Sunday afternoon I was folding Fred’s laundry and putting it away, trying to get the chore done and over with so I could go upstairs and hang out with the McMaos, when the goddamn alarm went off. Our doors and windows are alarmed, and the alarm system is somehow tied into the smoke detectors so that when a smoke detector goes off, so does the whole house alarm.
So the alarm system went off and I was all “WTF?”, and went into the dining room to turn the alarm system off. It turned off, but the smoke alarm kept blaring, and I was all “Where the fucking FUCK is Fred?!”
Truly, I don’t know how on earth he does it, but every fucking time there’s something going on in the house where I can use his help, he is NOWHERE TO BE FOUND.
Then I thought “Well, crap. I hope that smoke alarm isn’t going off because, y’know, there’s a FIRE.” It was the one upstairs, so I ran up to make sure nothing was burning and to get the goddamn smoke alarm to shut the fuck up. As it turned out, I’d lit a candle in the bathroom, and it was smoking a tiny bit, but certainly nothing that should have set off the fucking smoke alarm. I blew out the candle and grabbed a towel and tried waving the towel at the smoke alarm, in hopes that it would cause any smoke around the alarm to dissipate and perhaps the alarm would shut itself off, but nay.
Do you suppose there’s anything at all in the upstairs of our house that I could drag under the smoke alarm so I could yank it out of its mooring and pull the batteries out? AGAIN I SAY NAY.
I ran downstairs and stepped onto the side stoop and bellowed “HEY!”, and because my bellow is a loud bellow, Fred popped up from the other side of the compost heap and was all “Wha?” I bellowed “Could you COME IN HERE PLEASE!”, and then I shut the door and went into the dining room and grabbed a chair and hauled it upstairs. Then I grabbed the goddamn smoke alarm and pullled both batteries out of it, and finally the ear-piercing scream of the smoke detector was silenced.
Then I carried the smoke detector, the batteries, and the dining room chair back downstairs, and as I reached the dining room, Fred finally moseyed through the door.
While I was bitching at him about the fact that when there’s some emergency requiring his presence inside the house, it would be much appreciated if he’d pick his pace up from a mosey to perhaps a saunter IF IT WOULDN’T BE TOO MUCH DIFFICULTY, I somehow failed to mention that it was the candle I’d been burning that set off the fucking thing in the first place.
What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him, right?
(And when I went in to check on the McMaos, sure that they’d be freaked out by all the noise, they were all sleepily rolling around with not a care in the world.)
So? Has everyone been watching Extreme Couponing? I set the DVR to record it, and one day last weekend when we were looking for something to watch, Fred expressed some interest in watching that show, which surprised me. We watched a couple of episodes, and it was oddly fascinating.
I occasionally use coupons (though I tend not to go out of my way to get them), and have even once or twice scored some pretty awesome deals. I’d LOVE to spend $50 for $600 worth of groceries, but I just don’t have the patience to devote the amount of time to figuring out the deals the way some of the people on that show do. If I spend $30 at Publix and save (according to the receipt) $15 or more, I’m usually pretty happy with that.
I do follow blogs that figure out the deals for you – if you go to my links list, there’s a “frugal” section over there on the right – but I’m always so far behind in my blog reading that the majority of the time I glance at the post titles to see if there’s anything that grabs my attention, and then hit the “mark all as read” button without reading them.
I would usually vow to do better at figuring ways to save money, but given that we have freezers full of our own veggies and meat and don’t eat much canned stuff, I’m going to declare that I think we’re doing just fine.
(But given that we’re down to our last two rolls of toilet paper in the entire house, I’ll be dragging my ass to Sam’s soon. Y’all let me know if you run across any awesome deals on Scott Tissue toilet paper, would you?)
Comfy Rufus.
Rufus, fangin’ it.
Can you believe these babies are two weeks old?
First, the videos. In the first, Fergus Simon and one of his brothers (I’m not sure who) flail around and bite each other.
In the second, you can see how they get around. Not bad for two weeks old!
The amazed face over there on the right is cracking me UP.
Fergus Simon and his serious little face.
The pouty princess (Ciara) and Fergus Simon.
Cillian seems worried.
Macushla, giving me a bit of the ol’ attitude.
Finnegan, wandering.
Sweet Declan, wondering what’s going on.
The Anderson kitties (and Rufus) are nuts for ham.
Previously
2010: No entry.
2009: No entry.
2008: Kara’s birth story.
2007: I don’t know that I’ll know how to act when I’ve got internet whenever I want it, it’s been so damn long since I’ve had it!
2006: No entry.
2005: Taking the week off.
2004: No entry.
2003: Fred: That was a cowardly yellow-dog liberal DEMOCRAT thing to say.
2002: Things are getting back to normal.
2001: One of these days I’ll get my ass in gear; I just never know when that day will be.
2000: Squooshiness begets squooshiness, you know.