Ladies and gentlemen, I stand before you a humble and broken man. Were it to come to pass that I am not a Pagan/Buddhist/anarchist with atheist leanings but rather a Jesus-humping God-fearing love-preaching hate-practicing holy roller, I would fear no hell – because I have cleaned out my fridge and lived to bring you this tale.

Solid sheets of crud. Slivers of rancid butter. Unopened milk that expired over a month ago. Yolk that exploded from frozen eggs, fossilized into a light yellow crust of unmentionable horror. Crevices that, when sprayed with a household cleanser, ejected chunks of black mystery all over my traumatized self. A jar of shriveled pickles from the dawn of time itself, suspended in frozen ancient mariner brine. Lemons that look perfectly normal but upon further inspection have clearly suffered unspeakable monstrosities and are no longer pockets of citrus delight but rather organic grenades capable of untold destruction. Applesauce so old it may well have been made from the very apples that brought about the downfall of man via Eve’s disobedient mouth. All this – and MORE – came from our refrigerator and truly, I am shaken to my very core.

I will not sleep soundly this, or any, night.

I spent a healthy part of Saturday evening in bed with an umbrella over my head.

For some reason, my friends think this is weird.

To me, it made perfect sense. I was playing DS games and cuddling with a cat or three while Ed was getting ready to go to a party. He turned the overhead light to look for his party underwear, which also turned on the ceiling fan. The fan is my #6 nemesis (we do not get along but not so much that it deserved a spot on my trading card), especially now that I am suffering from some pretty extreme allergies – the artificial wind was driving my eyeballs crazy and it was not happy good fun times for anyone involved. What to do? I could bury my head under the blankets and also suffocate, or .. hey, an umbrella. There was an umbrella on the bed. I opened it, set up camp, and never had been more comfortable.

Umbrellas in bed: not at all weird.