Summer Stupidity

Last summer I was picking grass out of the herb garden, mistaking it for chives, and we blamed it on the pregnancy. Well, this summer I've done something equally stupid but have no fetus on which to blame it.

Our across-the-street neighbors have been away for months and were at first sub-letting their house. But now the sub-letters are gone and Minh and I have been tasked with merely keeping an eye on the place. They stopped their mail and they have no pets to feed or plants to water. So the job is an easy one...just make sure the place does not get robbed or burn down to the ground.

A few weeks ago, I noticed a package sitting on their doorstep, so I dutifully brought it inside, left it on the table, and locked the house back up. End of story, right? That's what I thought.

Meanwhile, Minh was anxiously checking the mailbox each day for his replacement cell phone (his was busted) and getting more and more pissed off each day that it did not arrive. (You already know where this is going, don't you?) After tracking the package online and seeing that it was marked as "delivered" he called up DHL to complain. DHL explained to him that they had indeed delivered it, and had left it outside the front door. When he told them that it was not there, they asked him to actually go outside and look around.

DHL said that they sometimes try to leave packages in inconspicuous places. So there he was, cordless phone to his ear, searching among the daylillies for his package when the light bulb went off over his head. His ditsy wife had locked his new cell phone in the neighbors house. He grabbed their house key, went inside and found that the package inside was clearly addressed to us, not them. Oops.

Of course, DHL had delivered it to the wrong house. But then I held it in my hands and didn't even notice my own name on the outside of the box. Something must happen to me in the summer. Let's blame the humidity for making my brain sweat. If only we lived in the Southwest where it's a dry heat....