My Day -- Monday, right?

So my day thus far:

Start school late (I homeschool my 6-year-old daughter) because DD can't decide which pink hair band matches her dress the best. We finally narrow it down to two, and she wears them both together.

Do math - simple enough, right? I mean, second grade... really. What's so hard about that? Any moron could teach second grade math, right? So, here are the instructions in my teachers guide:

"Using figures from chalkboard A, student checks all facts in which 0,1, or 2 is subtrahend. Student checks facts in which half of minuend is subtrahend. Last, student checks fact in which all of minuend is subtrahend."

Uh, sure... no problem. I'll get right on that, immediately after running to my computer and putting "subtrahend" and "minuend" into Dictionary.com

After we finished school, later than usual - between hair bands and subtrahends, I got a little behind - I ran a few errands.

Went to the local warehouse store - won't say which one, because I'm not saying nice things. Hubby loves General Foods International Coffee - French Vanilla flavor. The cheapest place to buy it is from this warehouse store... until today, when I made a special trip there specifically to stock up on coffee and they, apparently, no longer carry it. And I had so much extra time to waste going to Target instead.

Speaking of Target (and I love Target, so will name names), only two registers are open - but no big deal, even if I am juggling half a dozen little cans of coffee - because there's only one lady in front of me (who had the cutest little boy waving "bye bye" to anyone who looked at him). Evidently, she chose greeting cards with unknown UPC codes because each time the cashier ran the card over the reader a big STOP! sign appeared on her screen. She finally input them manually, and it seemed to help. However, it took me a good fifteen minutes to run what should have been an "in and out" errand. We won't go in to how the &^%$# credit card reader didn't want to read the strip on my debit card...

Went to Wendy's for lunch, cuz by this time we were starving. The lady who helped us is a sweetheart and Wendy's has, by far, the best fast food (except maybe Taco Bell) so, again, I'm naming names... even though my DD was shorted a chicken nugget. That's okay - they gave her a whole new batch when the mistake was pointed out. I had no idea she could eat nine nuggets, a dish of oranges and half a baked potato (mine).

Afterward, my mom (who was along for this wild ride) reminded me that I wanted these cool scented cap erasers from Staples for DD's stocking stuffer (yes, I do my shopping early - sue me), and since Staples is right next to Wendy's, I dropped her off, and sat in the car with DD. Later, mom told me that the display had been taken down and she had to ask if they still had the erasers. They did. But only two!

Then it was time to go Home.

Finally. *sigh* Got home, and started to relax. Then realized that I'd forgotten one very important stop.

I support a soldier over in Iraq that I "adopted" via Adopt-A-Platoon. Turns out he's a BIG New England Patriots fan (don't know why, but there's no accounting for taste -- go 49er's!). I am getting his care package together for this month, and wanted to include a Pats gift of some sort: t-shirt, ball cap, bumper sticker, whatever. Didn't make it to the store to find one. Probably could have found something at Target, since I'm smack in the middle of Patriots-land, but was utterly focused on coffee, so didn't even think of it. Bother. Add this to my list for tomorrow...

Oh, and did I mention that the battery in my 4Runner bit the big one last Thursday? At the YMCA? Turns out it's nine years old (the battery, not the Runner, which is thirteen), so we certainly got our money's worth... but hubby promised to get a new battery on Saturday, and couldn't, then Sunday and didn't, but promises he'll get one tonight (he wants the same brand, since this one did so well for us) and won't let me get it. Why? Because I can't walk up to the parts counter and ask? Whatever... BUT, what that meant was that DD and I couldn't take the dog for a walk around the lake today - BIG dog, small second car.

Bet you think that's all, right? ((hands on hips, chin up just like Peter Pan)) HA HA HA

Got home, put DD in Quiet Time to finish her school seatwork, and settle in to watch Ghost Whisperer that I TiVo'd on Friday. Get about 10 minutes from the end and look up... EEK!

Big. Ugly. Black. Hornet.

Now, I'm not bug-phobic in the least, but a hornet just isn't one of those things you can pick up and toss outside. I slither by it to run upstairs for hair spray, grabbing a big envelope of junk mail on the way. Come down, spray hair spray all over the place trying to freeze it's wings. It finally falls from the air in front of my front door. I smack it with the envelope over and over and over screaming all the while "Die! Just DIE!" I hate killing things, but it's especially bad when it writhes around instead of dying immediately. (I'm going to have nightmares for weeks after this.) There's a rule in this house - no torture of anything living... if you must kill it, kill it humanely.

This blasted hornet blew that plan out of the water. And I'm still waiting for the cops to show up - figure a neighbor must have called after hearing my very loud outburst.

So, is that it?

Well, no.... apparently Mr. Hornet brought a buddy over to play. He was hanging out on the screen of my storm door. I carefully slid the window down over it, walked outside and sprayed it with hair spray, then opened the window and dropped it out on the front step. I ran in to get my sandal, since the junk mail worked poorly as a swatter, but when I got back - he was gone.

I'm hoping he's spreading the word: I have Suave, and I'm not afraid to use it.

So - how's your day going?