The Cone of Shame–Not Just for Pets Anymore

Pippa Dog is plotting our deaths...

Pippa Dog is plotting our deaths…

The past week and a half has been…interesting. I was completely off last week, so messed up that I woke up Saturday morning, believing it was Friday. The super funny lady Leanne Shirtliffe, who was supposed to be my FRIDAY guest post, was probably all WTH? when I wrote about wanting a DeLorean so I could go back in time and kick my own @$$ for being stupid instead of posting her seriously funny guest piece and talking about her on-line humor-writing class (still open, btw).

Hmmm, a bit prophetic. And, Leanne’s post? Humor is Everywhere? Doubly prophetic?

So Friday Saturday, I stagger out of bed, exhausted (we’d been passing around a toddler stomach bug for the previous week) and I drink three cups of coffee just to be able to SEE straight.

Being the AWESOME, sweet, loving, and humble wife I am, I let my husband sleep in and kept The Spawn quiet while I posted my Friday Apparently SATURDAY Funny guest blog. I then made The Spawn’s lunch and took him to school.

I get to the school, but the parking lot’s empty. WTH? No one was there but the landscaper who probably wanted to know why this weird woman was yelling at the locked door. I totally thought the school had just invented some new holiday to keep my kid home and under my feet.

Was it Spring Goddess Day? Freyja Day? Gerald Ford Day? The Teachers are Burned Out and Suicidal So They Need a Freaking Day OFF Before They Duct Tape Your Kid to a Wall Day?

Irritated, I drove home. Hubby staggers out of bed and asked where I went. I fume, indignant that my husband didn’t tell me there was a school holiday and that I took The Spawn to school and they really send home too much paperwork because I didn’t SEE there was a holiday and why the heck do they need so many holidays?

Then Hubby tells me it is Saturday.

NO! I say. It is TOTALLY FRIDAY. I’ll prove it. So I rush to my laptop to pull up my iCal because I trust Apple WAY more than my husband…and I blink. My mind can’t process this.

OH DEAR GOD IT IS SATURDAY!!!! I TOOK MY KID TO SCHOOL ON SATURDAY AND I POSTED A BLOG AND MY FOLLOWERS ARE GOING TO BE ALL…WTH? NOW SHE’S BLOGGING SATURDAY, TOO?????

Did my husband hug me? Console me? Tell me that I was wonderful, generous and kind for letting him sleep?

O_o

NO.

Howling with laughter, he points and says, “You even made his lunch and EVERYTHING!!!!!”

The sudden urge to stab Hubby with a lemon zester was a big clue I needed more sleep. I did some writing then took a super-long nap that resembled a coma more than a nap. Sunday? Rest. Played video games. Ate dinner at my mom’s, so didn’t even cook.

I was SET for the new week.

Monday morning, I take Pippa to be spayed and get her shots. I pick her up. I have a very efficient day. Yesterday? Busy multi-tasking cleaning the kitchen while packing The Spawn’s lunch and telling him 1000 times I will NOT play the NASCAR race AGAIN.

****My son needs a 12 step program for car racing. He DOES NOT get that from my side.

In the midst of all this? I make sure to put Pippa’s pain medication away before it gets lost.

Two hours later? Guess what I can’t find? I tear the house apart. Certain I must have thrown it away, I go through the seriously disgusting trash (had cleaned out the fridge *shivers*). Finally, I call the vet and beg them to believe that I am not mainlining my dog’s medication and please, please, please can we buy more?

Hubby, being awesome, goes and gets her medicine. He comes home with The Spawn…and guess what he finds sitting at my computer?

*head desk*

I feel like I just want to hit CNTRL + ALT +DELETE and reboot. So, of course, my husband spends all yesterday mocking my pain…AGAIN.

This morning? Guess what we wake up to? NO INTERNET. Hubby forgot to pay the AT&T bill, even though his humble, sweet, cute, adorable, helpful, and humble wife brought him the bill with the debit card A WEEK AGO and sweetly reminded him.

So this morning, we’ve been discussing The Parable of the King Who Forgot to Pay the Internet Bill and All the Kingdom was Super Sad. There was great gnashing of teeth and the townspeople, justifiably distraught because there was no Facebook access and their blogs would be posted LATE, wanted to stone the King for being so absent-minded…

…until his kind, loving, and humble wife begged they give him mercy and placated them with chocolate.

Cuz she’s awesome…and humble :D.

And the moral of the story was the king needed to listen to his wife…and tell her she was pretty…and NOT make fun of her for taking their toddler to Kingdom Nursery School on Saturday and then later losing the Royal Dog’s medicine…and then tell her she’s pretty.

Anyway, yeah….

All I have to say is that Pippa isn’t the only one in need of a Cone of Shame this past week. Have you ever had days like that? Where you just want to go back to bed and try again? Have you ever done something really dumb, like take your pet’s medication? Put your keys in the freezer? Lose your car?

I LOVE hearing from you guys!

To prove it and show my love, for the month of April, everyone who leaves a comment I will put your name in a hat. If you comment and link back to my blog on your blog, you get your name in the hat twice. If you leave a comment, and link back to my blog, and mention my book We Are Not Alone in your blog…you get your name in the hat THREE times. What do you win? The unvarnished truth from yours truly.

I will pick a winner once a month and it will be a critique of the first 20 pages of your novelor your query letter, or your synopsis (5 pages or less).

And also, winners have a limited time to claim the prize, because what’s happening is there are actually quite a few people who never claim the critique, so I never know if the spam folder ate it or to look for it and then people miss out. I will also give my corporate e-mail to insure we connect and I will only have a week to return the 20 page edit.

At the end of April I will pick a winner for the monthly prize. Good luck!

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    • hopeclark on April 24, 2013 at 11:45 am
    • Reply

    I was chuckling like mad reading this. I’m so with you on all that! My brain is as riddled as swiss cheese some days. So, so funny. I recommend you all the time to my readers! http://www.chopeclark.com / http://www.fundsforwriters.com

  1. I was out of it on Sunday. Got out a glass for oj and mug for tea, boiled the water, grabbed a tea bag and put it and the boiling water in the glass. Not so bad, but felt STUPID. Good think I don’t do anything dangerous or particularly important with my time. Stitched my forefinger with the sewing machine once.? Thanks for a funny blog, Kristen.

  2. Waking up on Saturday thinking it’s Friday is WAY better than waking up on Monday thinking it’s Sunday. What a pleasant surprise it must have been to go to school and see that it’s closed.

  3. That was freakin funny! That makes me locking myself out of the house look very boring.

  4. I’m sure I have an embarrassing story to tell. Instead, I’ll tell on a friend of mine who called his wife because he couldn’t find his cell phone.

    Yep, he was in a parking lot on his cell phone, calling his wife to look for his cell phone somewhere else. He won’t ever live down that story.

    1. I’ve done THAT! Ha ha ha ha ha…yeah, I’m an idiot. In my defense, toddlers kill brain cells.

  5. Holy moly, and I thought my week was bad. Poor, poor baby! Here, let me adjust your cone and make you more comfortable.
    Thanks for sharing your shame in such a humorous way. I huggin’ love you and totally relate to the taking the spawn to school on Saturday thing. I once bought my husband a birthday card in September, thinking, “Oh my gosh, I almost forgot his birthday!” when his birthday was in August, and we had celebrated it together, card and all. Yeesh. Sometimes we definitely need a reboot. We moms are constantly running may programs at one time. A crash once in a while is inevitable.

  6. I love you. Not in a creepy stalkerish way (although it kinda is, since I “follow” you everywhere) but in a “wow, we should have been sisters because I have way more in common with you than my litter mates” kind of way.

    1. Stalking is encouraged :D. Yeah, writers…we are definitely a tribe of our own, aren’t we? LOL

  7. It’s odd that your post appeared right after mine in the humor category, and both ivolved suicide jokes. Something (bad) in the air?

  8. Totally hysterical. I couldn’t stop laughing.

  9. Oh this is too funny. I’ve never taken my kids to school on a Saturday. But, I have gone to work on a holiday. I did’t pick up on it and notice there were no cars in the parking lot either. I was informed at the security desk by a the guard who was laughing so hard he could hardly breath. He asked “what the hell are you doing here?” He knew me you see and this was just another one for the books in his mind.

  10. I’m really glad you decided to put your comic genius to helping writers instead of to stand-up comedy! I laughed so hard, I had to share it with my sister (a non-writer).

  11. I love it when you share like this. Sometimes I think we might even be related. lol
    Not long ago I tried to send my kids off to school on a Saturday but they were old enough to catch the mistake before I could shove them out the door to the bus-stop. Hubby, on the other hand, recently mistook a Sunday morning for Monday and got ready for work, fed the cat and semi-woke me to ask if he should wake the girls because their alarms apparently hadn’t gone off. I mumbled something about them not having school that day but didn’t say why. He might have made it all the way to work if he hadn’t noticed the newspaper on the driveway as he backed out. Monday’s paper is always thin, but Sunday’s is enormous. I should have left him alone to growl and stomp but about the time he came back in the house I figured out what had happened.
    I wasn’t laughing AT him, I was ENJOYING him. Right?

  12. Sooo…which of the King’s wives wrote this post? His humble, sweet, cute, adorable, helpful, and humble wife, or she who wanted to stab him with the lemon zester? That was a tough Saturday,

  13. Mwah ha hahargh! Welcome to my world. I live the cone of shame and I only have one kid for heavens sake… and no pets… You have my sympathy and understanding! 😉

    Cheers

    MTM

  14. I can so relate to this. I’m convinced that when you become a mom, you leave half your brain cells in the delivery room and don’t get them back until the kid leaves home.
    Also, it doesn’t help that writers are scatterbrained. My excuse is I just have so much going on in my head and matching socks are overrated anyway.

    1. You WEAR SOCKS? I am seriously impressed :D.

      1. I strive to. Although I am sockless in my sneakers again. Need a 12 step program.

      • Stacy A on April 24, 2013 at 12:59 pm
      • Reply

      You don’t get the brain cells back when the kid leaves home. Sorry to disappoint you. What happened was … you gave the kid your brain cells when you were pregnant. I must have been a brilliant person once, because my son is awesomely intelligent, smart, funny, etc. Me? I’m just old and tired.

    • Denise McInerney on April 24, 2013 at 12:17 pm
    • Reply

    One of the dumbest things I ever did was back when I worked for British Aerospace Inc. Went to airport to pick up a British aircraft engineer and his wife who were being seconded to our US co. for two years. Had never met them, so at Arrivals was waving a nice sign printed up with his first initials and last name so he could find me. A middle-aged couple spotted me and scurried over. “Mr. and Mrs. XXXX?” I asked. “Yes, that’s us!” I identified myself, happy greetings all around. Eyed their massive pile of luggage with horror, but schlepped everything to my car (wearing suit, stockings and high heels on hot, sticky summer day) and somehow managed to cram it all in, then left the parking area. They were to be posted in Mississippi and I remarked how it would be even warmer where they were headed. This was met with puzzled looks, and just as I turned the car onto the toll road, the man said, I thought our daughter’s home was just around the beltway? I hit the brakes and pulled over. Their last name was correct, but the initials were not! I had just kidnapped a pair of British citizens. They had noticed the incorrect initials, but politely refrained from pointing out the error as they thought I was an airport employee their daughter had sent to help them. Took a half hour to get them and their mountain of luggage (they were here for TWO WEEKS!) back to their frantic daughter at the airport. Meanwhile, my “real” couple had given up and taken a taxi to the office. Didn’t live that one down for a long time!

    1. ROFL. THAT is a blog *clutches sides laughing*

  15. No shame here, just very familiar. I share a house with a no-meds-bi-polar individual with short-term memory issues. Knowing the day of the week or time of the day is a rarity best left to the well-honed circadian rhythms of the cats and chinchillas.

  16. Hahahahahahahahaha,,,Sorry, I can’t help it. We’re related – just separated at birth. lolololol 🙂

  17. lol, I’d wondered about the Saturday post… 😉 I’ll never forget the time I let my 2 year old play with my car keys while putting him in the car seat. Then I closed the door. Guess who still had the keys? Yup. And he had already hit the ‘lock’ button. So, how do you get a 2 year old to push the right button to unlock the door when all they see is, “BUTTONS, FUN BUTTONS!” lol He sat in the car for 10 minutes before I realized that he probably hit the back window button. Sure enough, I was finally able to climb in and nab ’em. lol Good thing the car was in the garage…

    1. What a familiar story, Shea! Only my daughter was 18 mos, and I was in a busy store parking lot at the time. After 20 minutes she was bawling, I was bawling, and I never did get her to unlock the door. I had to call the police to help me. Thankfully, they had it open real quick, but then an officer pulled me aside to chew me out for locking my baby in the car. Apparently, there was a misunderstanding. They thought I’d left her there ON PURPOSE while I went shopping! ~shivers~ Glad I got that straightened out.

  18. It is wonderful to realize I am not alone in confusing the days, putting my keys in the freezer or arriving for an appointment that wasn’t until the following week. The worst – I was running behind getting ready for work and dashing around like a madwoman. I grabbed the OJ out of the fridge, took off the lid to pour a glass and decided it needed shaking up to stir the pulp. Um, yes…the lid was on the counter and I ended up drenched in OJ. 🙂

  19. With regard to Shawn MacKENZIE I’m curious, have you or anyone you know had any luck with slipping meds in spouse’s coffee? Just curious – I’ve considered doing that – better than murder – right?

  20. Oh Kristen, the hilarity of it all – and the familiarity.

    So many cones of shame, so few necks… Not so long ago I showed up to an RWA Chapter meeting, smugly proud of myself for being ON TIME instead of two-ten minutes late like I generally am.

    Only, it was Daylights Savings spring foward Day, and I was an entire hour late.

  21. Too Funny! Once, for the first day of school, I got my two sons up, dressed, took their picture for the 1st day of 1st grade and 3rd grade, drove them to school… and yup, did the same thing you did.
    It just so happened that the principal of the school was also my neighbor, so he got word of my mistake and had The Best Time laughing about it the next day… the first day of school.
    WTWhaaat? Who has the first day of school on a TUESDAY???
    Apparently ours did.
    I’m glad you got some sleep though. Your body was screaming for it. Now…
    get healthy again!

  22. There is nothing more attractive than imperfections…which makes you not just pretty, but beautiful.

    1. Awwwww (((HUGS)))

  23. Lol. This puts a whole new spin on the old “My mother told me there’d be days like this”.

  24. Two years ago I forgot my wedding anniversary. It wouldn’t have been so bad except for the fact that we had gone out of town solely to celebrate said anniversary, and I still forgot. I woke up that morning and the Hubs had flowers and a card in the living room of our hotel suite, and I’m all, “Holy crap! It’s our anniversary!” Trying to make up for it, I let him choose where to go for dinner that night, and he chose Joe’s Crab Shack. Tres romantic. But he kept ribbing me for not even getting him a card, so I tore off one of those paper towels they use in lieu of napkins, folded it in half, and MADE him a card with my own two hands. I even drew a barcode on the back. He still kids me about the whole thing.

  25. Omg. That’s funny. I have totally done the nursery school thing. I think it was a holiday I forgot about. I can still see the L on my forehead for that one. Tomorrow will be better. Promise.

  26. Thanks for the best laugh in a long time. I’ve turned up for an interview a day early and am famous for leaving the house keys in the front door. I once interviewed someone and forgot to turn on the recorder right away and was too embarrassed to admit it. His comments about the final product were amazingly positive–and he didn’t change any of my quotes!!

  27. I think April Fools’ Day just got confused and came late this year. You know, the wearher HAS been wonky.

    I will now make you feel better by telling you something really stupid I did. A few weeks back, I did a crap load of cooking. I was getting ready for Passover, so I was doing what all Jewish mothers do — cooking up a storm. Like I was Martha Stewart and Rachael Ray and Betty Freaking Crocker — except the Jewish versions.

    I made 3 times as many matzoh balls as I usually would, to make sure that my family would have enough matzoh balls to eat during Passover. It took hours, but no big whoop, right? These are the things we do for love. Well, I found I didn’t have enough room in my freezer. So, I asked my kind neighbor if I could use a little space in her freezer that she keeps in her garage. She said of course.

    Passover comes and so do all the guests. I’m serving the soup, and i’m like where are all my matzoh balls? I looked in the freezer. I looked in the refrigerator. I looked in the garage. It was cold enough. I thought maybe I may have stashed them out there. I looked in the trunk of my car. Sometimes I stick things there. I looked everywhere. I only had 18 matzoh balls. Kristen, we had 24 people at my house. I was cutting matzoh balls in half. I believe it is written in the Torah: thou shalt not run out of matzoh balls. This was a sin.

    Anyway yesterday my neighbor called me and asked if I would like to have my matzoh balls back because “wasn’t Passover coming up kind of soon.” This is not a lie. I didn’t even remember putting them in her freezer. Should I be worried? Should I call the doctor? Do I need to check about early dementia? Seriously, how did those balls get over there? Did they roll across the street on their own? Did I ask my son to bring them over?

    I hope this makes you feel better. At least your hubby can tell you that you are pretty. Me? On Passover? Kinda schvitzy.

      • Carol Newquist on April 24, 2013 at 5:24 pm
      • Reply

      “Should I be worried? Should I call the doctor? Do I need to check about early dementia?”

      Yes, yes and yes. And, it’s what I love about you, so don’t ever fix it.

  28. So glad my wife and I aren’t alone, when it comes to silly mistakes and oversights. 🙂 I guess misery does enjoy company, after all. 🙂 This post was just the humor I needed to read, today, BTW. TY 🙂

  29. I narrowly avoided spewing my lunch beverage (Yeah, I’m having a beer because hubbs brought them home and I didn’t get one yesterday– and… I’m drinking alone. Don’t judge.) into the laptop when you said you were ready to come at your man with the peeler. Relax, these things happen all the time. I have 4 kids, a husband and 2 dogs. And he wonders why I want to work from home! Most absent-minded feat? We once put on our house alarm, piled in the van and had it out of the driveway before we realized we were short one kid. Now THAT would have made for an interesting day at the beach, especially since the kid in question was only five at the time.

  30. You don’t know how much I needed this this week. I completely crashed and burned. I woke up Monday morning to realize that I’d forgotten to schedule my Monday morning blog post, so it was still sitting on the backside of my website, staring at me reproachfully. Monday was so busy that I didn’t get a chance to log in and even post it late. I thought, “No biggie. They won’t send out the lynch mob because I missed one Monday. I’ll just make sure that I have Wednesday’s post ready to go.” …and then Monday night my sinuses started acting up, leaving me in a pain and pressure fog. So yesterday I forgot to get today’s post ready. At which point, I have decided to declare this week a week off from blogging and to start fresh next week.

  31. Does mailing your keys count? Yes, I have mailed my keys. My mother still won’t let me forget about that one. :/

  32. Does forgetting a laptop in a small village in Wales count? (I live in Chicago.) And then trusting the inn’s receptionist to package it for FedEx, so that it arrives with ONE sheet of bubble wrap in a PAPER envelope?

    1. OMG. How many pieces was the laptop in? *shudders and looks away*

      1. It was in one very banged up piece. The story ends well, though–I got a repair quote from Apple (many hundreds of dollars) and submitted it to FedEx, assuming they’d laugh since it clearly wasn’t their fault. But two weeks later, I received a check in the mail for the full amount! FedEx is my new sweetheart.

    • TLJeffcoat on April 24, 2013 at 1:37 pm
    • Reply

    I do and say dumb things all the time. There are a lot of days recently since I quit caffeine that I’d love to reboot. Without my caffeine I’ve come to realize my brain is mush. It’s getting better, but I still zone out a lot.

    However, I’ve never taken the kids to school on Saturday. That’s a good one.

  33. I have just one question:

    Who is ready for a trip to the ranch soon?

    🙂

    1. *raises hand* I SO need a vacation.

  34. To be honest— when I saw the title, I almost didn’t read this post! What a relief! I was afraid you were going to put that cone on me!

    • Melissa Lewicki on April 24, 2013 at 1:50 pm
    • Reply

    Since I retired, the only time I know what day it is is on Sunday–the comics are in color. Otherwise, I don’t care what day it is. My days used to be scheduled with meetings and project groups and more meetings every hour of every day. Not now. Life is good.

  35. You
    Thanks Kristen, you just brought back a memory from 30 years ago with your story. I once was standing on a NYC subway platform at 5:30am, wondering why I was the only one there during rush hour. Turns out it wasn’t rush hour. It was Saturday morning. When I got back home my dad was sitting there with a big smile on his face. He said to me: “What happened, you got fired?”. That’s what happens when you’re 21 and was out drinking all night!

    JR

  36. It’s wonderful to be able to use the details of your bad days to make a brighter day for all of us!

    Usually it takes me a little longer to see the funny side of my own tragedy. My co-workers still like to tease me about the time I left for a 30 minute lunch break, planning to walk down the street for a sandwich. Instead, I got in my car and started driving. Next thing I knew I was sitting in my own driveway, 20 miles away, with no recollection at all of how I got there. I didn’t even get out of the car, just turned around and drove back to work. Didn’t get any lunch that day. Still regret that I didn’t have enough sense to keep my mouth shut about it.

  37. Oh my goodness! I’m so sorry you had such a crazy week! I’ve definitely had days/weeks like that. More than I’d like to admit. At least once a week I’ll walk around the house looking for something–a pair of shoes (which are on my feet!), my glasses (which are on my head!), my debit card (that I put in my back pocket that morning), the cat (who is wearing a smirk on his face right in front of me), the dish towel (that’s draped over my shoulder) …. *sigh* Yeah, my hubby has way too much fun laughing at me too. 😉

    Hope you and your family are starting to feel better! Stomach bugs are the worst. *shudders*

  38. LOL… Nice to know I am not the only one to put their keys, and wallet in the fridge. I was three hours late to work because of that one. I spent two hours looking for my keys once only to find them in my pocket when I sat down and gave up looking for them.

    and.. LOL got up one morning, did my usual stuff, went to work, clocked in with out really looking at the time card, three hours later my boss calls me and asks why Im at work on my day off LOL

    • jkmikals on April 24, 2013 at 3:17 pm
    • Reply

    Relax, Kristin. As you can see from the tons of responses detailing similar mess ups, this stuff happens in the best families! And you make a fabulous lemonade, hon.

    • dinavidscuitee on April 24, 2013 at 3:22 pm
    • Reply

    Yes. So many times.

  39. -grin- Hilarious post Kristen, but methinks you are doing TOO MUCH!

  40. You know what’s awesome? Reading something like this and yelling to the sky “Thank God I’m not the only crazy person in the world!” 🙂

  41. Tears running down my face, laughing. Oh, sweetie, been there, done it, but absolutely NOT seeing the humor.

    • malindalou on April 24, 2013 at 4:01 pm
    • Reply

    Pippa’s a cutie! And you sound like you need a hug. (HUGS) I hope this week gets better.

  42. A spoon full of sugar makes the medicine go down, the medicine go down…
    I guess hubby forgot that little ditty -:)

    • Debbie on April 24, 2013 at 4:36 pm
    • Reply

    Too funny. Hope that it was Fair Trade chocolate. I love the bit about the meds. Yesterday, I spent more time than I care to admit, looking for the meds I took before bed. My hubby found them (bless hubbys), in my nightstand!

  43. “And all the kingdom was super sad…” I love that so hard.

    My husband can literally forget to take the grocery list .5 seconds after I’ve just said “have you got the grocery list” and he has replied “yes.” It’s like a special talent or something.

    I had my own “what the hell day is it” moment last week. Hubby works away 6 days and then comes home for 6 days, and while he’s gone I disappear into an obsessive state of writing that involves a minimal amount of showering, house cleaning and feeding myself. Well, this last week I reached a new height of self-involvement…

    Hubby phones and says “we’re 20 minutes away.” And I’m all “away from what?” And he’s like, “away from home?” And I’m all “no, you’re not supposed to be home for another day!” Hubby felt very loved. I felt like an idiot. It was a good time.

  44. Crazy week, huh? Been there. Done that. The importance of rest is not a myth. 🙂

  45. I’ve noticed that the older you get, the smaller your “cone-of-shame” becomes:-)

    http://www.successpenpal.com

      • Carol Newquist on April 24, 2013 at 6:14 pm
      • Reply

      Cold weather does it for me, as well.

      1. Agreed:-)

    • Carol Newquist on April 24, 2013 at 5:29 pm
    • Reply

    It sounds like a lot of folks here could use a prescription for Ambivert. It really does work wonders, but beware the precautions.

    Warning: If you are pregnant or nursing, please avoid Ambivert or else you run the risk of your breasts exploding and/or immaculately conceiving.

  46. OMG. Hilarious! I needed that. And yes, I’ve lost track of days, but usually in the middle of the week. Then I get mad at having extra work days in my week when I desperately need a vacation. lol

  47. You know what’s great about it, though? For all your suffering at the time, now you’ve got an epic story to tell.

    For what it’s worth, yesterday I went grocery shopping, packed more than a hundred dollars worth of stuff in the shopping cart (I’d procrastinated getting groceries for a tad too long)– and to save a dollar or two, I decided to get our canned catfood in a tray instead of in a package (canned catfood is the first thing I’ve ever found that’s cheaper if you don’t buy in bulk). The second I set foot on the pavement, the catfood rockets off the cart and scatters all over the parking lot. Thankfully there was a nice dude nearby who helped me gather up the catfood while I mostly fretted and tried to keep the cart from trying to join a Nascar team.

    I get back to my car, reach into my purse for my keys… and they aren’t there. A friendly bagger comes by, finds out what’s going on, and she runs back to the register I was at to see if they found it there. Cue maybe fifteen, twenty minutes of me running back and forth to the manager, etc, to see if anybody found my keys (they found three sets– none of them were mine. This leaves me troubled for the other people who were in my predicament.)

    Frazzled, worried about the state of the salmon I just bought, I’m about to retrace my steps through the ENTIRE store, when the bagger suggests we look through my bags.

    Which is silly– I didn’t bag my groceries, another one of the baggers did. No way could I have put them in there by mistake.

    But she insists and I’m mildly freaking out, so I let her rummage through my grocery bags. There are my keys, in the second bag she looks for. Apparently I tossed them in the recyclable bags on my way in, thinking they were my purse.

    TL;DR: Sometimes I think that the only reason I haven’t combusted yet is that there are enough people around me who have their s#!t together and are kind enough to help me manage simple tasks.

    1. LOL. I am notorious for talking too much and walking away…WITHOUT my purse and groceries *head desk*

      1. Thank goodness for honest people who remind us of the stuff we left behind– or keep other people from walking off with it!

  48. Wow – this post took me back to the days when I was ‘busy being productive’ and had little ones in the house – –
    Don’t miss those days at all – – I must confess, I still sometimes mess up what day it is, but since my schedule is so empty, it matters not one whit…
    My empathies on your week – Know you can choose to look forward to being an grouchy old woman who doesn’t need no stinkin’ calendars! LOL

  49. My Nokia cell phone have the date and time. It is how I keep up with the days. One touch of a button and I am in touch with the universe. But it does not necessarily mean that I know where I am going on every morning. I wondered why there was no post several days ago. My mind is similar because I am coughing out crud the size of a yellowish chewed bubble gum. It is similar to what supposedly happens when someone had been infected with anthrax from opening a letter envelope or inhaled the never found nerve gas from Iraq. I have my bearings straight now to finish my super hero romance novelette. But still blowing my nose and coughing out the crud.

  50. A toast to having the passion to weaponize a lemon zester. You may enjoy this. My loopy cousin Maria was expecting an ‘important call’. With her cell battery dead, I suggested she unplug her kitchen phone and bring it over to the house with her. She could plug it into one of our jacks. She did.
    This incident is now and will forever be enshrined in the families hall of fame for eons to come. Having a bad day? Think of Maria.
    There. Don’t you feel better now?
    Regards from one of your recent follower.
    Dan

  51. Your husband apparently forgot the first rule – eventually everyone does something stupid. If he remembered that he’d have been a lot slower to make fun of you. Especially since his screw-up came sooner rather than later!

    And yeah, my dogs hate the cone of shame too. The Vizsla actually has to be hand fed. My husband begged the vet to take the stitches out early because we couldn’t stand how much more neurotic he became when wearing it.

    Nancy

  52. OMG I laughed so hard visualizing your husband saying “You even made his lunch and EVERYTHING!!!!!”

    To make up for laughing, I’ll confess a tired mommy moment of my own. After setting my daughter up with breakfast, I put the milk and cereal away and turned on the stove for a nice hot cup of tea to help me wake up. When I went to get the milk back out, I found the box of cereal. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out where I’d stashed the milk.

    In my defense, my little angel used to get up between 5:00 and 5:30 every day. Your body just doesn’t adjust to that hour.

  53. I totally could have written this post…though not as well as you. 😀 Loved it, as always!

  54. AWESOME post (yes, it deserved caps). I had one of those weeks last week, too. Hate when you get whacked by something that leaves you sick, tired, dazed, and oh, so confused. Thanks for sharing, and helping us all laugh a little when we darned well know at the time, not funny at all (one is usually too befuddled at the time to understand humor – and ticked off that people like husband’s laugh). Hope this week finds your bearings again, and you have a great one.

  55. Just know You Are Not Alone. Most (honest) people on the planet have had similar days. Sometimes they last for a week.

    BTW – I’m sure your husband was laughing with you (until the shoe was on the other foot).

    I’ve had a week of Mondays and I couldn’t stop laughing when I read your post. I really needed it. Thank you again, my friend, for sharing your faux pas in edification of your fellow creatives.

  56. Loved it! I don’t have kids–I just have me, and that’s enough. For the last week or so almost every day was mixed up with some other day. I think somebody messed with the calendar. I talked with a friend last night and had forgotten the date when they were leaving for vacation. She said the 20th. After a bit more conversation, I realized she was talking May 20 and I said, oh, so innocently, “Oh, you mean next month?” About 2 hours after hanging up it hit me hard in the head. The date was already April 23, so if she was leaving on April 20 she would already be in Barbados and I would definitely not be talking to her. The funny thing is, I don’t think she caught on either. And then there was the time, many years ago, when I decided to go to bed early–around 9:00 pm. I woke up “in the morning” and started to get ready for work only to discover it was just midnight and I didn’t have to get up for 6 more hours. I’m sure glad I didn’t get any further and start walking to work! And then there was the time I went through the checkout with my weeks groceries only to find I had left my wallet at home. I didn’t drive in those days, so had to walk home (not too far), get the wallet and go back to the store where my groceries were waiting for me. So you see, you don’t need kids or pets to get into those kind of predicaments. I think it just comes naturally. 🙂

    1. By the way, I re-blogged this.

  57. Reblogged this on For the Joy of Writing.

  58. OK, that was totally hilarious. Although I am sorry for you. Lack of sleep will totally do that.

    This might help–I recently hit a cement pole with my front right bumper as I was backing out of a parking space at a new job. I hoped the sounds was just me running over a monster soda can, but no. The worst part? 4 of my new coworkers witnessed it. The funny part? I work at a church so they offered to pray over me before I went home to my husband. LOL

  59. As a husband, I hear what you are saying. And as such – I am hiding the lemon zester.

    1. Good man!

  60. Oh yes, I have totally been there. And I read parts of this post to my hubby, after which he said, “Have I told you you’re pretty?” LOL.

  61. If anyone has read The Paris Wife…does leaving your husband’s valise on the train count? When the valise is full of solo-copy, original short stories…and your husband is Ernest Hemingway? True story, apparently.

  62. The cone of shame that it’s hard to find cat stock photos of but truly it is probably one of the funniest/saddest parts of owning a pet. True though sometimes I crave this myself.

  63. The most cone-worthy moment I can recall in recent history was a couple of years ago at a mindfulness retreat. Over the time change weekend. Now, this was my first time ever attending one of these and somehow I’d been put in a semi-important position, AND essentially a private room because one attendee was only coming for a day and wouldn’t be staying the nights, so she was assigned as my “roommate” even though I don’t think she spent more than 30 seconds in the room. *L*

    So after a full, busy day, I had a nasty migraine that would not go away and also plagued me with insomnia. I drank more decaf tea than I can remember that night, walking the halls, trying to wear myself out enough I’d just pass out. When I finally got back to my room, I set the alarm on my phone for 30 minutes or so before someone was supposed to come down the hall with a bell waking us all up, to give me more time because I’m slow in the morning.

    Next morning, I woke up and checked the time, and it was only 4:30. I went back to sleep and got up later when my alarm went off at the time I expected. I got up, showered, packed to go home, and stripped the bed and gathered the towels as we’d been asked to, put them in the hallway hampers that were already overflowing with linens. I found this strange, as only I and one other gal had been asked to get our rooms ready early so other guests could check in, and the halls were so very quiet as if no one was even up yet. I shrugged it off and went downstairs. The room we were to gather in was completely dark, so I went to get some tea again, and as I came back, I realized everyone had already gathered AND BEGUN what was actually a very important part of the retreat. After a bit of panic wondering whether I should risk the humiliation of coming in late or be questioned repeatedly later about why I had missed it altogether, I slinked in through the door and found my cushions, my ears burning and hoping no one noticed me. They did, of course. They couldn’t NOT notice for the way the room was arranged. And naturally, there were questions afterward. Some people thought I’d decided to go home or that I had something retreat-related I was supposed to be doing instead that morning. Others, my friends mostly, were concerned because they knew how bad my headache had been.

    It was incredibly embarrassing to admit that I, whom they all thought was a genius with technology for some reason (*L*), had overslept because my cell phone not only made the time “fall back”, but pushed my time zone back an hour as well. The first time I woke up had actually been the ‘wakeup call’ at 6:30.

    It turned out not to be a big deal, of course. And I had really just needed the extra sleep. Plus, the teacher leading the retreat had ALSO been late. Someone had to go and fetch him when they were ready to start. LOL

    When I went on the same retreat again a year later, I made sure to pack a travel alarm clock with working batteries that wouldn’t be subject to a time change like my phone. Plus I shared a room with a friend. 😉 I did not oversleep again. hehe.

  64. I shared in a comment 2 days ago about the time I got through the grocery checkout and found my wallet was at home. Well, I’ve done it again! Today my groceries were all scanned but when I opened my purse to get my debit card, lo and behold! no debit card or any other kind of card. They transferred my groceries to customer service to wait for me to go home and come back again. Well, at first I couldn’t find the card at home either and I was about to panic. On my way back out, I decided to check a tote bag where I have never, ever, kept my wallet or my credit cards. But there it was, large as life, in the inside pocket of that tote bag. How I ever managed to put it there, I will never know. And that bag was in the car all the time. If I had only thought to look then, it would have saved me a trip home.

  65. Whatever was in the air that Saturday seemed to be in cyberspace as well, for my email account was hacked, which proved to be the highlight of the week to come. For the first time in years, I took a trip, and that I consider the hacking of my account the most positive moment of the trip week pretty much says it all.

    Great post, as always, Kristen, and thanks so much for letting the rest of us contribute to the cone of shame.
    Karen

  66. I recently had one of *those* days. I head out of the house with my son to pick my daughter up from school. I put him in the car and get in the drivers seat… Only I can’t find the keys. I figure I must have left them in the house, so I get out of the car and walk to the door… Which is locked. I look through the window and hanging there in the usual spot are my keys to car and house, beyond my reach. The easy thing to do right here is call someone to help. But I left my phone in the house too. I spent the next half an hour walking from house to house in my neighborhood trying to find anyone who would let me use their phone. It took that long because NO ONE WAS HOME! Some kid finally pulls up to his house (presumably home from school) and let me call someone to please rush to pick up my daughter so they don’t think I’ve abandoned her.

    When I was finally able to get back into the house (when hubs got home from work) I had three messages on my phone from the school asking where I was. They had also called ALL of the emergency contacts trying to find my daughter a ride.

    That day deserves a definite do-over, lol=)

  67. I have definitely had days like these! I think it runs in my family too…Once my mom and I went to the mall around Christmastime. We parked and shopped for hours. When we were ready to leave, neither of us could find the car. We searched for about 30 minutes and then concluded it must have been stolen! We had mall cops out patrolling for about 15 more embarrassing minutes and then we found it…untouched and right where we left it!

  68. I’ve been training on a new registration process at work, and I completed 117 of them and was pretty proud of myself. But last Friday one of my coworkers called and said, “Renee, let’s talk about the NACIS code.” I said, “Oh, was I supposed to include that? I haven’t been.” “I KNOW. They kick up an error and end up in my queue.”

    Oops? I spent the last two days retroactively adding those codes to each one.

  1. […] This gives a whole new meaning to “My mother told me there’d be days like this. Hilariou… […]

  2. […] In the end, Kristen was able to laugh at herself and got a hilarious blog post out of it. If you missed it, you can read it here. […]

  3. […] the guiding force behind MyWana, a supporting and encouraging community for writers.  Her post,http://warriorwriters.wordpress.com/2013/04/24/the-cone-of-shame-not-just-for-pets-anymore/reminded me of my very own cone of shame […]

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