Paying the Piper

Well, I got a last-minute phone call from my mom yesterday. She had to go up to visit my sister at her college (it's an hour and a half away) because she's deathly ill with a urinary tract/bladder infection. My sister was in such serious pain that my mom wound up staying over night to watch her.

So I got called in to watch my nephew from 4 yesterday until 4 today, when my mom gets back. Yes, overnight, at my parent's house. When I called Mr. Borealis with this news, he goes "Oh, that's okay--why don't you bring him over to our place so we don't have to spend the night apart?"

Ah, men. I then proceeded to explain that unless he wanted tiny little sticky fingerprints all over our television, stereo, couches, and computers, having a 3-year-old at our completely un-child-proofed home was probably a bad idea.

I was supposed to take a new student through my tutoring job today, which I had to cancel. As I explained to Mr. B, this is the price of getting through college debt-free. It's the price of your family helping you out when you're short on tuition, your car is in the shop, or you need help fixing up your house. Someone pays the piper for all those favors in my family, and in this case, it means being 24-hr on-call childcare.

I kept my nephew up until 10 last night hoping he'd sleep in this morning, but no such luck. He woke up at 6:30. Then we watched a cartoon sing-a-long tape 5 times in a row.

I tried to make breakfast only to discover there were no grits (we're a grits family). Then I figure, that's okay, I'll make toast. And then there's no toaster in the kitchen. I try to load up on caffeine, and of course, there's none in the house. Also missing are diaper wipes.

So I figure, that's okay, I'll go to the store because we cannot be without diaper wipes. Guess what? They left me without a car seat. So we're using damp paper towels.

Other than that, watching my nephew has been a breeze. I'm apparently one of the few lucky ones that he will go poop in the potty for (read: changing daipers just got a lot easier), and he has a computer which he is fully proficient in using to play educational games online. He can also operate a VHS and DVD player solo, God bless kids today.

Q was nice enough to bring me an energy drink. She says Mr. Q is having a minor kinepshit over her lack of job. Please refer to my last post about how and why I don't have one yet, and then add to that the fact that despite her copious work experience history, she cannot report a Diploma or GED on her resume; let's talk about the fact that I called on the entry level position at a library stocking books for 10 hours a week for like 10/hr that closed in early January. Why haven't they gotten back to me? They serious received that many applications. They stopped accepting applications on January 5th and they are still in the process of screening and interviewing candidates that meets the state's requirements.

I, Alula, do hereby certify that I witnessed Q apply for several jobs today online while we were watching my nephew, paying the piper for all the people who are helping us out while we're on the financial ropes.

Alula