“You are severely sleep-deprived,” Crankenstein said on Sunday. “Maybe that’s why you missed that payment.”
To that end, she tried to let me sleep in on Monday morning by going downstairs to feed Muriel, a task I normally handle. Moments later, she returned to wake me up: “I need help. Muriel–”
Mentally, I was wide awake the second she said her name, before I even knew what happened. Due to Muriel’s lower back condition and the possibility that it could one day result in paralysis and surgery, I’m on high alert when there’s the slightest hint of anything amiss with her.* Fortunately, she was fine, but overnight she had some stomach problems and there were messes to clean up.
We knew how it happened. On Sunday we’d gone to the library and then walked to lunch, only to find one of our regular spots had a line almost out the door. We’d forgotten about Holi, the Hindu festival of colors, and all the revelers it attracts, so our trip took longer than usual. Muriel was unhappy back at home, having extracted every last lick of yogurt from her frozen KONG distraction, and registered her displeasure by somehow locating a ballot initiative mailer sent by the board of elections and eating it.
Normally she’s better behaved than that, but she wanted to send a message and was willing to sacrifice her digestive tract to do it. And so Crankenstein showed me the contamination zones, two of which she’d tried to clean up and one she wouldn’t have gone near for all the money in the world. Operating on four disjointed hours of sleep and without levodopa, which meant I was moving like an oddly tremulous mummy, I found myself on my hands and knees, scrubbing the floors and fantasizing about a Silkwood shower. The work continued long after Crankenstein headed to the office.
Muriel hid just out of view throughout these activities, like a clumsy canine Harriet the Spy, watching as I spot-cleaned a tiny patch of her mattress and gathered her linens and tossed them in the washer. Despite the frigidity of the early-morning air, I opened several windows, affording her the opportunity to bark at dogs being walked on the street. That she could smell them through the dense olfactory fog of cleaning agents and disinfectant spray and still angrily protest their existence despite being weakened by her overnight trials, was a moving testament to both her sensory superpowers and solemn commitment to being a jerk.
Later that evening, when the door swung open and Crankenstein walked in, Muriel gleefully accosted her and Crankenstein hesitantly inhaled. “It doesn’t smell!” she marveled, her face breaking into a broad smile. In a recent post I lamented diminished feelings of satisfaction and accomplishment. With that in mind, I probably should’ve felt appreciative of her subsequent plaudits. Sadly, “It doesn’t smell!” didn’t quite hit the spot.
* She has lumbosacral disease; there’s an old Cranky post about it.