Stink. Stank. Stunk.

Haven't even made it to lunchtime today, and my day is already headed down the tubes.

1.  The Mister refused to get up easily this morning. Meaning lots of extra trips back upstairs to shake him and tell him to get in the shower. Wasted time on my part.

2.  The Boy was unable to focus and help out with the morning tasks like he usually does. Which set me back in time for getting him organized and out the door and made my shower later than I wanted it to be. Then, he decides he doesn't need to leave at his normal time, yet yells at me while I'm in the shower about needing to do the paperwork for school picture day tomorrow. HUH?? Um, it's tomorrow - I can select the (overly expensive) package tonight and write the check. So at 15 minutes later than his normal departure time, I'm downstairs yelling, again, for him to turn off the mindless boob tube and get out the door for his walk to school.

3.  Getting dressed for work, gathering food for lunch, walking the dog and brewing tea for the drive to work took me 30 minutes longer than yesterday. I knew this would put me into bad traffic. As I'm driving, I'm hearing traffic reports about the Beltway being backed up. Great. Can't win for losing here.

4.  One of the roads I take to avoid traffic turned into gridlock this morning due to a ditz of a crossing guard holding up the main drag to let kids cross. I know they need to get to school, but a half-mile of cars would like to get past you, off this road and onto the rest of their drive to work! 15 minutes just to travel down 1.1 miles of this road. Need to check the school hours for these two schools so I can better avoid this mayhem in future.

5.  There was an accident on another side street I use. Had traffic backed up (not as bad as it could, I'll grant), and blocked one lane in both directions on this road.

6.  Finally make it to the Beltway, and as I'm driving I can hear my van clunking into gear (it's an automatic). Need to check the transmission fluid, again, since the Mister won't let me get a new vehicle until I get a "legitimate" job. Wonder just what I drive to every day?? I thought I had a job. Oh wait, he means a job with a future, as I'm one of the last employees left helping to close the company down.

7.  And it's freezing in my office. I put on my office sweater OVER the sweater I wore to work.

It's gonna be a long day, folks.

Night Owl

I've got to figure a way to create and cement a new schedule in my home. The Boy started middle school this year, which requires him to leave the house an hour and a half earlier than he did last year! And I'm not involved in getting him to school, either. He walks. Oh, my heart broke just a little the first day of school when he left and I was still at home, yes it did.

The Girl has taken a job looking after the son of a former high school English teacher in the morning, so the teacher can get to school on time (high school starts at 7:20!), and her son can sleep in and be taken care of and walked to school. Elementary school starts at 9 am. However, this little boy likes to get to school early, which is a good thing, as she attends our local community college and has a class that starts at 9:30 on Tuesday and Thursday.

Needless to say, our mornings are all kinds of higgledy-piggledy. And I'm still trying to squeeze myself into the cracks of the morning around everyone else's schedule, to get done all the things I do for them, and fit prepping myself for my day into the open spaces. It's coming together, but it still needs some tweaking.

And one of those things that requires tweaking is bedtime. I am such a night owl that I want to stay up late and do personal things that I enjoy; but the alarm clock is still going to ring at 5 am. And after 4 days of early mornings and still-kinda late nights, I am one tired person at work today. I've had my coffee, yes, I have, but the yawns are still arriving.

The schedule will continue to be finessed. Hopefully both ends will come together to make the week move along much smoother. Time will tell. But today my patience is thin, and I am tired.

Open Your Eyes

I should have done this yesterday, when it actually happened, but I'm me, and didn't get to it. Whatcha gonna do?

I told you about the fox on the hill, right? Well, the very next day, as I drove through the same neighborhood where crazy car lady hangs out - just one turn farther away - I saw a doe and two fawns standing in the yard space between two houses. This particular neighborhood is a bit more secluded, and backs up to forest, so I guess it's not all that unusual for deer to be out and about, but two fawns? Both were wearing white-spotted coats, so they were probably still young.

And to think, I live in a bedroom community just south of DC. Nature is all around you, if you'll only open your eyes to it. And I'm so glad that I'm a curious person, always looking.

Morning Salute

While driving to work this morning, and dealing with all the absolutely crazy traffic and kids going back for their first day of school, I saw something amazing.

Sitting on a hill beside a house, on one of the busiest corners in this development, where kids cross the main drag to go to one of two elementary schools (one schooling K-3, and the other 4-6) was a red fox. Parked close to a small tree, sitting just like a dog, watching moms and dads walk their children to the street crossing and on to their school. And I had plenty of time to observe him, as this crossing is manned by a policewoman, and traffic was moving slowly through her intersection.

And, rather than be disturbed by the fact that he was out, among all the humans, possibly rabid, I'm going to think that he was just being social, and giving those who observed him, a little special morning salute on the first day of school.

That's my story, and I'm sticking to it!