Wednesday September 26th, 2012

The exercise:

Write about: grooming/groomed/groomers. Any one of those, whichever catches your imagination.

Kat and I decided to spend the day focusing on having fun with each other, rather than on the imminent arrival of our baby. Sort of a final date day when it's just the two of us, though it was so much fun that I'm not convinced it will be the last one.

We went for a short walk this morning on a trail we'd seen signs for many times but had never actually been on, then had lunch at a winery restaurant we hadn't had a chance to try yet. After making pancakes for dinner we watched a movie on Netflix and called it a night.

Tomorrow we're back to baby business but it was definitely good to take a break from it.

Mine:

Tyler closed his front door behind his departing guest and allowed exhaustion to pin him against the nearest wall. He'd been convinced that he was up to the challenge, but after just three evenings on his latest job he was ready to give up.

It's not that he wasn't qualified for the work he'd agreed to do. He had triple the experience the classified ad had been asking for and a degree from a more respected school than his employer could have reasonably hoped for.

But this... he wasn't sure how much longer he could last.

The paycheck. He had to focus on the paycheck. If he made it to the end of the month he'd be debt-free; a week or two beyond that and he might actually be able to afford a birthday present for his girlfriend.

He pushed off the wall with a groan, aware that if he remained there much longer he'd be woken by the sunrise and spend the next day working a monstrous crick out of his neck. That would only make work even more difficult than it already was.

Tyler's last thought as he collapsed into bed, just before sleep stole him away for a few hours of sweet relief, was to wonder whether any man could hope to maintain his sanity while grooming a four-year-old girl to be the next president of the United States.

2 comments:

Greg said...

Sounds like the more stress I get the easier your days become... I want things to reverse! Pancakes for dinner sounds very nice – I didn't actually get time to eat yesterday evening .
Heh, I definitely wasn't expecting your punchline today, beautifully done! I look forward to watching in horror as people vote for her and her policy of a Barbie in every home....

Groomers
Jack and Bill clutched between them: seven buckets, one cast-iron trough, fourteen brooms (two with extensible handles), a child-sized bag of wash-cloths, some iron pincers, a pick-axe, three pumice stones, a head-sized bundle of iron wool and a large, sloshing jar of copper sulphate. Grumbling (but only quietly as they barely had enough breath to speak) as they struggled up and over the hill to the stables, they both stopped at the same moment. The iron trough thudded to the earth as they looked at the curl of black-smoke gently lifting up into the cerulean sky from the stables.
"Bloody hell," said Jack, dropping everything else. "The bloody dragon have set the stable on fire again!"

Marc said...

Greg - you, good sir, need a break. I dislike hearing that you missed out on dinner.

Ah dear, they were so prepared and now it's all for naught! I reckon whoever is responsible for that fire is in for some trouble if those two manage to catch them.