Excuse Me While I Go Mad

The K12 curriculum will not be arriving for another full week. My kids are revolting against my "learn by writing" made-up busy work. They do not use capital letters. They do not put their words into tidy little paragraphs with related thoughts. They do not have a beginning, a middle and an end. And they can't spell.

But they are gone now. My husband took them with him on an errand to Costco. Upon hearing the news that they could go with him, they frantically asked if they could have an advance on their allowance. "Does Costco sell laser-tag?" they said.

The house is still. The babies are asleep. I have a giant glass of Diet Coke with Lime. And I have no idea what to cook for dinner. I intended to get a frozen chicken out of the big freezer (yes, nestled right next to the lentils), but the morning got away from me and now I have to be creative. I hope I can find something in that freezer besides old oats. The children tend to hate creative dinners (i.e. anything other than crockpot chicken or roast and potatoes).

Last night, I took all the kids to YoungestBoy's soccer practice. The practice appeared to be complete bedlam. Everytime I glanced over, I saw the boys milling about, kicking their soccer balls and grabbing each other around the throats. Only six boys participate on each team and they were all crazy with cabin fever, I guess. First full week of school and all. My older boys "helped," although I'm not sure how helpful they really were.

Babygirl had a great time sliding down the school playground slides. I improvised and used a clean disposable diaper to wipe off the rain-drenched slides. I was fairly impressed with my ingenuity, which only proves what a small world I live in at the moment. I could have used napkins, only YoungestBoy spilled an entire chocolate milkshake in the backseat of the car (on the side where the door no longer opens) and I had to use every napkin I could find to sop up the frozen treat.

I spent this morning dunking two cats' behinds in a sink full of water. We have three mutant cats, all from the same litter. Smokey is a long-haired ball of fluff, with no tail. Chestnut is a short-haired grey striped kitty with half a tail that kinks ninety-degrees at the end. And short-haired Roy is shaped exactly like a white-tail deer. My husband agreed to take the kittens from the neighbor down the street. I would have chosen beautiful kittens, not this homely bunch, but as it turns out, these cats have been shockingly gentle, even though Babygirl slings them around over her arm like a furry purse.

For some reason, Roy and Smokey occasionally have a bit of poop cling to their hind-ends. I cannot believe that it's my job to dunk them under water and stick my fingers into that matted mess to clean them up. And the cats were not even grateful. They acted as if I were the one who was getting a thrill.

The other day, I was sitting at my computer, minding my own business. Then I smelled poop. What kind of scares me is that I can tell the origin of the poop by the smell alone. I knew it was cat poop, not baby poop. (I can tell by smell which toddler is poopy; the DaycareKid has the most foul smelling diapers ever. Blech.) Anyway, so I smell poop and I peer under my desk. Sure enough, a cat is exiting, but no poop is visible.

I walk across the room to the laundry room, the location of the litter box. No poop. I scan the floor. Nothing. I walk back to the computer, see two spots on the carpet and realize, someone has poop on a shoe! I check my shoes and yes, I have a clump of smooshed poop on the bottom of my newish shoes.

I can't believe I do this job and get no paycheck. Or hazard-duty pay. Or even a Certification of Completion.

What an unsavory post this was. My apologies.