The Difficulties of Motherhood

So here I was thinking that I had absolutely nothing to say today - not that it would have stopped me from saying something, you understand - when, just as I was sitting down to eat dinner I got a text message from my adorable child reading "Mom! Read your email IMMEDIATELY!"

Well, of course, my first thought was, "Oh, my God, who died?" (Yeah, well, when one has elderly family members...) So I stuck my plate in the microwave (not only to heat it up when I got back to my dinner, but also because with three cats, one doesn't leave unattended food if one wishes to find it there when one returns) and raced up to the computer.

It turns out that a certain person I gave birth to was merely stuck on a paper that had to be emailed within the next hour.

Okay, I will admit that it's nice to be seen as the font of all wisdom. But Jesus Christ...did the damn paper have to be on The Canterbury Tales? With quotes in Olde English? Have you got any idea whatsoever how many years it's been since I went anywhere near Chaucer in the original? (Do you actually care?)

I am here to tell you that I am EXTREMELY proud of myself because, by God, I waded through the paper and found that I could still read Olde English (or maybe Middle English...which I tend to confuse with Middle Earth). Of course, that may have a lot to do with the fact that in my day, people would read Chaucer on account of it's mostly fairly dirty. Beowulf in the original Anglo-Saxon got a LOT fewer takers. (That was originally in Anglo-Saxon, wasn't it? It's been a LONG time.)

But, honestly. I realize that parents are supposed to rally round in a crisis, but why do I have a kid with a crisis in Olde/Middle English?

In other news, there's absolutely nothing, except for the fact that I just discovered via good old CNN that my income tax rebate will be one of the first to be mailed out, which I think is neat. This is presuming I GET one, which I suppose I should, after all these years of being a loyal taxpayer - a fairly grumpy one, to be sure, but loyal (out of necessity - otherwise they send you to jail, don't they?) all the same.

And I've finally got proper full medical coverage! This was very exciting to me, until I found out the catch. I've been paying for five prescriptions by the week (on account of no insurance) at full price, which was running me about $115 per week. Well, now that my coverage has kicked in, I pay $147 a month. This is great - except that the insurance costs me $118 per week. I don't know whether this is a step forward or backward. Ah, well - at least I now have excellent hospitalization, should I, God forbid, break a leg or something.

And a very happy Amateur Night - oh, sorry, I used to be a bartender - St. Patrick's Day to you.

Love, Wendy