Lord, Won’t You Buy Me a Four-Wheel Drive?

Photo source

About three weeks before the first big snowfall, a wholly terrifying CLUNKCLUNKCLUNK began thunderously beating from my front axle. I pulled into the nearest parking lot (coincidentally, my favorite coffee shop) and called Mr. Wright, sobbing hysterically. He agreed to meet me, but wouldn’t arrive for about two hours.

I enjoyed a soy mocha while chatting with my barista pal, who was actually happy my car was kaput, because she hadn’t seen me in months due to some silly determination on my part not to spend a quarter of the family grocery budget on caffeinated beverages with enough calories to solve the world hunger problem.

Three mochas and ten bathroom breaks later, Mr. Wright arrived to rescue me. Or, at least, give me a ride. If he could fix or diagnose the car, I’d take it as a bonus. Plus, I was out of cash, and as spun out as a washer full of pantyhose. Mr. Wright started the car, threw it into reverse, backed up to the rhythm of CLUNKCLUNKCLUNK, and pulled back into the parking space.

“It’s making a lot of noise,” he said.

“Really? I didn’t hear a thing. Actually, how did you know I was here? Did you hear my synapses buzzing, from the caffeine?” I countered. “Of course it’s making a lot of noise! That’s why I called you.”

My husband gave an indignant sniff, then bent down and looked under the rig. I always sort of laugh when he does that. The thing is, he has no idea what he’s looking for—like when I walk into the laundry room and push a couple buttons or turn a dial on the washer or dryer. I don’t really know what I’m doing, but figure if I tinker around until the thing starts, the clothes might get clean. Or dry.

Mr. Wright walked around the car, peered under the other side, rubbed his chin and said, “Well, you got me.”

“Yeah, I know. And sometimes, I wish I’d accepted Mr. Goodwrench’s proposal. Then I’d have him, right now.”

He got back in the car, started it, and asked, “Why are you driving around in four-wheel drive?” I heard a soft click, and Mr. Wright backed the car up—with absolutely no sound but the tire rubber on pavement.

“That’s amazing!” I cried, and showered my husband with the appropriate number of “it’s so sexy when you fix things” remarks. The problem, he explained, must have been something wonky in the hub, making noise when the four-wheel drive was engaged.

When the Snowpacolypse hit, the only operational function on my big, heavy rig was rear-wheel drive, due to a crazy-high estimate from the mechanic and a crazy-low balance in the checking account. Why can’t those of us who need snow tires and chains every year file our taxes a few months early, to get those returns in time for winter vehicle maintenance? I’m going to write a letter to my Congressman.

There were a few scary slips, one embarrassing failure to get up my own driveway, and one miracle. Oh, yes—there was a miracle.

Mr. Wright had to drive me to Target to get a pair of snow boots for Curlytop because they were on a fabulous sale, and I was too chicken to drive. As we exited the parking lot, we saw a small car high-centered on the berm between lanes on the avenue. “I have a tow strap,” said Mr. Wright. “Let’s pull them out.”

“Are you crazy? Our four-wheel drive doesn’t work! We’ll get ourselves stuck, trying to pull them out, and you’ll cause an accident and we’ll die, making it impossible for me to punish you for weeks over insisting on such a stupid idea. No way!”

After the tow strap was hooked to both vehicles, Mr. Wright flipped the dial to four-wheel drive and started to pull. The CLUNKCLUNKCLUNK returned. The small car stayed high-centered, and the front of our rig was sliding on the ice, threatening to enter the next lane of traffic. Mr. Wright pressed down the accelerator, and the small car dismounted the berm.

The car’s driver and passengers gave hearty thanks to Mr. Wright, and we drove away. In four-wheel drive. Without a single clunk. The force of tugging the small car off the berm forced the hub to lock in.

Guess how many “it’s so sexy when you fix things” that cost me.

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Car, Pay Diem

Photo credit

“It rattles, shakes and knocks,” I said to my brother, Bubba. “I’m almost afraid to drive it.”

“So, it runs like a car with 280,000 miles on it?”

“No. We refer to 280,000 miles as ‘the good old days,’” I sighed.

Big Green came to us about seven years ago. She had more miles on her than we’d like, but she started, she ran, and she accommodated enough cabooses for our giant clan. Considering I’d just rolled our family van in a three-flip horror, Big Green was in considerably better shape than our other car.

Now, she shimmies and clangs like a two-ton belly dancer. The dash lights went out a couple years ago, and because Mr. Wright deemed removing the dashboard to fix the bulb too problematic, I now use a flashlight propped on top of the steering column to check the speedometer. The back window doesn’t properly close anymore, so we have a rag stuffed into the latching mechanism to keep the interior light from staying on – or would, if the interior light worked.

A family of four could be fed from the scraps and crumbs of French fries, potato chips, dry cereal and assorted other snack foods wedged into the cracks and between the seats. We could probably create a small island with the mud caked on the headlights – which, by the way, we can’t wash because we have a low beam out, and the dirt is masking the fact that we’re driving around with our brights on all the time.

Vehicle maintenance is not a gift the Gonzos possess.

Big Green is getting on in years. She has a ton of miles on her, and she’s held together mostly by prayer. She doesn’t look as great as she used to. In fact, I’m pretty sure I’m responsible for the big scratch on the rear panel. I just haven’t confessed to Mr. Wright yet that I backed into the fence around the pool. He was pretty upset at the thought of a stranger doing the damage in a parking lot, so I’m not sure how he’d react to his beloved bride proving to be the culprit.

Like Big Green, I’m getting older. I’d like to say I’m aging gracefully, but really, I’m just aging. My odometer keeps ticking, and some days I, too, am held together by stubbornness and prayer. The mirror reports I don’t look as great as I did ten years ago – though Mr. Wright swears I look better.

As beat-up and sad as our old rig is, Mr. Wright isn’t making plans for trading her in. He has this funny idea about getting a full lifetime out of things. Thankfully, he feels the same way about marriage. I’d hate to see him driving around in a new, sporty convertible. Know what I mean?

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A Bit Rash, Don't You Think?

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If you’re a longtime reader of The Gonzo Mama, you know I’m cursed with the most sensitive skin on the planet. You also know Mr. Wright is a bit—um—“frugal.” Throw those two circumstances into a shaker, add ice, and you have the makings for a Marital Murder Martini, straight up. All you need to do is toss it into the spin cycle.

As I may have mentioned, we’re moving. The home we’re moving into was previously set up as a vacation rental—it has four bedrooms, a pool, and a hot tub. Who wouldn’t want to vacation in such a haven? Well, us. We want to live in it, all the time. The owners are out-of-state. What that means for us is, in addition to moving all our things in, we also have to move all the previous instruments of comfort and convenience out.

Mr. Wright found some powdered detergent in a decorative glass jar in the laundry room. Obviously, the mystery powder couldn’t just be thrown out! After all, it was FREE, and in Mr. Wright’s world, that’s an acronym for Found, Ready, Easy and Economical. So, he washed a load of towels. He washed a couple loads of the kids’ clothes; a load of his clothes; and a load of my clothes, including my favorite boy-cut chonies, yoga pants, t-shirts and socks. Essentially, my loving launderer ensured that every particle of fabric coming into contact with my skin this week was clean—and toxic.

At first, I thought it was my new after-shower moisturizer. I’ve launched a new in-home party business (“I sell bath, beauty, and bedroom accessories. And by 'bedroom accessories,' I don't mean nightstand lamps.”), and my favorite product is to be sprayed over the entire body after showering and rubbed in, for all-day hydration of the skin. There I was, faithfully spraying and rubbing every day, even as the bumps began to appear. I checked the label, carefully reading the ingredients, and didn’t see any obvious triggers, but I stopped my daily ritual, just in case.

The moisturizing, I mean, not the showering.

A couple days later, my skin had morphed into dry, scaly patches. “No wonder,” I thought. “I haven’t been moisturizing!” I dug some sensitive-skin lotion out of a yet-unpacked box and greased myself up, the way Mom used to slap butter onto sheets of cinnamon roll dough before rolling them up in her old bakery. It wasn’t my sweet-scented, pheromone-laced favorite, but surely the lotion would lock in some moisture.

By the end of the day, the hives began populating. Around the same time, Snugglebug shed her clothes, complaining, “Mommy, I hurt. And my tummy has red dye on it.” Snugglebug and her sister, Curlytop, are both allergic to Red 40, a common food additive, and they’ve been trained to spot suspect products. “No, thank you; that has red dye,” is a common refrain.

Poor Snugglebug’s belly was covered in raised red patches, rivaling her mama’s. Indeed, it looked as if she’d been sprinkled with red dye. She may be adopted, but there’s no doubt she’s mine. My little four-year-old hadn’t yet discovered the miracle of after-shower moisturizers, so I was left scratching my head—and every other imaginable body part.

I’ll spare you the details.

It was a few long, itchy hours before Mr. Wright got home. He walked in the door, wrapped his arms around me, and drew me in for what would have been a passionate hug, had I not screamed, "Don’t TOUCH meeeeee!” It was a fiery, burning embrace, and not in a good way. Every cell of my skin was ablaze—and angry. Taken aback, and deprived of his wife’s back, Mr. Wright retreated to the room I most love to see him in: the laundry room.

I tried to muster an apology as he sorted clothes into the washing machine. Then, I watched as he dipped a measuring cup into an unmarked glass jar, scooped out some powder, and loaded it into the washer’s detergent cup. “What brand is that?” I asked. Mr. Wright shrugged. “I don’t know,” he said. “Why do you ask?”

“No reason.” I shed my clothes—an act which usually inspires a favorable response from my husband. This time, his reaction bordered on disgust.

“Yuck,” he managed. “Have you been moisturizing properly?”


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You Know You're a Great Role Model When...

I've been trying to get across to the members of my family that Curlytop and Snugglebug are like over-sized camcorders these days. Anything we say or do is likely to be played back for us by one of our little cinematographers - most likely at the most humiliating or improper moment.

So far, this has included choice phrases uttered by adults and teens in the household (not terribly appropriate for either set, and definitely inappropriate coming out of the mouth of a kindergarten student). Sometimes, it includes an interesting pose or gesture.

Sometimes, it includes both.

Yesterday, Snugglebug walked up behind Curlytop, grabbed her sister's posterior and declared, "Ooooh... that's NICE!"

Pepper and I stared at Snuggle in disbelief, then looked at each other. "Did she just do what I think she did?" Pepper asked. I nodded. "Where did she learn THAT?" Pepper wondered aloud as I explained to Snugglebug we don't do that and it's not okay and her sister's bottom is her sister's bottom, and we don't touch it.

I knew the answer, of course, but Pepper confirmed it when her father came home, entered the kitchen, kissed my cheek and copped a squeeze. "Ooooh... that's NICE!" he announced to everyone within earshot and a decent line of vision.

Then, he scooped up the four-year old attached to my leg.

Where did she learn that, indeed?

Delta Blues

Nothing satisfies me more than things working out splendidly after they go horribly wrong. Take our recent flight to Baltimore, for example.

Mr. Wright accidentally booked me on a flight precisely 24 hours before his. When he realized his mistake, he tried to rebook through Delta’s call center. We figured if the cost of changing was lower than putting me up in a discount hotel for a night, we’d do it. Sadly, it was not to be so. Mr. Wright loaded my carry-on into the car and set off on what would be the first of two trips to the airport for him.

In the car, I used my netbook to check in online and was virtually assaulted with Delta’s invitations to try “mobile ticketing,” which promised to save all sorts of time at the airport by sending my boarding pass to my smartphone. Always a fan of better living through technology, I decided to try it.

We arrived at the airport early, in spite of my attempts to postpone our arrival with requests for Starbucks stops and just as many for potty stops. Unfamiliar and ill-at-ease with the experience of arriving early for a flight, I decided to burn the calories I’d normally expend racing to my gate in a different manner; I made out with my husband in the backseat of our car.

It was still an hour before my flight when we approached the Delta counter and tried one more time to rebook. Sometimes, those counter people are sympathetic and let you rebook for fifty dollars if you, say, forget your asthma inhaler and have to go home to get it, which is the angle we took. No luck.

“Lemme use your computer. I need to book your room in Baltimore.” Have I mentioned Mr. Wright’s thriftiness? He wasn’t about to give up before he found the absolute, none-lower, rock-bottom, cheapest room. “I’ll give up the limo if you don’t send me to some rat-infested alley motel,” I begged. “And my flight boards in thirty minutes. Hurry up.”

But Mr. Wright did not hurry. That’s how, fifteen minutes before my flight boarded, I found myself as the only person in the security line, and without my sunglasses, which I’d taken off my head in the car before hopping into the backseat.

I can't live without them.

I can’t live without my sunglasses. My eyes are very sensitive to light. Sure, it was the middle of the night, but it would be daylight when I landed, and then what would I do? Mr. Wright hadn’t made good on the envelope of cash to go shopping, and how could I even find a sunglasses store when I’d be blinded by the sun’s harsh glare?

Mr. Wright made record time retrieving them. I had five minutes until my flight boarded, which meant fifteen until they locked the door. I was still the only one in the security line. I could make it. I kissed Mr. Wright and trotted up to the TSA agent and showed him my mobile boarding pass.

Delta failed to mention their mobile ticketing image may not be properly sized on some devices. The image Delta sent me was refused by TSA! I was sent to the Delta counter for paper tickets.

I ran – in my socks (I’d removed my shoes for security) – to Delta, skidding to a halt when I saw not a soul was there. It was two minutes until my flight boarded. I called out and waited for someone to help me, but no one came.

I raced down the escalator to Delta’s baggage claim area, where hoards of people waited in the “lost baggage” office – a ringing endorsement of Delta’s service, to be sure. “TSA won’t take my mobile ticketing, my flight is boarding, I don’t have paper tickets, no one is at the counter upstairs, and I need help!” I cried over the complaints.

One of the women behind the counter glanced at the clock and said, “Yeah. You’re not going to get on. Go sit out there on the baggage carousel and wait for someone.”

Well, I called Mr. Wright and cried and made him come back to yell at those Delta ladies until they rebooked me – without a fee – on his flight. Then, he called Delta’s national customer service and yelled at those people until they gave me 2500 frequent flier miles. After all, it was Delta’s bad mobile ticketing image that made me miss my flight, right? Finally, he was able to cancel the reservation for the Baltimore hotel room, saving enough money to buy me a sandwich.

The moral of the story, of course, is:

Don’t make out with your husband in the airport parking lot if he is thrifty and you have sensitive eyes and you’re trusting Delta’s technology.

Photo source

Running on Empty

“I left you enough to get to the gas station.”

Is yours a two-car family? Do you, like me, have a spouse who runs one car nearly out of gas, then takes the other vehicle with the full tank, leaving you stranded? I’m just asking.

Mr. Wright considers himself thrifty when it comes to paying for petrol. So thrifty, in fact, he’ll drive 30 miles out of his way to save a nickel per gallon. He’s also a firm believer in not filling the tank until the gauge hangs a quarter-inch below empty – as if squeezing an additional 50 miles out of the low-fuel light entitles him to a certain amount of smugness.

About that 50 miles—it’s actually more like 43.2. At least, that’s what the trip odometer said as I chugged to a stop in front of the gas pump on my way to work a shift at the local library. “Thank You, Lord!” I sang, then added under my breath, “And curse you, Mr. Wright!”

I called him while the gas was pumping, ignoring the helpful gentleman who scowled at me and pointed to the sign that warned of the dangers associated with using a cell phone near the pump. “You said 50 miles! I totally ran out of gas!”

“Where are you?” Mr. Wright asked.

“At the gas station.”

“You got a ride to the gas station?”

“No. I ran out of gas at the gas station.”

Mr. Wright issued a loud guffaw. “That’s not running out of gas! That’s almost running out of gas. See? I told you you’d have enough!”

Sometimes, that 50 miles past “low fuel” is actually only 40.4, like the other day. I had to run errands and pick up kids. I even attempted to purchase gasoline, but Mr. Wright had relieved me of my debit card without my knowledge. Panicking, I calculated the miles home and back to town. Since we live 15 miles from the nearest gas station, I’d planned on filling the tank before I left town. Sadly, that was no longer an option.

“Ten miles home, plus 15 to town,” I mused. “It’ll be close, but I know now we can eke out 43 miles after the low-fuel light comes on.”

When Mr. Wright ran out of gas about two miles from town with a vehicle packed with children, I responded appropriately. “Really? I was positive it would go 50, Sweetheart!”

I wish I could say it’s the economy, and he’s being frugal, but the warning bells chimed, rang, and then crashed loudly back when were dating. During one of our many inter-county trips, we ran into a spot of bad traffic on the narrow highway. “Don’t worry,” Mr. Wright assured me. “I know a back way.”

Nervously, I glanced at the fuel gauge. “How far ‘back’ is it? I think you need gas,” I pointed out.

“Nah… We have plenty of gas. We’ll stop as soon as we reconnect with the highway.”

Ten miles from the highway, Mr. Wright’s old Suburban took its last choking gasps and died in front of a farmhouse. “Huh. I guess we’re out of gas,” my then-boyfriend deduced. He hopped out of the driver’s seat and sauntered up the sidewalk to the house.

“Sorry to bother you, but we’ve run out of gas,” he explained to the old farmer who answered the door.

“I got some gas in th’ shop,” the old man said, looking at me through the vehicle window. “That yer wife?”

Mr. Wright shook his head. “No, she’s my girlfriend. I’m kind of hoping she’ll marry me someday, though.”

The farmer sadly shook his own head. “Yeah, well… Good luck wit’ that, Son.”

Photo source

The Princess and the Frog Rescuer

Being married to an animal rights hobbyist takes its toll on a hunter like Mr. Wright. I’d go so far as to say it serves to make him the subject of abject ridicule among the gun-toting Bambi stalkers who used to invite him on weekend outings.

I say “used to” because many of Mr. Wright’s hunting buddies suspect – perhaps with good reason – that he may, at any time, endeavor to liberate the prey.

In San Francisco, I found myself in tears while visiting a waterfront vendor, shocked by the boxes filled with crabs stacked one upon the other; fifty to a box. “Look at all those poor, dead crabs,” I said.

“They’re not dead,” Mr. Wright corrected. Sure enough, the shelled creatures were pinching and waving their arms in a futile attempt at escape. The person ahead of us pointed to a plump crustacean and the vendor plucked it from the box, tossed (tossed!) it on the scale, backside down, then plopped it into a pot of boiling water.

“Noooooo!” I shrieked. The vendor, alarmed, asked, “Was it the wrong one?”

I turned to Mr. Wright. “I want a crab.”

“Sweetheart, you’re vegan. You don’t eat crab.”

“No, I want to save a crab.” I used that tone that tells Mr. Wright I mean business – if you can call saving animals a business. “You’ve got to be kidd—” he began, but knew it was useless.

I selected my crab – one of the small ones at nearly the bottom of the box. Surely, he was young and had a full life ahead of him! Besides, hadn’t he been through enough, being on the bottom of a box?

The horrified look on my face when the vendor roughly tossed my rescued friend onto the scale was matched only by the horrified look on the vendor’s face when I said I wanted to take the crab, alive.

We headed for the wharf and quickly realized that throwing a crab from the dock’s elevation would serve only to shatter his shell on impact, thus voiding any good intentions. I began calling over the dock’s edge to boatmen. “Say, I’ve got this crab, here, and he’s away from home. Could you help me out by motoring him out a bit and letting him go in the water?”

As I parted ways with the third boatman to get a crazed look in his eye, while licking his lips and drawing a pot full of water, I saw Mr. Wright, climbing down an access ladder to the water, crab in hand. He reached the bottom, gently set my friend free, and began ascending the ladder.

By the time he reached the top, I was in tears. “What’s wrong?” he asked. “I let him go. I did what you wanted. Do you realize I just paid ten dollars a pound for something I risked falling into the water to set free?”

“But,” I wailed, “I didn’t get to say goodbye!”

Recently, Mr. Wright and I were driving home through a certain community on a golf course after dark. Suddenly, he brought the car to an abrupt halt. There, in the headlights, was a frog. Never one to needlessly kill a critter, my husband got out of the car, picked up the frog, and carried him to the grassy median.

“That was sweet,” I said as he got back behind the wheel and put the car into gear. We didn’t make fifty feet of progress before he stopped again.

Switching on the high beams, we saw the entire roadway, dotted with ribbiting revelers of the night. “Maybe you’d better drive,” he said.

I got behind the wheel and inched the car along as Mr. Wright rescued frog after leaping frog from certain doom beneath a set of Goodyears. All told, at least twenty found themselves in the cool, moist grass covered in evening dew.

As he climbed back into the car, my dear husband said, “You know, I really hope those frogs weren’t in the road because the grass was recently sprayed with lye. I hope I didn’t just send them back to third degree chemical burns.”

Well, at least we didn’t shatter the crab.

Photo credits:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/chilledsalad/ / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

http://www.flickr.com/photos/foxypar4/ / CC BY 2.0

All the Wright Moves

The homeschooling next-door neighbors with six kids and the homeschooling family across the street with six kids laid hands on the huge trailer attached to our Suburban. They prayed for our safety, and thanked the Lord that we were leaving.

Our northern Snohomish County community was nice enough, but we really were the freaks of the neighborhood. Back then, we only had five kids; all of our neighbors had six. We were irresponsible enough to send our kids to public school; our neighbors all homeschooled.

We were preparing to move to the Lake Chelan Valley, and I was protesting the entire plan. No one could understand my resistance, and many asked, “Isn’t your whole family there?” as if that weren’t enough reason for my unwillingness to return.

The truth was, I had a bad feeling about the move. When Murphy penned his famous law, I suspect he had our future move in mind.

Our new house didn’t close in time, but summer soccer practice started right on schedule. That meant getting up with Princess at 3:00 a.m. every weekday morning, making a pot of coffee and driving over Stevens Pass to get to practice in Chelan by 7:00 a.m. There were still a lot of things to be done at the old house before our renters arrived, so after practice we drove three hours home, where I boxed and scrubbed and wallpapered and painted until I fell unconscious.

Our renters couldn’t delay their move-in date, and we had to start moving things out of the house before we actually had a new home to move them into. Mr. Wright rented a storage unit in Chelan and borrowed a friend’s pickup truck to haul boxes and bins over during his inter-county trips between his new office and home.

During a late-night trip over the mountains, Mr. Wright was involved in an accident when another driver fell asleep at the wheel. He wasn’t terribly hurt, but I used the incident as further proof that we shouldn’t be moving.

I was frustrated at having to move everything twice; once into the storage unit, and again into our new house when – and if – it ever closed. Fortunately, someone broke the padlock on the unit and relieved us of many of our possessions, so there wasn’t quite so much to move in the end.

Two days before the renters were due I sat, teary-eyed, in the middle of the living room floor, a gallon of sand-colored paint spilled on the carpet in front of me. I’d only meant to touch up the window sills.

We loaded the last of the boxes into the huge trailer, only to realize there was too much weight, and the tires were beginning to flatten with the pressure. Mr. Wright pulled furniture and bins out, rearranging them, until the weight was more evenly distributed and not directly over the tires.

“The trailer’s too heavy,” I said. “We’re either going to wreck our transmission, bust a tire, or make it on sheer faith.” I called the homeschoolers. Everyone laid hands on the trailer and the Suburban, asking God to provide us with safe travels and mechanical miracles.

We cleared the top of Stevens Pass just after dark. It was all downhill from there, as they say. At the bottom of the hill, Mr. Wright glanced in his side mirror to see a wheel spinning down the road. It passed, crossed in front of us and came to a smashing halt against the guardrail.

“You don’t think…” I began, as Mr. Wright pulled over to the side of the road. I never did finish the sentence. I didn’t have to. We both knew where the wheel had come from.

As we approached the back of the trailer, it was clear that one of the center wheels had come off. We both broke into hysteric, unrestrained laughter that lasted far too long. (Think Tom Hanks in “The Money Pit,” when the bathtub falls through the floor.)

When he could manage words, Mr. Wright took my hand and said, “Let’s go find the lug nuts, Babe,” and we walked and walked up the highway, flashlights piercing the darkness.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/rooreynolds/ / CC BY-NC 2.0

More Evidence for My Insanity Plea: Premonitions

Look, I'm not saying I'm clairvoyant or anything.

What I am saying is that sometimes I have dreams, and they come true. My grandmother was known to read tea leaves and, by all accounts, was quite accurate.

Most of the time, I don't actually remember the particulars of a "seeing" dream until I'm in the middle of the situation the dream foretold. I'll be having a conversation with someone and realize I've had the exact same conversation before - in my dream. It's a weird déjà vu-like thing that's happened to me since I was a kid, and I've learned to mostly ignore it.

Sometimes, though, I have dreams that I do remember, and they seem like things that COULD happen in the future.

Last night, I dreamed that for some reason, Mr. Wright and I were in separate cars before we went to the airport to fly out to Japan. He was one place, and I was another. We were both engaged in last-minute activities (I was dropping the toddlers off to stay with their brother, Omri, and his family; I have no idea what Mr. Wright was doing) that needed to be tended to before the flight.

We were not close to one another in distance or driving time, by the way.

Upon arriving at Omri's house, I discovered that the bags I'd packed for the girls were, in fact, in Mr. Wright's vehicle. Checking the time, I realized there was no possible way to wait for him to drive them over. I called his cell, and he said he'd drop the bags off with a relative, who would deliver the bags to Omri's house.

The next thing I remember is meeting Mr. Wright at the airport. Only then did we realize that we'd left my bags in Mr. Wright's car - where he parked it, OVER HALF AN HOUR AWAY. That meant an hour, round-trip, to retrieve my bags. Oh, and we'd miss our flight, of course.

When I woke up, I pushed the dream out of my mind. How silly! Of course, we'd be in the same car. We wouldn't get separated, so there was no danger of bags being in the wrong place... unless we actually forgot to put them in the car to begin with.

What a relief!

So... I just got a call from Mr. Wright. "Listen," he said, "I have to take the displays for the home show over to my brother, so I'll drive the SUV on Monday, and you can take the girls to Omri's in the sedan. We'll leave the SUV at my brother's house, and we can meet up..."

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" I screamed, not letting him finish. "Trust me. I KNOW how that idea will turn out."

We've formulated another plan: I'll follow him to his brother's house, then we'll go to Omri's together.

Do you have any "gifts" for seeing things before they happen? Tell me all about it, so I won't feel like such a freak.



Photo credits:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/44835687@N05/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

http://www.flickr.com/photos/lopolis/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Bad Gratitude Monday (Gratitude from the Road)

I'm on the road today, posting from the passenger seat of my very full Expedition. We're headed to Washington State University for Princess's orientation. See the pic of my full car? It's tough to think that our car will never will this full again. *sniffle*

What am I grateful for? Let's see...

1. One of Mr. Wright's assailants, Tattooed Necklace Guy, was arrested. The detective says that he's asking the prosecutor to pursue this case as a hate crime, which would make it a felony in Washington state. Hopefully, with the pressure of a felony hanging over his head, Tattooed Necklace Guy will be inspired to plea bargain his way to fingering his accomplices.

2. The adoptions for Curlytop and Snugglebug are almost done! Our attorney should be receiving the last packet of information and preparing the decree of adoption and other documents needed to secure a court date for finalization this week. We got word from the adoptive family of the girls' brother, Omri, that his adoption has finalized. Soon, all three of the kids will be "official!"

3. After two solid weeks of battling infections and general crud, I'm feeling much better and almost 100% back to my good old snarky self.

What are YOU grateful for?

My Husband: Facebook Celebrity Stalker

People who know Mr. Wright will tell you, unequivocally, that he doesn’t do anything halfway. It is for that very reason that I went to such great lengths to hide the existence of Facebook from him. For some, Facebook is a social networking site where they log on, catch up with old friends and business contacts, log out and sleep peacefully through the night, knowing that they are a little better connected.

Not Mr. Wright. In less time than it takes to grow a Chia Pet, my husband has turned Facebook into an ongoing name-dropping opportunity of the highest order.

“One of my colleagues invited me to join Facebook,” he announced only a month ago. “I think I’m going to join. It will be a great way to promote my real estate listings, don’t you think? I think it’s a good idea.”


Perhaps you, like me, routinely hear sirens of the air-raid variety in your head when your loved one has a “good idea.” The only thing worse is a “great idea.”

To give some perspective, the last “great idea” my husband had involved a late night drive to a service station to blow up a queen-sized airbed, rather than inflate it with our foot-operated pump. The trip to the service station was uneventful, but after using the free compressor, the inflated bed wouldn’t fit inside our Suburban. Attempts to tether the airbed to the luggage rack failed, as the mattress was wider than the racks, and squishy to boot.

I won’t bore you with the minute details, but suffice it to say, I drove slowly through the dark back roads to our hotel with the airbed on top of the Suburban; and my husband, spread-eagle style, on top of the airbed.

Obviously, I’ve lived with my husband long enough to quickly calculate the most outrageous possible results of any good or great idea he cooks up. Somehow, I didn’t foresee the Facebook Celebrity Stalking of 2009.

“Someone wants me to join their mafia. Should I do it?” he asked. I checked my watch. He’d had a Facebook account for two hours. “No,” I responded. “You want to block those applications; otherwise you will spend a whole lot of unproductive time on Facebook. Plus, I, um… I think you can catch a bad case of spam from those things. And possibly gonorrhea.”

Okay, I lied. Seriously, though, I know how competitive Mr. Wright is, and the last thing I wanted him to spend hours each day assessing was whether he had more Pieces of Flair on his profile than his friends.

I thought I’d set pretty good boundaries: Use Facebook for networking only. Don’t say anything on Facebook that you wouldn’t say to your client or your mother. Don’t waste time playing games. Don’t try to make a career out of Facebook. Unfortunately, I forgot the all-important, golden rule of Facebook, as it applies to Mr. Wright: Do not spend hours searching Facebook for celebrities that might add you as a friend.

“Michael W. Smith added me as a Facebook friend!” My husband was elated when the contemporary Christian music legend accepted his friend request. Sadly, it was just the beginning. Mr. Wright, after a month of Facebook use, has over 750 “friends,” and an embarrassing number of them are celebrities. Our dinner conversations usually start with something like, “I was talking to Eddie Van Halen today… we’re Facebook friends, you know…”



Today, he came home and boasted, “Belinda Carlisle, Heather Locklear and Julianne Moore became my Facebook friends today!” He doesn’t even like Julianne Moore.

I'd better get a national syndication deal, so he'll add me to his list of friends