He HADN'T stopped Christmas from coming! IT CAME! Somehow or other, it came just the same! And the Grinch, with his grinch-feet ice-cold in the snow, Stood puzzling and puzzling: "How could it be so?" "It came with out ribbons! It came without tags!" "It came without packages, boxes or bags!" |
One of the advantages, I felt, of having Thanksgiving at my mother's, and Christmas in Santa Barbara, is that we would at last have a holiday without Mom's Christmas Crisis.
Unfortunately, I forgot to share that information with Nicki.
This morning started, as usual. Nicki apparently woke up. But she is always very quiet. I wouldn't know she was awake, if Sheila didn't insist on making me aware that the Puppy Needs Care...NOW. I had been up futzing around with photos and videos last night until 2 a.m., so I tried burrowing under my blanket for a little more sleep, but that cold nose managed to find my face and she gently kept licking me until I got up. 6 a.m. Damn dog.
Nicki was, of course, overjoyed at having company (and Sheila now got to sleep on the couch, because I was out in the cold, wet back yard with the puppy. Grrr.)
Nicki did her business outside. Again, producing an amazing amoung of poop for such a little thing. I got that cleaned up and both of us back in the house. I went into the bathroom to brush my teeth, then went back into the family room. As I was approaching the recliner, I realized that my slipper felt funny. It felt funny because it was caked with dog poop. That little...bitch (well she is a female dog)...had even more in her than what she had produced outside. It was still pre-sunrise, so it was dimly lit in the room and I can't see well, you recall. I just never saw it and stepped right in the middle of it. By 6:30, before the coffee was made, I was washing my slippers and scrubbing the floor.
I finally got that all done, came into my office and sat down--and immediately smelled more poop. I got up and there, down the hall was another line of puppy poop. I swear, I'm not going to feed her 10 times a day, I'm going to starve her for a couple of days!
So the day progressed calmly. I had done two loads of towels in the washing machine before 8 (I love that the SPCA has supplied me with a seemly endless supply of towels for our various foster puppies!). I wanted to work in my office, but I work with the TV on in here and I noticed last night that the cable box was not on. I figured Nicki had unplugged it and I decided that I would plug it back in again. Which was easier said than done.
I also had the "assistance" of Nicki who thought it was just oh so much fun that I had that funny broom thing in my hands and was sweeping up so much stuff that she could chase. I finally locked her outside. Of course then Lizzie and Sheila wanted to be outside, because they didn't want to miss anything, so I locked them out too, and immediately Lizzie started jumping at the door trying to get back in because I wasn't out there with them and she was surely missing something good INside, and Sheila managed to get in the dog door anyway, under that tiny space under the TV table. It is a miracle she didn't knock the table over.
But I was knocking things over myself. Everything I touched ended up falling. I was trying to move things out of the way and the more I moved, the more I spilled. I didn't lose it until I accidentally tipped over a box that had glass Christmas balls in it and several of them broke.
Now I had glass shards all over the floor, Nicki somehow back in the house and wanting to play.
My children are familiar with the cry of anguish that emerges from me during Mom's Christmas Crisis. Walt looked like he was afraid I was going to attack him and asked if he should help or get out of my way, he did the only logical thing, and retreated upstairs to let me have my meltdown in private.
I finally managed to get things mostly cleared out of the way and the TV moved (it would be easier if I could just get down on my hands and knees and just plug the damn thing in, but I can't get down on my hands and knees so all this furniture moving was necessary. With the TV sort of out of the way, all I had to do was find the unplugged cord. Yeah. Right.
This was hindered by two things: this office has the worst lighting ever. I've been griping about it for years. So I was trying to work with this tiny flashlight. But you can see that it's kind of a snake pit of cords down there and I can't see, remember. I got all the cords plugged in and the thing still didn't work. I was determined I was going to find the solution by myself and not ask Walt for help.
I finally found the cord on the back of the cable box and followed it back to the socket and discovered that it was on the floor, hidden under all the other cords. Once I found that and plugged it in, I was back in business again and Mom's Christmas Crisis was once again, if not exactly averted, at least solved.
But it's not even December 1st yet. I'm sure there will be another one before December 25th.
But at least I found a bag of books I could shove in the space where Nicki has been going to get to the cords and maybe at least I won't have a repeat of this particular situation.
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