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10:18:2005 Entry: "Ann : Hell, part 2: The Cleaning Lady"

Hell, part 2: The Cleaning Lady

This is sort of a weird doppleganger thing that happened on both sides of the Fort Collins lag of the trip. (An aside, I made a corpse slice back in the summer and I titled my section "Doppleganger RoadTrip". I didn't know what it meant at the time, but the words sounded good together ((as I often do for art titles)) but now I have an idea of what it means.)

Stan's mom has a cleaning lady come in once a week to dust. Cleaning Lady used to be a drug addict back in the day, and although from what I understand she was born a normal/average person, the drug problem gave her the appearance of at least a mentally-challenged person, if not even a Downs syndrome. Being a distant, distant relative by marriage, Stan's mom felt the need to help her out, hence hiring her to clean. Well, you know what they say, once an addict...

So I'm finally getting to the point that I'm sleeping *fairly* well at Stan's mom's (bedroom situations on trips are always challenging, but I think that's an entry for Hell part 3), but by the time we get to Fort Collins, I'm loosing massive amounts of sleep again (single-sized futon bed with wooden "arms", cat constantly on me, stuffy, hot basement, Stan snoring in the other bed and I can't kick him because it's another bed...etc...etc...) and decide it's time for drastic measures, i.e., Lorazepam.

Lorazepam was prescribed to me to counteract the effects of Claritin which makes me sort of jittery, so I can get to sleep. Although I really don't have that problem with Claritin now as much as I did when I first started taking it, I hung on to the Lorazepam to save when I'm having massive problems sleeping. Since I have no refills left, the few pills I have left are like gold. It's a great drug...allows me to sleep straight through the night and wake up refreshed. In the case of travelling, it means I only wake up about 20 times during the night instead of 80.

So I'm rifling through one of my many travel bags to find the drugs. I have a gazillion travel bags and two little old-fashioned hard-sided suitcases that I take with me. I really need to chuck them all and buy a nice, softsider luggage set, but hey, I don't fly and I don't have the $, so why bother? The suitcases were free hand-me-downs from my parents, one was a free promotion my grandmother got from opening an account somewhere (back when banks gave you stuff). I remember when she got that I had to carry the suitcase home on a Racine city bus. It's very 70s blue with green, yellow and orange stripes. Yeow. The travel bags I got free too as free promotions from GeoCities (remember them, when the web not only was free, but gave you stuff?) and assorted perfume bonus gifts (Dune). I take a lot of clothes travelling. Reason? Parents do not have a clothes dryer, hence a convenient clothes wash while in Fort Hell is out of the question. It sucks. And they ask me why I take so much stuff with me. Duh! Yet I digress. Upon searching, I realize I do not have my drugs. They are nowhere. We call Stan's mom, thinking that maybe I left my drugs there, but she can't find them.

Then it hits me...I probably really did leave my drugs there, but the day we left the western slope was the day the Cleaning Lady would come. The Cleaning Lady, the former drug addict STOLE MY DRUGS! Not that you could get off much from Lorazepam, Claritin and Ibuprofen, but hey, who knows.

Blame the Cleaning Lady! Damn drug addicts, finding my allergy medication, painkillers and sleeping aid! I can always replace the Claritin and the Ibuprofen...those are OTC, but the Lorazepam was my only hope for ever getting one good night of sleep at my parents'! I cursed drug addicts more (and why is it that they always get someone to pity them and help them out of their situation, whereas those of us who aren't drug addicts, but need help, get nada?)

But then I felt something in one of my black bags, a hard bulge in a zippered pocket. It was...YES! My Meds! I only woke up about 20 times that night.

And the Cleaning Lady was off the hook...for now.

We get back to Madison Friday night. I'm feeling like hell due to Montezuma's revenge (I guess that's an entry for Hell part 4.), and pretty much feel like hell the entire useless weekend. On Monday, yesterday, I feel ok, so I decide to get my mail from the Post Office and shoot pictures of my jewelry, but first I needed to unload my camera contents, namely the really ugly kneecap (see below).

That is, if I could find my camera.

I searched everywhere. I called Stan at work. He didn't know where it was. I searched everywhere again. I called the hotel I stayed at in Lincoln, Nebraska, our halfway point, to see if anyone, like, oh, The Cleaning Lady, turned in a digital camera. I called my mom. Nothing. No digital camera.

This isn't a little cheap $100 camera. I bought it 5 years ago and tried to get a pretty good model at the time. Along with the entire accessory package--charger, adapter, batteries, flash cards, USB cord, etc., I was minus a grand. And now I was minus a camera. And although I never wanted to be a photographer, I ended up being one by necessity to photograph my jewelry and beads (I have a side business of selling imported Bali beads...bet you didn't know that). And now Stan uses it to photograph his cactuses. We are both completely dependent on having a digital camera for our livelihood, not just to take pretty pictures on vacation. And now it appears we were screwed.

I did my errands, Stan called and said we could go look for a new camera after he got off work that evening. I started doing research on the web to see what would be the best model for macrophotography. I kept mulling over in my head how although I thought I made sure I had EVERYTHING with me before leaving the motel, how maybe because Montezuma was playing not only with my one end, but possibly even with my mind, that maybe I really did leave it in the motel in a dark corner by the bed. Damn. Damn. Why hasn't the hotel called back? I bet The Cleaning Lady found it and took it and is laughing over my injured knee picture. I bet she'll pawn it and use it to buy drugs. I decided to call the hotel back. I sat down on the futon couch, and readied myself for interrogating them about their Cleaning Lady not coming clean (pardon the pun) about what she finds left behind. As I was talking to the receptionist, my eye spotted something in a dark corner. It was small, dark, no, could it be? Was it? Was it my camera bag? "No, we haven't turned up anything, but we'll call you if we find it," said the receptionist. I thanked her as I simultaneously grabbed the strap and felt the familiar feel of the camera bag. It must've fallen on the floor from the other futon when the dogs were squirreling around, then pushed back in a dark corner when Stan was working on his cactus stuff.

The Cleaning Lady is off the hook.

4 Comments

Oh no. That is funny. You must have been under so much stress!

Geocities used to give stuff away?! Damn.

Good Luck recuperating!

Posted by Dawn @ 10:18:2005:11:32 AM CST

Geocities, back in the 90s was great! I got a couple coffee mugs, 3 attache bags which are great for overnight travel (or for long trips if you have several of them like I do), a big CD boombox that still works (even though something broke inside and it clicks when you turn it on--that I didn't buy with my points, but won as a gift or someting), and a bunch of stuff from The Museum Store, a bunch of silver jewelry, 2 miniature gothic rose window reproductions (that hang in our bedroom), Frank Lloyd Wright-style glass vases...great stuff, all free (except shipping) just for having their banner on your page and getting impressions which translated to $$$. Ah, the good old days. I remember frantically going through The Museum Store (Shop?) trying to find stuff to get with my GeoPoints before they expired. This was like right at the end of the century. Then the stockmarket crashed, stock offerings were worthless, software companies went out of business, (Metacreations demise really got me sad) it all started to go south. Priming for the running of the Shrub in 2000, no doubt.

Posted by Ann @ 10:18:2005:12:36 PM CST

Cleaning people probably get falsely accused of taking things frequently just because of the nature of their work.

Posted by Stan @ 10:18:2005:08:02 PM CST

Yeah, I feel bad about that. All us stupid space cadet travellers suffering from lack of sleep and various e-coli sickness who pack stuff in the wrong spot because we're not in our right minds, thinking "The Cleaning Lady did it!"

But I guess we all get accused of a lot of stuff because of our professions, false accusations that we don't deserve.

Posted by Ann @ 10:18:2005:08:10 PM CST

By Ann @ 09:25 AM CST:10:18:05 ..::Link::..

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