The kids let me sleep in today. First they snuggled around me and slept in themselves, then they even got up and poured cereal without me. I rolled in the warm covers. I just love that hot sheets with covers on top sensation. It's only ever like that in the morning when you're supposed to get out of them. I heard a pounding but I didn't think much of it. Little Man regularly pounds on things so unless there's a scream after the pound or the sound of glass it's not an emergency. Certainly nothing worth sliding out from under the delicious blankets. I was trying to stay in that after-dream-glow.
"Mom! Somebody is at the door!" my daughter said in the tone that conveys her superiority over me for being up and out of bed when important things are happening like a knock at the door.
"Wha? Who? Can you see who it is?" I asked as I hopped out of bed.
"It looks like one of those guys who was digging the hole." oh. The septic people? But the hole had been filled in. All our septic and hot water heater woes have been over for a week. Then I remembered… THE OIL GUY!
Shit. I was wearing Jammies. Girl boxers, thin t-shirt. Very appropriate for bed… not so much for answering the door. Or even being out of bed at all according to my nipples. I grabbed a hoody and made my way to the back door. The poor man standing there in the cold looked nice and normal enough, youngish but mature.
"Hi!" I sheepishly said so we could both pretend I didn't just crawl out of bed and he didn't witness my children climbing on chairs to retrieve their own damn cereal. I spotted the big oil truck and asked "Do you need me to open up the basement door or something?" what!? I've never had oil heat before, I don't know how this works.
"I already filled, I just need a check." he said, kindly.
"Oh! Of course, let me just.." I tried to coax my unruly giant bed hair back from my face. We've reached the point in bangdom that I need to decide if I'm already growing them out or trim them. There's no explanation for the size and grandeur of the rest of my hair, it just is. "Come on in!" I opened the door wide and began a hopping dance back and forth over a basket of laundry sitting there. The Man had informed me the oil guy would be coming and that I would have to pay him but I had no idea if he forgot to leave a check out of if I just wasn't seeing it. So I hopped over the basket this way to look, then back over that way to look. All the while feeling ridiculously underdressed and crazy like.
"Who is he!?!" Lil Dew stood next to me protectively with her own bed hair. Thankfully Little Man seemed to be fully engrossed in cartoons and breakfast and didn't come to check out the visitor or try to lend a hand with his "I'm a Doctor" skills.
"Never mind, go eat your cereal." I told her, smiling apologetically at the oil guy and grabbing the phone. I dialed The Man quickly. Luckily he wasn't on top of scaffolding unable to answer. "Hey the oil guy is here, did you leave a check out somewhere?"
"I put it in the drawer by the mail thingy." I hopped back over the laundry basket and shuffled through the drawer looking.
"It's not here!" I said in panicked tones. I was wondering what they do to someone who has an oil guy come out and then doesn't pay up. I certainly don't have the skills it would take to make that giant dollar amount disappear. I'd have to live with the guy a whole month. (SLIB)
"Oh not there! In that other drawer where I've been keeping all the bills. I tucked it in there 'cause I thought you would find it there." The checkbook was there, under about fifty stacked envelopes behind all the kids school paperwork in a giant drawer we never use. *perfect* I practically hung up on him.
The Man had scrawled his name in the signature spot. I had to fill in the rest, asking the poor oil guy for help on every line. "Date? Amount? Who are you again?" He was very patient and smiling even though in my half awake state I felt I was trying to write in another language and it seemed to take forever.
Finally it was done and I passed it to him proudly. "Thanks so much!" I told him.
"Enjoy this cold weather we're going to have with your new oil." he said. I'm pretty sure he wasn't talking about my nipples. I imagine he's just thrilled that oil prices have dropped, I bet it's very uncomfortable witnessing heart attacks and crying when you give people their bill.
"Sorry about this." I gestured all around and hopped back over the laundry basket to help him out the door. "Next time I'll be ready for you!"
Yeah. My foot spends a lot of time in my mouth for "that's what she said" remarks.
The moral of this story is that being a kept woman isn't all fun and games. Sometimes you have to pay the oil guy.
And also that since oil prices have dropped so much it isn't necessary to show up at the door in next to nothing when your oil guy shows up. But you can and he'll probably tolerate it.
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