Monthly Archive

If you happened to read this post, then you know how much I look forward to Mondays. My dog apparently read it, unknown to me at the time, and decided to take matters into his own hands today, or more accurately, into his teeth.

It all started before I had dressed, put my contact lenses in, had my morning coffee, or even checked in at Gather. I made a mistake. I answered the phone. It then spiraled so rapidly out of control that it can only mean there is a God and He hates me. Every time I thought it might finally be over and breathed a sigh of relief something else, or more accurately, someone else happened.

Before I begin to tell the tale I must state that beginning next Monday the kids and I will be evacuating the house as if Katrina, the tsunami, and Mount St. Helens were all occurring simultaneously in our back yard. We are not early birds so we will no doubt get car sick as we drive off away from the sunrise in the car with no air conditioning, but no matter how many times we have to stop and puke by the side of I-44, it will beat the alternative of staying home and allowing Monday to happen to us again. Not that my kids had an especially bad day today; they seemed oblivious to the utter chaos around them. The kid that went home missing part of his face may have a different opinion.

There is no force powerful enough to make me endure another Monday in my home. In fact, I am calling my realtor tomorrow to begin the process of selling our house in the city, conveniently located less than ten minutes away from the library, my bank, the grocery store, and the Wal-Mart Stupid Center. I am telling him to find me a house in the middle of nowhere, at the end of a one lane dirt road, with no neighbors closer than two miles, and impossible to find. I don’t know what else to do. My very life depends on it. It is sad that one must flee civilisation in order to get away from uncivilised people. It is even sadder that we will likely have to forgo indoor plumbing to make up the difference in what we will be spending on gasoline for my husband to continue to go to work.

Until the happy day that we unload this house of horrors we will evacuate at dawn every Monday and leave our phones behind.

I feel that this tale will become long and unwieldy so I may have to break it into parts. They will be as follows:

1. A crazy woman, her three kids, her dog, and her shit covered car arrive on scene. Things go to hell and stay there, culminating in my dog biting a child that wasn’t my child.
2. A downpour occurs and my car windows won’t roll up.
3. A neighborhood heathen spawn-of-Satan child shows up and things rapidly get worse just when I thought it was finally over.  Strangely, my dog did not bite this child.
4. My husband arrives home from work, runs off the spawn-of-Satan child and cooks dinner. Things are looking up, right? Wrong. We don’t even get to eat the dinner because…
5. My daughter’s loser uncle shows up with some loser woman right when my husband is putting dinner on the table. He has very bad news that he seems to think is good news. He’s rented a house two blocks away. Just kill me.
6. The neighborhood brat returns like Jason or Freddie Kruger or something unspeakably worse.
7. I yell. I cry. I vow to send my kids to public school and get a job working 120 hours a week. The dog looks confused.

A funny thing happened this morning, or right after I got out of bed which may have actually been afternoon. You should know that I have very bad vision and can’t see a foot in front of my face without my contact lenses.

I stumbled to the coffee pot blind and got myself a cup of creamer with some hot coffee in it as is my habit.

I then stepped outside onto the back deck so I could smoke and drink my coffee. I was not dressed yet but the neighbors are used to that and it isn’t a very important part of this story except that there was bare skin involved.

As I lifted the cup of hot, steaming caffeinated beverage to my lips the funny thing happened. My cup fell, emptying its contents all down my bare skin and landing on the toes of my right foot before bouncing off and shattering all over the deck. This seemed weird to me since I still had the handle of the cup in my hand.

I’m standing there still holding the handle of my coffee cup and wondering if I am in fact out of bed after all. This seemed a bit surreal.

The cup fell off its handle. That’s weird. My life is weird. If anything can go wrong, it will.