Poor Mr. ShellHawk

It's been a helluva week for me, and I'm really glad to see the back end of it!


Turns out the editor of Child Style Magazine essentially got herself some free product, as I haven't yet seen the link for the "Halloween supplement" in which my tombstone salt and pepper shakers were to appear. I had to write a politely phrased nasty email, as nicer ones were ignored. When the editor got my note, she threw something up on the blog without even proofreading it. The sentence is clearly copied and pasted from the description I sent her, with several of her own words thrown in randomly at the very beginning; the sentence doesn't make sense. Lesson learned, I guess.


Thursday evening, my Explorer was acting up badly enough I knew I needed to put it in the shop. Of course, Friday is the day I go to set up at Jack Russell Farm Brewery, so when else would the car not work right? Oh, and Mr. ShellHawk had a business trip over this weekend, so there wasn't a car in our garage that was going to work for the purposes of schlepping everything up the hill for the booth. 


So Thursday night, after I get done teaching, I'm pretty stressed out. Mr. ShellHawk told me Thirsty Thursday was being held across the street, so I headed over there after I dropped my stuff at the house.


Fortunately, Mr. S. had worked out a mechanic for me with one of our other friends, and my neighbors offered their Suburban for my use. Whew! What a relief!


Now, here's the funny part.


One of the guys mentions how I need a new car or minivan or something that's going to be more dependable. Now, Mr. ShellHawk and I have been good stewards of our money and agreed that next year, we'll start to figure out what the vehicle is going to be, right? We haven't discussed budget, but we know we want to pay cash because we don't want any car payments. (Before you ask, no, I haven't sold the Dodge, yet. I haven't been able to get myself to let go, even though it hasn't run in over a year-but that's another story involving the neutral safety switch.)


Then one of the guys comes up with, "You should just buy her a hearse!"


Now, I've wanted a hearse since I was seven or eight years old, so my whole demeanor perked right up at that. 


Mr. ShellHawk's face did not light up, I'm sorry to say.


Pressing the advantage, one of the other guys says something about how a hearse would have all the cargo space I needed, and would be fine to get the dogs to and from the dog park and the vet, etc.


I said I'd sell the Dodge and the Explorer to buy a hearse.





Now, Mr. ShellHawk has had an unreasoning hatred for my Dodge Dart from day one. If I die while the Dodge is still in my possession, he'd have it towed to a junkyard immediately, in spite of the fact that (other than the neutral safety switch) it runs like a top and has a pretty new old stock set of seats. He might even take it to the desert and set it on fire. Why? I have no idea, but that's the lay of the land.


So needless to say, when he heard "sell the Dodge," he got really happy.


"Fine, but the money has to go into buying the hearse."


Neighbor V asks about the budget and he tells her. "Great," she says, "Shell, you need to start looking now that you know what your budget is!"


I smiled. "Done." I turned to the five other people there, "You're my witnesses, right? You heard him say I could get a hearse, right?" Everyone allowed as how they did hear it.


The, "Oh, shit, what did I just do?" look came over his face. He tried to rally.


"But it's got to be your everyday car." Like that's supposed to be punishment or something? Really?


"Sure."


At this point, all the guys start chiming in with how we've got to get the "funeral in progress" sign in the window and put a fake body in the back and drive down the carpool lane in a procession to see if the CHP has the nerve to pull me over. All of them are trying to outdo each other, and Mr. ShellHawk has got the deer-in-headlights look in his eyes. Then neighbor Dave delivers the coup de gras.


He holds his phone out to Mr. S. "Look! Here's a 1986 Cadillac hearse on Craigslist!"


We are all busting up at this point. All except Mr. S., who plaintively asks me, "Why can't you be normal?"


I told him I was like this when he married me. That probably didn't make him feel any better.


Now, funny story and good-natured ribbing aside, it's still unlikely that I will get a hearse, just because I really do like being married to Mr. ShellHawk. Neighbor V pointed out that he "got all pinched up" about it, and that it was a good idea if maybe I didn't mention it for awhile. I'm still tempted to email him for sale ads, just because I'm wired that way.

I mean, I could be driving this 1938 Packard Formal Town Car! I'm only $100,000 short on my budget!


As for Mr. ShellHawk, it occurs to me that though I'm sure to make him comfort food and have a martini waiting for him when I know he's had a rough day, he still has to put up with some pretty odd things from me. Poor guy.


Update: Official words this morning, October 17th: "If you buy a hearse, I will kill you. It's completely impractical!"


*disappointed sigh*


I may have to get a "real job" for awhile to buy one. It might even be worth going back to that horrible feeling that my soul is being killed inch by inch. Not to mention the horrible florescent lights and the weird, repetitive conversations...