Tuesday, April 6, 2010

Stinkerbell-vs-MLTL

For 23 of the past 25 years, I've managed to work a lot of weekends and holidays. A schedule like this is the bane of any nurse's existence. It's just the way it is as the sick don't keep to a normal 9-5 schedule like the rest of the world. My husband had every single weekend and holiday off. Now the tables have turned and I work only one holiday a year (one of my choosing), and no weekends, and he works most weekends and almost every holiday. It would seem that airline travelers don't take breaks on those special days, either.

This leaves me in the position of flying solo when having to care for both my daughter, and worse, MLTL, on these days. It really does take a village, but it would seem the village has a tendency to disappear at these times.

At noon on Easter, my son picked up his sister and brought the ham over at the same time. He promised to stay and help out while I cooked and promptly fell asleep on the sofa. Since he's carrying 18 credits and working part time, I took pity and didn't terrorize him while he slept. Rachel immediately saw the advantage in this relative lack of supervision. Three times, I had to sweep the floor of crumbs and spit wads of paper. Don't worry, she didn't chew any books or DVDs. Instead, it was a few brochures she found tucked inside the DVD cases, bits of tortilla chips and Syrian bread crumbs.

At around 4 PM, my son went to fetch Mr. Larger Than Life. After much fuss over the small amount of artichoke salad he brought as a "house warming gift" and the beauty of the ham he had purchased for himself (everyone else ate grape leaves), he shuffled into the living room and sat with a bored look on his face. He wasn't into watching Winnie the Pooh with Rachel on the only babysitter television in the house, so my son gave him my husband's laptop. A Dell. Windows. This isn't what the man is accustomed to using. He's used to my son's laptop. A Macbook. After a bit of fuss, my son gave him my laptop to use. One he's familiar with.

Or so I thought.

Sunday night, when everyone left and I'd mopped Rachel's paths around the house by following the crumbs and bits of paper for the fourth time that day, and sterilized my tooth brush I caught her using, I sat down to upload the photos and write the grape leaf tutorial, watch The Pacific and surf my favorite sites. It was late when I noticed that someone had managed to delete all of my bookmarks.

All of them.

Perhaps it's time to go back to working the holidays for a break. It's certainly less work.


15 comments:

sandy said...

Oh dear...deleted bookmarks...arrggg...

Sounds like you had your hands full and don't blame you though for letting your guy sleep for awhile...

Michaela said...

OH HELL!!!! Gosh Rudee. That really, truly sux. I cant stomach the thought of someone else using my laptop. It was v generous of you, & I hope hubby appreciates what you go through for MLTL. Compare your Easter story to mine... xxxooo

Jane said...

Working holidays does seem to have it's advantages. Hope you find your bookmarks soon

willowtree said...

That guy is a total asswipe. I use this, but then I use Firefox.

Brenda said...

Great post title Rudee. It made me chuckle before I read it....and I mean that in a kind way. My computer sits on the kitchen table so everyone uses it even though they have their own. It seems to be the community laptop. I can't remember things very well anymore and have my passwords set to remember me and don't ask again...all that stuff. They still manage to wipe out my passwords. I have set up their own log on pages...but alas...yesterday someone used my page and I had to redo it all again. So, I kind of know how you feel.

Rose said...

Nice guy. Good grief, your holiday did sound like a lot of work. I just had to contend with my bitter sister being icy towards my oldest stepdaughter. Piece 'o cake compared to yours.

Celia said...

My f-i-l used to get on our computer and change our homepage to sites with his religious agenda on them. We created a guest login and our profiles have passwords. Just a thought.

NCmountainwoman said...

Don't bother with the guest login. Just tell the old fart that the computer isn't working properly and he'll have to use the Dell or watch Winnie-the-Pooh.

Ari_1965 said...

I have this desire to hit MLTL.

Ari_1965 said...

I believe the bookmarks are stored in a file called bookmarks.html. Do you have Norton or another file recovery program?

The Crusty Crone said...

I hate it when that happens... when someone screws up YOUR pc.

I use to find it handy to be able to tell family "sorry, I can't make it...working." No guilt.

Lisa L said...

omg. what as a*ss. hopefully you can retrieve them as ari 1965 suggested.

Rositta said...

Nobody touches my laptop, ever...There's always an old dinosaur desktop around for people to use if they want to. Hopefully you can get your bookmarks back. Sounds like it was a heck of a day...ciao

Miss T said...

Oh good grief.

Finding Pam said...

It is hard to work and prepare a holiday meal. Sounds like the man is not interested in visiting family.

I loved your previous post on the stuffed grape leaves. It looks so neat. I would like the lamb too.