The C’s, One More Thing (Only Me)

I made it back to my home desk an hour later than planned. Luckily, I have a thick vacation bank and sometimes the energy to flex an hour or so longer to find a clean place to stop.

Sliding into my seat, I felt the death-glare before I located the source. Gray cat on a gray carpet throwing laser beams. I apologized to HBlu, again, but fore-warned him. “We’re going back. Because, I love you. Amendously.”

While I was trying to figure out a prioritization balance between what needs the most attention and what seems most urgent, my phone flashed in a weird disco-ish way.

Two calls at once. Quite the anomaly for me. Ringer one was a colleague. The other was the vet’s office. I took the coworker call. At the end of our brief check-in, the vet called, again.

The caller asked me to go take a look at Harley Blu’s med that we’d picked up at the visit. She aske if HBlu’s name was on the bottle. It wasn’t. There was name there, but it was followed by ‘canine.’ It had already been determined that the medication contained was the correct one, but I compared it to the pills left from the last Rx and confirmed that for myself, as well.

I was asked if I could bring them back, because one of the prescriptions given was a narcotic and they needed to correct the owner’s names for their dispensary records. I explained that I had been one of the front-row right-outside-the- front-door sitters waiting for a jump and had already dropped my car off to be examined.

Oddly enough, the other car with the canine got my label and I got theirs. Maybe our difficulties were some sort of cosmic delay so that the office could notice their problem while we were still there. If so, the universe failed us, all.

But, that’s not the important part. Or maybe it was, because it became a catalyst for this revelation.

I’ve mostly adjusted to the odd and unusual situations I find myself in.

I think there’s a pre-programmed, mental-shrugging mechanism that becomes active in over-accepting, mid-life minds. I mean, by the time you’ve heaved over the hump, you’re aware stuff goes wrong and freak outs aren’t really worth the effort, anymore.

Quote for the Week:

ps. amendously isn’t a real dictionary word. It is, however, a 100% original Knabbler word.

Advertisement

more usual than un-

As Jeff requested, we went straight home. Didn’t stop to eat on a Friday night, which was unusual, for us.

I cooked that night. Nothing unusual. Just my usual, my-turn-to-cook, spaghetti and meat sauce. Quick, easy, and yummy;  only because Jeff had taught me how to doctor up the jarred stuff. Fresh garlic and onions, sautéed with the meat, and finished with generous handfuls of fresh grated parmesan, made all the difference.

Jeff ducked into the shower, while I was prepping. He announced that he had sweat enough for a whole week that day, and needed some freshenin’ up. He was in there a little longer than I thought he would be. I considered checking on him, but he appeared, just then, in fine spirits.

“What can I do?” he asked, brightly.

“You can go sit down and relax,” I said. “Dinner’s almost done.”

“Supper,” he jokingly corrected me.

It was our usual, silly corny routine. The result of early dating differences, and trying to convince each other what the proper name for our evening meal should be. A lot like the next Saturday/this Saturday debate. After a few, important, miss-communications, we’d decided it was best to always supply a numeric date, when discussing the future.

Happily headed to the den, Jeff parked himself in his chair, legs elevated, as usual. I was stirring the cooked pasta into the sauce, when the phone rang. The one-sided part of the conversation I could hear, was Jeff laughing and saying, “Oh, hi. Yes, I’m fine. Feelin’ great now. Must be…. ’cause I even got my appetite back. Just waitin’ on the wife to serve me up some supper!”

I playfully arched an eyebrow at him through the pass-thru. “Oh, I’ve done it now,” he laughed, said his goodbye, and hung up.

The check-in was from the owner of the business who had taken our original 10’x10′ spot at the mall. They hadn’t been open all that long. I’d only, recently, met him and his wife.

But, Jeff, as usual, had encouraged them, and advised them, and in the course of the day when there were few customers, extracted most everything there was to know about his new friend.

“Wow.” I thought on that for a second. “That was really nice.”

“Yeah,” Jeff nodded. “That was real nice…”

I delivered Jeff’s serving, along with his usual big glass of white milk. On my way back to the kitchen, I stopped before rounding the short, separating wall.

“So, you must have really scared him, too. Huh?”

“Nah. I didn’t scare him,” he negated. “She did that!”

Quote for the Week:

 

 

 

Couched

To say that I’d become accustomed to coming home to some sort of weird situation, is putting it mildly.

This time, Jeff was sitting-up on our living room couch. His head was bent as if he were scrutinizing his foot-ware. It took me a moment to realize he was fast asleep.

The sitting-up-sleeping thing wasn’t the unusual part. It was the fact that he’d couched. We rarely used our formal living room, even though it was right inside our front door.

All the good stuff, like the TV, stereo, surround-sound, book cases and treadmill lived in the den. It was where we spent the majority of our evenings, at home.

He woke up as I finished rustling in. “Oh, hey!” he said, cheerfully, like he hadn’t been completely conked-out. “You’re home early!”

I checked my watch. It was, indeed, a few minutes earlier than normal. “You’re right,” I agreed. “It’s only 5:45.”

“Huh. 5:45?” Jeff frowned. “I was just resting a minute after… oops!”

Wind-milling his legs for propulsion, he pushed off the couch, unsteadily heading toward our Dale Earnhardt shrine-home office.

Paused in the doorway, Jeff threw his arms up in frustration. “Aw, dang it! I never got the groceries put up!”

“When did you go shopping?” I asked, following. Gathering up bags, Jeff answered, “On my way back from dropping off the boxes.”

“When was that?” I prodded. He thought for a few seconds.

“I dunno.” He replied, pulling on his beard. “Sometime around 2:30-ish, I guess. I think I was home by 3:30.”

I was still processing that Jeff had been shoe-inspecting, sleep-sitting for over two hours, when the house phone rang.

Grabbing a few bags on my way to the kitchen to answer the call, I commented over my shoulder. “The milk’s probably no good, but everything else should be ok.”

“The milk’s probably ok, too,” Jeff hopefully argued, as he followed me.

I wrinkled my nose. He just laughed, and headed back to the other end of the house for the rest of the goods.

“Well, you’re the one that’s going to have to drink it…” I amusedly called after him.

I set the groceries on the counter near the phone, and picked up the receiver.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Hon!” the cheerful voice on the other end greeted me. We were lucky enough to have the sweetest, most sunshiny neighbor.

“Oh, I’m just checkin'” she chuckled. “Did Jeff tell you about the car, today?”

“About the car?” I squeaked.

Quote for the Week: