Fit To Be Tied

Mrs. Hillbilly Mom is not in a good mood tonight. After a series of unfortunate events, a major one being the #1 son forgetting his basketball shoes during his trip to town for a dental appointment, necessitating the return of Mrs. HM to the Mansion, a round trip of 45 minutes, plus the deliberate attempted murder of Mrs. HM by #1's cat, Genius, who is wont to dash under the feet of any adult navigating stairs, the icing on the cake reared its ugly head upon Mrs. HM's entry into her classroom after driving #1 to his basketball open gym.

Two weeks ago, during the Missifreakinsippi Heat Wave Vacation, the custodians blessedly waxed Mrs. HM's room while she was out of town. They returned all items, though they arranged them neatly in an order which bore no semblance to any floor plan Mrs. HM has ever utilized in the 10 years she has been in Newmentia. Perhaps it's too much to expect that a person who cleans a room every day for 10 years might remember where items are located. In the past, we have been instructed to leave a floor plan taped to the desk so that items can be placed correctly, and will not be dragged about willy-nilly, spoiling the fresh wax job. Not that it ever worked.

Last Monday, I spent 75 minutes carrying 31 desks and chairs, three tables, a mini-fridge, a TV, a microwave, and a lightly-loaded file cabinet to their final resting places. My back still hurts. Imagine my surprise when I walked in this afternoon and discovered that I was missing a 6-foot table. A 6-foot table that I paid for with my own hard-earned cash. A 6-foot table that I folded and carried and unfolded and placed items upon last week.

Being Mrs. HM, I could not let this transgression go unchecked. I searched my end of the hall for my table. A fruitless task. I headed for Mabel's end of the building, and spied a custodian ducking into a classroom. I popped my head in, interrupting his buffing, long enough to inform him that I was missing a 6-foot white table, in case he found an extra. He informed me, "I know right where it is. And your refrigerator, too. It's in the band room. Mr. Principal told us to put them there." Well, isn't that a fine how-do-you-d0? I wonder when he thought I'd miss them? Oh, I don't know...maybe...this may be a stretch here...but how about...THE FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL? The kicker is that Mr. Principal has a mini-fridge in his office. Why didn't he donate his own mini-fridge for this function that was held in Newmentia? You know, since it's a temporary loan and coming right back. Or maybe he did, and I'm just not privy to that information. It's incidents like this that make me take home my surge suppressors and keyboard and DVD player and other stuff I've boughten for my ownself, by cracky! This is exactly why Mrs. Hillbilly Mom can't have nice things in her classroom.

Once again, I don't get no respect. My room is like a giant warehouse for people to help themselves to furniture and fridges. I guess I'm lucky the TV didn't disappear this year. Oh, and the school projector that I used to have on a cart is also missing since graduation, but I still have that pink elephant of a SmartBoard that is now useless without the cart projector.

I'm thinking of dumping it along a darkened hallway one of these evenings. I'm going to have to change my inventory anyway.