birth control pill (50!). 

Things here are both uneventful and busy.  My days lately have consisted of avoiding unpleasant household chores, baking, ellipting so that I can eat all of the baked goods, and watching Breaking Bad.  I need two productive days to get me back on top of things.  And then I can return to my slothful ways.

Twenty-eight more days with my darling ninth graders.  Hey, isn't that the same amount of time that people often spend in rehab?  Or does it have something to do with zombies?  I have a feeling I'll meet one of those outcomes by June 11. 

Okay, I now have two hours to bake some cookies, ellipt, shower, and fold all of the laundry in the house.  Want to take bets on how many of those tasks I'll actually complete?

 

Dinner Party: Lesson #3

Don't go crazy with cleaning beforehand (though you may want to be sure to find all of the dead frogs around the house--sorry, Fletcher), because there's a good chance your house will be in disrepair within a few short hours.

Also, look into hiring a maid.

Mitch-gloo

"Mama, I'm pretty tired, and I think I'm gonna take a nap. Will you record SNL for me and find out of Virginia Tech won so I'll know what kind of mood Daddy's gonna be in when he comes home? . . .

. . .oh, and can you finish cleaning the house? There's dog fur everywhere! You know I'm allergic to dog fur. . .

. . .and wake me up if any kids walk by, okay? Or maybe you can just yell at them and tell them not to walk past our house. Man, it's chilly. I'm glad I have my blanket! . . .

. . .[big dog sigh], this feels. . .fantastic."

It's been that kind of day for dogs and dog moms.