Here's my day.  It started early, early because my baby was off to Dublin for 4 days on her 10th grade school trip.  They are doing Irish studies so will visit the pubs where James Joyce hung out, see Yeats statue in the park and go to two plays by modern Irish playwrights.  Hmmmm.  And where did I go in 10th grade?  Oh yeah.  Nowhere.  So their bus to the airport left at 6:30 so I volunteered to stay home and close up the apartment two and a half hours later when I went to work.

School is a mess.  It's the worse combination of American cut-throat corporate business and Italian disorganized bureaucracy.  There are over a dozen teachers leaving after this year, (and some sooner), either because they are fed up with the way the school is run or because the admin. didn't renew their contracts.  These are the ones who dared to speak up about the many problems the school has but doesn't admit to.  Some of the teachers are excellent and I hate to see them go.  Ironically most of the best are the ones not being re-upped because they "stirred up trouble".  I have no idea if I'll be brought back.  I hide in my library and try not to look obvious.  I'd love to say what I really think but I want to hold onto the job until Grace has finished high school as it's so damned convenient.  It's getting hard to hold my tongue though.  Not exactly my strong suit.

After school I had my 3rd dentist appointment.  Did Mom bottle-feed us with sugar water or something?  I remember brushing my teeth and I think we had fluoride.  Yet Grace has never had a cavity and I had a mouth full of silver by her age.  Today was a big one.  He shot me up with numbing meds and started drilling and digging and hammering.  At one point I thought he'd break my jaw, he was pushing down so hard with his chipper.  I left with a lip like a raw 10 ounce steak hanging from my face.  Will now take a break before starting on my top teeth 'cause I'm out of money.

Had to stop to pick up a frame that I'd ordered from Leroy Merlin, a French owned Home Depot kind of place.  Being Italy and being French it was not that simple.  I couldn't pick the frame up in the store but had to drive around to the back of the building to the "pick-up" area.  So far so good.  The "pick-up" entrance is unfortunately in a tiny, fenced-in area where maybe three cars can fit and ten try to.  I managed to get in but getting out was tricky, especially as I was backing out into rush hour traffic on a motorway! 

So with frayed nerves, frame in hand, flapping lower lip, I made my way home to my sofa.  So here's the question of the day.  Have any of you ever drunk wine from a straw?

xxoo me