I reached a new low today.

Yesterday, a plastic bag containing a shirt, 2 pairs of microfiber chenille gloves and all my bills disappeared from my hands between the house and my car door. This is nothing new; I apparently cross some sort of time/space vortex and gym bags, socks, towels, water, stuff I want to bring to work, have all disappeared before between my leaving the house and getting into the car in the garage. I didn’t realize my bag of stuff was missing last nite until I was almost at my destination, so I traced my steps in my head. Let’s see, I had the bag when I walked out the house, and then I backed up and cleaned the cat litter, put that in a bag, and then I saw another bag of trash in the garage I’d meant to throw away. I also packed up a bag of trash from the track bucket next to my washing machine to throw that away, and I threw 3 bags into the dumpster down the driveway. *gasp* Did I throw the bag of bills and clothes away? Nah, I can’t be that absent-minded, it’s probably sitting on the dryer or next to the kitchen sink, like so many of my disappearing objects when I get back home.

Upon my arrival back home, I ran around checking all the usual spots. Atop the dryer, nope. Atop the kitchen counter, nope. On the dining room table, nope. Upstairs in my bedroom on the floor? Nope. A string of cuss words followed me in my head as I marched out the house again and toward the dumpster. Luckily, the trash hadn’t been collected yet. I actually don’t know which day of the week the garbage truck comes. I lifted the lid of the dumpster and tip-toed, peering inside. I had to hold my breath. There, right beneath some other people’s stinky black garbage bag, was the white bag I recognized, with the name of the clothing store I shopped at yesterday printed in big red letters. If I were tall, I could reach in and only touch that bag. But because I’m short, I had to hang my armpit over years’ worth of crusty gooey ant-gnawed grime on the perimeter of the dumpster and stretch way down to lift off a couple of bags before I could grab my bag. Sure enough, shirt, 2 pairs of really nice microfiber gloves, all my bills. There’s orange-brown goo on the outside of the bag, but thankfully I’d tied the bag closed. And yet, the sour acrid molecules of discards had crawled into the bag and settled into every item inside. The shirt and gloves are sitting out in the garage to air out; the bills are paid and thrown away. Blech!

Today:
fold and put away load of laundry from yesterday – check!
do remaining 2 loads of laundry – in progress, check!
pay bills – check!
dig inside neighborhood dumpster in broad daylight for goodies to take back inside the house – check!
mail out bills – to do
pack – to do
vacuum – to do
clean cat area – to do
60 mins of cardio – to do
belly dancing – to do
gym for weight-lifting – to do

Man, vacation is a lot of work. I may not even have time to clean out my closets.