Just ignore me. It's normal.

Boy, when I give you a job (this time - stirring) you people really come through. And there wasn't even a prize involved. I can tell you're all civic minded team players. I'm going to report your good works to the Congressman next door and see if he can get you a plaque or something.

The results are that the counter-clockwisers are the freaks. Or, as I like to think of us, special. And not short-bus special but Faberge egg special, four leaf clover special, Christmas morning Quik special. What I'm saying is we're rare and kind of beautiful.

So I was grumpy all weekend. I’m blaming PMS because there wasn’t a single other reason for me to feel grumpy. I just did. Grumpy and punchy and irritable. Which is just awful because 1.) I hate being grumpy and 2.) I really hate being grumpy simply because of PMS. If my hair was looking tragic or I was fresh out of Burt’s Bees lip balm or nothing but No Doubt songs were playing on the radio, then I would have good reason to be grumpy. But there were zero irritants. Well, other than the billion and a half dollars I had to spend on new tires. But have you driven on new tires? After driving on Flintstone rock tires for several months? It’s a dream. So was the free alignment. And the hour I got to spend browsing around B&N while the work was being done. And yet I still felt like I couldn’t open my mouth for two days without breathing fire at people for looking at me. See? It’s PMS all the way. And, let me tell you, it’s ridiculous to be such a cliché – The Irritable Hormonal Woman. Like I should have been in a ratty bathrobe with mascara tears streaming down my face while stuffing chocolate in my mouth.

I have since moved on to the Emotional Wreck phase of PMS, which in a way is a relief - crying I can handle. I was watching Cranford last night - a movie I have seen before and actually remembered what happened so I was prepared - and I was weeping openly for about an hour over it. And then this morning I was reading Colleen's story about her friend Amos* and was openly weeping at work. And I had to explain to Chiquita that I was fine and to just ignore the blubbering. Maybe I should watch Shadowlands tonight to get it all out of me.

*If you choose to read this story Colleen would appreciate it if you only thought mean things about her. Although I will risk her wrath and say that I have known her for many years and have always thought, even before the Amos story, that she is one of the kindest people on earth. Take that Colleen!