Talking to the Insurance Company

Shhh, everyone down in the foxhole.  Keep those heads down, goddamnit!  The dog is lost, forget about the dog.  Hossmom is on the rampage.

She's on the phone with an insurance company.  Which one?  We have no idea and the kids and I have decided that it's unimportant.  It's a detail that doesn't help us deal with her snapping fingers and her snapping glare.  I just know that her patience is being tested and I can hear her getting angrier by the second.  Every time she says "Don't transfer me" I see her fill like a volcano fills with lava.  It's going to blow on someone and my job here is to make sure the kids and I aren't the poor villagers.  Well, me really.  The kids are secondary.  I have no shame.  The kids owe me.  She can't divorce the kids.

"No!" she says.  "Don't put me on hold."  She sighs and then the eyes fall on me.

Fucker.

I keep my head down.  This is the most interesting blog I have every written, yup, just gonna keep on writing here.  Oh, look, funny jokes.  Let's make more funny jokes.  Don't look up, don't look up, don't look up.

I look up.  Double fucker.

I get a glare and I'm not even sure why.  I'm not the insurance company nor one of their agents. I'm just a guy sitting in a chair trying to find a story to write about.  I'm about to become what is called "collateral damage."

"Hoss....."  She doesn't finish.  I"m not sure what is going on but I'm spared.  She starts talking on the phone again.

She's ripping into someone now and that's good.  That's not me so that's excellent.  My 4-year-old comes into the room.  He's screaming.  I don't know why he's screaming.  I rarely know why he's screaming.  He's 4.  He likes to scream and he likes it better if there is an inopportune time.  Something about My Little Pony or the state of Isreal.  I don't know.

My daughter comes down the stairs to see what the screaming is about.  I sent her upstairs when I saw how the phone call was starting to go.  I tried to spare her, her stupidity brings her back.  Think Little Hoss!  Think!  She does not.

"Daaaaaaaaddddddddd, I want.........."

She doesn't get the sentence out because now my 9-year-old rolls in because when you are in quicksand it just gets worse when you struggle and I'm about to struggle pretty damn hard.  He is running and mows over the toddler.  This is my house.  It's like a Nascar race where there is a high-performance machine on the track and also the Amish.

Now I know why my toddler is screaming.

 Vesuvius blows and it blows in a whisper.

Hossmom begins snapping furiously like she is trying to break her thumb.  She is holding the receiver of the phone away from her mouth because I'm assuming that what she is saying, she doesn't want witnesses.

There are soft hisses coming from her mouth and I know we are all screwed.  The only thing worse than Mom screaming is Mom whispering.  That's where the big trouble is, that is when nations crumble, in the whisper.

I don't know what she is saying but I think it's probably "I'm going to murder all of you then dance on your cold graves."  Or something like that.

I grab the kids, I put them under my protective wings and fly upstairs.  At the top of the stairs, I begin answering questions, kissing elbows, and explaining that we should be quiet so Mommy (can't find us) can get some work done.  Well, what I actually say is "Do you igmoes have a death wish!  Seriously, what the hell was that?  You are going to doom us all!"

Hossmom gets off the phone and I can hear her stomp to the bottom of the stairs.

"Hoss!"  Well, she doesn't call me Hoss but she should, it's an awesome nickname.  "Hoossss!"

"Yeah?" I squeak.

"It's time to do our taxes!"

I look at my kids.  I love them.  Very, very much.  I touch my youngest on the head, I smile at my daughter.

"Hoss!"

I give them the best advice I can now.  The only thing I can think of.

"Fly, you fools!"