Easter Revisited

I have one kid hiding on the bottom shelf of his wardrobe and one kid sitting in the huge Rubbermaid container we have in the laundry room that we keep dry dog food in. The hanging up laundry is, he hopes, shielding him from casual vision. The third kid is up in his room, blithely oblivious to anything and anyone except the video game of the day. My husband is passed out cold on our bed from a sudden onset migraine and the dogs are out in the yard eating all the candy filled eggs that the kids missed. Oh yeah, one more thing. Did I mention that our company is still here and that things have deteriorated to the point where they’re barely speaking to each other? Aren’t holidays FUN?

It all started so nicely, too. When I finished my post yesterday the house was presentable, the food was done and the kids were excited about the day. My trouble started when Gumby and Surfer Dude got into a huge argument in the front yard and the Film Geek blew a gasket. He was shouting and grabbing kids by the scruff of the neck until I was pretty sure all of our neighbors were calling Child Protective Services simultaneously. The man never has realized that his voice carries like a bull walrus on a desolate iceberg. He hadn’t started out short tempered, but had become that way in the minutes preceding this episode, when he and Sasquatch got into it because everyone else in the house was helping to get ready and our charming eldest refused because “it isn’t on my chore list, and by the way, will you drive me to a sleepover tonight?” Ain’t fifteen grand?

So between the impending migraine and the urge to maim his firstborn, he just plain lost it. He made the younger two stand in the corner in the entry hall, at which point Sasquatch looked downstairs and had the idiocy to laugh. Cut to three kids standing in the corner in the entry hall and me, with steam starting to spew out my ears. I went into the hall and in my sweetest most loving voice said “Honey, can I see you in the kitchen NOW????????” The kids were just leaving their corners when our friends got here, but I was still madder than H-E double hockey sticks.

So we did the Easter egg hunt for the younger kids. The older boys volunteered to hide the eggs and we took them up on it, which proves that the Film Geek and I may have been smart once, but it wore off. We found eggs in the most god awful places you can imagine. Think floating in the gunky green water in the outdoor fire bowl. We ate our dinner, which was wonderful. We had dessert, which was a lemon cake that was to die for. The day was picking up. See what happens when you let your guard down?

Now, the piece of information you don’t have here is that our friends are in the process of trying to buy a house and that things are at the really nerve wracking stage. They had a meeting last night with the prospective sellers to pitch themselves as buyers, since there are a lot of people interested in this house. It has been pretty stressful and the two of them are at the point where not a lot of civil words are being said. At one point after my own beloved and I had snapped and clawed at each other, I said how nice it was to be so comfortable with another couple, because usually you make nice in front of other people and we obviously are well past that point. I think that’s a good thing, but can’t positively swear to it.

Okay, now I’m going to fast forward this, so hang on. First, DeeDee the bipolar dog gets out of the house and we all tear after her screaming and yelling. The Film Geek gets to her first and drags her back home. Then John and I go outside with all three of their kids and my younger two to play baseball. He didn’t want to, but Laurie had to type up the document they were taking to the house meeting and print it, since their printer is on the fritz. Their kids are roughly the ages of ours, by the way. The game is going fine until their eldest, who is also fifteen, gets into it with Gumby and Gumby storms off. We call this fifteen year old the red headed step child since he’s here so much he seems like part of the family. Well, Surfer Dude, who never sticks up for his brother, is enraged, and attacks the red headed step child. John and I break it up. He attacks again. Did I mention that the red headed step child is six feet four? It gets ugly. I restrain Surfer Dude. The red headed step child trips him. Surfer Dude spits at him. John, whose bellow matches the Film Geeks, is shouting. I’m waving my arms and wringing my hands simultaneously. The only thing we’re missing at this point is a trailer and a bubbling pot of meth.

My two kids run in the house and hide because they’re so angry. The Film Geek has disappeared, and come to find he’s just gone upstairs, company or not, to go to sleep. Laurie is on the computer saying bad words of her own. It seems that every time she types the word “will”, the computer changes it to “poop”. Now, this was a very amusing incident in our recent past, where Sasquatch thought it would be funny to change the settings on Gumby’s files. It stopped being so funny when Gumby had a paper due and the word “poop” was liberally scattered through it. You can spell check all day long, but it doesn’t help, since the computer recognizes “poop” as a word. Sasquatch had to write an apology letter to Gumby’s teacher when a couple of “poops” got missed. The teacher was no help, since she was laughing so hard she had tears in her eyes. So I run screaming upstairs and demand that he fix it yet again. As I pass our bedroom door, I see the Film Geek sleeping like a *%&! baby.

He comes down and fixes it, laughing all the time. The paper gets printed and our friends leave, arguing all the way out to the car. I’m saying silent prayers that there are no “poops” in their letter to prove what a lovely family they are. Surfer Dude climbs out of the dog food and Gumby reappears. The Film Geek snores. The dogs have jelly beans stuck in their fur.

Honey, if you’re reading this today while I’m at work, this is what happened that you slept through. And when you woke up and ran through the house in a hurry to leave to go let your students into the studio…did you notice I looked a little peaked? WELL? Did it never occur to you to ask WHY?

I’m done. I don’t even have the energy to try to make this funny. I have to go and make sure that Child Protective Services hasn’t shown up to interview the neighbors.