A Day Beyond Ratbaggery
I have been sitting here staring at the blank screen for a while. I have an obvious opening for tonight’s blog entry, to wit:
I am not stupid enough to say ‘this day can’t get any worse’. It can always get worse.* But for a day that hasn’t involved major blood loss it would be very difficult for it to get any worse.**
. . . The problem is that a few of the things that are driving me over the incandescent edge are nothing I wish to air in public.*** And I’m so busy trying not to eat anyone†, punch my fists through any walls, or inadvertently set fire to the town centre–speaking of incandescent–by walking through it,†† that I’m not sure I’m up to making a good story out of the little dumb stuff. But the first rule of blogging is Do Not Waste Good Material, and the last item on my suitable-for-communal-delectation list should definitely not be wasted.
So. My little list of trials.
In the first place it is still hot. I do not like it when it is hot. So as background to what follows imagine a vague oppressive headache and an energy level of about 30%.
The house painter who is supposed to be finishing kitchen and bath at Third House has disappeared. Not only do I desperately want the builders OUT of there††† . . . I want to know if the frelling blue in the bathroom is going to match the frelling tiles.
My hay fever, having been absent so far this season, and which is, indeed, wearing off as I get older, just like they told you it would, and despite the innumerable temptations floating in the air of lush southern England, has suddenly staged a comeback.
A few days ago I made reference to the fact that I have an honest-to-Jehosaphat film contract to sign. It’s worth about $7.50 but The System Is the System and part of the Hollywood system is that you have to get your signature on a contract notarised. There are notary publics on every street corner in the States, right? Waving their little stamps and offering a three-for-one deal and a free pizza. Not over here. Over here they’re a rare, valuable breed which must be sought out by arcane ways and, once found, placated with gold and costly gifts.‡
So this morning I got up what passes in my world as early to get the hellhounds hurtled‡‡ before I drove half across Hampshire to beard a notary public in her gilded lair.‡‡‡ Turns out the roadworks that are making my immediate vicinity dusty, noisy, and mostly impassable, extend a considerable distance . . . including most of the way to the notary’s. By the time I got back the car was turning into a deep-fat fryer and I was starting to feel a trifle wombly.
I also got back just about in time for the Descent of the Computer Men. Both Peter and I are having issues§ so I managed to get about half my lunch eaten and a few fires put out, continuing the incendiary theme, by email, before Computer Men, having striven well on Peter’s behalf, turned to me. My issues have a habit of being more exciting, since they exist as a result of a clueless technosilly having way more complicated toys than she is capable of coping with. Or, sometimes, than they are capable of coping with.
They were here for three hours, while I twitched and twiddled and thought about the pages of PEGASUS I wasn’t getting written. I have several computers: a true warrior princess would get out another computer and settle down to do some work, despite the alarming and distracting presence of Computer Men.
After they left, and I turned my freshly enhanced kit back on and pressed a few buttons . . . I got a lot of errors messages saying ‘cannot open. This file is corrupt.’
I rang Computer Men.
Computer Men are coming back tomorrow. So I can waste another day.
And . . . remember the handbell wedding? Which is now two days away? And how our fourth is having back trouble and so dropped out, but Darcy and Niall and I–and Darcy’s new puppy–were going to be there with, as it were, bells on?
Darcy has broken her wrist.
* * *
* Even when there’s only about an hour of it left. But how do the gods of worseness count days? I don’t trust them to close down at midnight when my ‘day’ tends to carry on a while after that.
** Just to ensure that I hadn’t forgotten that I was having a day of unparalleled ratbagness, we couldn’t get through a touch of Stedman tonight at ringing practise.^ Although I don’t think it was me.
^ Yes, I thought about staying home and getting some PEGASUS done. And I thought, if I’m going to wreck something, I’d rather wreck a ringing practise than a page of PEGASUS.
*** I assume that regular readers of this blog will have figured out that it’s not only that I am a cranky, overreactive cow whose daily existence is a series of ridiculous superficialities, but that in fact there are also great swathes of my life that you hear nothing about.
† With, I fear, mixed results
†† Hellhounds, fortunately, being hellhounds, are fireproof
††† Except that they’ll have to come back. The new front door still hasn’t arrived. Oh yes, and we’re also still missing one tile of the eight that make the splashback in the attic bathroom . . . and the tile company is planning to charge us £20 shipping when it finally comes back in stock. My builder promises to argue about it.
‡ No joke. The one I didn’t use charges £250. Yes, you read that right. Merrilee’s assistant found me the one I did use. The internet is a wonderful thing. Especially under the fingers of someone young and clued-in.
‡‡ Which meant I was out there with a lot of other dog walkers. This is not a good thing.
‡‡‡ I asked her why–ahem!–notary publics cost as much as a weekend at the Dorchester when back in the States you get a free pizza. She said because a notary public is first a lawyer and then takes additional training. I didn’t ask what in. Advanced Stamping?
§ Peter got them first, while I hastily tried to find one of the things I needed them for. He came out of his office, where they were vying with demons, and said to me proudly, I’ve baffled them.
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