Post Secrets

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.In this week's PostSecret . . .
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Nope, it's not mine. My friends are either better friends or better liars.


But I know how she feels. When I finally got the courage to click the orange publish button, unleashing my first blog post on the world,* a battalion of butterflies stormed my belly. I cleverly decided to do it right before bed, so I wouldn't have too much time left in the day for worry. Because, you know, lying in a dark room with nothing but your thoughts is a surefire way to stave off worry, right? When I got up the next morning, I didn't even detour for coffee or a morning tinkle before firing up the computer to see what the world thought about what I had to offer.


Was it unreasonable to expect Tipton Hurst to arrive at any moment with the first of several congratulatory sprays, or the phone to start ringing off the hook with new adoring fans pelting me with praise? Maybe so, because what I got was one lone comment. And it wasn't even on the blog proper, but on the Facebook link that shepherds most of my (13) readers compliantly to the blog. After dedicating weeks to the creation of the Sliver site, days to the crafting of that first intimate and personal post, and hours to mandatory midnight fretting, would you like to know what it said?


It said: Susan, You look great! I love your hair!


Eh. Coulda been worse, I guess. She could have told me that writing like mine is the reason they invented Twitter. (That first post was pretty damn wordy. Let me know if you stuck with me all the way through; you go on the special Christmas card list.) I could sit here and tell you I don't care about comments, but I prefer to restrict my lying to stories about my sex life and the perfection of my child. Truth is, bloggers crave comments. Or at least I do. Comments are the social element that transforms the table for one into a cocktail party, the monologue into a conversation. Comments are the pat on the back that says, you know what, you don't suck. Stick with it.


So I do understand that irked blogger up there. But we both need to listen to Lore Sjöberg when he says, "Creating your own blog is about as easy as creating your own urine, and you're about as likely to find someone else interested in it." If you've taken time to show interest in me by reading, commenting, saying a supportive word in person or through e-mail, or even clicking the little like button~ thanks, I needed that.


And PS, If you're interested, my urine today was a beautiful sight, like clear spring water trickling from a mossy woodland hollow.
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*The world being defined as: my mom, my sister, my husband and three loyal and obliging girlfriends.

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Grammas Gone Wild

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When you look at this picture, what do you see?

Obviously it's a victim of Jack the Ripper, a pretty young thing with a slashed throat. But maybe you see something else. There is no reality, only perception. And sometimes, you have to squint and hold your head just right to see what might be lurking beyond the first impression..
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Let's try another one. What do you see?

This one's harder, because the dark underbelly is more cleverly concealed by the deceptively innocent exterior. Like those War Heads candies that start off so sweet and then all of a sudden blow your head off when you hit the surprise layer inside. Yeah, she's that. Sit back and I'll tell you all about her, starting with the sweet candy shell.

To most, she is Judy; to some, she is Gramma; to me, she is Mom; to my Dad, she is everything. And to us all, she is extraordinary. If you could look her up in a thesaurus and read the list of antonyms, this is what you’d find: boring, ordinary, typical, demure, predictable. She lives each day with gusto, as if it could be her last. Unlike her daughters, who have their Masters in delaying gratification. (My sister is going for her PhD.)

While my mother’s personality is huge and irrepressible, her belief system is really quite simple and old fashioned. Her life revolves around her husband, her church, her family, and her friends (we'll get to them in a minute). She married my father when they were kids, back in the fifties when good girls waited until their wedding night (and panicked on its eve). Their marriage is the best I’ve ever witnessed, beautiful and sacramental (which means they drink wine and eat bread a lot). They are so good together it almost makes me believe in soul mates.

Her faith is equally remarkable. She not only works at a Spiritual Life Center, but also attends services twice weekly and prays, well, religiously. (Although I will divulge that she cusses almost as much in her prayers as I do in my blog. He's either good with the sailor lingo or afraid of her, because He pretty much does as He's told.) She hosts a Christian book club which reads, duh, Christian books. The soundtrack of her life is Sandi Patty and the set design is everything angel. Her current ministry (and there have been many) is a Christian quilting group who goes on retreat to pray and make quilts for returning Iraq veterans and sick children.

As you might expect, a life so steeped in religion is bound to be rife with conservative Christian Republican friends. But make no mistake, liking them is not the same thing as being like them. It is my theory that God is using my mother to slap some cool into a seriously uptight crowd.

Which brings me to the surprise juicy layer, my sainted mother's inner tart. Dad, if you’re still reading, this would be a good time to go plunge toothpicks in your eyeballs. For the rest of you, it’s time to talk vajayjay.

I feel confident (nauseated, but confident) saying that my mother must have the heartiest vajayjay in the northeast. Those two lovebirds have been at it like a coupla randy teenagers at summer camp for the past fifty years. BLECH! Yay for them! Unfortunately, one of her friends has a different story. Years of abstinence has taken its toll on her vajayjay, turning it into an overcooked manicotti. So her doctor, and I am not making this up, prescribed a vibrator. (Did I mention I am not making this up?)

There’s a wide range of reactions an older woman might have to a recommendation like this: apprehension, fear, sadness. My mother’s reaction? Road trip! Granted, this is a group of women who take road trips together all the time . . . the quilting/praying retreats, annual treks to Women of Faith, shopping junkets to the yarn wholesaler in Massachusetts or the outlet village in Maine. It only follows that the Christian Coalition would pile into the minivan for a pilgrimage to the porn shop. So, while my father sat home rubbing holes in his temples and freebasing Tums, a vanload of Grammas headed across state lines in search of therapeutic dildos and a nice chicken salad.

The first minor glitch arose when the ladies came to the unsettling realization that they didn't know where the hell they were going. So imagine if you will, them asking directions. Excuse me young fellow, but Gramma needs a new Vibrating Silver Bullet. The poor guy had to think he was being punk'd.

Thanks to the kindness of strangers (and an epic pair of balls), my mom got them to their destination: Oh My, an emporium of adult toys, restraints, and paraphernalia so sordid my mother declined to elaborate. And she's a girl who lives to elaborate. You know that old saying, actions speak louder than words? Well, after taking a cursory gander at the inventory, my mother turned around to find herself standing alone. Her friends, including the one there on doctor's orders, had turned tail and run into the street, frantically crossing themselves and rubbing Germ-X on their eyeballs. The mission was promptly aborted, slack vaj be damned.

So the ladies instead retired to lunch, and giggle, and sip a Pinot Grigio or two, and probably pray for their sullied souls. Then, they headed back to the van for the return trip to piety and propriety. But just as the interstate came into view, the wine intervened and demanded they turn around and do what needed to be done. And they listened. In what I can only envision as a terribly wrong Golden Girls meets John Holmes mash up, the Christian grammas browsed, and compared features, and asked questions, and made their MasterCards blush. They left so thoroughly dazed that once they actually did make it to the interstate, they took a wrong turn and ended up in Connecticut.

Sometimes, there's just no telling where a road might lead. Dildos and handcuffs and whips, oh my!

PS, I can't wait to see what I get in my stocking from mom this Christmas!

Time to Say Goodbye

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Part of the bedtime ritual requested by our five-year-old, as essential as brushing and flossing, is The Pretend Book. I suspect more than a little of the appeal is the prolonging of the day. Even after lights out, a last-gasp effort at circumventing sleep. And it’s always successful. Can you blame us? The Pretend Book is a Father/Son bonding experience no less potent than my time breastfeeding. The two of them curl up under the covers and our boy says, as if from a script, “Daddy, read me a Pretend Book. Make it about Dizzy and Meggie and Buzz and me.” And off they go, to a familiar land where all good dogs who’ve gone to heaven are resurrected and get another shot at happily ever after.

We’ve been lucky. The Grim Reaper has been a perfect gentleman in the Sliver Household. The only death our five-year-old has had to deal with so far has been of the canine variety, as it should be. It’s strange to think of the death of loved pets as a stroke of luck, but that’s what it’s been. Loss is always hard, but also inevitable. Better we get our first dose in a milder form.

But now it’s time for him, and us, to swallow a harder pill. His Pawpaw died today. Still, Mr. Reaper continues to mind his manners. Who better to be a child's first experience with human death than an elderly grandparent who’s lived a long, rich life? It's as natural as the cycling seasons; we grow old, and we die. Funny how little consolation that bit of logic holds. Sorrow is unimpressed by reason. There's just no escaping the sadness when you lose someone you love. It's sad to suddenly have a void at the epicenter of a family; sad to be missing a part of the recipe that created my sweet husband; sad to imagine a bride of sixty years alone for the first time; sad to see my precious little boy crying tears that won’t go away with a Batman Band-Aid and a kiss.

So it’s no wonder I totally get my son's desire to cling to every last minute he can get with his Daddy each day. My husband's spent the past few weeks doing just that with his Daddy.

But now, it’s time to say goodbye. Rest in peace, Charlie. We love you.





For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and to melt into the sun?
And what is it to cease breathing, but to free the breath from its restless tides, that it may rise and expand and seek God unencumbered?

Only when you drink from the river of silence shall you indeed sing.
And when you have reached the mountain top, then you shall begin to climb.
And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance.

~Khalil Gibran








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A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genes

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Every Wednesday night, I have the privilege of sharing food and wine and conversation and laughter with some of the finest women you could hope to meet. They are smart, funny and beautiful in every way invented. They are doctors, lawyers, stock traders, writers, teachers, mothers. Why they choose to slum with the likes of me I'll never know. But they do, and I spend every Wednesday night counting my lucky stars for them.


Last night, for a change of pace, we decided to branch out and let a boy infiltrate our little Girls' Club. But not just any boy. Dave Eggers.
Dave. Freggin. Eggers.



In case you don't know him, Dave Eggers is a brilliant writer, educator and philanthropist. His first book, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, got him a stone's throw from the Pulitzer. He is the founder of McSweeney's, a quarterly magazine ("which comes out two or three times a year") and independent publishing house in San Francisco. He's also the heart, brain and soul behind 826 Valencia, an amazing free tutoring outreach program for youth in San Francisco's Mission District, which is now spreading across the country. His commitment to education doesn't stop at kids; he is also a valiant knight in shining armor for teachers. He has personally instituted a monthly grant for exceptional teachers in his area and co-wrote Teachers Have It Easy: The Big Sacrifices and Small Salaries of America's Teachers. Also a champion of human rights, Eggers co-founded Voice of Witness, a non-profit series of books that empower victims of contemporary social injustice. He recently co-wrote the film adaptation of Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are and co-wrote (with his wife) the screenplay for the upcoming movie Away We Go, starring John Krasinski. His latest book, What Is the What is the novelized autobiography of one of the Lost Boys of Sudan, Valentino Achak Deng. Not only is Eggers donating all proceeds from this book to aiding the Sudanese in America and Sudan, he has co-founded the Valentino Achak Deng Foundation, which is improving educational opportunities for Sudanese children.


I'm sure Dave would have gladly accepted an invitation to dine with a bunch of fabulous babes like us, but as you can see, he's a very busy (and married) sort of guy. So we took the party to him, and his lecture/book signing at The Clinton School of Public Service. As you can imagine, his presentation was nothing short of riveting. Entertaining. Enlightening. Inspiring. It was the kind of intellectual, soul stirring experience that incites the deepest of thoughts and most cerebral of conversations. Conversations exactly like this:


"Omigod! Did you see how cute he is!?"

"Totally! He is totally hot!"

"Ohh, and those blue eyes! Did you see those blue eyes?"

"Did you know his hair was so curly? I had no idea his hair was so curly!"



swoon . . . .




PS, When you have twenty minutes, watch this. It's the condensed version of what we savored last night . . . minus the baby blues.


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Feeling The Love

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You know that scene in How the Grinch Stole Christmas! where his heart grows three times its size? Here, refresh.





That's me, right now. Except not so dead.

There are moments when you can actually feel love, physically. Right in your heart. It barges in unexpectedly and grabs you, and it won't let go until it bursts out through your tear ducts. I'm having one of those moments right now, as it suddenly dawns on me how very near the end is.

There are only fourteen days left until school's out for summer. I know, I know. I've been counting down for a month now. Eager to say goodbye to those one or two kids who drive me to the box of wine every night. Anxious to have my freedom and nothing but time to enjoy my own child. But here's the crazy thing that happens every stinking year. Right about now, just as the frozen margaritas and neighborhood pool start singing their siren song, it hits me like a Mack truck: Dammit, I love these annoying little buggers. Every last one of them. Even that one.

And I only get fourteen more days with them.





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I'm pretty sure it's what Piaget would do

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There’s very little my five-year-old can do that crosses my line of acceptable age-appropriate behavior. I’m waist-deep in kids his age all day every day, so I get how they tick. For instance, I understand that kids come equipped with an internal source of endlessly renewable energy. They must be allowed frequent opportunities to release this effervescence lest it bottle up and explode. Their curiosity runs much the same way. If they see something sparkly or slimy, they simply don’t have the capacity to ignore it. Nor should they.

Like that time when he was two and we were baking together and I left the room for just a minute to answer the phone. A minute. When I got back, I found this . . .

Obviously my reaction was to be delighted! How funny is that that he would slather himself from head to toe with butter? And even if I hadn’t seen the humor, I certainly couldn’t fault him. I’m the adult who left him alone with something slimy.

Kids experience the world through their senses in a much purer way than most of us do. It’s how they learn, and how they grow. And limitless freedom to explore to his heart’s content is a beautiful, natural gift I choose to give my child. It’s a little thing I like to call love.

But if the little fucker jumps in one more mud puddle without taking his shoes off first, so help me, Mommy's gon cap his ass.

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When Life Hands You Lemons . . .

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. . . make lemonade.


When life hands you a solid month of rain . . . make mud.
Assuming you're five.


























This is very likely how Mike Rowe got his start.
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At Least It Wasn't Smarties

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For Teacher Appreciation Day, my boss put candy bars in all the teachers’ mailboxes. Nice. Nothing a bunch of stressed out women like more than chocolate, right? Her choice was the Hershey’s PayDay Bar. Have you had one lately? No, me neither. Until today.


I’m a very appreciative person by nature. If you give me something, I will be grateful. But, come on.


Actual Hershey’s PayDay Bar




I'm sorry, but this is not a candy bar. This, is a granola bar. This, is a snack served in little bowls on a bar and refilled throughout the night to make patrons buy more beer. This, is an affront to the good Hershey’s name.


At least I can appreciate the symmetry. My candy payday was about as satisfying as my real one.

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Mister Rogers' Hood

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My five-year-old has a cute new favorite show. At first I thought it might be a little too old for him, but he’s staring down the barrel at six now, and try as I might, I can’t keep him a baby forever. As a schoolteacher, you might think I’d be a bit uptight about how much TV I let my child watch. But as it turns out, quite the opposite is true. For one thing, I grew up watching 10 or 12 hours a day and, as you can plainly see, I is perfectly smart. Besides, in the Sliver Household, we understand that television is a More Is More proposition. AS LONG AS IT’S EDUCATIONAL TV. And I can’t stress that point enough. I mean, you wouldn’t put a limit on how much school your child could attend, or how many books he could read. So why limit educational TV?


The key is diligence to content, which is why we gave such thoughtful deliberation to this new show. We consider it our top priority to fill his head with valuable information, while at the same time protecting him from harmful messages. This, and making sure the Pop-Tarts and Yoo-hoos are on a low shelf so he doesn’t hurt himself getting dinner, keeps us quite busy.


And that’s why this new show is so exciting to us! It’s a perfect blend of the meaningful life lessons kids need and the playful exuberance they love. Every episode has a great moral for kids, but never in a preachy way, like those pain-in-the-ass proselytizing VeggieTales sons-a-bitches. Just go ahead and sample this scene.


You see what I mean?! Awesome, right? This scene alone touches on economics, teamwork, inertia, cause and effect, decision making, conflict resolution, and manners. And what an adorable way to drive home that crucial lesson on the importance of clean underwear! If your little ones aren’t turned on to The Wire yet, well, I don’t know what you’re waiting for.


Hopefully, you’re not wasting time making that classic rookie parenting mistake of mindlessly flipping the dial to PBS and expecting THEM to make intelligent choices for your child! My God, people. Have you not seen what they’re feeding our children these days? They’ve got this one show about an evil sociopath monkey who is hell-bent on breaking every blasted rule his kindly human gives him. He’s disobedient, reckless, and dangerous, and yet, in every episode, he comes out the hero. So what’s the message? Come on, kids! Fuck those lame rules! Why don’t we just steal this here car and see if we don’t end up with a medal from the Mayor!


Not on my watch.


Word.

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Suck It, Dooce

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Okay, I just peed a little. Don’t tell anybody. But when I checked my blog, as I do obsessively every five minutes occasionally, I noticed that I have SEVEN FOLLOWERS. And I'm pretty sure I only have one mother and one husband, so . . . hot damn. Yes, I realize Dooce has like 17 bazillion followers (and better hair, that bitch), but for me, seven is huge. Like, break-out-the-emergency-hooch-before-lunch huge. I mean, I’ve been slogging away at this thing for a month now and have a grand total of three comments to show for it, two of which I wrote myself under assumed names. Now, I think I might actually hear breathing out there.


You know what this means though, don’t you? Unlike at my house and in my classroom, I’m not just talking to myself anymore. I’m not sure how to feel about this. It’s such a unique sensation for me, my voice making sounds and all. Maybe three parts flattered and seven parts holy fuck. It was sort of comforting in a way to just go about my new little hobby unnoticed. When I said something stupid, there were no witnesses. It was just a little harmless mental masturbation. Now, I suddenly have performance anxiety. What if I can’t get it up? Oh, wait, I’m a girl. Bad analogy.


I just don’t think I like this one little bit. I don’t know who the hell you freaks are, but I think all y’all need a hobby. Or cable.


Go on now. Shoo . . . .

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Project Stress-away

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If you have a child who attends school, then I know you sent a perfectly lovely token of your appreciation to his teacher today to thank her* for her hours of committed service to your child. But if you forgot that today was Teacher Appreciation Day, don’t worry your pretty little head about it. Teachers are over-paid and under-worked as it is. Appreciation would only confuse us.

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For some reason which I can’t quite put my finger on, my room parents apparently really appreciate me. They couldn’t have given me a more perfect gift if I accessed their ATM cards and did the shopping myself.

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You might be wondering what this ideal gift is. What is this one thing that will guarantee ultimate happiness for the person who lovingly devotes her life to her students? Rather than tell you that, let me instead tell you what I didn't get. If you’ve ever given one of these sorry gifts (and fess up . . . you know you have), just know that these are the teacher equivalent of a ten percent tip:

• a candle
• a coffee mug
• a gift set of crappy lotion and body spray
• an inspirational wall hanging
• a tee shirt that says, “Teaching Is a Work of Heart”
• a Knowledge Tree gift card
• anything apple
• anything even remotely related to teaching, teachers, school, or kids

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What does that leave? Well, for starters, alcohol. There’s a perfectly fabulous gift industry based entirely on alcohol that would be totally appreciated by every teacher I know. Because, really, who needs it more? Why don’t you people get that? Give your kid’s teacher a bottle of Bailey’s. You have it here in writing: your kid will instantly be promoted to Teacher’s Pet.

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But that’s not what I got. If you can believe it, my gift is even better. Which can only mean . . . massahhhhhhhhge. I can hardly type the word without my fingers going all spaghetti on me. I’m not a girl for luxury, at least not the kind I have to fund. I simply do not have an off switch for the dollar counter. (That minute was a dollar. That minute was a dollar. Damn, there goes another dollar.) But if you’re treating? Then, oh honey, let the oil flow. Which is exactly why this gift is so stinking perfect. They could have given me the exact dollar amount of the massage in cash and I would have converted it to groceries, or a new muffler, or renewing my expired teaching license. You know, something luxurious like that.

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But now, against my will, I have a date with Mr. Benny Briggs, massage therapist/genius/god. You’ve probably heard of Benny’s wife, Korto Momolu. She’s gotten a lot of the spotlight lately. And, okay, she’s undeniably fabulous. But Benny? He’s the true genius of the family. And soon enough, I’ll have the melted muscles to prove it.

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*I started out trying to be all PC and using his/her and s/he, but it just looked like everybody was a hermaphrodite after a while. You’re smart enough to fill in your own pronoun, right?

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Wretched Excess

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(Actual present given at five-year-old’s birthday party.* Hand to God, y’all.)
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I have a five-year-old and it’s the weekend, which can only mean one thing: Random Classmate’s Birthday Party! Yippee!


Last weekend I told you about the two lovely birthday parties we went to which were held in 1957. Our luck didn’t hold out. This party most assuredly checked its calendar.


Before I type one more potentially-judgmental-sounding word, let me type this: It’s not you, it’s me. I had a therapist once tell me I was born in the wrong decade. She might have been on to something there. Just consider the clues: All I ever wanted to be when I grow up is a wife and mother. My husband handles the money, takes out the trash, and mows the lawn.** And I can squeeze a penny till two pop out. If they had wine in a box and Netflix, I think I really could’ve taken a pretty good stab at happiness in the fifties. So a lot of what passes as standard operating procedure today just makes my brain itch.


Like, when did it become de rigueur for little children’s birthday parties to be held in party venues that cost hundreds of dollars? Sweet sixteen, maybe. But five? Really? Are our kids’ worlds getting so big that the backyard birthday party has grown too small? Or are their attention spans shrinking so much that their fun has to be plugged in and pumped up? Did Donkey Kong kill Pin the Tail on the Donkey?


I don’t suppose there is a clear-cut right or wrong way to celebrate your child’s birthday. Just preference, and accommodation to schedule and lifestyle. Not everybody has a beautiful Wiccan party planner at their disposal. Some people work so hard all week it’s all they can do to make a phone call to the Birthday Big Box and sign the check. As long as the children come out happy, does it really matter?


Who knows?


I tend to look at parenthood as The Ultimate Science Fair Project (although probably an experiment better saved until after eighth grade). We toss in a dash of this and a handful of that; put on our goggles and wait to see if anything blows up. If only the results were as instant as baking soda and vinegar. Our foam might not come spewing out for decades.


But I fear that all this wretched excess is exposing our kids to dangerous toxins that will take root in their souls and fester over the years. What symptoms will manifest themselves as the disease progresses? Or is it all benign?


All I know for sure is that this . . .





. . . feels wrong.


Is there an inverse relationship between how much we get and how much we appreciate?


Could less really be more?



*Ok, that one was from me. Sorry. But it was a totally awesome present, purchased at a garage sale, and it was for a kid I love, not a random classmate. So shut up.

**He also does most of the cooking, baking, shopping, cleaning, and laundry. I do Facebook and drink. Okay, so maybe I’m not all that old school after all.
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CPR (Child's Play Revisited)

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Ever since my five-year-old was living on the inside, I’ve been meaning to get CPR training. Even on a good day, the little buggers are scary as shit. One false move, one dropped guard, one absent-mindedly tossed Starlight mint, and bam! Your world implodes. If you don’t have a kid yet, I don’t recommend them. Just one live grenade after another.

Take the day I recklessly gave my kid a dried cherry. Fruit, for Chissake. I know I read somewhere that’s what good mothers give their kids. And hell if it didn’t almost kill him. I noticed he was sort of staggering as he headed my way, which I didn’t think too much of since I do allow him moderate amounts of tequila before naptime. But then I noticed that his eyeballs were clearly trying to escape his face. They woulda made it too, if I hadn’t expertly sized up the situation and sprung into action. Although I hadn’t had any sort of first aid training, you never would have known it watching my slick response. Straight outta textbook, I picked him up, shook him violently, and screamed his name over and over until a slobbery little fruit bullet just came a-shooting right out of him.

Really, I don’t know why I wasted my time signing up for conventional training today when the old home methods still work just fine. But the course was free and held the promise of good snacks, so what the hell. Besides, who doesn’t like working all day and then going to a lame workshop on a Friday night?

One thing you probably don’t know about me is that I have a perfectly rational fear of dolls. Not all dolls. That would be silly. Just the ones that come to life at night and kill people. You know, dolls like this . . .

It’s not even possible that this doll doesn’t come to life at night so save your breath. The only thing that kept me in that room was utter devotion to my child. That, and the fact that it was still light outside and none of the chicks in the class were even remotely hot. Everybody knows nobody ever gets murdered by a doll until after a hot chick takes off her shirt. I think that’s a rule.

But seriously, even if you don’t know about the dolls who come to life at night? Even an ignorant fool like you would be smart enough to be creeped out by this, right?

It was a six hour class condensed down to five, and did I mention it was held on a Friday night after work? Plus there was the whole waiting for my imminent ghoulish murder and all. So I don’t really know how much got stored in the long term file cabinet. But I do clearly remember her saying, and I quote, “If you’re trying to resuscitate a baby, just use the air stored between your cheeks.” Which sounds really rude to me, but I swear that’s exactly what she said.

It was right about then that I noticed this . . .

The last place I saw a mess like that was the ladies' room at Backstreet. Great, now I’ve pissed him off and left a color swatch.

I am so fucked.

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