I don’t care what happens tomorrow…

…I am not leaving this Den!

A tornado has spun through this house. There can be no other explanation for the accumulation of crap on every surface, in every drawer, the crud on the bathroom counters, the laundry (dear God, the laundry), the bills that have not been paid, the invoices that have not been mailed out, the marks on the walls and the solid-crumb flooring we have apparently permanently installed in the kitchen.

I am two seconds from hiring a cleaning service.

Yesterday, I was going to deal with Things, but it was that early release day thing and I ended up ‘out’ puttering around dealing with Stupid Crap instead of the house. Meanwhile, the Den was cheerfully piling up crap upon crap on every surface.

Today, though, was going to be Different. I had no errands that needed running, nothing needing to be bought, sold, traded, or otherwise dealt with…

...oh…except for dropping off cupcakes at school for Eldest’s tenth birthday, which OH YEAH was today.

And getting the sutures removed from the Space Formerly Known As Tooth #3.

Also, having an impromptu meeting with a teacher about a child who is driving us both crazy.

Then, it was remembered that I hadn’t yet picked up a birthday present for Eldest.

And the sutures reminded me that I had wanted to open a token account at a local credit union because they have a member benefit providing discounted dental and vision – two things the current employer does not offer. Also two things which are killing us dead. Have I mentioned that Tooth #3 has thus far cost me almost $3,000, and I still have a $700 crown to go? Or that one uninsured trip to the dentist simply for x-rays and cleanings for the three female Denizens costs us $750?

@*&^@.

Sooooooo, I went to open the token account and then they had a 7% offer on a one year CD, and an 8% offer for minors, and then there were transfers made and savings accounts earning 3.25% were moved to the 8% deal and I’ve deferred my own wild-eyed spending for a year to get 7% and HOLY CRAP, it’s WHAT TIME?!?!

THEN I had to come home and put together the Birthday Dinner of steak, mashed potatoes and birthday cake which, by the way, still had to be baked…

Meanwhile, the Den had called a dump truck and invited it, and a few of its buddies, to come on over and off-load an entire landfill worth of trash-trash-trash all over itself.

I am officially not going anywhere tomorrow. I am doing nothing else, NOTHING I TELL YOU, but finding the conflabbed floor in this wretched excuse for a house. Also I am getting those invoices mailed out (the bills, however, can wait).

I am also going to spend some amount of time calling up cleaning services and getting quotes. I know what they are going to tell me: Something around $150 a week, or $280 every two weeks, or $450 for monthly. I already know this. And that I will recoil in horror and, for a few weeks, have tremendous house-cleaning energy.

It would probably save time to just skip right to the chase, recoil in horror and get the energy.

But where would be the fun in that?!

Seriously, though. I don’t care what the problem is. I don’t care if we’re out of oxygen, I am NOT! going to any store, ANY STORE, tomorrow. I am staying home, and taking care of home-centric business.

Hallelujah, amen.