Full Moon

Today there is a full moon. I know its probably silly and superstition but I can't help but believe that this has some kind of effect on life's little happenings down here on earth. Full moons make people act crazy. They make us do things we wouldn't normally do and they mess with our heads. As I'm writing this I'm thinking I may have done something I shouldn't have done. I blame the moon.

But that's not what I wanted to talk about. Today was a weird day. I woke up not to my rude alarm clock at 5:30 a.m., as I have unfortunately become accustomed to, but to something resembling the sound of a helicopter. I quickly brushed this thought aside seeing as it seemed highly unlikely there was a giant helicopter outside my window. I got up to investigate. It was 5:45. (I should have been up 15 minutes ago anyway). Imagine the shock I felt when opening my back door to let my dog outside and finding a very large, very loud helicopter souring over my neighborhood. Now, I am not a morning person. So while you may think this would have enticed me to investigate further. It did not. I was tired and my dog was not cooperating. It's just a helicopter Cooper, it's okay to go outside...apparently he didn't think so.

As I stepped out of the doorway and down the stairs to accompany my dog and hurry up this daily process, I couldn't help but notice the bright lights out of the corner of my eye. It took my brain a few seconds to register exactly what was going on...bright lights...red...flames...orange...huge...smoke...FIRE. Yes, there was definitely an extremely large fire spreading across the top of the street. I can honestly say I have never seen flames that big, that close and it was rather terrifying.

With the power in our house out and my brain still only half functioning in its non-caffeinated state, I woke up my roommates and we quickly used our phones to send pictures to our parents to ask them what to do. (It's okay, you can laugh). Living in a house of three single girls, with no boys to speak of in close proximity, aside from my 7 lb. maltese puppy, we have no choice but to call for reinforcements every once in awhile. I'm not saying its the most practical solution, but it has proven to produce results in the past. For example, the parents were also notified when we first moved in and didn't know we had to call to have our water and heat turned on; lucky for us the 'rents pulled through and we figured it out before the water actually got turned off, but it did result in some very cold showers. Another time we enlisted the parents expertise was when we thought we broke our garbage disposal. It's kind of a sensitive devise in terms of appliances and it had decided to stop draining. We let this go on for, well to be honest, entirely too long. One day, when I could no longer ignore the fact that our kitchen was beginning to smell a bit like left over gravy gone bad, the parents pulled through by informing us that garbage disposals come with a reset button. I think you get the point. Needless to say I was very proud of my new found plumbing skills.

Now, where was I. Oh yes, so while our parents assured us, via the local morning news, that the fire was contained; we decided to confirm their reports by stepping outside the front door and into the yard to see for ourselves. (I know what you're thinking). The police officers surrounding the street solidified the reports from our parents and we made our way back inside to sit in our dark house with no TV, no internet and no lights to speak of aside from a few candles. And really, this would happen on the one day of the week I leave the house at 6:30 in the morning and don't return until after 10 p.m. Getting ready in the dark is not my forte. This actually makes me think of another funny story that involves me and zippers, but I'll save that one for later.

So off to work I went with half straightened/half curled hair plastered to my head in the best side pony I could manage for what I had to work with; all the while thinking to myself that at least today would be an easy day at work. But alas, I did not take into account the full moon. Within the first 30 minutes of being there, before I could even get my second cup of coffee for the day, my boss called to inform me there was a massive wreck on 35 and he was going to miss his flight to Mexico. Normally this wouldn't be such a big deal except for the fact that ground transportation had already been arranged to pick him up upon his arrival, arranged by someone that spoke Spanish; someone that was not me. Nor did I have the contact information to the transportation services. (Probably a good thing as I'm not entirely sure my Spanglish would have gone over all that well). On top of that he had also managed to pull his achilles' tendon at some point between the car and the airport. This meant I would have to change his flight and hotel for the next day, so he could get home early and get into a doctor. (At least I know the moon gods do not discriminate). On top of my travel agent duties I also had to somehow manage to do may actual job. I don't think I looked up from my desk or away from my computer until around 2. At least the madness was half way over.

Aside from a few glitches here and there, the rest of the day proceeded with somewhat normalcy. In class we discussed Severance, the book we had been reading. A book that fictionalizes the final thoughts of mostly famous, sometimes made up, figures throughout history who all had one thing in common. Death by decapitation. Usually these were done by guillotine, but there was also the occasional ax or accidental decapitation by elevator, car crash, etc.  An appropriate novel for a full moon.

Then comes the thing I did that I shouldn't have done that I'm not going to talk about. So I guess that concludes this day, although the full moon will be out for a few more hours. You never know what could happen.

Until next time...