Ratatouille

I had a very interesting start to my morning.

For starters, the evil Chubber was up at who-knows-what-time (when I got out of the shower and walked into my room, he was standing in the doorway--staring at me!), so I had a super early start: 5:30am. Ugh. I really need, honestly need a half-hour to myself first thing in the morning after I get out of the shower. With the Chublet being up so early, my 'personal time' instantly evaporates. At any rate, despite the early, early start with kids, the first part of my morning went smoothly. Where's the interesting part, you ask? Here it comes:

Once I got to work I was really productive. Rare for me, as I like to socialize a little bit in the morning with my co-workers and catch up on the goings-on (I miss out on a lot since I don't technically work full-time. Yeah, right.). I got the art materials we'd be using prepped and ready to roll for Friday, and the only thing I was missing was a few gallon-sized ziplock bags.

I started to look for the bags I needed. None to be found in my supply closet, desk, or random piles of detritus that inhabit my work-space. Bummer. That left me with having to cruise down to the second floor to look in the 'science closet.' I am in this closet constantly (I have a bit of a penchant for science...) and I know that there are not only gallon-sized ziplock bags, but quart-sized bags. Oh joy! As I was opening the storage closet a friend walked by and started to chat about what was going on, and, being me, I turned and said hello and got filled in on this very important 'memo.' As I'm standing there I'm noticing a foul odor emanating from the science closet. It is nasty and somewhat familiar, though I can't quite place it. Finally, important office talk taken care of, I begin to turn around to look in the closet when I hear it (slow things down to slow-motion): the plat-plat-plat of little naked rodent feet.

Eew, yucky!

Then, it all becomes odorifically clear: that smell was rat and/or mouse pee! And, those little feet that were scuttling across the floor were rat and/or mouse feet.

At this point, the elapsed time is approximately 0:01.05 seconds. I SCREAM! and jump up in the air, doing a fair imitation of my 'arachnoleptic fit' (the jiggy moves I perform when I happen upon a member of the arachnids--I do not like spiders!). To my horror, there are two small children in the a hallway who witness my 'freak-out-fit' and I run (think 'fairy princess' in the derogatory sense of the saying) to another co-worker's office.

Talk about a wake-up-call!

I complain to the appropriate department, and find out:

1. The appropriate personnel is aware that there is a (moderate) rodent problem
2. An exterminator is to be coming soon (I asked "soon? As in we're getting our new copy-machine 'soon' (it was supposed to have been installed some time after JUNE!))
3. The appropriate personnel had, in fact, killed a mouse in said science closet that very morning

Oh, how I do love working for the US government. Your tax dollars at work, baby! Nothin' but the best for our future.

So, Disney had a 'cute' rat in their new Disney/Pixar film "Ratatouille". We have disgusting, bad-smelling-pee, nasty little scuttling pink feet, dirty ghetto rats.

Hmmm.

How did they ever think rodents were cute and cuddly? I'll never know.

Tomorrow is December 1, 2007

That means that NaBloPoMo is over. I will be able to say "I DID IT!!" and "I survived posting every single day in November (albeit, not necessarily thoughtful or good posts, but I did manage something).

Yay!!

Thanks to those of you who felt and/or posted your sympathy for my Bad Day. I'm really on a roll, today, albeit not as bad as yesterday, has been extremely aggravating. Thus, I'm having an aggravating day in lieu of a bad day. Does that count for anything? I didn't think so.

So, what was so bad about yesterday/today? (you may want to check out the list of links on my sidebar right about now, 'cuz the violins are coming out).

Rewind to Wednesday.

Work: the homo sapiens whom I deal with were great. Others, who, unfortunately, interact with my little universe were not. In fact, the description "wild-monkey-crazy-animals" would not be an overstatement. Can't go into any more details than that, because then it would be too specific,and the laws, and blah, blah, blah. At any rate, the behaviors (note: PLURAL) that were going on at work caused me to leave in a FOUL mood. I was so anxious and 'keyed-up' it took me the upwards of 2 hours to quit 'vibrating-internally' (you know, where you're so stressed out your guts feel like they're twisted in knots, and you start obsessing about what happened, and you get more and more upset--the negative cycle). Then, as a result of my stress I got upset stomach and started to have (am I actually going to publish this?) diarrhea.

Oh. So. Gross.

I was a very unhappy camper.

Then, I got to go back to work from 4:30-6:00pm for a conference/seminar that was mandatory. I'm currently taking a university class, and I have already done 25 classroom hours, and to finish it out I have a 'class' for 1.5 hours every month that I have to attend to receive my grade/credit. Oh joy. So,whatever 'unwinding' I had accomplished got undone when I walked in the doors for class.

Thursday:

Woke up at 5am still feeling ill. I have never had a somatic reaction like this to stress; ever. I rolled around and hoped I'd feel better...in the end I called in sick and spent the day feeling queasy and had unhappy intestines.

It gets better.

Wednesday afternoon after getting the mail (drove to the mailbox because, well, you know, I'd melt if I had to walk to the mailbox in the rain. You saw the Wizard of Oz, right? That was my sister), I noticed a tap-tap-tap noise. I figured I had a rock stuck in the tire of my van. Turns out I ran over a BOLT! AHHHHH!

So, after picking the kids up from the sitter (you thought I actually took a sick day and kept the kids home? Yeah. As IF.) I drove us to the Honda Dealer to ask about the tire. They told me to go to America's Tire Co. because they were really busy, and it would take a few hours for my car to get worked on.

Ok. I can do this.

We get to America's Tire Co. and my (evil screaming hellions) children behave like a 4 and 2 year old, respectively: they run around the shop, climb the tire/wheel displays, and scream like banshees. The tire guy looks mortified, and offers to 'work quickly' sine he sees I have "little ones." Great. Thanks. I appreciate it, I do. But, he tells me it is going to cost me $75 to fix my tire.

GAG!

Who pays $75 to fix a tire? Me, that's who. See, one of the joys of a 2006 Honda Odyssey Touring Model is this great little invention called run-flat tires. In a nutshell, run flats let you drive for 50 miles at speeds of up to 55mph without having to change the tire. The idea is so that if you're out and about and a tire gets a hole/leak you will be able to drive long enough (at highway speeds) to safely get to a service center without the hassle of changing a flat. Great idea. Poor design. Run flats wear out in about 30,000 miles of driving use. To replace them they are a special order, and here's what Consumer Reports had to say:

Consumer Reports magazine, said the tires offered a safety advantage, but the
tire forum on its Web site (consumer.org) had many complaints from run-flat owners about
higher-than-expected replacement costs, difficulty getting repairs and what some
considered excessive wear.

Ok. This is my only complaint about my van. Pretty good, don't you think, if that's my only gripe? I guess it is my 'just desserts' for insisting on the 'top-of-the line' if I were to cross over to the dark side of mommy-hood: driving a minivan.

The problem became, after I walked a sick me and two squealing, hungry little piggies up and down Lancaster Dr. and found a Chinese restaurant to feed us dinner (By now it was 5pm), was when we got back to the tire center an hour and a half later the tire was not fixed and he had, surprise-surprise, really GOOD news: It wasn't fixable.

I need 4 new tires (they're worn out) and I would have to immediately buy 1 new tire if I was to drive my van home. Great. The estimate he had for me for tires--ONLY, was $1,200.

It is amazing that I didn't barf right there on the counter.

Thankfully, by this time B.J. had met me at the store, and I let him take over the haggling.

In the end, since it was taking for-ever to get a tire changed, it is 6:45pm now, and we'd gotten to the tire shop just past 4:30pm, I pitch a fit, get the car seats squeezed in (should have used WD-40 to help) to the backseat of the Eclipse, if that is what you call the little shelf behind the front seats. Let's just say, preschooler and toddler in a sportscar is a real trip, in both senses of the word.

The kids and I get home. B.J. arrives about an HOUR later, with USED tire on the van, $150 lighter in the pockets for a USED FREAKING TIRE!!

We were so not loving the fancy tires, last night.

Friday:

Today was aggravating because my Nikon is still not back, got a call from the shop saying that it will be $95 to 'fix it' --huh? it is in the shop for a warranty-covered cleaning. I'm blogging right now so that I don't return the phone call and totally chew-off the store clerk's ear. My 1pm dentist appointment was cancelled. Let's just say I was dreading the cleaning all week long, and now that it has to be rescheduled, I have another new week to dread the cleaning, once I call back to reschedule.

Does it ever end? Oh, yeah, B.J. and I decided to buy new rims and tires for the Honda. No way can I put cheap-o steel rims on it (way too tacky, even for me) and that's gonna set us back $1800. But, that purchase (we're trying to hold off) is for next month--as in January.

But, to put it all into perspective, I'm grateful for what is a 'bad day' or an 'aggravating day' to me. Because, after reading about what the Ugandan people have to deal with, on Prose of Sharon's blog, I have nothing at all to gripe about. Even in my 'bad moments' I'm blessed beyond belief.

Here's to the weekend, and all the troubles I'm blessed with. I hope I can keep this perspective tomorrow, when we get picture re-takes of Peanut and Chubber.

We did it! Last post for NaBloPoMo.

And, how perfect is this? "The Twelve Days of Christmas" by The MacKenzie Brothers is on the raido right now. Their attitude sums up NaBloPoMo. Perfectly.