Juggling Monkeys

I thought I would have a free and clear day. There was nothing marked on the calendar on the fridge. I'd get the Young One to school, the Eldest to work, and then I'd be able to settle in and work on the book project. Maybe even have it finished by the end of the week.

As the Young One got ready for school, I took my morning tea and booted up my square headed spouse. The hum of the disk drive spinning up was meditative. The desktop widgets blinked to life. The Heath birthday countdown calender. Big Bopper's cheery "Helloooo, Baby!", the day's weather, monthly calendar, and the day planner. My eyes popped out of my head. It couldn't be. A 10:30 Weeble doctor's appointment? We were just there a week ago! It must be a mistake! Yes, that's it! A mistake. I marked the wrong date.

Before I left to take the Eldest to work, I made the mistake of calling the Weebles. Ma answered the phone.

"Do you have a doctor's appointment today?"

"Yes, at 10:30."

My heart sank at the loss of productive me time. At least I'm good at juggling monkeys.

Ma must have been in a good mood because she was yelling at Dad when I got to the house. She went to get dressed and Dad and I had a few minutes alone.

"Did that check clear?"

"No, the bank is still holding it."

"Do you still have the letter from the postal inspector?"

"What for?"

"Because I want to give him a call."

Dad gave the letter to me, one spy making a drop to another.

Ma's good mood held as we left the house. She yelled at Dad as she tried to maneuver around the metal folding chair that was on one side of the stairs. The bricks had come loose so she wanted to make sure no one would kill themselves on the loose bricks. Course, I don't know what she'll put out so people won't kill themselves on the metal folding chair. I helped Ma down the stairs. She took another breath in the car and began singing the "Your Stupid" song to Dad. I looked in the rearview mirror, and he was feverishly making the sign against evil. She sang repeated choruses from the parking lot to the lobby to the doctor's waiting room.

"Enough!" I yelled at her. "This is not the time or the place for that! Sit over here!" I'm not sure whether I'm their parent or the referee. The waiting room was fairly quiet so I wandered back to say hello to the lab tech and to hold an OPD Support Group meeting.

"Weren't you here last weeek?"

"Yeah, that was to see the middle toe doctor. This week they're here to see the big toe doctor."

"How are they today?"

I took a cautious peek around the corner. Ma was nodding off in her chair, and Dad was flipping through the pages of a magazine. "Good. Today, they're being good. How's your mother?"

"Oh, she's just wonderful! She had an operation, and it's like she's a new woman."

I wondered if the procedure was similar to what happens to the pod people in The Body Snatchers, but as I was about to ask, patients came in so I went to sit down in the waiting room.

As I was just getting engrossed into the latest happenings of the characters in the book I'm reading, another weeble lady sat down next to me. She was terribly concerned with the goings on of the trial for the body of Anna Nicole Smith. I refrained from rolling my eyes, smiled politely and turned back to my book. She didn't seem to notice, but happily kept on chattering.

A half an hour had drifted by, but the doctor hadn't sailed in. Rather frosts my fanny the office books appointments at 10:30 but the doctor doesn't show up for another half an hour or so.

Finally the doctor arrives and calls them into the exam room. My waiting room weeble neighbor asks me what time my appointment is.

"Oh, I don't have an appointment, I'm just the chauffeur."

The Weebles are in an out before I've finished my sentence. Ma had fallen earlier in the week. This now being a weekly occurence. She handed the doctor's prescription to me. He had written a prescription for Advil and Ben Gay. "We can go to the Stop and Shop to get these," I told her.

Dad decided to come in to the store with me to get the "prescription filled." "Would she mind the generic Advil and Ben Gay because it would save you a few dollars?"

"No! You better get the real stuff, because they'll be hell to pay if it's not exactly what the doctor ordered." I rolled my eyes, but got the items. We headed to the check out. "Do you need anything while we're here? Bread, milk, juice? The bank?"

He shook his head.

I dropped them off at the house and was on my way home in hopes of salvaging some of my work day.

"Before you go, give your father a ride downtown to the bank?"

"To the bank? We were just there!" I roared. "Why does he need to go to the bank downtown?"

"I got another check for $2000 and he needs to deposit it."

I silently borrowed a phrase from Himself. No, not horse's patoot! Help me, Lord! All morning Ma and I had been dancing around the issue of the check. Both of us desperately wanted to tell each other "I told you so!" but the jury was still out for both of us.

Dad turned me toward the door as I was still sputtering. "You go on. I can walk. I need to get a haircut."

Yes, a walk would do him good. It would get him away from her for a couple of hours. He didn't need to hear the "Your Stupid" song being hammered out like "The Anvil Chorus." I was going back to the Stop and Shop to pick up a bottle of baby aspirin to eat on the ride home.