This menopause “shit” is such a drag. Every morning as I get out of the shower I can feel the hot flash coming on “full blown”. It starts at the back of my neck and slowly creeps around to my face and chest, I even feel it in the crack of my ass, really attractive, right?

I sigh as I reach for the hairdryer, which seems almost like a torture device; at least it does to me when I’m in the throes of a major “hot flash”.

I have this whole routine I have to do each morning. It starts out after I have dried my hair. I put on my makeup, and then I must put powder on my neck and chest because I’m starting to ripen like a tomato on the vine. I run into the kitchen to get a cold bottle of water because at this point, “I’m dying here”. I must then turn on the ceiling fan to try to bring my body temperature down a few degrees.

I’m not one of those people that look great in a ponytail, but this is the last thing I do before I leave the bathroom. I have to keep that hair off the back of my neck. I keep my hair in a ponytail until I walk out the front door.

I was in the kitchen making my oatmeal the other morning and Dale was in the living room, he looked over at me, well more like stared and said, “are you on your way out to sign the Declaration Of Independence this morning”. I’m a little annoyed, I don’t need his “jokes” this early in the morning, I’m feeling a little crabby and I’m already running late. Annoyed I said, “What the hell are you talking about”. “You look like Thomas Jefferson with that ponytail”, he says. “Very funny, dumb ass” was my reply. Men have it so easy!

Every morning I have a bowl of oatmeal with cut up fruit. Many times I use the frozen fruit because it’s just easier. When Dale came home from his trip from California he was bearing lots of fresh fruit from a roadside stand (yummy). You can’t beat fresh fruit, which unfortunately does not exist in dry old Southern Nevada.

He had about three buckets of blackberries a large tray of strawberries and some bing cherries. I told him we had to eat the blackberries quickly because they don’t last more than a couple days. Dale leaves for work a couple of hours before me each morning. So this morning I was making my oatmeal like I always do and noticed a note on the counter from Dale that said, “please finish up the blackberries”. So I proceeded to dump the last tray in my oatmeal. It was delicious…

Now fast-forward about 8 hours. I’m driving home from work and talking to Dale on my cell phone (its legal in Vegas). He says, “Where are the rest of the blackberries”. I’m a little confused and say, “What are you talking about, I finished them like you told me to this morning”. He now is kind of screaming, “the note said, please DO NOT finish the blackberries”.

I must have really wanted those blackberries really bad, don’t you think? Of course I threw the note away in the trash and the garbage man took it away (how convenient). We might never know who was right, but I sure enjoyed my oatmeal this morning.

My husband arrived back home yesterday after a week out of town. I was lying on the couch last night as I heard him clamoring in the kitchen making us something to “snack on”. He gave me a plate with three cut up pieces of cheese and three crackers. You would think my first response would be thank you, but no, as I stared down at this “joke” of a snack, I said, “is there a cheese shortage around here or something” than a polite “thank you” as more cheese was piled on my plate.

As we watched Seinfeld (still the best sitcom ever!) and nibbled on our cheese, he says – “this is the best cheese I’ve ever had, I’ll never buy another brand again”.

He continues to say, “I can’t believe you didn’t attack this cheese while I was out of town”. I just shrugged my shoulders in response.

Am I a bad person for not saying, “Yeah, I found the cheese stash and polished off a whole brick”. I choose to remain silent!