The OFF Day

I have very little control over lots of things in my house. In my life, too.

I can't control when my body is going to mercilessly crave random junk food.

I can't control that I pee when I sneeze. EVERY time.

I can't control when I sleep, raging artistic insomniac that I am.

I can't control when the government decides to send Matt out on a road trip to escort sensitive materials, which requires him to leave at 3 in the morning.

So many things that are out of my hands lately.

But I do have one wonderful sanctity of peace in my life.

Laundry.

Nothing makes me feel more like an emerging supermom than to have 3 complete uniforms for the children freshly laundered and laid out before 6am. Since Matt had to be up to leave early, I decided I would stay up all night (like I could help it anyway) and make sure he got out on the road on time. And since I had nothing better to do, I decided at 3am to make sure I had enough kid uniforms to go round for the rest of the week.

So I gathered up the uniform laundry, along with fresh towels and some socks and unders, and took them downstairs. I got down there and started the water, adding the clothes in, and realized my new container of laundry soap was upstairs.

I hustled back up, grabbed the new bottle of soap, then headed back down. I added the soap, then looked at the clothes I had added. I realized I had switched bags upstairs, so I was washing UN-uniforms. I ran back upstairs, got the correct bag (this is why you should never do laundry in the middle of the night when you are sleep deprived) and went back downstairs to add those clothes into the washer.

I laughed to myself, saying "at least I am getting a workout!"

I watched an episode of the Tudors on netflix, and then went back downstairs to switch the clothes to the dryer. It was 4am when I thudded down the steps. Puppy, being our "ever the pain in the rumpus" cat, decided to go downstairs with me. Only she decided to do so after I was halfway down the stairs. Consequently, she ran between my feet as I plodded down the steps, resulting in me stepping on her tail, her screeching like a Bayside tiger, and me tumbling down the last 3 steps.

When I sat up at the bottom of the scary basement steps, I realized that our sewer was starting to back up. I had narrowly missed falling into a pool of poo. It is not fitting to repeat what I was saying to myself at THIS point.

Determined that wonderful things happen to the girl that doth not protest, I stood up, hopped over the little poo pond, and switched the laundry to the dryer. I then headed back to our sewer drain, plunged it, and sucked up the poo with a shop vac. Good thing I was wearing my big girl panties with the control top. Otherwise I might have cried.

Finally finished with the fecal fiasco, I went back upstairs, detoxed and anti-germed Silkwood style, and sat down on my comfy couch with a coke zero, watching one more episode of the Tudors before the kids woke up. Then I realized I couldn't hear the dryer running. Sure, I'd closed the dryer door, but forgot to turn it ON. Running back downstairs, I flipped the dryer on high, went back upstairs and relaxed until time to wake the kids. I also took an advil or 4, as my butt had broken my previous "Puppy fall" on the steps.

At last, it was 6am. I got the kids up, made sure everyone was moving (because kids - and moms- in this house are prone to saying "I'm UP!" without moving anything but their mouths, and going back to sleep) and headed back downstairs to bring up the clean uniforms that I had worked so hard for.

And just as you might expect with one of my stories, getting the laundry back up went without a hitch. I started passing out socks and unders and white shirts, which had mysterious pink spots on them. Not too bad, until I got closer to the bottom of the laundry bag. That's when I found THIS...

Sure, not so bad on the outside, till I looked inside the shorts.

Yep, a pink crayon in the pocket. I should know by now that life is never as easy as it sounds. Especially after 8 bazillion trips up and down the steps in the middle of the night.

When will I learn??? That's not rhetorical, folks. I really need to know, so I can write it on my calendar and have the official "Charlie's gonna figure it out" countdown.

Needless to say, I don't dare weigh myself until tomorrow. I've had enough adventure for one morning. Check back tomorrow for an update on the weight.

But I can show you a silver lining to all this. I'm officially announced as a speaker at FitBloggin' 11!!! Take a look!!! (I even have a new button up at the top of the ol' bloggy! I'm so excited!)