Grouchy

The morning started out fine, except that I woke up at 5:30 and couldn't go back to sleep. Excited, I guess, about today's roadtrip. So I got up early and made coffee and got nicely caffeinated while reading the news (and by news I mean my favorite blogs). And then I packed all of my perfectly folded (to avoid wrinkles) clothes very precisely into my suitcase, a pre-trip ritual that I typically savor, a sort of obsessive-compulsive delicacy if you will. And then I did what I normally do when there are vegetables in the fridge that aren't likely to be eaten before they're past their prime: I put a huge pot of water on the stove and chucked them all in to simmer for a few hours while I got ready for work. If you're never made your own vegetable broth, you don't know what you're missing. It's so easy, so cheap, and makes use of those veggies that are on the bubble...too wilted to munch on, but still too perky to toss. So far, so good, I thought. It was shaping up to be an excellent day.

But then I couldn't fit all the dirty dishes into the dishwasher and had to HAND WASH some --horror of horrors -- which made my hands all dry and scratchy, and I think I can feel a hangnail starting to form. And then I tripped a breaker while blow drying my hair and couldn't for the life of me get the little breaker switch to stay flipped in the proper direction. And then, when I was throwing out the cooked veggies after straining off the broth, I missed the garbage can and dumped the entire pot onto my left foot, covering one of my new shoes in a mountain of sloppy vegetable mush. To their credit, the shoes cleaned up nicely, and the only reminder of the incident is the fact that one of my shoes now smells...well,vegetable infused, for lack of a better term.

Despite what you may think, I didn't come here just to gripe. I also came to ask you to pray for James today, if you do that sort of thing. Because the poor guy has to sit in a car with his grouchy, scratchy, vegetable infused wife all the way to Oregon today, and he's going to need all the help he can get. So send him patient vibes and keep him in your thoughts. Oh, and if you have thoughts to spare, I know a certain hangnail that could use a little attention...