Does it ever end?

Last week damn near didn’t. Amazing. So I spend Saturday morning in the office working on Goodfellows stuff. Not great but worth it. I go home and do some stuff, when all over a sudden the dogs are barking like crazy. Dammit. I go see what’s wrong – a stray is outside in the front yard. Now the dogs are trying to bash through the front door so they can go out there and kill this dog.

Finally restraining them I get outside to see the other dog. Of course, as soon I step away from the door the dogs have jumped up on it. Basic physics follows and wham, the door is closed. And locked by the way. Now this other dog has run off and I’m standing outside in my shoes and shorts. Hmm.

I can’t get in. I try all the doors, no luck. I try the windows. No luck. I try the landlord. Not home. I try our neighbors. Not home. I found the last one out after getting mauled by their dogs. Ugh. Meanwhile Susan is off car shopping with no cell phone and no one else has a key.

I can’t even drive anywhere because my keys and wallet are stuck inside. Ugh. A few hours go by. I’m irritated because I’m not getting work done and this is going to make me late for my boss’s party. Worse, the last thing I needed to do then was sit around with nothing else to do but think about that week.

Looks like I picked the wrong week to stop sniffing glue.

So finally I call my boss from my cell phone (in the truck). I explain the situation (to his wife who answered the phone). She’s graciously repeating my words out loud for all to hear. Laughter. Later Susan gets home (with a new car btw) and I get in. By this point it’s late and I didn’t feel like going anyway.

But I should’ve because we didn’t get out to the other parties until later than planned. The plan was to go to Anita’s and then over to Tom’s. We left late but did make it to Anita’s. Which might as well been a Girl Scout Troop meeting. It was her younger sister’s birthday, so all her friends were over. Anita swears they were all of legal drinking age, but I wanted to see some ID.

So finally we just went home.

Which was good because I had to get up early to finish stuff for Goodfellows. Which I did and went over to pick up the vans. Some weren’t there yet, some Drivers were late and a few were incorrectly marked. One was slashed along the side and another had the driver’s side keyhole drilled out. Nice.

We finally picked up all the Chaperones and the Vans were off. Every Van got to the Marriot on time, thank you very much, and the fun was just beginning. One kid had already moved, one Van needed a Translator and there wasn’t a spot and one kid was in Fuquay when he was supposed to be in Raleigh. Strangely a family member drove him up to the Marriot, which was cool.

The rest of the evening went pretty good. One kid was a brat and had to be taken out early, but on the whole everything was a success. I stood up too much though and thought I was going to break my feet. Ugh. And I had to eat away from everyone else (‘salve quarters’) and didn’t have my own kid, so it wasn’t as much fun as it could’ve been. Would’ve been a good sharing/bonding experience, but I lost that opportunity again earlier that week. Ugh.

So all in all the week sucked but at least it ended on a mostly good note. If nothing else, GF is over and all I have to do now is write a report on that and get the Fuel Drive off to a good start. My plan there is to get my head stuck in one of the log-splitters and get this misery over with quickly!

Clay