Overheard - When Cleaning Kills Edition

Sunday evening The Saint was taking the trash bin to the curb and stopped to chat with some neighbors; a girlhood friend of Precious Youngest’s on a walk with her father. I was inside watching a re-run of The Real Housewives: The Reunion balancing the checkbook when I heard a loud thud.

The Saint: “Quick, there’s been another cleaning related injury!”

Fannie: stepping out onto the front porch to see a tiny bird lying on its side, stunned out of its mind “What happened? Did it run into the door?”

The Saint: “There were two of them! They were flying at top speed! This one slammed right into the storm door! The glass was too clean! He didn’t realize it was a window!

Fannie: *blink* *blink*

Friend: to Fannie “OMG, remember Lucky? Didn’t you learn ANYTHING after Lucky?”

Ah yes, Lucky. Many, many years ago Precious Youngest was gifted a gold fish named “Lucky”. Lucky had small tank with some pebbles, a filter, a few fake plants and, if I remember correctly, a tiny castle.

At the time the fish was “gifted” to her Precious Youngest was in the fourth grade. She would have been what? Nine years old? So you can imagine her record of taking care of pets (well anything at all really) was spotty at best.

One morning while she was at school I was putting clean clothes away in her room and realized poor Lucky’s tank was filthy. I stomped downstairs to retrieve what I needed to clean the tank muttering under my breath many bad words about irresponsibility laziness general ineptitude not being the maid.

I scooped up Lucky and some water from the tank and put it/hm into a bowl. I cleaned the tank, filled it with fresh water and dumped Lucky back in. Still muttering under my breath I continued on with my day.

Precious Youngest arrived home from school with a friend in tow.

Precious Youngest: from her bedroom “Mom, something's wrong with Lucky!”

Fannie: seeing Lucky floating upside down in the tank “Oh my gosh that’s so weird, he was fine earlier today when I cleaned the tank!”

Precious Youngest: “You cleaned the tank?”

Fannie: defensively “Yes, I cleaned the tank! Who ELSE was going to clean the…”

Fannie: *blink* * blink*

Precious Youngest: “WHAT?”

Fannie: “Huh, I wonder if using Windex to clean the glass was a bad idea.”

Precious Youngest: “MOM!!!!”

Friend: to Fannie "I knew your cleaning would kill some day.”

Cleanliness may be next to Godliness, but around here you’re gonna take your chances!

Living On The Edge

Do you ever find yourself doing something stupid, maybe even dangerous? That as you're doing it you're thinking

“Gee, I really should stand on something stable/put on work
gloves/make sure the electricity is off/put on some safety goggles!”

BUT YOU DON’T?

Last night I decided to tackle the weird mold spots that appear on the bathroom ceiling over our tub/shower. (Please tell me this happens to you too – PLEASE?) I did put on rubber gloves before I grabbed the bleach. I did get my kitchen stool and take it in to the bathroom. I did have a bucket of water at the ready to rinse my cleaning rag. My intentions were good. But…

I’m short, so reaching the ceiling from the stool wasn’t really working. So I started wiping the ceiling with bleach and water from the safety of the ledge of the tub. And as I’m peering up at the ceiling and realizing it is dripping I thought “Huh, I probably should have on some sort of eye protection…” Did I get down for the tub ledge? No I did not. Did I find protective eye wear? No I did not.

Did you know bleach really, really stings if it drips in your eyes? Well it does. It really, really does.

But you could eat off my bathroom ceiling. I’m just sayin’.