Me to Hubby: “How do I look?”
Hubby to me: “Fine.”
I look absolutely ANYTHING but fine. But this man will not be phased. He uses “fine” for just about everything – from how I looked on our wedding day to that time I was shuffling to the bathroom before my in-and-out throat surgery. The bathroom is totally visible to all the other patients sitting in their little partitions-open-to-the-front. I’m using one hand to push my I.V. along and the other to hold my hospital gown closed; I turn to him and ask him if you can “see anything.” He says, “No, you’re fine.” At which point I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror that’s mounted along one entire wall of the day-surgery area and see my ENTIRE A$$ HANGING OUT OF MY HOSPITAL GOWN!!! “Yeah, folks. Bow-chic-a-wow-wow. Enjoy the show. Me and my ‘fine’ a$$ have to pee!”
While that was a LONG time ago, nothing has changed. I still look “fine” to him. I’m wearing a silver hat with faux black fur poking out the front. It has ear flaps that snap under my chin. It’s complimented by a hand-crocheted green cowl scarf wound twenty times around my neck , a jacket that makes me look like the Stay-Puff Marshmallow Man (‘cept in black), massively big exercise pants worn over top of my actual exercise pants and tucked into silver boots that have shiny black toes. Alpaca mittens with little alpacas on them cap off the look. For good measure I wear big movie star sunglasses to add a dash of mystery and glamour to the whole ensemble.
It’s 9 degrees out and I’m getting ready to walk the new puppy. This is akin to walking a stuffed animal on a piece of a string. It mostly consists of dragging it along behind you, with the odd throw-it-out-in-front-and-then-catch-up-to-it manuever added for fun.
No, all you dog lovers, I don’t ACTUALLY pull the dog along behind me (much), so don’t report me. But the whole thing IS an exercise in tedium. Long catatonic pauses followed by five-foot mad dashes are not my idea of fun. Added to the fact that the dog is scared of absolutely EVERYTHING (the pine tree, car tires crunching on the snow, the tiny, pretend-dog that exhorts him not to poop in that yard, the fifty MILLION birds that live in every other yard) and it’s no wonder I long to get this over with and get at the day’s P90X assignment.
And when it finally IS over? It looks like I’m returning from a demented shopping trip to the poop store, swinging my purchase jauntily from my wrist. “Yes, please, sir. I’ll have a half-pound of poop, sliced thin and wrapped up tight to-go. And we’ll be back tomorrow!”