Friday, May 13, 2011

*Whew*

How is it that every week starts out with not too much on the calendar, and by Wednesday chaos reigns?

I began this week thinking I'd get to work plenty of hours, do a little school with Man-squared (Man-boy's new nickname, courtesy of my oldest son, Mike), help Abbie get all her stuff unpacked. It would be a piece of cake.

Then I realized we lacked a CT scan appointment. And the authorization and referral from the insurance company. Oh, and an appointment with the surgeon, only his June calendar is not out yet, so I have to call back next week for that one. And then the neighbor's grandmother took a turn for the worse and she had to make an emergency trip to Florida, so we've had Princess P for two days. Somewhere in there I thought it would be a good idea to get the dog caught up on his immunizations and get his nails cut on the same day Man-squared had a job interview and I was supposed to be going out to dinner with my singing group from church. And because I am pig-headed and won't give up my workout, we have to factor that in there too.

It would have worked perfectly if the vet had finished the dog by 11 when I asked her to, but no. Pete was ready to be picked up at 1:30, after Man-squared had left for his interview. So I sent him in one car, I would drive the truck (it's the only thing we have that fits the dog crate), and Abbie could meet us at church later in the other car (she's watching P while I'm doing the running around).

I brought Pete out of the vet's and lowered the tailgate for him to jump up in his crate. Latched the crate. Shut the tailgait . . . oh, no, wait, the tailgate is bouncing open. Slam it harder. Still no dice. Look for something in the way . . . nothing. At this point, a very well dressed woman got out of her car and came over saying, "I can see what the problem is right here. Do you have a screwdriver or something?" I had Man-squared on the phone and he said that yes, indeed, there was a screwdriver in the glove compartment for just such eventualities.

(Long story mercifully shortened here) The lovely lady and I worked on the tailgate for a solid 15 minutes, holding it up all the while (it's a good thing I work out), and couldn't get the latch to unlatch so I could slam the thing and it would latch. Does that make sense? No? Don't worry, it doesn't make sense to me either. The long and short of it is this: The thingy was up and it needed to be down so it would hook onto the doo-flipper when the tailgate was shut. And that's how I explained it to Ben when I got him on the phone.

And you know what? He understood exactly what I was saying. Twenty-seven years of marriage does that. So he told me I needed to pull up on the handle while simultaneously working the thingy with the screwdriver and holding up the 75-pound tailgate.

Well, sure. (The well-dressed lady was gone at this point.)

And you know what else? I did it. And without even cussing one time. And Man-squared got his job, and the truck is home with tailgate intact, and P is having a lovely nap with Abbie, and Pete got his nails cut and all his shots.

(Two days later . . .)

And then Blogger died, so here I am on Friday night, finishing Wednesday's story. Tomorrow Ben and I are going to see my mommy and daddy. It will be nice to get away from responsibilities for a while. Have a great weekend!

Be thankful ~

Karen

1 comment:

Mike said...

Thingy up, needs to be down, latch on to the doohicky when it closes...know what else makes someone understand that?

A very long time spent working on that very thing, at the end of days spent hauling wood. I know exactly what happened :D