Please Pass the Awesome Sauce

Yeah, I know. It's been a week. And while I'd like to regale you with fantastic adventures and narratives about how kind my muse has been to me of late, I cannot tell a lie. My day job took over, my muse went on sabbatical and I abandoned my blog to the black hole of non-regular posting death.

On Monday, I could not have felt any worse had my head been duct-taped MacGyver-style to Titanic's anchor. Death and snot and all. Rearranging the deck chairs of coherent thought that day proved just as futile, so I slept Rip Van Winkle-style. Time-wise, not on a grassy knoll.

On Tuesday, I could have sworn a time-warp occurred at a Starbucks in north Dallas. You see, a friend came over five hundred miles to see me, for a few hours, just conversation. No shopping, no sight-seeing. She and I over a hot drink and the best soup I've had all season. Three hours passed in one precious blink. What a treasure I have in her.

On Wednesday, though I cannot divulge why, the pissboy scene from History of the World Part One, kept replaying in my mind. Though, on this particular day, it most certainly was not good to be the King.

On Thursday, I almost posted a haiku about my dentist, but I couldn't figure out how to make exasperate and con-artist adhere nicely to the required number of beats. In his own mind, and I'm sure his mother's, he missed his calling as a stand-up comedian. But when a temporary crown falls off three times in one week just breathing air, all things dentist cease to be entertaining. Even the whoopie-cushion-esque jokes when your Levi's hug the vinyl chair too long.

On Friday, I watched New in Town. And, while the always-handsome Harry Connick, Jr. was a visual treat that melted nicely into my weary sensibilities, the bizarre, post-plastic-surgery-movement that Renee Zellweger's once-beautiful face twisted into with each line of dialogue was more than enough to toss me out of my story-world-suspension nearly every scene. Why do women do this? My mother, at 70, is still one of the most beautiful women I know. Her strategy? Protect what God gave you, don't try to change it. And be a good person. Over time, long-term emotions wear on our faces like a worn set of radials. Her road-wear suggests laughter and the grace of time. I can only hope to be so lucky.

So what if they're excuses? They sounds infinitely better than I sat, I tried, I uttered, "Ugh" and gave up. This week promises more time, a few extra breaths, at least one more dental visit and a monumental backlog of ideas for the Vortex.

Tell me one event in your life I missed last week that could only be described as one piping-hot bowl of awesome sauce.