Tess and the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day

That title is directly from Judith Viorst's classic of a similar name. Just sub Alexander for Tess and you've got it. It was one of my favorite books as a kid. That and the story of Rikki Tikki Tembo Nosarembo Chari Bari Ruchi Pip Peri Pembo. I'm not sure if that is how that was spelled, but I've never forgotten that fictional character's name. He nearly died of pneumonia or drowning because his brother had to say that entire name when looking for help. Go look it up.

I was asked by my dear friend Julia to write this blog post because she has an unhealthy relationship to her keys. I think I'll have to blog on her key problem. It got so bad at one point that my husband suggested she gets one of those lanyards to wear around her neck and couple it with one of those key rings that clips to your belt. With two points of contact with her body, there would be a good chance that she could hold on to them. My situation on Wednesday filled her with a sick kind of redemptive joy. Oh well, here goes.

Hubby left very very early on Monday morning (4:30am wake up time) on a business trip to Houston. Before he left he asked me to go to bed at a reasonable hour. I've gotten a little addicted to Facebook. One of my friends manages to be online at 11pm my time so I end up chatting with her for an hour or so. Next thing you know, it is 1am and I need to get the kids up at 6:30am. This is just not good for my health. So told Hubby that I would try to get to bed on time. On Monday night, I found my friend online and managed to stay up until 2am my time. I was a bit of a wreck on Monday morning but managed to get the kids off to school and then I crawled back in bed with my youngest. I couldn't do that again.

When Hubby called to check in that day and asked when I got to bed, I told the truth. I certainly could have lied and said that I went to bed at 11pm like a good little girl, but I know he is wise in the ways of computers and can figure out exactly when I logged out. For all I know, he has my desktop mirrored on his Blackberry. So I vowed to go to bed at 10pm that night especially since I had an 8am appointment with my son's teacher for conferences on Wednesday morning.

Well, I did better but not 10pm better. I got to bed around midnight but was feeling pretty positive about that time. A good six and a half hours of sleep might just do the trick. That was until 1:30am when Lil'T decided that she didn't want to go potty and would instead prefer to whine a good long while. She also found it necessary to fight me picking her up out of bed to put her on the toilet. I finally got her back to bed by 2 am but because Hubby is out of town, I allowed her sister and her to sleep in my big bed with me. Big mistake. Lil'T kept complaining that her sister was too close. At one point, Princess was practically lying on top of me. That's when I kicked Lil'T out of bed. Around 2:30am. I lay there for what felt like hours before I decided to get out of bed and shop Ebay for a while. I finally got sleepy at 5am. Yeah, 1.5 hours before I had to get up again to get Princess to school. Plus I had to get dressed and ready for the conference.

In the book, Alexander woke up with gum in his hair. At least he had a good night's sleep. Having the conference at 8am meant waking Lil'T up at 7am. You wouldn't think that was a big deal but she normally wakes up at 8am. A 3 year old deprived of an hour of sleep whiny and clingy. Compounded with the fact that she's on antibiotics for a sinus infection. Way more opihi than normal. How wonderful to have to deal with her while That's teacher was telling me all the ways that he shouldn't have failed Art. Or Science. The boy disliked his Art teacher. I hear it is a common problem. But he shouldn't have totally blown off Art. Meanwhile he's acing Math. He failed Science because he missed the due dates for his project since we were in Hawaii. And instead of turning the project in, he just held on to it. OHN. So, he will be turning in the final project on Monday and hopefully the grades will be revised. No matter what I say, he won't deal with Art. He'd rather just fail.

Then I get a phone call from Julia. She'd had her car serviced and hoped that I could help her out. So I went to pick Julia up at her house, picked up Princess from the bus at our house and off we went. Since we were so close to the mall, I decided to see if Ross and TJ Maxx still had some of those formal white dresses they hauled out for the holidays. I just wasn't thinking 1st communion back in December. I'll remember when it is Lil'T's turn.

Anyway, because we were leaving the island, I let the kids use the DVD player in the car. Lil'T and That wanted to stay in the car and watch the DVD. I told them that they could provided they lock the car doors. I left them my cell phone in case they got harassed by anybody. Then my son could call the police or call the store for help. Plus, I was just going to pop in and out since Princess had a lot of homework to complete before Thursday.

After about 10 minutes in the store and seeing nothing but pink, yellow, peach and mint dresses, we were headed back to the car to leave. Just as we were leaving we saw That and Lil'T coming into the store. My son had to use the bathroom. Here is the exchange that followed.

Me: "Did you lock the car?"

Him: "Yes."

Me: "Okay, let me have the keys."

Him: "What keys? You never gave me the keys."

I ran out to the car and sure enough, he had locked every door. And he left the DVD player running so the car was on accessories power. At least the engine wasn't idling.

Remember, I had left him with my cellphone. He left that in the car too.

So I was stranded a good 17 miles away from my home. My husband was in Houston. And I only had 2 of my friends home phone numbers memorized. Who memorizes phone numbers anymore??? I didn't have enough loose change to make a phone call at the pay phone. Thankfully the TJ Maxx sales people rock and let me use their phone. I called both of them and neither was home. Panic. Then I called my husband on the off chance that he had one or the other's cell phone number. He had Julia's phone number. I hoped and prayed that she wouldn't screen the call. That she wouldn't see "TJ Maxx" on the caller ID and say, "meh, I won't answer." But perhaps the fact that she was driving at the time helped me out because she answered after only a couple of rings. She said that she could come out but she had to find a way to take care of her daughter who was at swimming lessons. I told her how to get into our house and asked her to bring every key that she saw because I had the Toyota keys there too. Wouldn't it have sucked if she got to me and brought the wrong car's keys? And she had to go back to her house and pick up her van because in case she had to jump start my car, she wanted to use the van.

So we shopped and waited. At some point I noticed that Lil'T was walking a little funny. I walked over to her and got hit in the face with that distinctive foul odor that all moms dread. I asked her, "did you poop in your pants?" She got all teary eyed and told me that she had. So I found a 5 pack of panties for $3.99. Yay for TJ Maxx once again. If it had been Nordstrom, I'd be paying at least $10 for one panty.

I tried to get by on the sly. I don't know why, but I didn't want to embarrass her and let all the shoppers at TJ Maxx know that Lil'T had an accident. The doctor told me that a lot of kids on the antibiotic get diarrhea. It is a very common side effect. Unpleasant, but common. So I go to purchase my pack of panties and Princess pipes up, "Mom, I think Lil'T pooped her pants." I swear she was yelling it at the top of her lungs, but I'm sure she wasn't. I just loved the looks I got (real or imagined) from the other people there. The checker cut the panty bag open for me and I was off the the handicap stall in the ladies room. It happened twice, but the second time with more histrionics from Lil'T. She was really upset. Clean up was aided by my quick thinking and a sanitary napkin in her underpants. When you're diaperless, you do what you can with what you have. Thankfully I had the pads. Can you imagine if I only had a tampon?

Could this day get any longer?

Julia showed up about an hour and a half after I called. I couldn't thank her enough. Luckily, my car started up no problem, even with the DVD player in perpetual menu mode as the movie had finished ages ago.

When we got home and finished eating our $0.89 burritos from Taco Bell because there was no way I was going to cook after all of that, I bathed T, showered myself and felt a whole lot better. Sadly, I still had to contend with Princess's homework. She was up a good 2 hours past her bedtime. Poor thing.

Oh well, everybody has days like these once in a while.

Even in Australia.