I Live on the 11th Floor

OMFG, why do we live on the 11th floor? I may have asked Husbandrinka this a few dozen times in the past few days.

Other philosophical questions I’ve posed to him in the days since we lost power because of that Frankenbitch Sandy include: “Why did you eat my hurricane snack sbefore the storm even hit?” and “Why are you saying that I’m overreacting? Answer immediately because  WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE!” and “Do you think it’s safe to drink Chardonnay at room temperature?”

Husbandrinka was asking himself some questions, too, of course. Along the lines of “how did I get so lucky to be married to this marvel?” I’m sort of paraphrasing here, because he was murmuring a lot and had for some reason had a murderous look. Maybe it was the candlelight.

But we made it through the storm, even though our electricity didn’t. Oh well, I thought. At least we’re all together and can have cozy Monopoly playing sessions. My 14 year old daughter opted out immediately, saying that she wanted to go to my parents’ house in queens because “I miss them and they have electricity and I have only one clean pair of jeans left, so I’m having my personal state of emergency here.” Young Ladrinka, who is happy to wear the same pair of pants for the season, agreed that he must have power immediately if not sooner and before we knew it, my Papa drove in and got them. (Conversation between me and Papa: Be careful driving in my neighborhood, the traffic lights are out. I don’t need traffic lights and never did.)

So now they’re enjoying the all things electric in Queens. I may have called them and asked them to hold the phone to the toilet while they flushed. It’s music, I tell you.

But besides the lack of power and water, we’re totally fine. All of my complaining is exaggerated HELP ME. I’m so touched by all the offers of help, of people offering their apartments, and cars and jewelry (I’m just assuming here).

And then yesterday, I got this from Wendi (who lovingly posted on my behalf earlier this week)-

My name’s Eric _ and I’m a producer at ABC News. I see on Marinka’s blog you’ve taken over for her during the hurricane. Do you have a way to reach her? We’re working on a story about families living through the power outages—would it be possible for our GMA anchor, Josh Elliott, to visit her and her family? Love for her to show us how it’s been so far. They’d be featured on tomorrow’s broadcast.

This was obviously a huge dilemma for me because I’m anonymous online and I suspect that being on TV would blow that to smithereens on the one hand but on the other hand, I love Josh Elliot. I don’t mean LOVE love, I’m not some kind of psycho who thinks that she has a relationship with an anchor, even if that is totally blinking at her through the TV, but love in the sense that I think he is super adorable and looks like a great guy who would never vote for the GOP. Hey, I have standards. Which is why it never worked out for me and Clint.

Anyway, I had a few Rapunzel fantasies of Josh standing outside my building asking me to let down my hair, but sadly, I had a recent trim, so that wouldn’t work, plus, wouldn’t that be really ouchy? And then I had a fantasy of him climbing eleven flights of stairs to see me, and wondered if he would mind carrying a few buckets of water up so that I could flush the toilet. And that’s when I snapped to reality. Because I don’t want my and Josh’s soundtrack to be flushing toilets.

So we’ll have to wait for another opportunity.

“Aren’t you so relieved that you’re not losing me to Josh Elliot yet?” I asked Husbandrinka last night at dinner.

Poor thing was so overwhelmed, he didn’t say a word.

One year ago ...

• Kids Today - 2011