Would you like a paternity test with your cell phone plan?
April 3, 2006
So Daren came home from work this afternoon, about 4 hours before he was due home. Strange, but sometimes he gets off early and heads upstairs for his daily, uh, flush.
ANYWAY, after about 15 minutes, I finally went up to find him in bed. In bed? This is the man who, in the 10 years we have been dating, has missed ONE DAY of work, only because he had separated his shoulder at hockey and was too drugged on Tylenol 3’s to drive himself there. I don’t know anyone else with this kind of track record.
With the kids in tow, I snuck into our dark bedroom and asked him what was wrong.
“Sick,” he grunted.
“Oh nooooo. Flu?”
“I pulled over on the way home and threw up.”
OH. MY. GOD. MY Daren? Okay, well we can deal. I ask him if he wants anything and he says no, so I tell him I’ll take the kids out for dinner so the house can be quiet and he can rest. The only request I managed out of him was ginger ale. This man hardly ever takes pills, so Gravol was not on the horizon, in his mind.
I scoop the kids up, throwing a fresh pair of socks at Dylan (who INSISTS on taking off his socks as soon as he gets home from school every day - what is with that?), and we head out. I decide to hit the mall, because at least we can each eat what we want at the food court and I can upgrade our cell phone to something we can actually hear out of. A novel concept, I know.
Well Troll Baby is screaming all the way to the mall. THE ENTIRE 5 MINUTES. God forbid that I ever take these kids on a road trip. (I have, actually, alone, and 3 hours away to see family - more evidence towards my insanity, I’m sure.) I go to park the car in a spot fairly close to the door, and normally I don’t mind walking, but it’s raining and windy, and I know I have to strap the little badger into his stroller, so you know. Well this bitch takes the spot right in front of me.
Nice.
Breathe…..
I find another spot quickly and get the kids into the mall. Thomas loves his stroller as much as he loves his car seat - about as much as I love plucking my eyebrows. (When IS that Brooke Sheilds look going to come back already?) We both cry at these things. He fights the strap, squirming like frying bacon, and screams all the way through the mall, to the bank machine, where I have to deposit our tax return cheque (sweet!). Well of course Dylan wants to push the buttons at the machine and gives me a hard time when I won’t fork over my PIN number. For the last 4 nights, he has had these weird and upsetting talks to me about death and wants to know what will happen to him when Daddy and I die. I mentioned life insurance and I swear that is all he can remember from the conversation. My 7 year old miser. Look out King Midas.
We manage to deafen every bank patron with the Troll Baby Car Alarm, and make our way to the food court. We all get what we want, and Thomas sits on my lap and devours everything within arms reach, including the laminate on the table. I only wanted a root beer, because the mere mention of puke throws my stomach into a whirling dervish. Besides, with last weeks puke fest, and this weeks imminent rerun, you can guarantee this mama is going to shed another 5 pounds. This whole flu crap is doing wonders for my bathing suit shopping, which in itself, makes me sick anyway.
During dinner, if you could call it that, there were several children in the food court acting like zoo animals. One little boy was climbing OVER the steel wall into the Dairy Queen kiosk, and a brother and sister came narrowly close to smashing into Thomas and I, as they fought over a comic book. Remind me to train Troll Baby to kill! kill! Or at least gnaw off the arms of grade-schoolers with a decibel range higher than 70 and negotiation skills of wasps. Dylan turned to me at one point and said, “Let me say this about the mall. Parent supervision needed.”
Root beer out your nose? It hurts.
Once the savages are finished their feast, we headed to the phone store. We had a nifty $200 credit toward a new phone and I’d already spent Troll Baby’s nap on the phone with customer service and I knew the phone and the plan I wanted. I wanted to get a gander at it before getting salespersoned to death, so I walk over to where the cell phone display is and Troll Baby continues his best Mariah Carey Someday. Yay.
Ricki Lake comes over to help us. No, not that Ricki Lake, this Ricki Lake (spelled the SAME way) is a small man. Shorter than me. He asks me what I’m looking for, and I quickly tell him that I’d already arranged everything with customer service at the phone company and about my credit, etc. He shuffles some papers in his hand and says, “Karen Rani?”
“You know about me already?” I was taken aback that the phone company knew which store I would shop at. I mean, there are several locations, and wow. A little too Big Brother for me.
“Oh yes, and you wanted this phone. It’s a great phone.” He starts to rattle off features while Troll Baby squirms, turns himself inside out and eats 40 cell phone car chargers. In one bite. I know I’m on a time limit and I’m even typing this faster just to get it over with again.
For the next 42 hours 15 minutes, Ricki Lake talks about the phone, the plan, the agreement, the features, the add-ons, the options, his mother, his plantar warts and GOD KNOWS WHAT-THE-FUCK ELSE SHUT UP I WANT TO LEAVE WITH MY SCREAMING TODDLER.
Then, suddenly, silence.
I look over and the saleswoman-who-must-also-be-known-as-Mom, has turned on Treehouse TV. Ricki Lake has T minus 40 seconds before I KNOW things will get hairy again. He tries to reiterate all the shit he just told me. I stop him quickly and say, “I’m a Mom, and I not only heard everything you said, but I’ve signed the agreement, returned your pen and you have mere seconds to throw the $15 fee on my debit card, so I can leave with my spawn. Do it.”
Of course, Ricki Lake is slow on the uptake (hey that rhymes), and takes FOREVER to swipe the card, pull out the phone, activate that sucker and pack it back up. Troll Baby resumes his witching hour and no amount of Toopy and Binoo will save us.
We finally high tail it outta there, and as I’m staring at the idiot board, trying to figure out where our mall exit is, Ricki Lake comes running after me. “You forgot your new phone!”
Shit. And I was so sure I looked so incredibly confident and capable in the store.
