Every summer Boo and I invite his entire family over to our acreage to kick back, sit around our fire pit, get smoke in their eyes, eat my bad cooking, get stung by wasps and step in what ever animal droppings lay around. If the weather is nice, the kids splash around in the pool while the adults nurse their alcoholic beverages and try to ignore the children’s squeals.

It’s good times really. I enjoy having them over. Shaddup. I really do. There is nothing better than a dozen children (aged 11 and under) littering your lawn with popsicle wrappers, juice boxes and plastic toys. While us adults sit around and try to do as little as possible with the exception of bending our elbows and swallowing back sweet nectar of the gods.

All under the watchful eye of the mother-in-law. Who doesn’t drink.

Good times. (Picture a passel of grownups hiding their beers behind lawn chairs, planters, or shrubs whenever the MIL wanders by. Until we get liquored up of course. Then we just prance around nekked and revel in our wicked ways.)

I jest. Kinda.

Because Boo’s sisters and husbands, brother and wife, nieces and nephews, (not to mention the MIL and her hubby) will be on site sometime Friday afternoon, I decided to get off my duff and make my house resemble something other than a pig pen.

Not that I generally live like that. The majority of the house just needs some floor washing and a good dusting, but my bedroom, well that was a different story.

I still had paraphernalia strewn about from my trip to Chicago. Not to mention mounds of folded and once neatly stacked laundry that had flopped over and strewn itself all over my bedroom floor.

In other words, my bedroom looked as though a bomb went off in it. Much like when I was a wee lass living at home and my dad would barge into my room, bellowing “Clean this damn mess up before I do it for you. Anything on that floor or not put away will be burned in 30 minutes!!”

Not that he said that often or anything. I was the model of perfection. Snicker.

After making the bed (pointless if you ask me, I’m just gonna mess it up again), putting away my clean laundry and gathering my dirty laundry, I eyeballed the large stack of papers I had piled on my dresser. With a big sigh, I flopped on my bed and started sorting through the mess.

Just as I was almost done, I noticed a large orange paper. It was the schedule for the upcoming school year. The school year which I am highly eager to start because my children have stepped on my last frazzled nerve and I have run out of duct tape to tape them to the wall.

As I was reading the schedule I noticed the start date of the school year. A date which is a week later than I had thought and pinned my giddy school girl dreams on all summer. A date seven days later than the day I have circled in red marker on our calendar, marked with a happy face and exclamation points.

My daughter walked in and noticed I was frowning at the orange paper.

“What’s the matter Mom?” she politely inquired.

“Nothing.” I was pouting.

She bent over to pick up the paper I had just wadded up and chucked across my room like the stable, loving adult I am.

“Oh Mom!! You were wrong! School doesn’t start until after the long weekend! This is great! I’m gonna go tell Frac!”

Oh yeah, I muttered as she excitedly left to find her brother and tell her the wondrous fucking news. It’s just great. Made my day. Life couldn’t be any more sweeter, I thought sourly.

I picked up my car keys and walked to my car, when Fric and Frac noticed I was about to leave.

“Where are you going Mom?” they asked in unison.

“I need more duct tape. I’ll be back shortly.”

I’d better get more booze too. Something tells me this last week before school starts is going to be excruciatingly slow.