The Atypical Government Worker.

Imported from the old lesombre.ca…

I can’t think of a moment where I say this more than when I hang around Lovely Wife. Sadly, I rarely blog about all the crazy stuff Lovely Wife does – can you figure why? – until now.

One day, it snowed so much here that all the radio and TV announcers were urging people to stay off the street. “Unless you’re an emergency worker, a doctor, or some kind of super-hero, stay home!” They would say every 10 seconds. At the time, I was a stay-at-home dad, and I didn’t mind all the fuss about the snow, since my day involved walking from the couch to the kitchen to the bathroom.

But, Lovely Wife, beeing the Atypical Government Worker that she is forced me to give her a lift to her office. I made the face* to her and tried to reason with her: People were stuck in snowbanks 8 feet tall out there, nobody in their right mind was driving. I pointed out that she needed a lift because the city buses had been called back to the garage. Did she think it was a smart idea to get her, me and our 16 months old daughter in the car? She wouldn’t hear any of it. She had to go to work.

Did I mention she was pregnant at the time?

So against my better judgment we pile in the car. On the way to her office, she explained to me that her job was vital to the country. You see, my wife’s boss’ boss’, the Chief statistician of Canada, is 5 steps removed from replacing the Pime Minister of Canada. That makes my wife 8 steps removed from running the country in case of a major disaster. Hey, if that can work on Battlestar Galactica, I can’t see why it wouldn’t work here. So in case all the 7 other echelons decided to take the day off, well, because everybody was staying home except the crazies, I had to drive my wife in.

The 15km ride took us almost two hours. People were stuck in the road, crashed on the sidewalks (we couldn’t see the sidewalks), Snow plows everywhere, etc. It was like Hell had frozen over. I manage to make my way to her office. By this time, I’m a little mad myself. She hops off and I head back home.

Driving back took me about 90 minutes. Traffic was still bad, but at least the snow removal crews were slowly winning against the snow. Not to mention that by this time, most sane people had realized that they shouldn’t be on the road at all, or got to where they were going. I almost got sideswiped twice, rear-ended three times, and my gas pedal got stucked as I took the exit to get to my house. But I made it. I was tired and sweaty, Zoé was hungry, but we were alive.

I hear the phone ring as I’m getting up the stairs. I pick up. It’s LW. “Come pick me up, there’s nobody here”. It’s amazing that we’re still together.

This attitude still persists after all these years working there. These days, if LW gets to work 5 minutes late, she’ll stay one more hour to make up for it. But if she gets there early, she won’t leave early.

Pray that she never gets to run the country.

*Are you stark raving mad woman!

There’s toothpaste for sensitive teeth

Imported from the old lesombre.ca…

But my teeth are fine. It’s the rest of the person around the teeth that is sensitive. I’ve been asked this today, and it made me really sad:

“Is it true that sometimes parents can kill their own children? I was told by a friend that this 16 year-old girl got pregnant and then her parents told her that she was going to ruin her life by having a child, but at the same time they wouldn’t let her get an abortion because it was against their beliefs. They told her she wouldn’t be able to get straight A’s in school, so she gave birth to the child by herself, stuffed it in a plastic garbage bag, then stabbed it with a kitchen knife and threw it in the garbage. Is that true?”

My daughter, 8 years old.

A classmate of hers, also 8 years old, told her that story. Isn’t that waaaay too young for stories like that?

I’m sad.