Wouldn't You Know It!

Sunday morning, while waiting for the closest floodwaters to recede so I could make it to town for my 44 oz Diet Coke and lottery tickets...I frittered away some time by putting away the gift bag of Christmas swag that has been sitting on the kitchen stool underneath Hick's cuckoo clock.

Since that took all of five minutes, I decided to put away the Chex Mix makin's that were in a box on the kitchen counter. Let the record show that if an archaeological study was ordered, the Chex Mix makin's box would predate the bag of Christmas swag, because I made my Chex Mix so that I would have some to take TO the Christmas Eve party at the house of my sister the ex-mayor's wife. I had some partial bags of Cheerios and Corn Chex left, and a few Bugles, and some cashews, and some mixed nuts, and part of a bag of pretzel sticks. I put it all in a cardboard box, meaning to put it up, but then I though I might make another batch of Chex, so left the ingredients together.

I didn't make the extra Chex, but I left that box of ingredients sitting on a kitchen chair. We don't need all four chairs now, you know. Then I put something else on that kitchen chair, when making Easter packages for The Pony and Genius, and moved that box to the table. Then I needed the room on the table and moved it to the counter, and...well...I've been meaning to put away that Chex stuff all week. Sunday was as good a time as any, especially with Hick in the house and me having time to kill before I could get away.

It was shortly after 11:00 when I started going through the Chex box, saving the nuts, trashing the five or so Bugles left in the bag that obviously Hick had been sneaking, and tossing the cereal out for the five remaining chickens. The last thing I pulled out of that box was the partial bag of pretzel sticks, which I saved as a snack for myself, 53 sticks a serving, people!

I lifted that bag of pretzels, and saw, in the bottom of the cardboard box, THIS:

Yes, I know that's not an actual ladybug, but a similar beetle. But it's the kind we always find, and call it a ladybug. The kind Mom had in her ceiling.

It's my mom's original handwritten recipe that I use for making Chex Mix, you know.

Just for Joe H, I looked at the time on the microwave clock when I found the ladybug. Oops! It was 11:16. Not 11:11.

I guess I was a little behind schedule, but still on track with my life.