Thursday, May 15, 2008

Lamentations and Laundry

I am so blessed. Chris hasn't even HAD his surgery yet, and we are overflowing with offers of help. I can’t tell you how valuable it is to have such a wonderful support system. My wonderful friends are Already extending their supportive arms. I’ve had a plethora of people tell us that they are praying for us, and it’s so wonderful. And as if that wasn't enough. My friends help and support my effort to keep busy, playing on the spur of the moment. There's a list of folks who want to supply us with food. In case I haven't mentioned, I never realized the value of Church Women Home Cooking, until we had Chris. Priceless. Truly a God-Given Gift.
So, I have this friend, and she felt bad that she was skipping town this weekend, and unable to be at the hospital and help immediately. Honestly, my head will be so engrossed at that hospital I don't expect to see daylight until Monday anyway. We used to refer to the NICU days as getting sucked into the Black Hole of Cuteness. But there really is this certain Black Hole factor. Anyway, she came up with this great idea. She knew I had a man eating pile of laundry. (Truly, a good friend knows that you haven't seen the closet floor in months, and knows that you call the Man-Eating pile of laundry, but that's another blog...signs of a good friend.)
I've decided there's like exponetial growth in laundry. Here's my laundry theorum, one must do more laundry in a day than one wears, otherwise one will never catch up. Ay, there's the rub. I usually take more than 1 day to do a load. If you are 1 person, it will take you a good few days to wear a single loads worth of clothes. Even if you are 2 people...watch, 2 people-2 outfits a day, 4 pieces of clothing, 2 days: 8 pieces total. But 3 people (check out the exponetial growth of laundry:) 3 people 1 day 6 pieces of clothing, 2 days: 12 pieces total. That's like a load, but of course it's not all the same color, so instead of a simply in 2 days you have a load, by the 3rd day you have 18 pieces of clothing and so 3-4 days you have 3 loads! Exponents! Aye Carumba!
Anyway, she volunteered to take all my laundry off my hands and do, so that I wouldn't have to worry about it for our trip. How fabulous is that?!
So, Tuesday, I bagged it all up, and took it over. I realized after doing so, one huge reason I don't do lots of laundry, and have trouble keeping up with laundry, is it hurts. The bending, the awkward angles when one sorts, they hurt. I never put the two and two together until I got home after moving the aforementioned man-eating pile of laundry. Motivated by my other girlfriend, Eric and I had been productive out in the yard, (OK Eric planted, I deadheaded some plants and chased Chris, but I think we were equally worn out) and once back inside found that Fina had peed in the house. She peed in the living room. She peed in the entry to the bedroom. Ugh.
I could see my closet floor, but I still had a ton of clean stuff piled on the chest to put away. Eric and I decided to put it away. That was unwise, my back was so sore when done, I collapsed down on my bed, flapping my arms by my side. My right arm went flipping right into another flipping pile of pee. I finally have NO laundry, and suddenly the dog deems me worthy with an entire bed's worth of laundry. And so I did laundry anyway. Drugs help back pain, and luckily it has cleared up by today. Though I saw my chiropractor yesterday, that might've helped some too. Unfortunately, Senorita Snot Boxer peed all the way through to the mattress, finally getting (she's come close a couple times) the heating mattress pad, which needs to be barely washed in a washer, and get this, Air Dried. Flipping Dog. So, I couldn't remake my bed until it air-dried for a day.
The next morning, I hop out of the shower, and shoo Fina off the bed again. She'd snuck up and curled up for a long morning's nap. As is customary now, when I sweep her off my bed, I sweep the spot where she was, just touching the bed's warmness. There wasn't warmness, there was wetness. Twice in 24 hours!!!! I flipped out. OK, the first round was pee, the second round was from her getting Licksy Chopsy, which is when she gnaws on her foot or a belly and totally slimes herself and anything she's touching, and she was touching my bed. More laundry, but at least the slime layer didn't contact the mattress. But Jeez Fi!
Oh well, I didn't not speak to Fina for long. Just long enough to kick her off the bed for a few nights. She's still not allowed on the bed, but it's hard to stay mad at her for long, she gets the sweet puppy dog eyes, the same ones that schnookered us into getting her in the first place. Dogs today.
This evening, I got to have a mini-Girls Night Out. Amy and Ben, requested that Suellen and Alicia, and Eric and I meet them at the new chinese place, Hoo Wha or somthing close to it. Not a bad place, good eats. The babes got done at 8, and we were hearing the call of Chocolate Lava Cake from Applebee's. Un-American to ignore the call of chocolate cake. Actually, Kathleen told me today they were doing a fundraiser of sorts for one of their employees and $1 from every margarita went to the cause. I'm up to drinking for the cause so we did sort of progressive dinner. Chinese followed by drinks and desserts at Applebee's. So really by going there to drink, we were Good-Deed-Doing. It's amazing the feeling of relief one can get in an hour...Fabulous. The pretty stripey one I got Mango-some berry was so pretty, and not heavy on the boooze. I don't usually like margaritas, tequila tastes like liquor and I like things that don't taste boozey, I'm all about the tutti fruittis. I felt like my grandma, who upon traveling to the Caribbean for the first time, told my mother she could get her own drink then said, "I'll have the Red and White one." The bartender didn't even blink, he knew exactly what she wanted, and Grandma got it. My mother stood silently in awe. Thank Goodness for Good Bartenders.
Just the same, when all of this insanity dies down a bit, I'm going to need a serious good old Moms Night Out, and I really enjoy the Progressive Dinner approach.
Things to ponder....

3 comments:

Jenibug7 said...

LOL Maybe you can get a Margarita at Riley? Probably not...
Still praying for ya sista! It is 4pm there, so I am hoping you are out of recovery and into a normal room...

Cathy said...

Just got out and things are looking good. Not our own room, but drugs are keeping Chris happy.

amypfan said...

Glad we could help you out, both with the man-eating laundry and the good-deed-doing. :)