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Michael's Diary Entries Diary Navigation: Choose A Diary Entry -------------------- Latest Entry: 8/28/00 -------------------- 8/21/00 8/14/00 8/7/00 8/1/00 7/24/00 7/17/00 7/10/00 7/3/00 6/26/00 6/19/00 6/12/00 6/5/00 5/29/00 5/22/00 5/14/00 -------------------- Michael's Introduction

Introduction

Dear Readers,

I’m back on the job full time, and it feels good. I rule the roost once again. And by Tuesday of this past week, I had put the house back in order (my order, that is). The books are shelved, organized and placed in the kids’ reading bins. The toys are found, fixed and rotated. And, best of all, sleep and nap schedules are back to normal. Yes, what a week. After a summer of clutter and irregularity for schedules and routines, not eliminatory or feminine cycles, every one (except Lisa) was clamoring for a little more consistency, especially me. But give me a month and I’ll be crying for the leisurely lackadaisical summer days again, longing for my wife to be around in the afternoon to take the kids.

Rejection: On Monday, Lisa came home from work, about 4 p.m. She was eager to see her kids after being away from them for a full day for the first time in months. She entered the house expecting them to greet her but found them napping, much to her surprise, since Brandon didn’t nap during the summer and Allie usually was up from hers by then.

As Lisa put her work stuff away and slipped into comfy clothes, Allie woke up whining. I picked her up out of her crib and she immediately calmed down. Lisa quickly came to see her little girl only to have Allie tell her, "No, mommy. Leave me alone. I want daddy." Lisa persisted, thinking surely she must want to see me and said, "Allie, mommy wants to give you a hug," to which Allie responded by pushing Lisa away and kicking her feet about and yelling, "No, no, I want daddy."

I then very thoughtfully (and teasingly) said to Lisa: "Allie’s mad at you for being gone all day." Lisa shrugged her shoulder and said, "I’m gone only one day and already she prefers her daddy." I, of course, immediately tried to cheer up my wife. "Well, at least it’s her daddy she prefers right now. Just imagine how crummy you’d feel if it were some day care worker." My wife nodded but didn’t look any happier. Fortunately, Allie quickly came to her senses and sought out her mother. And I got to cook dinner. Back to normal.

Natural Gas Emissions: On Wednesday night, just as we were going to bed, Lisa told me that she smelled gas in the house. Now, I had mentioned to her earlier that I thought I smelled something gaseous coming from the utility room but she didn’t notice it then. I had also said it smelled like the dirty diaper bag she had thrown out earlier. Since I was already half asleep and snuggled in our blankets, I dismissed her suddenly offended nose: "I’m sure it’s nothing. Now I’m going to sleep. If you think it’s something, go check it out." I never expected her to actually do this.

Lisa left our room and sniffed around the kids’ room and her walk-in closet room and said, "I smell gas here." And she opened the windows to let it out. "I don’t smell anything, go to bed," I yelled from under the blankets. It’s nothing, I thought to myself. She’s bothering me with nothing at bedtime again.

As Lisa climbed into bed, she said, "If we don’t wake in the morning I want you to know I love you." That was it. I lay in bed a few more minutes but I knew what I had to do: get rid of the gas leak that didn’t exist.

So at 11 p.m., I started sniffing around. Sniff, sniff in the bathroom; sniff, sniff in the kids’ room; sniff in her walk-in closet room. Much to my surprise, I smelled (or sniffed) a sort of gas-like smell. But it came and went; mostly it seemed to float between the two bedrooms. "Lisa," I called, "it kind of smells like that diaper, not gas." But she insisted it was gas, and it smelled enough like gas for me to conduct a household gas check. That meant more sniffing -- what dread. My head ached already from over-oxygenation at this point.

Into the kitchen with a quick sniff, nothing. To the utility room by the furnace and hot water heater, nothing there either. Over to the garage wall where the gas line enters, nothing again. Outside by the meter, sniff, sniff in the dark, in my pajamas, nothing. Back to the garage, sniff ... I picked up the scent. Sniff, sniff, I walked over to my workbench. I thought, what could cause the psuedo-gas smell here? Then I saw it. And I burned up in anger. Then I laughed at the sight of the dirty diaper bag resting in my workbench garbage instead of the covered garbage where it belongs.

I promptly went upstairs and informed Lisa of the discovery. Of course, she had no good reply. She then asked, "Did you throw it away?" I looked at her as though she were insane. Lisa then rose from bed to give the potentially lethal diaper a proper burial. By the time she returned I had snuggled myself back under the blankets and prepared myself for a good, safe night’s sleep.

Sniffing about in the dark,

Michael