Why I love the Fed Ex man

So, I'm typing here at my kitchen table, enjoying the sun streaming through and the fact that all of my children are HAPPY. Thank you dear cousins for spending some of your spring break with us. What fun it has been!

My kids and their cousins playing who-knows-what in the spring sunshine. Life is good.

From March 2011

Ez and his cousin Levi, who is six weeks older (and 10 pounds heavier! SO SO CUTE!). We like to say that they are future college room mates. :) 

But the REAL happy issue here is that I am typing to you all on a computer previously left for dead. Can I tell you the story?

A little over a month ago, our desk top computer gave up the ghost. Now, this was SAD for a number of reasons. 1. We'd had it for three months 2. We use our PC as a media PC and watch movies and TV through it. 3. It was the only computer *I* had actual access to.

Number 3 was by far the biggest issue for me. I enjoy my computer time and was none too depressed when I had nothing to use! Derek has a laptop but he works 20+ hours a week from home so, um, yes, no so much a computer I can use.

Derek declared he thought *maybe* he could fix it and if not, we'd wait for our tax return to come and buy a new one.

Well.

THE GOVERNMENT SUCKS! Okay not really, but they continually delayed our tax return. One day I was so thoroughly tired of plunking around on my phone that when Derek took a work break, I snatched up his laptop and got myself on Facebook. (Oh Facebook how I hate to love you!)

Well. Apparently Derek wasn't ACTUALLY taking a break, and had merely set his computer down for a second.

Whoops. My bad. I had interpreted putting the computer on the ground and not touching it for a few minutes to mean he was done.

I got mad.

I wasn't mad at Derek. He genuinely had work to do and I had stolen his apparatus to do so!

I was mad because I was computerless.

So I threw a bit of a tantrum. "I want my own laptop, and I want it NOW!" I whined.

Derek sighed in relief. That poor sweet man has been begging me to let him buy me my own laptop for over a year. I always refused. "I can make do with the desktop!" I'd always assure him.

NO MORE!

The very next day, by sundown I was mama to a beautiful peanut of a netbook. She's GORGEOUS!

And I love her.

And turned out Derek couldn't fix the desk top so we HAD to wait and wait and wait to buy a new one.

And all that whole TWO WEEKS of waiting was made much less painful because I had Strawberry, my netbook.

And then our money came in and we bought a new desktop and we could watch TV again. And I could WRITE WHILE I WATCHED TV.

Miracle.

So, about a week after we got everyone all computered and happy, I left my sweet Strawberry out to go upstairs and tend to a baby.

When I returned to the basement, I saw my little baby netbook had been DESTROYED.

I lie not.

The screen was so cracked that nothing showed up on it. Just white and prisms of cracked color.

Apparently Spencer and Oliver had been arguing over who got to "close" the computer and it had been the only victim in their argument.

Strawberry was dead. (I just made up that name...cuz she's red!)

And after buying TWO computers in TWO weeks I was not about to let Derek run out and replace her. He wanted to. Oh how he begged. And I refused. "It's my own fault! I should't have left it out!" When I want to be a martyr I'm really very good at it.

For a whole week Derek pleaded. I would not consent.

Finally he discovered the manufacturer could replace the screen for much less than the cost of a new computer.

That, I would agree to.

So off shipped Strawberry to the hospital. And I endured the desktop at times when we had no shows to watch, and my phone in the interim.

Until two days ago, tragically I MISSED THE FED EX MAN!!! And since it was an insured package, he wouldn't leave it on my door. The biggest tragedy in all this was that I WAS HOME THE WHOLE DAY! I just didn't hear him knock. HEARTBREAK!

So, yesterday I plunked myself down on macouch and refused to move until he knocked on my door!

Sing it with me now, "Come and knock on my door!!!!! I've been waiting for YOOOOOUUUU!!!"

He came right on schedule! "YAY!" I yelled when I flung my door open!

"You're home today!" he said with great glee! (Yes, he seemed to be a bit overly excited himself... funny Fed Ex Man.

"I am! I wasn't going to miss you again!" I cried as I signed for my package. I was so thrilled to see him I nearly invited him in for a Weight Watchers Ice Cream Bar. But I didn't.

And now? Well. My life makes sense again.

Dear Strawberry, Welcome home.