Silver infiltration and shopping trips

I was wandering around the house this morning, getting the girls ready for school and wondering if I would think of something to post here today when I caught sight of a silver infiltrator in the mirror. My mirror mocks me like that sometimes. It catches the light just right to show me, quite clearly, what I'm trying to ignore. I'm getting older.

My hair is naturally dark, really dark .. with a bit of auburn highlights. I noticed a few silver strands, just laying there, mocking me in the mirror a few months ago. I'm not one to sport my new-found silver strands proudly, 'cause I'm not getting old, I'm not! I'm only 37, my mom didn't start showing her gray until her mid 40s and I'm SO FAR AWAY from that still ... so I did what any sane, rational person would do ... I went blonde. I didn't really do that on purpose .. I started out with just throwing a few blonde highlights in there, but got a little carried away with pulling strands through that stupid cap and ended up "freakishly blonde" as Nyxie said when she saw it. After blinding myself with the blonde when I checked out the finished product, I figured that would take care of the little wisps of gray that were popping up here and there with alarming frequency. But no ... there it is, laughing at me in the mirror. *le sigh*

I can't be nearing middle-agedness ... I can't. I still remember things from the past like they were just yesterday. Well, except for yesterday, or last week, or 5 minutes ago, or my name .. those things are a bit out of reach in my memory sometimes .. ok most of the time... wait, what was I talking about?

Oh yeah .. memory .. I remember things that happened years ago with great clarity ... and that is NOT a sign of getting old. I hear you people laughing!

My daughter thinks it's hysterical that mom can't remember anything. I walk through the house, she's right on my heels. I ask why she's stalking me ... and her reply is usually "To remind you what you came in here for." Like I need reminding .. hmmph. I remember what I was coming into the kitchen for .. at dinner time .. it was to do laundry. Ha! See? I came to mop the floor, I'm not THAT forgetful yet, little missy. What? You're hungry? At dinner time? The nerve!

Why is she still awake anyway? She should be in bed .. at 5 in the evening, 'cause I remember when I had to get up at the crack of dawn to walk to school, 73 miles in the snow with no shoes, carrying 7 tons of books .. uphill both ways .. and ... oh wait, wrong memories .. those belonged to my grandfather.

pfft .. See, I have a great memory. It's so good I remember other people's memories even!

heh, ok, so maybe my memory is failing, but it's been scattered like this since I was in my early 20s. It's normal. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

It's most noticeable (to other people) when I go shopping, not so much when I'm at home where people can't see me wandering aimlessly through the house, trying desperately to remember what I was doing, and asking the dog if she remembers ... with every expectation that she's going to do some kind of charades to help me out. But, that's an entirely different kind of problem.

I have a very structured way of shopping. Really. Ask anyone that's ever shopped with me, either in person or on the phone. Yes, I take people shopping with me on the phone. Nyxie was my latest victim .. and it gave her giggle fits to listen to me talking to myself while I picked stuff up, carried it with me around the store, and then put it back down somewhere else ... then made another round to do it all over again. On the next round, I find whatever it was that I put down earlier and think .. Oh hey, I need this! .. and I pick it up again, only to decide later that I really don't need it .. and put it down somewhere else. The entire time I was shopping, Nyx was helpfully reminding me to look at the stupid list that I somehow actually made it out of the house with, amazingly enough. It was like a surprise every time she said it and I realized, oh hey, I have a list.. how cool! She thought it was the funniest thing .. too bad she couldn't see the blank look followed by that little surprised blink when the lightbulb went on in my brain every time she reminded me I had a list. That would have really had her rolling.

It's pitiful, really.

I don't know why, but I've always shopped like that. I dated a guy once upon a time that thought it was the funniest thing. On about round 4 of the store, picking up the same exact thing and putting it down somewhere else .. he'd pipe up with "WAIT! Let me do it .. I know how. We pick THIS up ... then we carry it over here and set it down. Then we come back and pick it up again, and set it down over here. We finally just leave the entire cart full of stuff and grab something random that we totally didn't come for and go to the register."

When we finally got to the register, he'd grab the PA mic and do a Jason Vorhees impression for all the lovely people ... "kill kill kill kill. " I thought it was just 'cause he was a bit silly, but now that I look back on it .. it was probably because I'd just driven him crazy.

Yeah .. shopping with Kay .. good times, good times.

So anyway ... yeah. I was going to write about something else, but I can't really remember what it was right now. I'll remember it later when I'm driving my daughter to her orthodontist appointment, which I'm pretty sure is today. I have "bad memory Tourette's" when I'm driving ... all of a sudden whatever I've forgotten will come to me, and I'll kinda shout it at myself in the car, which usually makes me start giggling, and then the thought wanders off because it gets lonely in my head.

Hopefully Pookie will remember and remind me later while I'm waging war on the silver insurgents .. armed with the plastic cap of doom and a bottle of blonde dye.