It is twelve thirty four on Monday morning when Paul's cell phone begins to ring. You just can't help it, your heart rate kicks into high gear when the phone rings at that time of night. Paul has a ring tone for each one of the kids, but I don't which one is for which kid. When the phone rang he knew who was calling, so instead of saying hello, he answers it with ..."JULIA" I hear her yelling, from her room, as well as from the phone. "DAD THERE IS A CENTIPEDE!"
I made an instantaneous decision to remain snug as a bug, (no pun intended) in bed and skip this episode. Seen one centipede, seen them all, and I had just killed one last week. In other words, I had met my centipede quota for a lifetime. Creepy things!
Paul throws back the covers. Julie's knight in shining armor, or in this case, shining tighty whities. He's off to the hallway where the multi legged creature was last seen creeping. Julie thinks it's under the rug. He lifts up the rug, but no centipede. He makes an educated guess that it has disappeared. Paul and Julie fear that the creature has ventured into Jacobs room, and if that is the case, we may never find it again. I am listening to this conversation while still in bed. I'm thinking, if that thing goes into Jacob's room, I will never set foot in there again. His room is scary enough without the creature from the black lagoon creeping about in there.
Paul comes back into our room, and we hear Julia yelling, "There it is! Dad it's under the couch!" Now Paul feels like he needs more armor, so he puts on his sandals. I think his boots would have been better story material, but sandals is what he wore. Now he is ready to do battle with the centipede. He is dressed to kill in his shining tighty whities and his manly sandals. Centipede beware, a hero has arrived.
As he was leaving the bedroom to do battle, I said, "Get the broom and the thingy, and sweep the centipede up into the thingy." He said, 'Cretia! I don't know what the thingy is." Well, I know what it is, I just can't think of the word. Oh yeah, the dust pan. He didn't take my advice, and frankly, lying in bed was becoming boring when the entertainment world was happening in my living room, in full and living color. I got up, put on my flip flops and headed to the battlefield.
Julie was safely perched on the dining room table, a quivering mass of nerves. I would be too if a creepy crawly centipede had crawled over my bare foot. Paul was turning over all the furniture and preparing to leap from danger at any moment. I had the broom and was beating the bottom of the couch, hoping the centipede didn't come stampeding out at me with all it's dirty little feet. Sometime during the fierce battle of fighting the centipede that had disappeared, Paul realized that the blinds were open, the light was on, and all the world had a clear view of the crazy people in our living room. In full battle gear, (undies and manly sandals) he leapt across the living room and pulled the blinds closed. Ah, safe from view, but not from the creepy crawlies. Too bad he didn't have a cape on. My hero!
We turned over, and rearranged all the furniture in the living room, but no centipede was spotted. It's a little difficult to go back to sleep once you've seen one of those things in your house. Every little whisper of movement against your skin, and you are beating yourself half to death for fear it has managed to crawl on you. Now we are contemplating taking all the furniture to Goodwill, and just sitting on folding chairs. I can't make myself sit on any of the living room furniture for fear of sharing it with the centipede that disappeared. Why am I afraid? I'm married to the knight in shining tighty whities and manly sandals. EGADS!
PS, Julie took a picture with her cellphone, but I better not post it. lol Paul still fails to see the humor in this story.
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