My Career as a Carny is Not to Be

I am so lazy this morning. Yesterday was a whirlwind of parenting errands. Okay, that is a lie. Having the Apple folks look at my Ipod, which crapped out after slapping the pavement on Thursday's run (Oh, the sadness of running back home with no music!), at 9 am, after dropping Rollie off in the rainy carpool mess, was a me-me-me errand. After being given their sincerest condolences, I left the Perimeter Apple store (which is so less annoying and hipster-crawling than the Lenox mall store, by the way) to sit in a parking lot of rainy 285 traffic.

I made it to Lavista to pick up more aprons for the Pre-K to decorate with Little Red Hen themes, then hit the Publix across the street and pick up a cheater's shameful dessert for the Cakewalk. Got back in the car, then drove through the dry cleaners to pick up one cat puke-stained down comforter, two blood-stained zombie prom dresses (no idea how the dry cleaning goddess removed the blood from the white dress!), and one shirt that has been lying in my car to go to the dry cleaners since we moved out of the old house. I don't make it to the dry cleaners very often. All of this in the pouring rain. I looked like a drowned rat.

Made it home, changed shoes, and had a cup of coffee to warm up. Had lunch, then did laundry and cleaning out of Tiller's closet for stuff to go to consignment store, while todd had taken her to the library. Handed off aprons to Todd to give to teacher when he picked up Rollie, then headed to school myself for Fall Carnival setup. Cotton candy machine had not arrived yet, so spent two hours sitting on the stage in the cafeteria blowing up balloons and tying them off until my fingers were worn to the bone, all the while talking to two complete strangers and a parade of precocious elementary school students who wanted to bust the balloons.

Finished the balloons, then got a run-through on the cotton candy machine from the events folks. Headed back home to meet todd and the kids, then turn around and head back out for mexican (read: much-needed margarita), and then dropped back off at home to change Tiller's clothes, which she managed to pee all over in the restaurant bathroom. Tiller and i went back to the school for the fall festival. Wandered the halls with Tiller having a freakout over something scary every two steps. Finally found Todd and Rollie in the treasure chest room, switched off kids, and waited with Rollie in line to open the chest. headed back to find Todd and Tiller so that I could ditch the kids and do my time on the cotton candy machine. (Evidently, the parents of pre-k kids get the cotton candy machine duty, which is extremely sucky, unless you happen to like being covered in sugar from head to toe, while having kids and parents clamoring for cotton candy.)

Did my 7:20-8:30 shift, then cleaned up cotton candy machine. Not the most fun job in the world, by the way. Didn't see any of my cleanup volunteers, so I stuck around to help clean up the school, which looked like a disaster area. Finally knocked off at 9:20 or so, then walked back the creepy nature path through the dark wood, spun sugar probably attracting a number of animals tracking me through the night to my car.

I made it home alive, in time to change, down three beers, and watch two episodes of Fringe.

So, yeah, I am tired today. No energy. No desire to talk to another elementary-aged kid for weeks. Or their chitchatty parents, either. I am also fairly sure that I do not want to be a carny. Ever.

Also? Go Dawgs! Do or die time today! Don't let me down, dang it.