Today was one of those days that when I got up, I thought to myself, "I wonder if I call Mike and beg to sleep in bed all day because I've got cramps, if I could just crawl in bed and die without feeling guilty?"

Then I realized, I'm me, so the guilt would be there regardless, because I know he'd say yeah, no prob and I'd feel rotten because our laundry didn't get done and I didn't clean stuff out of the car, etc. Mike doesn't care and never judges me when I do that stuff, but I still feel bad.

So I did laundry all day. It was kind of quiet. Just me, various renditions of Star Trek and MacGyver, folding sheets, hanging sheets, and getting towels together and put away.

Russell came home at 3 and we chatted a little. Then, I went and got Genny at LaDawn's. We talked for a bit and then, she had this plastic spider on her toaster cover. She was trying to scare the kids and was talking about catching the spider. I was kind of wrinkling my forehead because they were clearly not falling for it, but then she screamed so loud in pretending that I jumped. Then she was giving me crap for jumping. I laughed and said,"Hey, I spent a quiet day of doing laundry and getting stuff done, so the noise itself startled me, not the plastic spider!" Then she said,"It's never quiet here."

All I could think is that I don't think I could handle not having some quiet time. I think the most enjoyable part of my day was hanging sheets on the clothesline. I was enjoying the sunshine balanced against a cool autumn day. I annoyed a male quail in charge of a covey, so he was giving me "back off bitch" chirrups and I smiled at him and told him gruffly to get off my bird house. He flew off in a flutter of wings and chirrups to keep track of his wards.

Now, I enter the house and I think to myself, "What the hell is that smell?" I've searched the kitchen and all I found was a moldy orange left over from cutting the things for the cross-country team -- no one but Mike can eat oranges in our house because the rest of us are allergic or are worried about allergies -- so I tossed it out. Mike threw out the trash, but I can still smell something odd. I have a super sensitive nose, but damn.

That should be a reality game show,"What the hell is that smell?" You put something horrendous under a couple of contestants' noses and once they've stopped gagging, you ask them, complete with audience participation,"What the HELL is that SMELL?!" The first one to ring in correctly gets points. The final round would be weird things -- not easily identifiable maybe in vials sitting on a wheel o' fortune wheel maybe with hints offered. Contestants could get one hint for free, but further hints would jeopardize the amount of final loot that they took home.

I may have too much time on my hands.

Speaking of which, I demonstrated how much time I have on my hands while driving to Salt Lake City. I came up with a redneck vocabularly word passing an exit for Shafter. I told Mike,"What shafter in the fridge?" He snickered appreciatively.