Just a quick review of the day, friends, in a list of 32 things. Honest to God, as much as I want to think today was unusual, honesty compels me to admit this is just like every day for, like, EVERY PARENT I KNOW.

1. OK. I went to church this morning, but I couldn’t find my travel mug for coffee. My 4th grader suggested I use my whiskey flask. I was seriously tempted because whiskey flask + church makes me happy the same way profane embroidery + church makes me happy, BUT, contrary to public opinion, I do occasionally behave in socially appropriate ways, so I did NOT drink my coffee from a flask in church. I was simply late — as always — because I obviously couldn’t go until I found my travel mug.
2. It was in the car.
3. There was solidified milk in it.
4. I didn’t gag when I cleaned it out — and it fell in one heinous, gelatinous, fetid mass into the disposal — because that’s apparently one of my super powers now.
5. I was leaving the house with my clean, filled travel mug when I discovered the dog chewing on a glass ball she stole from the Christmas tree.
6. Yes, the Christmas tree is still up and it’s the tail end of March.
7. Yes, of course the ball was already in shards.
8. Yes, of course I checked her mouth.
9. Yes, of course it was full of glass. I pulled it all out. Piece by piece. She’s fine. No cuts. Sad dog, though, that I took away her toy.
10. Yes, I got glass and dog slobber all over myself.
11. No, I didn’t change my clothes. I’m not a rookie. If I changed my clothes every time I was encased in things like slobber and glass, I’d never do anything but change my clothes.
12. I wiped off the slobber as best I could with someone’s sock, discarded for, I imagine, just that helpful purpose next to the door.
13. I made it to church with coffee and without a trip to the emergency weekend vet, so goal accomplished.
14. I came home.
15. I made homemade stock. You know why? BECAUSE I’M A BOSS, and that’s what bosses do. BOOM.
16. “Mom?” asked my kid, peering into the pot. “Is that a mole you’re making into soup?” 
17. He didn’t mean mole sauce.
18. He meant mole, the animal.
19. It’s not a mole. It’s a piece of smoked pig. But I saw no reason to say so.
20. “Yes,” I said. “Yes. We’re having mole soup for dinner. I caught a mole, I marinated it, and I threw it in the stock pot. Should be DELICIOUS.”
21. “Huh,” said the child. “Am I allowed to add cheese?”
22. “Yes,” I said. “You may add cheese. Cheese is, in fact, the traditional garnish used with any type of rodent soup.”
23. “K,” he said, and he ran off to watch a video.
24. I, in other words, have lowered standards SO FAR that my son thought a soup made from dirt-dwelling rodent flesh, albeit smothered in cheese, sounded acceptable.
25. I have officially won parenting.
26. I have not won dog-sitting.
27. In fact, I had to come to terms this very afternoon with my dog, Zoey, leading sweet baby Hazel, a lovely baby Golden Retriever I’m watching this week for my cousin, astray.
29. Unlike for mere slobber and glass, I DO strip down to wash muddy dogs.
30. My kid videoed that bit, Internets. You’re welcome. Now you get to watch me sit in the bathtub in my granny bra and lecture the baby dog. “IF ALL THE OTHER DOGS JUMP OFF A CLIFF, HAZEL, YOU DO NOT JUMP, TOO.”
32. I suspect this lecture will turn out to be as effective for the puppy as it is for my children. Which is to say, I suspect she’ll become a cliff diver any minute.

Sincerely,

P.S. Poor Hazel…