Made in Richmond

Things that Hurricane Sandy could potentially ruin:

1. Our church’s Harvest Party, AKA The Funnest Night Of The Year.
2. The arrival of my birthday boots–scheduled to be delivered to my house on Wednesday, AKA The Day The Storm Of Death Is Supposed To Destroy Everything Which Probably Includes My Front Porch Onto Which My Birthday Boots Would Be Placed By The UPS Man.
3. Trick-or-Treating, AKA The Only Thing I Can Currently Hang Over My Son’s Head To Make Him Behave.

I hate you, Sandy. You are dumb. Take your drama somewhere else.

Today is Labor Day which basically means Summer is over (even though next week’s forecast indicates that Richmond is going to drag her feet about cooling off). Today is also my “Last Monday” with JR.

His school offered us the chance to increase his number of days from 2 to 3, and since he’s getting older, and elementary school is no long very far down the road (WUT.), we decided to make it work. Thankfully, my job working for our church seems to grow at the exact rate I need it to, and this was a good time for me to take on more hours.

We’ll still spend Tuesdays and Wednesdays together, and I think my extra time in the office will allow me to really make those days about our time together, instead of still having to squeeze work in every now and then.

It’s a good thing for us. JR is stoked to have more time with his friends, and even though we’ve got the added expense of an extra day at school, my new hours should be enough to give us a little extra breathing room, financially.

But I’m sad. Saaaaaaaad.

Because here’s the thing: he’ll be gone 3 days a week. Next fall we’re hoping to get him into the pre-K program at our neighborhood public school. Pre-K is all week long and lasts all day (or at least regular school hours). So basically this next phase marks our final days of “being home together” before he’s at school 5 days a week…until he graduates from high school and leaves me forever.

As you can see, I’m feeling a bit dramatic about it. But I don’t care because, dudes, my baby is a boy and he won’t quit growing and it’s really REALLY pissing me off.

Also, here’s a video that has nothing to do with anything; it’s just cute:

So this happened:

We had a crazy storm on Monday and our part of town basically took a direct hit. Branches were down everywhere–including into the windshield of our car, as you can see from the photo above. The best part is, we were the only car on our street *not* parked under a tree.

It’s about as awesome as you can imagine, but it could be worse. We weren’t *in* the car when it happened, and our house was spared any damage. Another insane storm blew through last night and we only had a few sticks in our yard for that go-around.

The insurance adjuster came out on Tuesday. He was very nice and seemed to genuinely feel horrible about having to tell me that the car was totaled. I wasn’t exactly surprised–the car was nine years old and subsequently worth less than what it would’ve cost to fix damage to the roof and frame. But it was also wonderfully, gloriously paid off, so we’re looking at having to take on a car payment for the first time in six years. I would be lying if I said that thought didn’t make me want to throw up.

The whole process has sucked a lot–I think mostly because it was such a random event and there’s no one to blame for it. Money is going to be tight while we work to replenish our savings, but I realize we’re lucky to *have* savings to begin with. While this situation is unfortunate for us, it could be potentially devastating for someone else.

Still. It was sad to see the old girl go. She was very good to us for a long time.

…that one day I will be able to use the restroom without *someone* standing outside the door, commenting on how I take a “weally, weally long tiiiiiime.”

A recent text message conversation between Ross and I while he was in
Blacksburg at a football game.

Last night a bat swooped down on me as I was getting out of my car. AND IT TOUCHED MY HAIR. Then it continued on its flappy, gross, flying rodent way, probably heading out to spread rabies everywhere. Because that’s all bats do, don’t you try to tell me different.

Then *I* went inside and flopped around shouting “I FEEL LIKE IT’S ON ME I FEEL LIKE IT’S ON ME!!!!!” for about 10 minutes.

What is it with those damned winged creatures? I will not stand for this harassment.

As I briefly mentioned earlier, a pizza tried to kill me on Saturday. Well, Sunday, technically. And I’m only assuming it was the pizza, but I suppose it could have been anything I consumed. Anyway, the hours between 12am and 6am were spent either throwing up or curled up on my bathroom floor praying for death. Or Gatorade. Either one would have been fine.

Then on Monday I noticed a rash on my right hip. Because sure, why not? I showed it to Ross and he seemed to be unconcerned, but casually mentioned that the rash was vaguely circular and bulls-eye-ish which could mean Lyme Disease. After Googling the shit out of that, I was pretty convinced that wasn’t it, but spent the next two days casually awaiting my death, just to be sure.

THEN on Tuesday, I noticed I had two lumps in my abdomen, juuuuuuuuuuust to the left of my right hip bone, sort of down a bit into the “pelvic” area, I guess you could say. Lumps that hurt. Hmmmm.

After making an appointment with my regular doctor, I cancelled that one and opted to go with my OB/GYN. I figured anything in that…area…fell into his jurisdiction.

My appointment was yesterday afternoon, late enough in the day that I had gotten myself worked up into a proper frenzy. Just when I thought I was going to pass out and fall over, my doctor walked in the exam room.

He poked around at the lumps and then asked to see the rash. 0.5 seconds later he uttered those words every woman longs to hear…

“Oh, that’s herpes.”

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The look on my face prompted much hand waving on his part as he quickly asserted, “No, not THAT kind of herpes. Herpes zoster. It’s from chicken pox. You know, shingles.”

Three things….

1. Maybe he should have *started* with “shingles” before throwing the old “herpes” thing out there.

2. I effing have effing shingles.

3. SHINNNNNNNNNNNNGLES.

(The lumps were swollen lymph nodes made angry by all the shingles business — a nice added bonus, I think.)

So off he sent me on my way with a prescription and orders to relax. BECAUSE WE ALL KNOW THAT I AM SO GOOD AT THAT. His theory is that I’m not taking good enough care of myself and that the whole food poisoning/vomiting incident weakened my immune system and the shingles were all, “Dudes, prime hang out spot right here!” He didn’t really say that, but what he said was boring, and I have shingles so I will take artistic license here if I damn well want to.

By the way, the prescription? Is Valtrex. Yes, the same medicine they give you for genital herpes, the same medicine that is advertised on TV all the friggin’ time. So that was fun handing over to my neighborhood pharmacist. The same neighborhood pharmacist who after putting my prescription order into the computer went on her dinner break and forgot to fill it, so I had to go back up to the counter and talk to the pharmacist assistant (who always seems mildly high, which isn’t at ALL disconcerting). He asked me my name and then asked me which prescription it was. In front of the 34,220 people who were also waiting for their prescriptions because it was 5:30pm on a weekday. When I told him, I was sure that people were looking at me judging me. It took everything I am to start waving my arms and say “No, not THAT kind of herpes!”

Before I left, I bought myself a peanut butter cup. I figured it was the least I could do for myself.

JR and I came home from errands this morning to a strange kerfuffle happening in our pantry.

A kerfuffle of the feathery sort.

Yes. There was a BIRD in my HOUSE. A black, winged, gross bird who alternated between perching on the pineapple tucked away in the corner and flapping frantically into our windows with his death beak ready to kill me and my child.

(I have a thing about birds. I love them on pillows and curtains and bags. But they scare the bejeezus out of me in real life.)

Being the wonderfully calm and collected parent that I am, I hollered at JR to get upstairs and go into his room and play with his blocks, so help me God. Then I called my husband. My husband who was nestled all snug in his bird-free office, undoubtedly thinking to himself “Isn’t it awesome how if there were a bird in my house right now, I totally wouldn’t have to deal with it? My life is great!”

So we talked.

“Hi.”

“So there’s a bird in the house.”

“What?”

“A BIRD in the HOUSE. In the pantry.”

“How did it get in there?”

“I have no idea, but what do I do.”

“How big is it? Like a baby bird or a bird like as big as your head?”

“It’s probably half the size of my head, but it’s still bigger than any bird I would like to have in my house.”

“So what you’re saying is that you’d prefer to have no birds in your house?”

“Yes.”

“Well, you’re going to have to open the windows and then swoop it out of there with the broom.

“What.”

“Yeah.”

“Can’t I just open the door and wait for it to find its way out?”

“No, birds are dumb.”

“Ok, here I go. I’ll call you when it’s gone. Or when my eyes have been pecked out.”

“Bye!”

(I wish I were making that conversation up. Oh how I wish I were, that my husband, upon hearing the distress in my voice, would have booked it home to help me deal with our wildlife situation, but alas, no.)

Because I am me, I immediately thought he was wrong about the front door thing, and I opened it up. But I grabbed the broom because I can follow some directions.

And then I just stood there. As the bird kept slamming his dumb head into our pantry windows, down the hall from the open front door.

I moved out on to the porch. With the broom. I stood there some more, hoping a kind passerby would see me and come to my rescue. A few folks did walk by but they didn’t help. Probably because I didn’t say anything to them. Apparently a haggard woman clutching a broom on her front porch doesn’t communicate “Excuse me, kind sir, would you be willing to come inside and help with a bird removal?”

Eventually I went back inside and did my best bird talk.

“Psssst. Bird! Cheep cheep! Tweet! Over here!”

He was unimpressed.

After about 15 minutes of this, I decided one of two things was going to happen 1) the bird was going to get brave and venture out into the rest of my house, forcing me to move away forever or 2) it was going to eventually kill itself slamming its aforementioned dumb head into the glass, and then I’d have to deal with a DEAD bird in my house. Ew.

So I did the only thing that made sense: I wrapped myself up in Ross’s Eagle Scout blanket. Because a knit blanket is impervious to a frightened bird’s beak.

With a deep breath and silent prayer, I went in. Moving faster than I ever thought possible, I got the window open and high-tailed it out of there. A few seconds later, the bird completed one more (and extra dramatic, in my opinion) lap around the pantry before flying out of the window.

And then I spent the next 15 minutes cleaning up the bird shit he left all over the counter, floors, and windows.

Happy Friday, everyone.

This is pretty much how our morning was:

Ross and I leave work at the usual time. Before heading to JR’s daycare to pick him up for the evening, we make a quick stop for gas.

While I sit in the warm car, reading the Twitters, Ross fills up the tank.

(This is one of the best parts of being married to him — he always pumps the gas, no matter what.)

A few minutes later, he get back in the car, I slip my iPhone back into my bag, and I start the car.

Click-click-putter.

Then nothing.

I try again.

Again, nothing.

Ross hops back out to see if maybe the car isn’t starting because he didn’t twist the gas cap on tight enough (which is apparently a thing that happens?).

Encouraged by his calmness, I try the car again.

Annnnnd nothing.

It’s 5:30pm. It’s about 3 degrees outside. Our kid is stuck at daycare and our only car isn’t working. We’re at a gas station located in a parking lot of a grocery store during rush hour when most people are scrambling to pick up those last things they need for dinner. Or, in the case of this particular grocery store, driving around the parking lot like maniacs and kind of being a-holes in general. (It’s the Kroger on Lombardy and Broad, for you Richmonders.)

Without any other options, I put the car in neutral and Ross pushes it into a parking space.

We take a minute to collect ourselves. Then Ross calls his dad and I call JR’s daycare to let them know we are still coming and haven’t abandoned him, we just don’t know how we’re getting there yet (luckily they’re open until 7pm).

Because Ross’s parents are made of unicorns and magic and goodness, they drop everything to come help us.

Once they’re on their way (from the other side of town, during rush hour, mind you), I call the dealership that usually handles our repairs. Luckily I get Nice Guy Joe, as opposed to Dumb Lady Who Couldn’t Work The Phone When I Tried To Schedule Our Annual Inspection Yesterday And Hung Up On Me Twice Before I Gave Up.

See, Joe is great because I can say things like this to him:

“Hi, Joe. This is Valerie Catrow. My car won’t start and I need to get it over to you. I have AAA, but I’ve actually never had a car break down before and I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. So what’s next?”

And because he’s Nice Guy Joe, he chuckles and then tells me what to do.

So I call AAA and arrange for a tow truck to come get the car and take it to the dealership.

(Speaking of, did you know that AAA calls you like every 5 minutes when you’re waiting for a tow truck to give you an ETA? Technology is the tops.)

Just as Ross’s parents show up (in two cars so we could have one to borrow should the repairs take a while, God bless them forever and ever amen), the AAA guy pulls into the parking lot. Ross and his dad stay to deal with the car while his mom and I hightail it over to JR’s daycare to pick him.

When we get to JR’s classroom room, he’s eating yogurt and hanging out with the evening teacher (it is so late his regular teacher has left for the day — talk about mother’s guilt). Apparently being the only kid in the class is SUPER FUN because he wants nothing to do with leaving, what with all the yogurt that must be eaten.

By the time we get home, I have a few messages from friends who have seen some exasperated comments I made on Twitter, offering rides or even CARS if we need them. Luckily we don’t, but it was still lovely to see.

So, how was your evening?