My 15 Minutes? Oh Lord, I Hope Not!

"Baby, don't feel pressured to get home at 5 tonight. We probably won't eat until after 7." Ever the understanding wife, I pressed "send" and reflected on tonight's meal.

In truth, that text message was totally self-serving.

Here, let me explain.

Today has been a cacophony of catastrophes. Not really, I just wrote that for dramatic purposes. Today actually started off pretty well. After a peaceful night's sleep, I got up, read the paper and then dressed to go running with Le Pooch Grande. "There's no way I will run into anyone I know," I thought as I put one of my cheesy, plastic butterfly clips in my hair, "Who on earth would be at the lake this late in the morning?" I didn't even bother with makeup; I just wet my finger and strategically wiped around whatever was leftover from yesterday in a way that made my eyes look a little less tired and puffy. I donned my black running pants and hot pink tank top and off we went.

Forty-five minutes later and haggard after riding around in a convertible and a three mile run, I briefly considered going home to shower. "No--I should probably hit 'Hey Cupcake!' for tonight's dessert before the line gets too long. At least the line is outside so no one will notice my smell." It was 11:40 and 'Hey Cupcake!' wasn't even slated to open for another twenty minutes, but I'd been warned that the lines would be long today and didn't want to miss out on cupcakes tonight.

We pull up to the Airstream and the line is already 10 people deep. Le Pooch Grande and I settle into 11th position and prepare to wait.

That's when I spotted the camera man.

News 8 Austin was on site, filming the line (within minutes there were twenty additional people behind me). Then they scan the crowd for a sucker to interview. I hastily put on my sunglasses and become engrossed with my cell phone. In my peripheral, I see them heading my way.

"This can't be," I tell myself, "Surely they will take one look at my raggedy-a-- and pass me by." I look up to check and see if I'm right. They (camera man and reporter) stop dead in front of me.

"Are you specifically here for cupcakes for Valentine's Day?" she asks me.

"Um...yes." I reply, personality shining through.

"Great!" She gestures to the camera man and suddenly he's hoisting his camera up in preparation for filming. "Mind if we ask you a few questions?"

"Um...sure." I say (again with that awesome personality). I would feel like a jerk otherwise. Besides, showing up on a TV interview looking like hell is pretty damn funny!

I can't even remember what she asked me. All I could think about while I answered the questions was, "Dammit girl! You've got more personality than that! Stop answering like a drone. Smile! Smile! Stand up straight. Suck that gut in! Say something funny. Was that funny? Oh--she's not laughing, that wasn't funny. Is my right eyebrow all twisty and weird? It was twisty and weird this morning! Is this a high-def camera? Why didn't I fix my twisty eyebrow this morning?" And so on.

After that, I rode to Melek's and presented her with a Valentine's Day cupcake. She immediately took a bite out of it. This is why we are friends.

Off to the DVD store. I had to get Husband's Valentine's Day present and my research told me that I could find it right around the corner from 'Hey Cupcake!'

I stroll into the store and declare to the friendly guy at the counter, "Hey--this place smells good! Like a spa!" (it did).

"How can I help you?" he asks, smiling widely.

"I'm looking for MI-5 volume 2. I saw on your website that you have it in stock." I was delighted with myself for even finding a store that sells this video. It's a little obscure and I was kicking myself earlier for waiting until Valentine's Day to look for it.

"We do." he replied as he walked me over to the appropriate shelf.

I started scanning the selection and found what I wanted, but something seemed weird about the packaging. Whatever, I took it to the clerk.

"I'd like these!" I announced as I set the series of five videos down and pulled my purse down from my shoulder.

"Mmmm hmm." was lukewarm response as she turned to some shelves behind her.

"Oh! That's why the packaging looked so weird. It must have been a shell for the real deal here behind the counter. I guess a lot of people steal videos, or something." I thought to myself as I pulled out my wallet.

"I need your license." She looked at me expectantly.

Wait--this didn't make sense. Why would she need my license? She hadn't even rung up the sale yet. Are these videos x-rated, or something? I decided that it must be the rating or something so I pull my license out of my wallet.

"You are a member, aren't you?" She asks. Now she's borderline snotty.

"A member? Of what?" I ask.

She gives me the "Great, another stupid customer." face and says, "This is a video rental store. Did you think you were going to buy this, or something?"

Oh crap, oh crap, oh crap!

"Oh crap!" I say. "How could I be such a moron? I had no idea what this store was..."

Her smile doesn't reach her eyes. "Well did you want to rent these or just forget it? You'll have to join to do so."

I think quickly. Husband LOVES this "MI-5" series. He will stay up until 3 am on a work night watching them. I really want to get this for him and I can't show up empty-handed tonight. Worse still, I have no idea what else I would get him at this late hour. "I'll rent two of them," I decide, "that will give me time to order the series on Amazon and have it delivered."

Clerk's hard exterior actually softens a little and we get it squared away.

I shrug off the experience as I drive home. There are important things to take care of! Husband's flight should land any minute now and I still stink! I need to get into the shower, pronto!

A few minutes later, I turn into my driveway and press the button on my remote to open the garage door. Nothing happens. Huh. I try the other button. Nothing. Weird. I alternate pushing the only two buttons on the remote. Garage door stays closed.

"Stay here, stay." I tell Le Pooch Grande as I unfold myself from my car. This is so unlike my garage door. Perhaps it's my remote...

I go to the keypad attached to the door frame. I enter the code. Nothing. I enter it again. And again, and again, and again, and again. Weird. I grab Le Pooch and go through the gate to the front door. "No problem," I think to myself as we climb the front stairs, "I'll simply let us in with the key."

Oh no I will not. The key to the front door is no longer on my ring.

"G-d#%&*! husband!" I think to myself as I stare at my key ring, "he stole my key again!"

Husband has a weird habit of taking the key off my key ring whenever he needs to go for a run. The problem is, he doesn't put it back. Now I am locked out.

"Crap, oh crap!" I say for the second time today. Husband is due home at any minute, it's Valentine's Day and I stink and look like crap. What the hell am I going to do?

I scan the list of friends who have a key to our house; there are none. Wait--there's the Shetland Pony door!

When Husband and I enclosed the porch last summer, he insisted on the largest dog door ever made. The contractors laughed when they saw its monstrous size and dubbed it the 'Shetland Pony Door'. Today, Husband was redeemed.

"Move over!" I instructed the dogs as I twisted my torso sideways and climbed through the dog door. The dogs leaped all around me, thrilled that I was one of them.

"Now what?" I thought as I pulled myself to my feet and glanced around the porch (panting, I might add). I cursed myself for locking all of the interior doors and windows last night. I jiggled a window but it wouldn't budge. I threw my purse down and surveyed the contents that spilled out. My insurance card! Surely it was thin enough to unlock the windows.

Fancying myself a 007, I slipped the card up into the window frame. It stuck tight. I pushed left, right, up--it was stuck. This was a stupid idea.

I opened the porch doors and made my way to the side yard back to the driveway. "I'm going to stink and look ugly for Husband on Valentine's Day." I thought morosely. I walked up to the garage door and entered the unlock code once, twice, five times. Damn door wouldn't open so I gave it a swift kick.

"F-you door!" I thought as I climbed into my car. I figured I might as well go buy the rest of tonight's groceries in my stinky, ugly state. I fretted over not looking my best for Husband on Valentine's Day as I reattached the garage door remote to the car visor. A movement out of the corner of my eye caught my attention.

Oh look--the garage door is opening!

I stared in stunned silence as the garage door climbed upward. Sensing a trick, I hastily pushed the button on my remote to see if it would close. It did. Oh man, I am IN!

I raced inside the house and batted the dogs' heads around in celebration. I ran up the stairs to the shower. I estimated that Husband should be home in 10 minutes. I can be showered and sexy in 10 minutes, I thought.

Then the power went out.

I missed a beat, then continued. "Showers don't need electricity," I rationalized, "Unless you shower too long and run out of hot water."

I took the fastest shower of my life. Periodically I would notice that the blue light on my electric toothbrush would go on, then off signifying that there was an intermittent power issue. It all made sense. The garage door failed due to a power issue!

After my shower I grabbed my phone and saw that Husband had sent me a text message. "I have to go straight to the office," he wrote, "I'll try to be home at 5."

Which leads me to the present. Between then and now I decided to play "Valentine's Day Fairy" wherein I buy Valentines for people, put them on their doorstep, ring the doorbell and hide. This is great fun and a good excuse to play 'Ding Dong Ditch'.

Trust me, try it. People are so fundamentally delighted by surprises on their front porch.

Anyway, I make my way home and start cooking dinner. This is where it gets bad, of course. I mean, I *think* I know the recipe but when I review it again I realize that I was supposed to marinade the filet mignon for five hours. FIVE HOURS? It's five o'clock already!!!! On this schedule we'll be having dinner at 10pm. I do the math, decide that the author of the recipe is being conservative and set the marinade to boil. At the same time I text Husband and let him know that it's okay to come home late.

'Cause I'm cool like that.

Post Note: My TV debut made it to the local airwaves this evening. I'll post a link if it ever gets uploaded on News 8's website. In short, the clip shows me talking about how I'm buying cupcakes to surprise my husband for Valentine's Day. Husband sees the broadcast before I get a chance to present the cupcakes.

Of course he does.