Desperate Housewife

Three months ago I made an appointment to have our furnace cleaned today.  At the time I remember thinking, "It'll be nice to be home on maternity leave and not have to take time off of work to 'get things done."  I was envisioning leisurely afternoons at home while my babies napped.

Silly me.

The babies did actually coordinate some nap time this morning and since I had completed my daily glamorous chore list (laundry, washing bottles, etc) I decided to treat myself to a bit of luxury.  These days that translates to: "I planned to take a shower."  

I glanced at the clock.  It was noon.

The furnace guy was due at 1:00 and both babies theoretically should have been content until at least that time.  I decided to throw caution to the wind, live on the edge and spoil myself with a bit of hygiene.

Somewhere between the steps of shampooing and conditioning I thought I hear a baby.  I noted how nice it was that the white noise of my running water made it hard to hear the demands of the wee one and took a moment to enjoy the respite.  But then it got louder. 

I told myself, "she's safe in her swing and crying won't hurt her."  Then I remembered that it may not hurt her, but it would in fact wake the other one. The secret to my success has been staggering their schedules so that only 50% of the infant population of this house needs me at one time.  So without completely rinsing the conditioner out of my hair and with 1.5 legs shaven I shut off the water, put my dripping hair into a (as seen on TV) turbie-twist, wrapped a towel around myself, snagged the crying baby and fled to the lower level of our house.  

I changed her diaper.  She still cried.

I did all of the usual tricks.  She still cried.

I realized that although it was earlier than expected she could be hungry.

Rather than continue to drip and feed her in a towel and not wanting to go back upstairs and risk waking her sister I decided to make due.  I dug into the laundry basket (and in the name of journalism and reporting all the facts I will confess that this was the basket of dirty laundry). I pulled out fleece pajama bottoms that were covered in festive snowmen and not-so-festive spit-up and put them on.  I then coordinated those with a mis-matched shirt that had a stain which I think was beef stroganoff from dinner two nights ago, but would require a CSI forensic team to properly identify.  I was a thing of beauty.

I plopped on the couch with the baby, a bottle and a remote and ironically tuned in to a DVRed episode of Desperate Housewives.  About 10 minutes later the door bell rang.  Ah, yes I had forgotten about my furnace man.

It did cross my mind to not answer the door until I went upstairs and changed, but I feared he would think I wasn't home and leave.  Since it took three months to get this appointment I wasn't about to let him get away.  

The doorbell woke the baby sleeping upstairs so she was screaming.

The interrupted feeding angered the hungry baby downstairs so she was screaming.

I was sporting a turban and couture that most likely smelled as bad as it looked.

And that was how I greeted the nice man who came to clean our furnace.