The fourth long day.....

I had to write this post on the fifth day, because on the fourth day, I was too tired to keep my eyes open. On the fourth long day of the busiest week of the year, while my husband was busy out in the woods "not" hunting elk, I woke up early to take Hannah to a school assembly. I kind of figured I'd just drop her off, take a few pictures during the performance, then we'd be off and running in a half hour or so. Not. We arrived at 8:20 to find out the assembly didn't start till 9. So I got to sit with the drama kids waiting for their performance at the pep assembly, AND it turns out the performance was the very last thing on the agenda. Good times. But what I learned was that high school NEVER changes. Same groups, same cliques, same "popular" and "not popular" stuff. Nope - don't miss those days at ALL.

After the assembly, I picked up Hayley, who was house/pet sitting for a friend of mine. We dropped her off at work, and then Hannah and I went to Tully's for coffee and breakfast. It was lovely to just sit and enjoy coffee, even though I knew my time was limited because my mom and sister were driving here from Boise to see the kids' performance tonight, and my house was a pig sty! Gah! We arrived home around noon and I had exactly two hours to: do three loads of laundry, clean up Harrison's room and change the sheets on his bed, same to Arlie's room, vacuum the upstairs, pick up the downstairs, dust, and  text the other kids the chores I needed them to do upon arriving home. I picked Hayley up from work and left minutes later to take Hannah to her school appointment. An hour later, we left there, arrived home for about ten minutes to change and were out the door again for call time.

My job last night was "kid wrangler" backstage. Let's just say it wasn't my favorite job.

After the show, everyone went to Applebee's. I wanted to go home since my mom and sister were now sitting at my house, with no one home, making fudge (yay!). But the kids wanted to go, so I had a mudslide drink with double kahlua. We arrived home at midnight, visited for a bit with the family, tasted the fudge, and then went to bed.

Well. They went to bed. I discovered that I'd left a HUGE pile of clothing and towels that needed to be folded on my bed. I REALLY didn't want to fold them at 1 a.m. so I pushed them all over to Jeff's side and crawled in. Finally a good reason for him to be gone!

On an unrelated note, I cut my finger on something in Harrison's room while I was cleaning it. It was more of a little, tiny slice, really, no big deal. Except I kept "catching" it on everything so I tried to trim the excess skin, but that didn't work. It was apparent that I needed a fingertip bandage. Which we don't have. And the thing is, I know we had some at one point. You know how you buy that box of fingertip bandages for that ONE time you cut your finger and then it takes you six or seven years to use it all up? Guess my seven years was up. So, I concocted this fingertip bandage of my own, using several different bandaids, but nothing worked. I don't even have a normal-sized bandaid. Clearly, it's bandaid shopping time. I don't even know why I just told you that story.

And since I'm writing this in the morning after the fourth long day, I will say that I had to get up early this morning.....again. I have had about five hours of sleep a night for the past several nights, so I was really hoping to sleep in this morning. But no. I had to go pick up Shade. The demon from Hell. I was not looking forward to this AT ALL, but Jeff asked if I could pick him up this morning so we didn't have to pay for boarding over the weekend. I agreed (but only because money was involved. Not love). At the vet, they gave me Shade's "report card" which said things like "I played well with ALL the dogs" and "I was a good, quiet boy!" WTF? They could not have been talking about OUR Shade? I even got a picture of Shade lying nonchalant next to a lovely golden retriever who seemed unfazed by the fact that he was in such close proximity to the Devil himself. When Shade came trotting out on his leash, he was indifferent to me. He couldn't get himself into the car so I had to struggle to help him. He weighs about 75 lbs! As soon as he was in the car, I could feel my stress level rising - his obnoxious noises, his disgusting breath....and I realized the sense of peace and calm I'd had every time I passed his empty kennel this past week. He wasn't home five minutes when he started barking and making noise while everyone was still trying to sleep. Back into the kennel he went. Get used to those bars, kid. (Bonus points for who can tell me what movie that line is from)!

The hunter returns today. Just in time to make pizzas for the cast party tonight. When I mentioned this to him he said he "owes" me one. I'd prefer my payment in the form of a massage or a weekend away, thank you. :) He won't be bringing home an elk, or any other form of nourishment for the family. I'm just hoping he doesn't bring home lyme disease or hantavirus. I can hardly wait to see (and smell) him - the mountain man, returned after the long hunt.

And now I just really want to sleep. But it's show day - again. A matinee and a show tonight. Call is at noon. Maybe I'll just shut my eyes for a minute...................