Reader, This May Be My Last Post

It's not that I'm not enjoying blogging, it's that I fear I'm actively dying.

Mom woke up at 11:00, ready for her late night snack. I sat her up on the side of the bed, brought her something to eat and drink, and sat on the only chair I have room for in her bedroom, the potty chair. While she has her snack, we either watch television or do what we did tonight, collaborate on the NYT crossword puzzle.

I could hear Anna in the kitchen bickering with her boyfriend Sam, but that's nothing new. They always squabble like an old married couple, so I tuned them out and kept calling out clues for Mom until I noticed that Anna was sounding increasingly panicky. I laid Mom back down and went into the kitchen to see what was up.

Sam had gotten out the s'mores maker (As Seen on TV!) that my older daughter Ellen bought me a few years ago, knowing I secretly wanted one and wouldn't buy it for myself. Sam discovered it was out of Sterno, so he filled the well with rubbing alcohol and lit it despite Anna's protests. Well. Rubbing alcohol certainly is flammable! Anna and my youngest, Scott, were cowering away from the blazing inferno on the kitchen table. Rather than let the flame go to waste, of course, I made myself a s'more and stayed in the kitchen to make sure all the emergency exits remained clear until it burned out. Scott chose to make his s'more in the microwave. Sam admitted that he doesn't actually like s'mores and was only interested in setting something on fire, so he didn't have one. My marshmallow tasted funny, and I'm having a flareup of my troublesome old hypochondria, so I'm pretty sure I'm going to die of ethanol poisoning.

If I do, please make sure the first line of my obituary reads, "Accompanied by the sudden sound of a host of wildly flapping angel wings, Bingo left this earthly plane early on the morning of July 14, 2009." And whatever you do, don't send any floral arrangements with babies' breath in them or Ellen will make a spectacle of herself huffily removing them and rearranging the flowers at the funeral home.