Monday Blues

I’m having a very hard time concentrating today.  There are so many things to do and I just can’t seem to get my butt in gear.  Must be the Monday blues.  I can see why women used to call it Blue Monday when they had to hand wash clothes and hang them up to dry.

For some insane reason, my ex-mother-in-law didn’t like to put her clothes in the dryer.  During the winter (in Wabash, Indiana) she’d hang them in the basement because she thought they smelled better.  If the weather wasn’t 0 degrees and snow up to her short ass, she’d even take them outside.  I can understand hanging them outside in the summer, but the basement in the winter?  Nope, no way!

We got a day’s worth of rain starting on Friday and almost all day Saturday.  I had to be out in it, but I didn’t care.  It was just so nice to have rain…finally.  I’m waiting for everything to start blooming.  Spring and fall are my favorite time of year.

And my mind rattles around in its cage as usual.

I’m trying to put the finishing touches on a not-so-short story to submit in a writing contest, but every time I read it, I make a few more changes.  I sent it in to Glimmer Train last year and it was a runner-up, but no big…  How does that saying go?  Anyway, here are a few paragraphs for your reading pleasure (?).


G MEN


     I was the Great Gordo Gibbons until the summer of 1960 when Gary Reddick, his three sisters, and his parents moved in next door.  That’s when Gary and I became the G Men.  I won’t say it was love at first sight because like most males of the human species, we had to do our strutting and roaring to establish the pecking order.  Besides, I was an only child and used to being the center of attention.
Fortunately, we were only five, so there wasn’t a whole lot of pecking to establish.  As soon as I saw his brand new, two-wheeler, decked with playing cards attached to the spokes with clothespins, training wheels, and plastic streamers flying from the handlebars, I decided that any differences we had were unimportant.