Ruminations in the Shower, episode III

So I'm out of the shower a bit early this morning. It's chilly, so I step out on the back porch to grab an arm load of wood for the stove. It's a little difficult with only one hand, as I must keep my left hand elevated with my middle finger totally distended to keep the pressure off the spot where I shot a nail through it two nights ago. Careless mistake, but Theresa is convinced I got loaded and thought it would be a good idea to place my middle finger directly beneath a Bostich framing canon and pull the trigger. Can't really blame her. Stranger things have struck me as good ideas at times like that. And I was pretty loaded.

I stand up and ram my head into the silly decorative wrought iron wrack my loving wife has screwed to the wall at exactly head height with a resounding WAAAAAANG.

SON OF A... Grrrr.

Seeing stars and red clouds of rage, I make my way back into the house and load the woodstove just as Matt, Jocelyn, and Tyler are making their way onto the front porch. I flee into the computer room and duck down at the desk so they won't see me through the window above the stairs.

"How yeah doooin?" I hear Matt ask my wife, in that rural yankee twang. It's that half Cockney half... half something else... dialect that's delightful when spoken by the old timers, but pegs a person for a rube if they talk that way in their thirties. Words like "here" are pronounce "heeeeah." As in "whacha dooooin heeah, Pumkin Man?"

I grimmace and clutch my throbbing head.

"Jocelyn got the olive oil treatment this mornin," He continues.

What the hell? I think to myself, completely forgetting the head lice that filthy, listless, bovine urchin nearly afflicted my ramshackle, yet uninfested home with.

"It was eeetha that or Mayonaisse." He chuckles the pumpkin hee hee hee. Mayonaisse. Sweet Jesus, I know all about what rural country freaks do with Mayonaisse. Especially the ones that keep it in their garages.

"Or Vaseline." My wife chimes in.

"Holy God!" I nearly cry out. " They're in cahoots."

Visions of my wife in her own Pumpkin costume burst upon my brain, and I suddenly know it is time.

The Pumpkin Man is going down.

The guns are all on the other side of the house, and I can't get to them without revealing my hiding spot. And of course, I'll need proof before turning them into purée of pernicious perverted Pumkin people. I sneak out the door into the unfinished addition, grab a chisel, and make my way to Matt's car.

For various reasons that are all well sealed in juvenille court records, I am rather adept at jimmying a trunk with a screw driver or chisel. Two seconds and I am in. I begin rummaging for the Pumpkin costume. Nothing. Loads of crap, and then I find it.

It's not a Pumkin costume. It's one of those inflatable Frankenstein Halloween costumes with the battery powered fan that makes the whole outfit bobble about when the unfortunate kid wearing it gets the crap beat of him or her for being such a freaking dork.

Horrors, I think. I've entirely underestimated this perverted freak. He's no Pumkin Man. He's freaking Frakenstein! My wife must be the Pumkin. Pumkin woman!

Now for the guns. I quickly replace the contents of the trunk, make my way to the back of the house, and lean a ladder up to the roof line. If I sneak across the roof, and swing myself James freaking Bond style down off the pergola and through the bedroom window, I can have them cornered before the glass has even finished settling. I grab hold of the pergola and swing down.

Crack. The 1x3 lets go.

Thud. I slam into the wall completely missing the window.

Crunch. I land on my back in the gravel path.

Stunned, I lay there for a moment seeing more stars, and then I remember the head lice. Olive oil treatment. It makes sense now. And the Halloween party at the town hall. I caught a glimpse of Matt there with Tyler and a giant inflatable Frankenstein. Must've been Jocelyn in there. Damn it.

I hobble back around the house and sneak in the back door to the computer room.

"Eeeeooorp eeee poooty woooty dog dog?" Blurts out Tyler?

"Where's the dog? Oh he's sleeping in the computer room where John's hiding." Theresa replies.

"I'M NOT HIDING!"

I stand up and inadvertantly give everyone in the room the bird. Matt's eyes get a little wide. Jocelyn laughs that low gutteral heh heh heh laugh and says " he made the bad finger dad."

I look at my protruding middle finger and start to explain, but then think better of it and just sit down in my static, yet impotent rage.

"I'M DOING IMPORTANT SECRET THINGS ON THE COMPUTER FOR WORK!" I yell.

"Oh yeah... he's talking to his Jeep buddies." I hear my wife explain to Matt. I can almost see her rolling her eyes. She goes on to explain that I broke my finger being stupid.

"Hee hee hee", Matt laughs, "yeah shouldn't drink and use powa tools. Hee hee hee. That's how ahccidents hahppen. Well seeeyah laytah."

I crouch lower in front of the monitor and and shaking clenched middle finger swinging fist swear my secret and solemn oath. Curse you Pumpkin Man. You may have gotten away this time, but mark my words... I will get you. I'LL GET YOU, YOOOOUUUUU BAAAASTAAARD!