dealing with positive, me and my 16, & overshare queen

I drafted this BEFORE Mini was positive for covid:  

Lots to do, particularly since we aren't planning to go to Budapest anymore. I need to shop.

The tree is still in the garage. Curly's birthday is the 19th. Tank is still waiting for me to whip up his requested birthday dinner. Gifts need to be decided on, bought, ordered. Something. I might get Curly a season pass to Great America, one of her BFFs has a season pass so she'd have a buddy to go with.

Unrelated, but hey - I know there
 are staffing issues, bur really
Culvers? Turtles?
 You're hiring turtles?

I tried to get Christmas shopping done Wednesday night. Operative word:  tried.

After dropping Curly at dancing, I drove to Dick's Sporting Goods. I had to return Reg's b-ball shoes. Note:  he isn't buying a pair because someone called his shoes BROKE-ASS, but those shoes are a year old and he needs a new pair. He bought these the week before, wore them a bit during practice, and didn't like them. After I parked, I noted that I was incredibly dizzy. I sat making a list. It didn't get any better, the dizziness that is . . . clearly the Christmas shopping doesn't get any better until after you've actually put a dent in it. 

I went in the store. Asked an employee to find the pair of shoes Reg wanted to swap out. He went in the back and grabbed them. I bent over to look through a display of basketball socks and almost fell over. When I shared this with Tank, I told him that I worried someone would think I was drunk. He died laughing. I've had a very hard time finding Elite basketball socks for my 3 b-ball players. Finding them didn't make me almost fall over, it was the dizzy head thing. While bent over, I gathered as many as I could in the right sizes. I was having a hard time balancing. 

By balancing, I mean me not falling over. But since I bought over $275 worth of Elite b-ball socks, um . . . I guess I was also struggling to balance the importance of good socks with other essential items for our family, like food. 

I made it through the checkout, got in my car, and aborted my plan to go to my fav department store, Von Maur. I credit my allergy shots for the dizziness, usually I just get tired. I'd gotten my shots in the afternoon - just before my YOU-HAVE-HIGH-CHOLESTEROL physical. 

Is it me? anyone else struggle to say 'physical' without  humming, LET'S GET PHYSICAL, PHYSICAL? 

DRAFTING AFTER THE POSITIVE COVID:  

The pressure is sort of off. I want to get the gifts that I need, but I had to cancel my Mon-Wed babysitting jobs, no income for me. Ouch. Without babysitting, how can I afford the socks I bought? I have more free time though. Um, when I cancelled my sitting, I happened to look at the calendar. I've been thinking that I was sitting through the 23rd, but Wed is only the 22nd - so it's like I found a day. Also, we can make the tots' ornaments that we gift them each year whenever, since we won't be seeing them before Christmas. 

Per the doc, the rest of the family doesn't have to isolate since we'd been vaccinated, unless we get symptoms. So I hit the mall HARD . . .  in case I go down. I was in race-the-clock mode, more than usual. 

Ed asked me to help him shop for his girlfriend. He thought jewelry. Smart guy. I suggested Von Maur. Of course. 

Curly had plans to see the Spiderman movie at a mall down the street from the mall I was going to. The girl she was going with said she'd still go even though Curly's sis now had covid. Long and boring, but meeting up with this girl (who isn't one of Curly's close friends, but a girl who digs Marvel) was more of a headache than Mini was experiencing from covid. Ridiculous. Once I realized that her high school age brother was dropping her off, the confusion became a little more clear.

It took me FOREVER to exit the mall lot after I dropped Curly with the friend, because hello Sat. before Christmas. Meanwhile in a separate car, Ed was doing me a solid, returning the NEXT pair of non broke-ass shoes at Dick's between the two malls. The employee who got them out of the back for me must've also been dealing with a dizzy spell Wed. night. Wrong.shoes. Reg can order his shoes online. Good grief. 

These.Are.Some.Broke.Ass.Shoes - I snapped
 this of Reg during church. He rolled his toes
up so they weren't sticking out at the sides,
but what on earth? These are not his
b-ball shoes. His everyday shoes. Probably
 bought them in the fall. No idea what
he does to them, but when he orders his
 basketball shoes, I'm going to have
 him order some everyday guys as well. 

Ed texted me a photo of the line at Dick's. A mile long. He accidentally sent the pic 3 times. I was like:  I get it. I'm not getting to Von Maur in lightning speed anyway, please don't abort the return-shoes mission. 

Eventually we found a very delicate, feminine necklace by Coach that was on sale. I texted Mini's BFF to ask what she thought. Mini, like her mother, doesn't accessorize. Fun fact:  Mini's BFF's mom and I attended one of those jewelry parties YEARS ago at someone's house. 

I turned to her and said:  I DON'T REALLY ACCESSORIZE. 

She looked at me blankly:  DO YOU TAKE MEDICATION FOR THAT? HOW DO YOU NOT ACCESSORIEZE?

Still makes me laugh. BFF agreed, this was a great gift. Me:  DOES THAT MEAN YOU THINK THERE IS HOPE FOR ME? 

Ed drove off and I powered through the men's department solo. I wasn't planning on getting lotsa clothes, but when I demanded that the boys organize the bedrooms that have been swapped and re-swapped out with different residents of late, I few things became clear. First of all, Reg owns hand-me-downs exclusively. He wears a   Cobra Kai hoodie that he got last year for Christmas daily. We're sick of seeing it, and I'm tired of begging him to let me wash it. 

He told me that he has no other hoodies. How? There are days when I believe that our house is nothing more than a hoodie storage facility. With two boys home from college, I asked them to give Reg any hoodies that no longer fit, etc. Reg scored some nice stuff from Ed. Nothing ratty. I decided:  REG NEEDS HIS OWN THREADS. 

Ed approached me with a quarter zip, workout jacket during the room cleaning. It was time to retire it. As he showed me the holes in it, he pointed out that he'd gotten it for his 16th b-day and had worn it thousands of times. He's now 21.

So, I bought 16 gifts in the men's department for the 5 men who live here. Probably 7 of those gifts are for Red. Only one is for Coach and he'll take it back, guarantee. Only 2 for Lad because he has too many clothes anyway. He admitted the other day that we don't need to get him anything since we're letting him stay here with the dog and all. Good point, but I can't have him open nothing. I plan to wrap up a doll bed from the basement as a reminder that we gifted him with a mattress for his leaning tower, made-from-a-coffee-table bed. 

Good 'ole Von Maur boxed 'em up at the register. While she boxed, I explained:  SO WE WERE MAYBE GOING TO GO TO BUDAPEST . . . I JUST STARTED SHOPPING TODAY. She wore a big-ass smile for the commission she'd just earned as she pretended to be interested in my life story. I labeled each box with a name, and took them to be gift wrapped for free. The woman in gift wrap gulped when she saw me and my 16. 

As she jotted down my info and prepared the order, I launched into my:  SO WE WERE GONNA GO TO BUDAPEST . . . GETTING IT ALL DONE IN ONE DAY mantra.

It isn't just you that I overshare with.  

Curly was bummed that we cancelled her birthday party Sat. night. I promised to reschedule. 

More bedroom shuffling due to our covid-kid. Curly slept with me. Coach insisted he'd do fine on the floor. She could've done the basement pullout, but Finn sleeps in a crate down there. Well, I was up crazy early and didn't want to keep her up, so I snuck downstairs to share the latest with all of you. I want to share Mini's college  search with you, but as always there is some serious back story, so you can look forward to that after Christmas along with a whole list of stuff I never got around to telling you this year. 

Hope you and yours enjoy a Merry Christmas, or whatever else you might celebrate, if you're like the Shenanigans then you're mid b-day-celebrate-mode too. Wishing you all the best this season. I hope you know how much I appreciate all of you. I enjoy sharing laughs with you, and your comments and support have truly been a blessing during this challenging year.  

Enjoy. Celebrate. Relax. Stay healthy. Report back.