Enough about you, let's talk about me!

Tessa's home! Our house is full of life, laundry and laughter. And napping. At this moment she's describing her perfect vacation...A place where the beds are exquisitely soft and the temperature is set for comfortable sleeping...where there are no clocks to tell you it's time to get up.

Miss Tessa likes to be the center of attention, when she's not napping. And we are happy to oblige. Only six more days before we have to send her back. I want all the time I can get!

Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

So last week I was out on the dental van as usual. It had been two good days and we were at the beginning of our third. The van was due at Muskogee Head Start by 8:30, so I decided a quick stop at Starbucks was in order. For those who know me well, they know that passing a Starbucks without stopping if almost a physical impossibility. But I've been trying to eat healthy and count my calories, so a caramel machiatto and scone isn't really on the list. But I'd been doing well and thought it would be a little treat. You can probably see where this is going... Let's just say that between picking up the caramel machiatto and heading towards downtown Muskogee, a ditch intervened. I managed to drop the right rear wheel over a curb and into a ditch, leaving me teetering on three wheels and cursing. Whip out the iphone, hop on the internet, find a tow truck, call the police to tell them I'm blocking the street, sit down and try to enjoy my Starbucks while I wait. Grrr.
The day pretty much stayed downhill from there. There was no "going" downhill when you start with a bang like that. Fun. I won't go into great detail, but the remainder of the day included the dentist sliding under the van to get a jack to go up, stopping at Walmart in Henrietta to buy automotive duct tape to keep the windshield from falling off (thanks to a prior incident which was NOT my fault), and being treated to a little indecent exposure from a guy standing on the side of the highway who thought it was a good idea to let it all flap in the breeze.

I was never so glad to see home.

Leap year make up day

News flash!! It's the first day of March! We enjoyed a whole extra day in our lives yesterday. February 29th - an extra 24 hours that we don't get just any old year. I'm thinking it makes up for a little of the wasted time in the past four years:

• on hold with the health insurance companies
• trying to understand how insurance companies think
• trying to explain that ADD does not magically go away after the age of 20, although the insurance company no longer recognizes it as an illness after the age of 20
• trying to explain that arthritis should be a good-enough reason to go to see the doctor
• on hold with the cable company
• trying to convince the cable company that I really am Cari, even though I failed the security questions because I can't remember my 4 digit pin number I set up more than four years ago
• on hold with the bank
• trying to explain why I want to order a fourth bank card for Tessa
• trying to explain to the bank that I really am Cari even though I failed the security question because the address they have on record is not my actual address, which is not my fault, since it hasn't changed in years, but because of security reasons they can't tell me what address they have on record so I can help them understand why it's not my actual address
• on hold with the car insurance company
• trying to explain why Angela should not be at fault in a car accident where a very large truck rear-ended her on the highway
• trying to understand why the insurance company will not provide a rental car, even though we have that in our policy, but apparently since the car was totalled there is no longer a car to have a policy for, so there is no rental car benefit - even though this is exactly a reason why we have a rental car benefit in our policy

Actually, I think the combined total of all of the above was more than 24 hours. Bummer. Oh well. At least I spent Feb 29th doing something good for a bunch of grateful people. That makes the extra day meaningful.