Written @ 10:43 p.m. on 2007-09-22
Angry
I had an angry day today. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRrrrrrrrr.
Angry, yet strikingly productive. It was as if I was posessed by an amazon warrior who tackled projects instead of mearly completing tasks.
I threw out half of my children's toys. I asked them to clean up. They poked at the seething gelatinous mass, and I decided it was lesson time.
"These things, this huge pile of things are the things that you own. You don't even know what you own, but somewhere, parts disassembled, broken, unused, in this pile is all your stuff. IT OWNS YOU. When you have something, even if its just a little thing, it needs a place, it needs a job, it needs to be appreciated. Stickers need to be appreciated. Coloring books need to be appreciated. Everything. You OWE something to every object in your posession.
If you have 80 coloring books, you aren't taking proper care. You can't. You can't use them, you can't find a place for them, and you certainly don't have time to appreciate 80 coloring books. We are going to keep the things we can appreciate, and get rid of everything else. NOW! EVERYTHING ELSE!"
We filled 2 garbage bags. Seven hundred dried up markers, old glue sticks and strings. A million strings. Packaging from behind the bed, near the garbage can, and behind the door...cellophane and sticky labels. Broken doll babies and 70 of the 80 coloring books. All the little colored paper pieces from a million projects. Puzzle pieces and half eaten birthday goodie bags.
"THESE ARE YOUR BATMAN TOYS!" I roared. "In this box right here. I'm not throwing them out. Don't worry. I'm putting them here and you are going to do your part. Play with them and appreciate them from this second on! CHildren, these are the things we CHOSE to own. We want these batman toys, we aren't just keeping them for the sole reason that it's "stuff". The stuff demands care, and we can't care for all this stuff!"
I think the kids got it. They didn't cry and scream. They watched with saucer eyes, and then they helped. They filled the bags and they made the beds, and they put everything else neatly on shelves. It was beautiful.
Then, the vacuum cleaner. My apartment came with the same, beige cheap-ass carpet that almost every apartment I have ever had has. It eats vacuum cleaners because when you vacuum the carpet, the carpet disintegrates, and clogs the vacuum. I've read about the environmental impact of said carpets, and I am sure I might as well be a coal miner. Instead of black lung, we all have beige lung.
So, in my rage, I get a knife and I cut all of the fibers off the brush roller, and fish all of the fuzz out of the orifices/ Dust spews everywhere. Like a cave man in a pile of my own filth, I grunt with satisfaction. I fixed the damned vacuum.
Since I was on such a roll, I decided to call the Redbox movie people, and give them a piece of my mind. Have you tried these little machines that let you rent a dvd for a dollar? Sweet, right? Until it is time to return the movie, and the machine won't accept returns. They are supposed to, but they don't. So, I get charged late charges. Au contraire, mon frair! Not with Hil, Amazon woman at the helm. Needless to say, I'm sorry, Mr. Customer Service Rep, that you had to deal with me today. It was an angry day, you understand. I got my refund.
Oh, but I'm not done! Family meeting time! The bunny had his trial, and was judge by a jury of his peers. He's guilty, and will be relocated. He has bitten his last child, eaten his last book, and destroyed his last carpet. The decision was brought down with the smash of my parental gavel.
Bunnies do not make good pets.
What else? Furniture. Moved. Windows. Cleaned. Slip covers. Laundered.
Don't fuck with me.