Five Nights

A lot can happen in five nights. Just when things get back to normal – you know, forks and knives pointing down in the dishwasher, all rolls of toilet paper in the house installed correctly – over the top, of course and the garage door is closed all the way down; I’m back in the Exit Row again.

I’m not saying that these things are all that important in the way our house is run on a daily basis. That is just the way I like things to be. I mean it is OK with the Betty if no matter which way she is facing, “that is north.” It works for her just like her map – north is always straight away. Me, I kind of like knowing where north really is. I need to actually get there on time. I don’t do late.

So, tonight I am on the plane again – only this night is Sunday night. Hey, not my plan; but the boss who just loves Friday afternoon conference calls decided that I need to be in Los Angeles on Monday morning for an 8:00 meeting, so here I am heading north to California. I just know that by Tuesday the paper in the master bath will be rolling from under and there will be a dinner fork pointing up mocking my absence. Betty says, “what’s the difference if they all go in the dishwasher?” I guess she is right since she was the one doing the dishes – it’s just when I start bleeding when I unload it that her system presents a problem.

Last week I am at the hotel and go to get my socks and sneakers to get my walk in for the day – and the two white socks don’t match that were paired together. So, what’s the big deal – who will know, right? Well, I know and the whole time I’m on the treadmill I’m thinking, “where are the other two socks? Are they also together like these two, or will I go home to a whole lot of white socks paired at random?” I mean to tell ya, when I take my socks off I don’t just rip ‘em off and let ‘em get inside-out; no siree! I know how I hate to turn the socks back correctly when I do the folding, so I take care not to just toss ‘em in there all wrong side out! Once I casually mentioned that my socks were wrong to Betty and I got about as much sympathy as she would give me if I was floating in the pool and told her my ice was melting too fast. So, when this happened again last week as I was unpacking I went over to look at my sock drawer to find the other lonesome pair of mismatched socks. Betty looks at me, like “what ARE you doing?” I explain my socks were mismatched this week and without missing a beat, “I’ll tell the maid,” she says. (We don’t have a maid.) I wasn’t planning on saying a WORD, I swear! I just didn’t want to end up in Cal-E-FORNia with any mismatched socks. They have laws against that out there, I’m told.

I’m afraid that my next couple of weeks will give the B way too much time around the house alone – my stuff is sure to get moved around. I think she does it on purpose, too. You know, “oh, I thought you didn’t want that old copy of the SuperBowl program anymore. It was so old, anyway.” Things get too neat around our house when I get past three nights out – in a row. I’ve got five this week – and three more next week. That’s eight outta 14- I might come home and be down to one car in the garage. “Well, you weren’t using it.” I could almost hear her say it now. I had better hurry up and head straight home – north to Texas.