Raise Your Hand If You're a Dumbass

Well, it's been a while.

Let me first say you don't want this flu crap that is going around. It does horrid things to one's body. Terrible, horrible things emit from various orifices. Trust me. I had it. In fact, I celebrated my oldest son's 18th birthday by hurling out the back door because I knew there was no way I was going to make it to the bathroom when the wave of nausea hit me out of nowhere.

I'm just not one of those puker sorts, either. I will actually will myself not to pay homage to the porcelain god. "I'm not going to throw up. I will not throw up. Nope. I'm not going to throw up. I refuse to throw up," will be the thought process as I'm talking myself out of it. When this hit, I didn't even have time to think about it.

Take your Airborne. Spray yourself down with Lysol. Don a surgical mask. Drink your O.J. and load up on vitamin C if necessary because I can't emphasize enough how much you do not want this particular strain of the plague.

In other news, my poor old laptop went off to the great computer graveyard in the sky. I'd had it for quite a number of years, so I shouldn't have been surprised. But it's par for the course that this time of the year something will decide to go off and be with Jesus. One year, it was the water heater. The next, it was the refrigerator. Another year, it was the stove when my oven stopped working.

It was something in the ability to run off A/C power that caused the problem. The battery would charge so long as the laptop was not running. My husband even tried hardwiring it, but to no avail. I wish I could get excited about this new one. It's nice and all, but it was definitely not something I wanted to add to the monthly budget this close to Christmas. Luckily, I was able to get my files off of it. That's a relief all things considered.

Another fun bit from the past week involves the attic panel that resides in the utility room ceiling, my left hand, and my skull. I'd fixed it once, which is probably why what happened did actually happen. The trim pieces that serve as a lip to hold it in place weren't doing the job. I prodded around a bit, and since the ceiling is so low, I was able to stand on my tippy toes while doing this. I thought I'd had it positioned correctly and securely, but after seeing stars, I knew I was wrong.

It was all because of instincts that I tried maiming myself. The dryer buzzed, and like an idiot, I turned my head to the direction of the sound. It's not like I hadn't heard that infernal buzzer buzz a gazillion times or more because laundry is my life. Anyway, I looked, and looked back up just in time to see the panel, which weighs no less than 30 lbs, plummeting towards my noggin.

As I've learned in my life, you can't fight gravity or human instinct. My caveman genes said to me, "Protect your head, you damned fool!" So, listening as one is apt to do when the danger is present, I raised my left hand to shield my grey matter.

My first thought was something like $*$% @ %$^% &^@ @! &*$%, which loosely translate into, "There. I've gone and done it. I've finally broken something besides my little toe."

I had quite the lump on my head for a few days. My hand is still a bit bruised and tender, but I don't think it's broken. I seemed to have regained use of it for the most part. And the attic panel? Still not fixed. The pain killers? Absolutely wonderful.

One might wonder why I didn't just take a step back and avoid the whole scene? That I can't answer. It didn't occur to me to flee. Nope, I just stood there like an idiot raising my hand as if to answer "Who's the dumbass? Raise your hand."

I've been raising my hand a lot these days.