SwordfishT blows a gasket

Okay, I don’t usually bitch too much about Baker B, but today I’m just going to have to make an exception. Because I have to bitch about something and my job is actually going moderately well at the moment. It’s not horribly busy, I’m kind of catching up, I got the Travel Spreadsheet From Hell straightened out (maybe) and despite being, oh, TWENTY ONE THOUSAND DOLLARS over budget, nobody was particularly surprised or distressed. Unlike last year when it was as if the end of the universe had arrived. Hello, the student teaching budget has stayed the same for the last five years, while the number of student teachers climbs every semester, and we all know what’s going on with gas prices lately as well. Of COURSE we’re drastically over budget. DUH. Anyhow, that’s settled unless something unpleasant happens, which is always possible with me and budgets. And suddenly I have till next Tuesday to finish the Annual Report, which is already quite overdue but we’ve been given an extension. Because Dr. Airhead has suddenly decided he’s only coming in on Tuesdays and Thursdays until his resignation day arrives. And since he’s only staying part of each day when he is here, he certainly didn’t want to wait around all afternoon for me to finish what I have left. Now I have till Tuesday and as the bulk of it actually is done, that’s quite a bit of pressure off me. Oh, and my new student employee is working out REALLY well. He’s very pleasant, even-tempered, has excellent manners and is organized. And has shown up every day so far.

But let’s get back to Baker B, shall we?

I went home for lunch because I had to mail off the car payment today and I’d forgotten to bring the coupon book thing with me. I met Baker B going in the opposite direction right before I got there, and he turned around and followed me. Oh, how nice! I thought. He’s gone all out of his way and turned around just to say hello to me! Maybe he wants to go get some coffee before he goes back to work! How sweet! So I waited at the entrance of our neighborhood in case he didn’t want to drive all the way to the house. He pulls up, and first thing he says is, “Are you in a good mood?”

That’s never the greeting you want to hear from your spouse. That CAN’T be good.

“Ummm…why?” I ask. He hems and haws and says, “I did something really really bad.”

So a hundred things are going through my mind about what he could possibly have done that are really really bad but are not, like, burning the house down bad. That are bad enough for him to follow me home and tell me, but aren’t like a horrible tragedy sort of thing that he wouldn’t tell me in the middle of our development entrance. At first I thought he’d moved boxes and hurt his back, and was going to say we can’t go to Charleston week after next, which would be pretty high up there in the list of really really bad things. Because he’s had trouble with his back hurting and has had to go to Physical Therapy and that wasn’t helping so he quit that a week or so ago and is just doing the stretching/yoga exercises they gave him, which have helped – but if he does something to it again after swearing he won’t, and we can’t go to Charleston (which involves a long car trip and a whole lot of walking on pavement all over town) I will, in fact, NOT be happy.

But no, it wasn’t that. Finally he confesses.

He’s lost his bank card.

Let me rephrase that. He’s lost MY bank card. Because MY bank card is the only one he has, because, yes, he lost his OWN bank card ages ago. And instead of calling the bank and getting them to send him a new card, he’s just been using my extra. So now IT’S gone, which means I have to call the bank and cancel MY card. So now I am not going to have a card for two weeks or so and I’m going to have to use checks which I hate and not everyone will accept and cash which I don’t like to carry much of.

I’m totally and completely dependant on my bank card. I use my bank card for EVERYTHING. I’m going to Asheville this weekend, so I’ll be cardless then, and I bet anything we won’t have it before we go to Charleston. Even WORSE, I pay most of our bills on line, using, YES, my bank card number so it comes right out of our checking account. So now I have to figure out which ones I use it for and which ones I just used the checking account number for and I don’t know exactly what I’ll do about the card ones since some will certainly be due before I get a new card and it’s a huge enormous pain and a whole lot of extra work and I am REALLY REALLY MAD.

Oh, and this isn’t the first time this has happened, either. He’s lost his card one other time and he’s also previously lost my card so this is at least the third time I’ve had to cancel cards because Baker B loses everything he touches. It’s not so bad when it’s just his card, because they are different numbers and I just cancel that one. Well, it wasn’t so bad. That’s only happened once, and although they let me cancel his, they wouldn’t let me order a new one for him, and would he ever call and do it? Well, of course not! Why go to all that trouble when he can just use MINE???

{On a side note – someone just called with an extremely odd voice, and I was just one breath away from saying, “Okay, I KNOW it’s you and YES I’m still MAD and calling me up to try entertaining me with amusing voices is NOT GOING TO WORK TODAY!!!!!” Yikes.}

AAAAAAAAGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH.

I wouldn’t be so mad if this wasn’t habitual behavior. He can’t keep up with ANYTHING. When he was a child, he lost every coat his parents bought him until they finally gave up and just got his coats from the Salvation Army. He’s lost about fifty pairs of sunglasses, and currently is sunglassesless because the most recent pair finally seems to have vanished for good (he keeps finding those in weird places. Like in the DRIVEWAY behind the car the other day.) I won’t let him touch mine, because he’ll either lose them or drop them. He still loses coats. He loses his wallet if he carries it, but usually he leaves it in his pack and puts the card in his pocket. How could that possibly go wrong??? He loses everything it’s possible to lose, but the bank card is a BIG DEAL. Someone could conceivably find and USE it. They’d have to know the pin number for a debit transaction, but you can use it as a credit card too. Oh, even better – he hasn’t seen it since TUESDAY. It doesn’t appear anyone’s wiped out our bank account – we did that all on our own – but they could.

Oh, somebody found his card lying in the parkinglot here on campus one day a year or two ago and called him to say they had it. They left a message on the answering machine, so I found out about it. He doesn’t like to tell me when it’s missing since this is always my reaction. But HE IS SO CARELESS!!!!!!!

Okay. It’s time to go home. **deep breaths….deep breaths….deep breaths…** I checked our Dish account since I have it taken out automatically, and it’s due TOMORROW. So I had to switch to a credit card real quick so we don’t get our TV cut off. Good thing I CHECKED.

On the plus side, he’s already called and ordered his own card. And has apologized profusely. If he loses his new card, that’s IT. He’s never getting mine AGAIN.

AAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!