May 2018 – Chaotically Controlled

Traveling with Frangers

I have to apologize to the subject of this blog. They are going to be embarrassed, or pissed. I sure hope they will eventually forgive me for telling this story.

Or I’ll be exiled.

I volunteer for a rather large anime convention. For the uninitiated, anime is Japanese animation. No, it is not “cartoons” and they are not all proper viewing for children. For those who still want to doubt me, I invite you to put “Elfin Lied”, “Helsing”, and “Grave of the Fireflies” on your little one’s playlist. Go on. I dare you.

As part of my volunteer duties, I travel to different conventions and talk to anime industry representatives about the latest releases, and what we can do to promote/showcase these releases. A few years ago I was new to the position, and as such I traveled in the shadow of a more seasoned volunteer. Let’s call him Frank. Frank is an expert on most things anime. I mean, ask him the year an anime was released, who the Japanese and American voice actors are, the company that owns the rights – he has all those facts swimming around in his head. Just don’t ask him about Miss Manner’s Rules of Etiquette.

The convention we traveled to is a rather large and popular convention on the West Coast. In a rather large and popular city. Because lodgings cost a ton, and are in short supply, Frank and I were to share a room. Because he is the senior, the room was in his name. So I had to wait for him to show up before I could check in to my room. Lucky for me there was someone else that I know who was attending the event, so I was able to leave my things in their room while I waited. Frank was actually in the city, just staying with friends, so it was not supposed to be long before he was able to get to the hotel and check us in. My friend and I met him for breakfast and he passed me the room key. I waited a few hours, explored the convention a bit before I returned to the hotel to move my things from my friend’s room to mine. When I entered the room I was speechless: he had gotten one king size bed instead of 2 queen beds. So I called him and asked what he was thinking. “Oh, I didn’t realize, I’ll have it changed when I get back.” Still didn’t put my name on the room, so of course I can’t do it. Remember what I said about rooms being in short supply? By the time he gets back there are no rooms available to switch to.

He shrugs apologetically and says he will sleep on the floor. Of course he is, because *I* am not.

Next morning we get up and get ready for the official first day of con. Frank has appointments to keep, I do not. I take my leave and find coffee, breakfast, and a view. An hour and a half later I come back to the room and Frank has left. Mission accomplished, because all of you know that a man and a woman cannot get dressed at the same time unless there are multiple bathrooms – especially if that man and woman are not romantically involved. I pull out my clothes, grab my toiletries and head to the bathroom… where I promptly lost my footing and almost slammed my head in to the beautiful marble flooring. I look around and the ENTIRE BATHROOM FLOOR is SOAKED! So I back out, find my slippers and carefully enter again. The bathroom mat, the one that goes on the floor in front of the tub so you DON’T bust your ass on the floor? Still hanging over the tub. And soaked all the way through. Oh but the tub…

Imagine you have a puppy. You take that puppy outside after a heavy rainfall. S/he is all over the yard, swimming in mud, digging holes, the works. Then take that puppy and drop them in a tub ¾ full of water and clean them until their fur sparkles. Take puppy out, then drain tub. Don’t rinse the tub, don’t swirl the water so the dirt drains out. Just pull the plug and walk away. Now think about what that tub looks like.

THAT IS WHAT THE TUB LOOKED LIKE. I declined a bath/shower that morning. I did a spot clean, got dressed and headed to the convention. That evening I came back, walked in to the room and almost gagged.

Frank had turned the HVAC to 80 degrees. In July, on the West Coast! Not only was the room sweltering but it STANK. Like rotting food in the kitchen garbage smell. I turned the thermostat down to 65 degrees, but I could not locate the source of the odor. Lucky for me the cool air helped to eliminate the smell.

This was my life for 5 days.

On the fifth day we are packing up to leave. I generally carry an empty luggage or bag with me in case there is swag and I can’t fit it in my suitcase. I did not need it this trip and was about to pack it away when Frank asks me if he can borrow it. It is a unique bag. It cannot be replaced. I do not want to let it out of my sight. I impressed upon him that this is my favorite bag. Please give it back to me in one piece. He all but pinky swears that he will. I relinquish the bag and continue packing. Frank then picks up a plastic grocery bag and says “I guess I don’t need these anymore.”

Now, I am a nosy broad. I asked him what was in it. He says they are some Japanese snacks that he was given just before he checked in to the hotel. I’m thinking Pocky, some ginger candies, maybe even those green tea KitKats I love so much. Frank tells me to check it out. I reach my hand in the bag…

…and immediately yank it out again, full of some oily substance that absolutely REEKS. I open the bag wide so I look in it. There are packets, about the size and shape of a gas station size box of condoms for well-endowed men. Inside these packets are fish, in oil. One of these packets was OPEN and leaking EVERYWHERE. Thus solving the mystery of the obnoxious smell. I was so happy that trip was over; I almost kissed the floor of my house when I got there.

A month later I get my favorite bag back. With a hole in it.

Never traveling with Frank again.

Wake me up, before you go-go

I promised to tell this story, so here it is.

After having gone to bed at some unreasonable hour the night before, the alarms go off at 5 am. 2 of them: one in the parents’ bedroom, one in the tweenager’s room, where the Tasmanian devil decided to sleep as well. 2 alarms, 4 people, only I get up. Alright fine.

“Babe, wake up.”

“Make me.”

“Get the hayell, up! Don’t make me go grab the water.” (He loathes being sprayed with water. I sometimes wonder how closely he is related to cats.)

“No.”

Now at this point I figure he is just messing with me, because he does like to see how angry I can get. Because he is coherent enough to argue with me, I figure he is going to get up. On to the girls.

“Tweenager!”

“Yes Mommy”

“Time to get up baby.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Alright everyone has been told to get up. I go get McFurrybutt out of the cage and outside. I give her some water, some food. I get the day’s wardrobe together. I have not heard one foot hit the floor yet. I do not want to go back up the stairs, so I pick up the phone instead.

“Hello”

“Get out of bed, we need to go, I don’t want to be late.”

“Yes ma’am”

My other half does not ever have his phone where he can conveniently reach it. And if by some miracle he did, he would not answer it anyway.

I go on about my business, picked out clothes for Taz, got dressed, used the bathroom. Packed my lunch. 15 minutes later, still no footsteps. Now I am furious mainly because I am going to have to climb the stairs again. I am stomping around the kitchen doing my best impression of Mrs. Cosby: (muttering) “These people want to drive me crazy, why can’t they just get up on time, now I gotta go BACK up them stairs and…” (record scratch) Hold up!!! Oh no I don’t have to go upstairs!!!!

Let me interject a mini story here, just for background:

A few years ago, I lived in this same house with 6 other people. I did all the cooking. They preferred my cooking to theirs, I was happy to oblige. This is a 3 level home, and have I mentioned how I hate stairs? If I didn’t notify every one that dinner was done, someone would pout and say they didn’t get enough food. But I was not going up and down stairs. And then my housemate found a solution for me. Have you ever heard a ship’s bell? The one that rings the hour so the crewmen know it’s time to change shift? Yeah, one of those.

Mind you, I had only rung this bell during the evening when the house had plenty of other noises to compete with it – TV, radios, conversations, etc.

This morning, there was none of that. Even McFurrybutt had forgone her normal “I’m pissed you put me in here” bark. It was dead silent. I carefully picked up the bell, making sure to hold my hand around the clapper. Stood at the bottom of the stairs and then:

“clangclangclang clangclangclang clangclangclang clangclangclang clangclangclang clangclangclang clangclangclang clangclangclang clangclangclang clangclangclang clangclangclang clangclangclang clangclangclang clangclangclang

I need everyone to the get the FUCK out of bed RIGHT THE FUCK NOW!!!!!”

THUD

Three people fell out of bed almost simultaneously.

“Yes Ma’am!”

That night, all three of them were pissed at me. I couldn’t breathe I was laughing so hard.

“Just another Manic Monday…”

Mondays, who needs them, right? Of course if we didn’t have Monday then by default Tuesday would the scourge of the week. If we could just find a way for the first day of the work week not to suck then there would be unicorns and cotton candy and all would be right with the world, right?

And then the alarm goes off. 5 am, time to rally the troops. The tweenager, the toddler and the man. All three leave me with the impression that I will have to repeat the great cowbell incident of 2018. (I’ll share that story with you all another time.) I head down the stairs to tend to Puppy McFurrybutt and get today’s fashion ensemble out of the dryer. Head back upstairs. Maaaaaan this family must love punishment because not one of these jokers are out of bed yet. I make the rounds again, this time sounding less like Mary Poppins and more like Freddy. Back downstairs I go, to pull the toddler’s clothes out and get dressed myself. 15 min later and I still do not hear footsteps. I yell for the tweenager to get the toddler and get both butts downstairs now before there are CONSEQUENCES. They comply. In the meantime, McFurrybutt has waited until I have put on my mostly white ensemble to drop THE MOTHERLOAD in her cage. Loverly. Cage and dog go outside and are subjected to the hose. I am late for work now, and kids are doing their best impression of pure molasses going up a Canadian hill in January. And the man has yet to make an appearance.

Back upstairs I go. This man is cocooned inside the comforter sounding like a forest full of lumberjacks. “Hey, I assume this means you are not going to work today?” The response is a grunt that sounded like it was distantly related to the word No. Ok, I’m gone.

I pile the girls in the car. We head out of the subdivision. And then I realize I am wearing flip flips to a business casual workplace. I turn around, and tweenager runs in the house to get more appropriate foot attire for me.

This really should be the end of my story, but that bastard Murphy was bored this morning.

Dropping of the toddler at daycare was uneventful. I take tweenager to the before school program, and we are stopped at the door. Apparently she has an overdue balance and they will not let her stay. Tweenager’s dad is supposed to handle this, and he did not. Nor did he give me a heads up. And he will not answer his phone. I am standing there, late for work, with no recourse. And they do not take plastic. Now I am fuming. They do take cash. Of course I don’t have the full balance on me, but they will take what I have, and let her stay.

That was 15 min of my life that I will never get back. But I still have to get to work. So, hop in the car, move on down the road. I stop at the local Gas ‘n’ Snacks spot, get some iced coffee, and start to head on my way. Then I was flagged down. Through some improvised sign language I was told that my tire was going flat. Grateful that I was not on the expressway, I moved the car to the air pump and attempted to pump some air in the tire. Notice the word “attempted”. Tire won’t inflate. I think I heard Loki give Murphy a high five (bastards). I call the man, who tells me to call AAA. Yeah, that will take forever. Let’s see if I can get someone to change the tire for me. Nope, everyone is too busy being lazy to help. No, that is not fair, there were a few who were on their way to work too. So eff it, I’ll change my own tire (in the mostly white ensemble that I was dressed in for work). I take picture of the flat tire, text my boss the picture and an explanation of why I will be late, and get down to business.

So there I was, moving the mound of uselessness that always clutters my trunk to get to the spare tire. And then I had a Della Reese moment.* There is a young man walking toward me with a smile that would make the Cheshire cat retire. First words out of his mouth were “I saw you coming out of the store and I like your shape.” Internally I said “NOPE!” However what came out of my mouth was “Oh, ok.” as I go back to attempting to get the tire out of the car.

Him: “Do you have a flat tire?”

Me: “Nope, I was thinking this is a great place to put up a tire swing.” (Here’s your sign.)

Him: “Would you like some help with that?”

Me: “That would be fantastic!”

You know how things you need often come with a catch? I spent 30 minutes listening to him tell me how to change a tire, and how long I can ride on the donut, and all other manner of mansplaining. Meantime he spent 3 minutes tightening the nut on the car before I was able to control my laughter long enough to tell him he had to turn it counter clockwise if he wanted to get the tire off. And that since I have a VW, he needed this adapter that I am holding in my hand to take off the 5^th nut. Dear Gods…

Tire changed, tools put away, and I want to tip him for helping me. But no, he is back to his original scheme – Operation Get Them Digits.

First I played one of my favorite games: Place That Accent. And I was spot on in guessing he is from Nigeria. Then I told him it’s not gonna happen. With a mix of confusion and indignation he asks me why. I hold up my left hand. To his credit, he moved along without the normal “But I bet he can’t do it like me” nonsense that young men seem to think is a valid argument.

I’m back on my way, and I call the boss to tell him I’m back on the road. He is completely confused. And I am tired and on a short fuse. I am wondering if this is going to be a lecture that I am going to have to (im)politely correct him about. But before I acted ridiculous I checked my phone and realized my mistake. Apparently I did not send the text to him, I sent it to a landline number. I get the feeling that he wanted to chew my head off before he realized what happened. He told me to go home and work remotely for the day. And the man is going to handle replacing the tire.

I think I just need to add some special creamer to this coffee and call it a day. Roughest 4 hours I’ve had in a while.

*(For those who are unfamiliar, Della drove a delivery trunk before she became the phenomenal actress she was. She said she was a much less “wonderful” woman back then, and the big trays of bread were really too heavy for her to move by herself. So she would reach in the truck – bend over – and make a show of trying to lift he tray. The sight of her perfectly round bottom would make many men “spring” into action and thus kept her from having to do all that heavy lifting.)

Adventures in Zoo-sitting

“…I don’t like pigs. I mean, I like bacon, and pork chops, and the occasional ham. But I am not a fan of the live squealing version, and definitely not up close and personal. “

Spring break 2018 I was hoodwinked into sitting for a snake, 2 cats, 2 dogs, and 2 pigs. Nope, you don’t have to reread that. I said PIGS. Let me first advise all of you that I don’t like pigs. I mean, I like bacon, and pork chops, and the occasional ham. But I am not a fan of the live squealing version, and definitely not up close and personal. But my best friend batted her baby blues at me and said “Please?” so what else could I do? While her and her teenagers head off to Disney for the week I was on Zoo duty. And like any good caretaker, I made sure she was aware of how her wild kingdom was holding up in her absence. What follows is excerpts from our texts during that week.

Battle of the Bulge

“…I don’t give a flying fart in a windstorm if anyone has a problem with my skulls and roses skater dress with a chest window. Because I feel like a goddess in it”

Today a friend of mine and I were joking that he could not stand up on a transit bus. It would be his luck that he would lose his balance, fall and he would crush someone. It would be some little old lady whose family would sue him for wrongful death. For clarification, Tuck (my friend) is 6’8” and built like a tank. A solid muscle tank. But the doctors want to tell him he is overweight. He commented that whoever made up the height/weight chart must have been tripping the light fantastic to which I agreed. We started comparing stories of how we never fit in to that chart, even as children. Which led us down the rabbit hole of what size we were when we were growing up as compared to now.

I started life as a stick figure. I could LITERALLY hide behind a telephone pole. Then the tweenage years hit and it was like my body changed overnight. Suddenly there were hips, glutes, cleavage. My angles turned in to curves, and I could no longer wear clothes built for stick figures. Unfortunately that was all the fashion during those years (egads what I would give to have had the Curvy Girls movement back then) so everything bought for me looked like I needed baby oil and fishing line to get them on. Imagine a girl going through puberty, already a misfit, with body changes that she doesn’t understand nor appreciate.

My step brothers constantly called me “Fat Boy”; they would not use my given name for anything. One evening after having had absolutely e-fucking-nough of the name calling (having heard that awful moniker 10 times in just as many minutes) I told everyone in the room that that is not my name and I would appreciate it if they would knock it off. The whole family laughed.

Sometime after that it was time for back to school shopping, which included clothing of course. After a frustrating afternoon of trying on clothes that would not fit properly and having to settle on the few pieces that did, my mom announced “See that is what happens when you let yourself get too big.” WHAT?! I was a freshman in high school wearing a size 8. What the actual FUCK was she talking about?! And my ego took a hit, because if my mother says I’m fat, then I must be, right?

I look back on all of that and I see the amount of damage I’ve had to repair, and am still repairing. And thank the GODS for stores that make trendy clothes for curvy girls. I finally found a style that I feel gorgeous in. More importantly, I don’t give a flying fart in a windstorm if anyone has a problem with my skulls and roses skater dress with a chest window. Because I feel like a goddess in it, and that is all that matters. Some days I wish I was more than a few pounds lighter, but most days I know that I look dayum good after 3 kids and years of stress eating. It also helps that I have surrounded myself with friends who have much praise for me, but are not afraid to tell me when I have lost what little mind I have left.

Tuck says my family was just jealous of who I was becoming and that is how they expressed it. Maybe they were, maybe they weren’t. I know that I am super proud of who I am today.

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Mom Is Crazy

“I don’t hide my illness from them; I just don’t let it be the centerpiece of our lives.”

Kids will say that, but my boy really means it. He reminds himself. He tries to warn his sisters, with differing degrees of success.

I gave my firstborn life when I was 19 years old. I was a freshman in college, and I was living with his father. His father and I are friends now, we can talk without getting local LEOs involved, but back then… whoo boi. Some folks say oil and water, we were more like water and potassium. Part of my decline into madness were the insults he would hurl at me (don’t jump him, I threw out my fair share too) when we fought. He was – in my mind – the authority on all things me (having usurped the reigning queen – aka Mom), and if he said it then it must be true. Neither of us realized at the time just how mentally destructive we were for me, we just accepted that couples fight and we would get over it or move past it.

And Boy had a front row seat. I am certainly not advocating this as a good environment to raise children, but because of it my special child was/is able to see approaching meltdowns from far away and initiate evasive maneuvers. Post diagnosis I developed the tools to see it coming myself, and I hide myself from the children while I properly address it.

One afternoon my (then) husband and I took Boy to Olive Garden for early dinner. We sat down and I immediately start digging around in my purse but I cannot find my medications. I’m getting increasingly agitated at the fact that they are not there.

If you have ever eaten at Olive Garden in the early 2000s, you know that the chairs had wheels. I don’t know who thought of that clever idea, but there you have it. My (then) husband was sitting across the table from me, and Boy is sitting next to me. On the other side of Boy is a wall.

My son looks at me and says, “Mom, why do you need those pills right now?” With a perfectly straight face I turned to him and said “They keep me from going RAWR all over you.” Just as I roared I took a pseudo leap at him. He must have forgotten he was next to a wall because he launched his chair – and himself – right into it. He looked at me with eyes bright and round as silver dollars. I folded him into my arms and hugged him, he laughed and play punched me in the arm “That’s not funny Mom.”

That is how I minimize it; how we have fun with it. Yes it is a serious issue. But it is not a death sentence. And it’s hereditary, so one of them could be the next victim. And that is why we maximize the upswings. We hang out in book stores, explore “antique” shops, tell jokes, and take turns frightening each other. I don’t hide my illness from them; I just don’t let it be the centerpiece of our lives.

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Adventures in Motherhood

I tend to think that I am good mom. I’ve been doing this for <mumble> years, I should be an expert right? My kids are well behaved in public; they are clean, healthy, well adjusted. I got this! And then the evil gods of chaos chuckle and say “That’s what you think!”

It’s Saturday, I have the 2 youngest with me, and my adopted sister. The baby is sitting in the grade-schooler’s lap and they are on the hardwood floor watching TV. I hear a *thunk* followed by a wail. You guessed it; the baby face-planted the floor. I gather her up and give her hugs and squeezes and kisses and make her feel better. I am carrying her on my hip when I realize that dinner is going to burn if I don’t yank it out of the oven RIGHT NOW.

So superwoman (aka: me) rushes to the kitchen grabs a pot holder and single-handedly saves dinner. Literally I pulled dinner out of the oven with one hand, because the other was anchoring my baby to my left hip. Which she reminded me of by letting out a high pitched squeal. Ladies and gentleman the hapless hero saved dinner and BURNED the baby’s foot all in one fell swoop!

Apparently the pan got too close to my left side and the grazed the top of her foot, leaving a ¾ inch welt on the top of her foot. OMYGODWHATHAVEIDONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So I drop the pan on the stove, race to the freezer to get a piece of ice. Let me pause here to say that my icemaker doesn’t so much dispense ice cubes; it prefers to deliver 1 giant ice BLOCK. I frantically pound on the block and finally get a few chips. I close the freezer, sit the baby on the counter so I can easily reach her foot and *splash*. The 24 oz. cup of red colored Kool-Aid that I had poured and then forgotten had the misfortune of being in the space now needed to administer first aid to the baby. So now my attention is split between putting ice on the baby’s foot and trying to keep the advancing red army of destruction from redecorating everything on my kitchen counter (which includes the baby.) Lucky for me, reinforcements arrived in the form of my adopted sister who stemmed the red tide while I stemmed the baby tears.

Now the baby is quiet, but every time she flexes her foot she whines. My other half is at work and has the car, so I called a friend to see if she could run to the store for me to get aloe. Of course she is not home – the gods of chaos gave her the desire to be out having fun this evening. (How dare they!) I KNOW I have aloe somewhere in this house. This is not the first time I needed aloe for some kind of burn, there has to be aloe in this house, right? Chaos gods chuckled while giving each other conspiratorial winks. Of course I couldn’t find it.

Being a paid troubleshooter I rethought my end goal. I want her to not have pain, right? Infant Tylenol! That is a pain reducer. But I have to call a doctor to find out how much to give her. Right, nurse hotline it is. Side note: “Hotline” is a misnomer. They do not a thing quickly. The one I have with my insurance is staffed by old retired nurses who would lose a race to a snail. So I call the number and someone takes my information and says that a nurse would call me back within in 60 minutes. Really… I mean, seriously. So, tick tock tick tock. You know that feeling you get when you place a pizza delivery order and they say 60 minutes but it turns out to be 25? Yeah, no. 59 minutes and 30 seconds and then my phone rings. I won’t torture you with the details of that conversation. But I will say this: people who know me know that I don’t like to repeat myself. I repeated the same information 3 times in a 10 minute conversation. In the end I got the dosage amount. I take the little plunger and measure out exactly what I needed. I pick up the baby, lean her head back and slowly, drop by drop, squeeze the medicine into her mouth. Halfway through this process she decides to do some redecorating of her own. And now I am covered in regurgitated Gerber’s. I think the chaos gods had a belly laugh at that moment.

But, they forgot that I have a wonderful daughter who volunteered to get in the bath with baby while I clean up the floor and myself. 1 hour and 2 clean children later, I am limp on the couch with the baby sleeping on my chest, and that is when my other half saunters in with the Aloe. He leans in for a kiss, I shove the baby into his arms.

Not today Chaos!!!!!