Starting out small

But not nearly small enough.

Even though I have yet to fully explore the life-altering craziness of the past five weeks (only one more week to go until I can eat that Snickers bar in my freezer), this particular story's just bugging me to get blogged (pun intended).

I am officially one week and two days into my new job (the so-far successful result of the Major Life Decision-making), and trying desperately to convince everyone in my office (including me) that I am capable of arriving at work fully conscious and alert at 8 a.m. Until this morning, I like to think that I was doing a pretty good job. But my bad habit of turning off the alarm clock and rolling over for "five more minutes" finally caught up with me, and I ended up stumbling around my apartment in great haste. And then, in the middle of my kitchen, my morning rush minutes came to a screeching halt.

My boyfriend often says that I am "stable and rational" almost to a fault, usually when he is having a neurotic episode and I am being less than sympathetic. But at 7:45 this morning, I was reduced from "paragon of level-headedness" to blithering idiot by... a bug.

Granted, this was the biggest bug I ever want to see in any place that I intend that inhabit. And I did make an attempt to rationally assess my options in dealing with it. I even went so far as to arm myself with a clunky-heeled shoe and an attack strategy. I reminded myself repeatedly how ridiculously I was behaving. I mustered all of my courage... and then I retreated to that safest of refuges. I called my Mommy.

"I'm having a bleeping meltdown over a bug!" I wailed.

"Call the fire department," she advised.

We eventually devised a slightly less drastic solution, and I called my boss to make a vague excuse about why I was running a few minutes late. Then I headed around the block to the grocery store for a big ol' can of Raid. Somehow that bug didn't seem quite as big now that I was really armed. And somehow I can't help but think that a grown woman shouldn't need to call for a family intervention just to kill a bug.