Murphy’s Law and Conference Calls: My Day in a Nutshell

I was having a pretty decent day today, until around 8 AM. That’s when it all fell apart.

As I tossed laundry into the washing machine, my daughter called. She’d left the house 10 minutes earlier and stopped at Starbuck$ on her way to school. Leaving her car running, she went in for her drink–but her driver’s side door froze shut, and all her other doors were locked, so she had to be rescued.

I hadn’t even had my coffee yet at that point.

Arriving home, I quickly downed some breakfast and got ready to go to daily Mass for the first time all month (and maybe only the third time this year). I almost fell apart when Hubs suggested that we take care of a banking errand right now. Fortunately he was willing to wait until after church.

He’s home today, because his office has no power. That means he’s been spending most of the day on conference calls.

On speakerphone.

Conference calls involving 75 computer programmers do not provide the world’s most fascinating eavesdropping, for the record.

I made my usual runs to Little Brother’s school to hang in there with him while he had his before-snack and before-lunch glucose tests and shots. He says he needs me there…I’m serving as a security blanket of sorts, I guess. Whatever helps. On my way back from the second school run, I was in Hubs’ car because he’d blocked mine in. I pulled into the driveway, listening to the Catholic Guy show in satellite radio, and suddenly heard some unfamiliar voices talking about “the primary user.”

“What the hell?!” I yelled, turning off the car engine and suddenly realizing what had happened.

Hubs was using his cell phone for the conference call. He hadn’t turned off the Bluetooth.

Fortunately, he had it on MUTE, so his career was in no way jeopardized by my hollering.

But honestly, I was really feeling like a mess today. All I wanted was a good cry and a Big Mac. I couldn’t cry until I got back from that second run, because I didn’t want to be in school with red eyes–all the kids there know me and I have to be able to smile when I see them. And I didn’t get the Big Mac, because Hubs wanted to go to lunch together at the diner.

They brought me the wrong omelet, and I got to listen to a lecture on 99 experimental treatments for juvenile diabetes.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m glad they are doing research. But I’m just trying to get my diabetic child through the next meal. I don’t have room, mentally or emotionally, for experimental treatments, the Defcon 3 Continuous Glucose Monitor, or artificial pancreases (pancrei?)

I still want that Big Mac, and I still want a good cry, but I can’t have either one right now because it’s time to pick Little Brother up at school.

7 thoughts on “Murphy’s Law and Conference Calls: My Day in a Nutshell

  1. Yes, I hope today is better. Some days are just the perfect storm of disasters and moods, aren’t they? I don’t know if you got your cry—-sometimes I find it helps, and other times it doesn’t. Sometimes we just have to get through it and fall, gratefully, into bed.

  2. I love your sense of humor that brings such levity to a very relevant topic! We have had so many days much like the one you described, but I confess that I am not often one to search for the humor in it all.

  3. Thank you for bringing such humor to an otherwise catastrophic day. I can relate to a lot of what you posted on most mornings, and I admire the fact that you actually MAKE it to daily Mass! I confess I haven’t made it to daily Mass in over a year, since our infant daughter was born. And I truly miss it. But it always makes me smile when I read a blog posting from a fellow harried mom who actually can bring light on the subject, which I struggle with greatly!

    • Jeannie–sorry you had to post twice. I have it set to approve comments when it’s a new commenter, so I guess you posted a second time when you didn’t see the first one come up! (But I have to keep the spammers away…)
      I make it to daily Mass NOW. Go back in my archives and you’ll see some stories of my struggles with Little Brother was, well, little, I brought him when he was a newborn, but once he started getting loud, I let discouragement get the better of me.
      Go if you can–even if you can only stay a little while. There will probably be people who love seeing you and your baby there. There will be others who don’t, and will let you know it. The people who loved seeing us more than made up for the others. Read here: http://franciscanmom.com/2010/02/25/r-i-p-the-hat-lady/
      And enjoy your baby! 🙂

  4. Hugs and more hugs Barb!! I remember when our oldest was so ill with his heart problems and every phone call I made resulted in money for research. I needed help to get through the next day, the problems with the school, all the challenges and heart break.

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