Monday, September 27, 2010

Weekend Woes

All things considered, my weekend was pretty good.
Except for the dead animals in my back yard.
We had some company over on the weekend, and THANK GOD they weren't of the high fuluting variety, they were low faluters (whatever faluting is), which was good, but even still I was kind of mortified when a few minutes after the kids had gone outside to play in our backyard they all came rushing in.
"Your back yard is full of dead animals!"
"What?" I asked, feeling a cold lump forming in the pit of my stomach.
"I just stepped on a dead mouse"!
"Oh God! Just stay inside," I said, herding them in and casting my cat a spiteful glare.
"It's okay," said the oldest, a ten year old boy. "The mouse is gone now."
"What did you do with it?" I asked, another knot forming.
"I picked it up and threw it over the fence into the neighbors yard."
I handed him a bottle of antimicrobial soap and shepherded him to the bathroom. "Wash your hands," I said as I liberally pumped soap into his hands.
The neighbors will hate me, and I can probably count myself out of a fruit cake at christmas, I thought, but I'll have to deal with that later.
I donned a pair of latex gloves, feeling fortified by the sharp snap as I pulled them on. With a garden trowel in hand, I set to work at the grim task or removing small animal carcasses.
I found three mice and three beheaded birds.
It was disgusting.
Never get a cat for a pet.
Just don't.
They look cute and cuddly, but if you've ever felt the squish of a dead mouse give way between your toes, it's really not worth it.

And then I take my darling children to the store to buy Slurpees, the day being uncharacteristically warm.
"Cash or debit?" the cashier asked.
"Cash," I replied, pulling a twenty out of my wallet.
"That's good because our debit isn't working right now."
"That's okay," Payton said. "My mom's debit card isn't working right now anyways."
I shot her a look of silent reprimand.
"It works," I told the cashier. "She just..."
"What?" she asked. "Remember, the bank called and told you not to use it."
"That wasn't..." I said, looking at the cashier plaintively. "That was just because my debit card got used at a store that's been involved in card copying. I got that all straightened out," I said, pleading, my voice slightly desperate.
I was tempted to go over to the ATM and print off a bank statement and shove it in his face to prove my point.
And then I realized that I was defending my financial situation to a sixteen year old boy with greasy hair and a lazy eye. What's the point, I thought with a sigh.
He looked at me, still skeptical.
Although it was hard to tell with lazy eye being so wandery.

And then today, I'm drinking my coffee, and Gage, my oldest calls to me. "I'm turning the coffee off.  You're wasting energy when you leave it on all day. Just leave it off and then if you want another cup later you can microwave it."
I think they must be taking a unit at school about energy conservation.
Thanks, school.
Now I'm drinking cold coffee.
Meanwhile, he's got every light on in the basement, the TV on, the XBox on and the computer on with thirteen unclosed screens.

Anyways. I should be going now.
Have a happy Monday.

6 comments:

Joann Mannix said...

Isn't that funny, how we feel the need to defend ourselves?

Last year, my husband's card got declined while we were eating out on vacation in California. He has one of those fancy, hard to get cards and along with that, your card is handled like an armored car. It gets shut down the second anything suspicious looks like it's going on. And there was something suspicious, something they'd been trying to call us about . . . at our home in florida. And since we were in Ca. well, we didn't get any of the messages. Someone had cloned? seriously. his numbers and had bought 5,000 bucks worth of gift cards at a walmart in mississippi. Once we called his credit card company and found out what was going on and shut down that card and got a new one sent to us, I just had to explain to the waitress, that indeed, we were not maxing out our credit cards. I don't think she believed me.

And don't even get me started on the dead animals. Gift are left on my patio all the time, and yes, most of the time, they're headless.

Lorrie said...

I don't understand why the message on debit has to say 'insufficient funds'...why can't it just tell the cashier 'card error' in a discreet manner instead of 'LOSER ALERT...NO MONEY...TAKE BACK GOODS NOW IF YOU KNOW WHAT'S GOOD FOR YOU'.
They send you your statements in cardboard security envelopes but feel it's okay to tell the employees at 7-11 that you're a little shy that month, haha!

Stephanie said...

What fun stories! I especially liked the one about the debit card...I SO know that feeling. I tried to use my credit card once, without realizing that it had expired and they'd sent me a new one, and then felt SO anxious about the cashier judging me when I used a different card instead.

And you can always count on kids to say exactly what you don't want them to...lol

mom said...

low faluters, the kind bearing wine...beer,...rum....
HIGH Falutin' , the kind with low falutin' freinds sharing.. wine...beer..rum...

randine said...

LOL mom, I think maybe it should be the other way around.

Low Faluters=people that use my Pyrex 4cup measuring cup to drink out of...

Domestic and Damned said...

Dead creatures. Oh dude!
Never had a cat myself, had two dogs growing up, neighbours had cats. Lots of times I would be leaving for school and there would be dead squirrels and birds not just on the neighbour's step but our too. Nice way to protect and provide for "their humans" Eh?