VI: Put Me Back (Together Wrong)

Here's a novel one. Writing a blog post at 9:41 AM on a Monday.

Let me explain. Saturday night, I was getting into the car. I closed the door and heard a crunch. The door had closed on the pocket of my big winter coat. And that pocket just happened to have my phone in it.

My phone is now inoperable. I spent Sunday morning running around trying to see if I could get it fixed but nobody could get the needed part here before Tuesday. One shop even intimated that the problem may be with the motherboard. He indicated that if it was, there would be nothing I could do, but I have since learned that it is possible to replace a motherboard, provided you can source a working part. Hm.

With no phone until Tuesday evening at the earliest, I'm a little out of sorts. Okay, I'm on the computer doing stuff. But I used to alternate stuff with distractions like games and passively refreshing social media. There's only so much of that I can do on the laptop, although it's also probably healthier not to anyway. My brain is a little frazzled and it's also going to impede my communication level with Mel while she works, but we can make do.

It was going to be a noteworthy weekend anyway. Saturday was mom's 70th birthday, the main feature of which was that the guys and I put it together. By which I mean, a few weeks ago, Brandon texted to say, "Hey, mom's birthday is coming up, should we do something?" and I then figured out what that would be. We arranged for the aunts to come -- Gail wasn't going to come because they just got a new dog but Cam wasn't feeling well so he stayed home and Gail came. We ordered catering from Jimmy the Greek, which was a big hit, with the caveat that I had to go pick it up which ended up taking a while... if I were to do it again, I'd probably alter the timing so that I got it in advance, especially since it had to be heated up anyway. There was also an obscene amount of rice, which merited a lot of commentary. We all had our share though. Maybe could have done with another salad. We ended up taking a lot home. Hank was there, mostly curled up on the couch in his sweater, very fawned over.

Long convos into the night. You know, whenever you get my mom and aunts together it's a long trip down memory lane. Then after they left it was more family chat until we made our exit, went home and had a second skewer each for second dinner (we'd had a late breakfast so we were light on dinner.)

Sunday was Mel's hair appointment day. This was delayed from last week when there was the insane snowfall. Mel was booked at 4:20, so we had this scheme of going over to her parents for dinner. The plan was for me to drop her off, then bring Hank to her parents' place, say a quick hello and come back to pick her up because she wasn't expecting to be very long. The lack of a cell phone complicated this a little but not much.

We got a bit of a late start out the door, but by the time I got to the in-laws, Mel texted her dad to reveal that her hairdresser was running behind and she'd be an hour later to see her. Well then. We sat and chatted, and Mama H came home and we chatted some more. Hank settled on the dog bed after trying to eat a spider plant (that's a new one.) We decided what to order for dinner from the Chinese place, then at 6 I was getting my shoes on to go when Mel texted anyway to say she was ready, so that worked out.

A nice evening was had. We tried to fix the magnification settings on Mama H's tablet, to no avail. We put some pieces in their puzzle. (We dropped off some of the puzzles we'd done this winter, in exchange for some from them.) Mel was feeling drowsy and eventually a little bit of stomach upset so when we got home she went right into bed and I sat up, doing not-having-phone things.

Such is life. Hey, what can I say.

Back on Friday, I spent some time cleaning the front hallway at Mel's behest. It felt good to accomplish something tangible. There are other things I really should do. No idea when any of them might happen though.

Keep on rockin'

-Scotto