It's a Privilege to Pee

There is definitely going to be a......ahem......running theme here.

The good news is, it doesn't involve poop.

I took a "ME" afternoon today (woohoo me!). Went to a movement workshop in Port Townsend. But before I left, I spent a couple of hours working on my audition monologues and songs. One of those songs is a little diddy from a musical called Urinetown. Some of you may be familiar, most may not. That's okay. Suffice to say, the title of the song is "It's a Privilege to Pee."

In a word, I spent the first part of my morning singing about.......well, singing about pee (which, I might add, is a far cry better than what I've been cleaning up the last few mornings.....but that's another story....or not).

Anyway..........I go to the workshop and, lo and behold, one of the exercises is to write one's name with one's clenched buttocks. I think the exact instructions were "pretend you have to pee really badly and write your name with a hypothetical pen that is sticking out of your butt."

Oh, did I mention the instructor is Italian? And speaks through a translator?

(And for the record? "Write your name with a pen sticking out of your butt" sounds wayyyyyyy more poetic in Italian than it does in English.)

Anyway, the workshop was a much-needed diversion, and I can't wait to go back tomorrow night for the next installment. But as I was walking to my car to come home, I couldn't help but think, "I should use the bathroom before I go, otherwise I'm going to really have to go bad by the time I get home."

But, of course, my next thought was, "Nah! I'm fine. Just get into the car and go!"

So I did.

Cut to home.

I arrive. I get out of the car with one thought, and one thought only--get thee to a bathroom first thing.

I open the door.

My father is standing in the kitchen. He turns. He gives me Shrug #2. (For those of you who missed the Shrug blog--Shrug #2 is the one Dad and I exchange that is code for "Mom is acting realllllllly weird and I have no idea what to do about it.") Then I hear Mom wailing from the hallway, "Is that Denise???!!!!"

Buttocks clenched. "What's up Mom?"

"I neeeeed.......yourrrr......hhhhhhelllllllp."

I look at Dad. He gives me Shrug #2 again. I tell him with my raised palm, "I got it" and I follow Mom back to her bedroom.

Now you're probably wondering what the "crisis" was?

It was..........

The TV Guide.....s.

Plural.

See..........Mom pulls out the TV Guide insert from the newspaper every Sunday so she can pick and choose what she watches (Even though the only channels she watches are CNN and the Western channel! But of course I always just let that go.......it's her TV afterall.).

The trouble is (at least the trouble for Mom today was).......we get two newspapers, each with its own TV Guide. So Mom has pulled out both guides (and they're both printed in that microscopically small font) and now they're both setting on her bed. Separately. One setting "over there"; the other setting "over here." But for some reason, she's clearly terribly confused at having two TV Guides and not knowing which one is the "right" one, or the "old" one, or the "new" one, or the......whatever.

Remember--I have to pee! So my patience is running very, very, VERY thin (that's patience with a capital P.....as in PEEEEEE!)

So I ask her, "Okay Mom, which guide would you rather use?"

She points to one.

I take the other one, "Okay, then you don't need this one" and I turn to take it to the recycle bin. Except..........my mother now has this aghast expression on her face like I just dismembered her favorite puppy.

So I stop. "Okay Mom, let's do this. You use the one that's on your bed. And I'll set this other one down on this chair over here. And if you think you need it, you can just go over to the chair and get it. Okay?"

A compliant, "yesssssss."

Then she says to me, "Do you have to go to the ladies' room?"

"What?"

And she says, "Well you're squirming around like you have to use the ladies' room."

And I chuckle and say, "As a matter of fact Mom, yes. Yes I DO have to pee. Really, really, really badly."

"Well then you should go," she says oh-so logically.

(Notice she had no trouble getting those words out. Weird how that works.)

Note to self: Go before you go.