Won't you be...?

We have a saying in my family -- when someone asks you what's new, what's going on, you say "nothing to write home about." And often people will comment, "you write home often?" and of course the joke's on them. As you know... yes we do.

But I often think, when approaching the blank blogger screen "nothin much to blog about." I'll treat you to a real old-fashioned weblog entry from the life.

Pour yourself one.

I have a couple of outstanding life management issues of late. If you are a careful reader, you have found them:

1) I really need a new car
2) I don't talk to my neighbors
3) I need a good handyman, Eldin style
4) I have mice
5) I think Hollywood has gone Apocalypto, with a capital A -- every movie is about the eve of destruction, and what if these really are the end times (lower case)
6) I still work too damn much, only now without feeling, so now I hate myself on top of it.

But the light in my week is Recording for the Blind. Tonight I was treated to Legal Rights of People with Mental Disabilities. Besides being able to say "deinstitutionalization" and "mentally deficient," I began to wonder if I count as mentally disabled. These authors say only if your condition interferes with normal life operations and/or is dangerous. I am simply a middle-aged American who returns to the house 3 times from the driveway to be sure the oven isn't on, and who really won't run my drier if I am not home.

My goddaughter wouldn't get into the pool because she thought the flowers would come off of her bathing suit. I say, until proven otherwise, why shouldn't she think so?

Driving home, my oil light came on (that is, I was driving. Oil light was not) which it does now about 1000 miles too soon, but at 136K and 10 years, it is entitled. I just throw a quart in and call it a day. I stopped on the way home to do that very thing, in the parking lot of the Shaw's (next door to the gym I have neglected for over a week) feeling so independent and cocky because I just take care of these things, you see, when they need taking care of (please look away from the broken garage door, fireplace, and the mouse trap). Hear me roar.

8:30pm and I drive up, hop out to lift the garage door and wait...is that the car...door... oh.... crap.


Good thing it has a full tank of case and a new quart of oil. Which it is burning through.

Ass.

I got as far as the AAA phone menu-- because you know I throw staff at problems like these -- when I decided this particular mysterious way was more palatable than 4 horsemen and a whirlwind of fire, and I just went next door.

Husband next door threw himself into the puzzle as only other people's husbands will. Your husband, I am sad to say, will read you a full chapter of What You Should Have Done, but to me he will bring a coat hanger, screwdriver, and wood shims (of course he does). We will pick and pry and make what sounds awkwardly like sex noise as we guide each other to the elusive door button. Oh yes, manual doors and windows. I told you I needed a new car.

The wife suggests the cops will do this and pours us wine. After 20 minutes, I feel like he has made a fair effort but it just isn't going to happen (pause... giggle) and I call AAA. Waiting in their family room, wine in hand, charm fully on, we get to know each other while my car idles in the adjacent driveway. They apologize for the loud graduation party this weekend; I say I have been out of town, in Texas where I used to live. I decide to be normal and not international woman of mystery because they are being nice and it is 9pm in the suburbs, and he used his best husbandry on me.

We talk about the mice (they don't have them. Wife suggests I am not home enough and should have loud boys like they do). We tell our best cocktail party stories and I say what I really need is a handyman. Neighbor Wife knows one she loves. She is a realtor, she recommends him, he'll do anything. No job too small. I give her my email.

AAA comes and the other neighbors are milling in my driveway, worried I have been raptured (now, seriously, everyone knows my SHOES would be there) and chatting up the driver who is trying to locate the phone number I left him. Other neighbor confesses she has climbed up our deck to break in before. Husband and I get to tell our story to a whole new audience while AAA guy opens the door by ROLLING DOWN THE WINDOW with a bent coat hanger.

damn. that's hot.

I have thought of all the places I will hide my extra car key in the garage, all the places I will hide my extra house key in the car. But I am also giving the neighbors my email, and calling the handyman, and thanking my car for being so old you can break into it. And thanking the Lord for making me careless, even if just for a moment.