Joys of Single Motherhood

It's the day before Christmas and all through the house, space heaters are placed, to warm even the mice. The stockings are hung, though the mantel's a mess and I'm still at the office doing nothing at all. The nice plumber has called with his holiday tidings At least a new boiler will cost less than siding... The Ex has announced he's without funds for his half And all I can manage is a half-hearted laugh. This eve' the kids and I'll dine on lobsterish fare And I'll be pretending that I don't have a care. The house is all toasty and Santa will visit We'll leave cookies, he'll eat them and all will be right But I'd still rather be somewhere warm and sunny tonight... This says it all for me about the holidays: http://www.salon.com/mwt/col/tenn/2007/12/20/alone_on_christmas/ Happy Winter Solstice!

We have mice and it's not nice. It's not only not nice, it's disgusting. It took us way too long to figure it out. We started finding these strange black rice-shaped things in our napkin drawer. I stopped putting napkins in the drawer or anything else and decided to wait and see. Then one day I discovered what looked like the remains of a tiny, haphazardly organized picnic that had been interrupted by a thunder storm--in that same drawer. Suddenly, I realized that those tiny black rice "things" were mouse droppings. My buddy the handy guy, set traps and sealed up all the openings in the kitchen and voila, the problem was solved. I cleaned all the drawers and cabinets and threw out the old utensil containers and replaced them. Then about a week and a half ago, I was dashing around to get ready for a date and went into the bathroom to turn on the shower. There in the bathtub was a frantically scared mouse scrabbling to get up the sides of the tub and escape. I turn...