Happy New Year
I’m going to relate this story to you. I just told it to Andy to let him view a little slice of how my mind works. He stopped listening half way through (a wife can tell). I give you my full permission to stop reading at any point. It’s pretty rambling, and there’s no real reason to relate it other than it really makes me realize the huge difference in the way Andy’s and my brain work.
C: “Andy, should I make a drink? It is New Years Eve and everything.”
A: “Sure, why not.”
I put the ice in the glass, poured the rum and then the coke. Lime. I just went grocery shopping, picked up some prescriptions and dinner. I couldn’t carry everything so I left a bunch of bags, one of them containing limes in the back of the Element.
I put my boots on and trudged out to the garage. While I was getting the bags I noticed the two mirrored closet doors that we had previously taken off the closet upstairs when the loft bed was being built. We thought we weren’t going to put them back on, but then decided to. I meant to bring them up yesterday.
After I put the grocery bags on the kitchen floor I went back out for the doors. I already had my boots on after all. I lugged the doors upstairs to the bedroom. While coming back down, I noticed a pile of laundry. I was going downstairs anyway, why not bring the laundry down.
When I went to throw the laundry in the washer, there was already a load in there. When I went to throw that load in the dryer, there was one in there ready to be taken out. I put the clean laundry from the dryer in the laundry basket and put it on the stairs to go up. I started the washer and dryer.
Back to the kitchen to unpack the groceries.
The last things in the bags were eight, four packs of wet cat food. I had been keeping the canned food in the cat room but it wasn’t an ideal system. In the morning when I feed them, I have to go in twice, once to get the food and then again to bring it in. They always try to escape and are successful much of the time. I found a bottom drawer with only a few kitchen towels in it and used half for the food. But there were more cans in the cat room.
I went into the cat room got the cans and let the cats out to explore the house for a little while.
I finished tearing open the plastic holding each of the four cans together and stacking them in the drawer. When I finished and turned around, I noticed the cats in one corner of the kitchen/dining room looking like they were chewing on something that they shouldn’t be. They scattered and I noticed that the two worms that I had seen on the floor were gone….
Let me insert here that I have a worm composting bin. It’s small, covered and doesn’t smell. I had to take it out of the laundry room because it was too cold for them in there. I put it right outside of the door, and am still deciding on where it should live. If the conditions are to wet or dry in the bin, or there isn’t enough food, sometimes a few earth worms will go searching for other conditions and end up outside of the Eco system.
….It looks like my little kittens of the apocalypse found a snack. I opened the top of the bin and thought they needed some moisture and food so I sprayed down the dirt and got a tupperware of rice that no one was going to eat and dumped it in.
I went to the kitchen sink to put the tupperware in and noticed a bunch of dishes. I washed them, turned around grabbed the lime that I originally went out for washed it, cut it up and squeezed a slice in my now flat, watery rum and coke.
Andy said that nothing like that train of thought has ever happened to him in his entire life. I asked him if he could tell me a story that could illustrate his train of thought. He said, the whole point is there would be no story to tell.
I think maybe my New Years resolution should be to be less complicated. I know that sometimes when I stop multi-tasking and thinking three steps ahead the household crumbles a little. Dishes pile up, trash overflows, laundry and other things that need to be done, don’t. But really, so what. I’m not saying I’m deciding to live in squalor, but maybe I just need to stop myself when I feel that compulsive pull, and redirect some energy to living in the moment.
Happy New Year.
Yep, that all sounds familiar.
hi cindigo, i saw an oil lamp that i think you posted for sale some time back. is it possible that its still available?
m.
Sorry, the lamp was gone a long time ago.
Great recollection, I love how honest and straight-forward your writing always is. And yes, I guess I can relate to the multi-tasking thing too - it’s the only way that my apt. stays clean. Happy New Years to the both of ya, and here’s to 2010 and hopefully sharing a few watery rum ‘n cokes together at some point. x.
Who is this? Alex? I recall knowing an Alex a long, long time ago but I haven’t heard from her in so long I though she may have moved to Guam.
Come and visit some day. You’d like it here.
I really do not want to rain on your parade, but that is exactly how I do things. Oh MY God you are turning into your mother. I get much done that way. However now that I have such a small house, I read knit,or watch tv if I am going out for a walk. Today it was 24 cents. yesterdau 51 cents
SOMEONE SENT ME THIS 2 YEARS AGO BECAUSE IT REMINDED THEM OF ME.
NOW IT REMINDS ME OF YOU.
SEEMS ANDY IS THE ODDBALL, NOT YOU.
Recently … I was diagnosed with A. A . A . D . D . - Age Activated
> Attention Deficit Disorder. This is how it manifests itself:
>
> I decided to water my garden.
>
> As I turn on the hose in the driveway, I looked over at my car and
> decided
> my car needs washing.
>
> As I started toward the garage, I noticed that there is mail on the
> porch
> table that I brought up from the mail box earlier.
>
> I decide to go through the mail before I wash the car.
>
> I lay my car keys down on the table, put the junk mail in the garbage
> can
> under the table, and notice that the can is full.
>
> So I decide to put the bills back on the table and take out the
> garbage
> first.
>
> But then I think, since I’m going to be near the mailbox when I take
> out the
> garbage anyway, I may as well pay the bills first.
>
> I take my check book off the table, and see that there is only ONE
> check
> left. My extra checks are in my desk in the study, so I go inside the
> house
> to my desk where I find a can of Coke that I had been drinking.
>
> I’m going to look for my checks, but first I need to push the coke
> aside so
> that I don’t accidentally knock it over. I see that the coke is
> getting
> warm, and I decide I should put it in the refrigerator to keep it
> cold.
>
> As I head toward the kitchen with the Coke, a vase of flowers on the
> counter
> catches my eye - they need to be watered.
>
> I set the Coke down on the counter, and I discover my reading glasses
> that
> I’ve been searching for all morning. Then I decide I better put them
> back on
> my desk, but first I’m going to water the flowers.
>
> I set the glasses back down on the counter, fill a container with
> water and
> suddenly I spot the TV remote. Someone left it on the kitchen table.
> I
> realize that tonight when we go to watch TV, I will be looking for
> the
> remote, but I won’t remember that it’s on the table, so I decide to
> put it
> back in the den where it belongs, but first I’ll water the flowers.
>
> I pour some water in the flowers, but quite a bit of it spilled on
> the
> floor. So, I set the remote back on the table, get some towels and
> wipe up
> the spill, then, I head down the hall trying to remember what I was
> planning
> to do.
>
> At the end of the day:
> —-the car isn’t washed,
> —-the bills aren’t paid,
> —-there is a warm can of Coke sitting on the counter, —-the
> flowers
> don’t have enough water, —-there is still only 1 check in my
> checkbook,
> —-I can’t find the remote, —-I can’t find my glasses, —-and I
> don’t
> remember what in the word I did with the car keys!
>
> Then, when I try to figure out why nothing got done today, I’m really
> baffled, because I know I was busy all day long, and I’m really
> tired. I
> realize this is a serious problem, and I’ll try to get some help for
> it, but
> first I’ll check my e-mail.
>
> Do me a favor, will you? Forward this message to everyone you know,
> because
> I don’t remember to whom it has been sent.
>
> Don’t laugh– if this isn’t you yet, your day is coming!!!
>
> Growing older is mandatory.
> Growing up is optional.
> Laughing at yourself is therapeutic.
>
> P.S. I just walked outside and SOMEONE LEFT THE WATER RUNNING IN THE
> DRIVEWAY!!!!!
So genius. I can appreciate this on so many levels…
Yup… totally sounds familiar…
oh, look… there’s something shiny and sparkley…
what was I saying?