How To Have a Craptastic Day

Step One:  Send your 6-month-old subliminal messages to wake up, screaming, at 4:30 a.m.  Yes — A.M.  Before the sun rises.  Or chickens.  Or any other animal with God-given intelligence.  Continue sending subliminal messages over and over, preferably every 45 minutes (or until you decide that getting up and actually facing the day is the only thing you can do to stop the screaming).

Step Two:  Choose oatmeal as the breakfast fare for both of your children — make sure to tell them that TODAY they can decide they no longer love oatmeal.  Give your two year old diva permission to scream about her sudden dislike of oatmeal and tell your snotty, sneezing, coughing infant to sneeze out “mucousy” oatmeal each time you bring the spoon to his mouth.  End breakfast by holding both kids in your lap and spoon-feeding each one — follow up with a shower for all three of you.

Step Three:  As you unload last night’s dishes from the dishwasher, do NOT pay attention to what you are doing.  Reach into the silverware basket and grab the wrong end of a steak knife.  Yes, there will be blood but you’ll get to use your daughter’s “Monkey Band-aids.”  She’ll insist.

Step Four:  With your newly bandaged hand, load the dirty dishes.  Between the pain of your injured finger and the incessant whining of both children (to ensure an appropriate level of whine, make sure to schedule this activity in lieu of nap-time), you will stop focusing on the task at hand.  Casually, slip an infant fork into the garbage disposal and turn said disposal on.  Yes, turn it on and then sigh loudly when the disposal stops working.

Step Five:  Complete the first four steps WITHOUT any coffee in your system.

I promise — the best, most craptastic day of your life. . . and, best of all?  It’s free (minus the cost of oatmeal, the water and soap used in the shower, the bandaid, and the repairman needed for the garbage disposal).