Three-plus more hours of freedom. Three-plus more hours of relative contentment and sense of purpose. At five o’clock, I’m back to the same old same old run of the mill grind. Here’s what’s on my mind as I steel myself, girding my loins, preparing for the inevitable.

We’re lifting two cocktails from another place. A good place. A place that knows its cocktails from a hole in the ground. What we call ‘lifting,’ others would call ‘theft.’ It’s a valid point. We’re re-jiggering an ingredient or two, and in one case, changing lemon to lime, to make it less than outright theft, but … it’s still theft. One cocktail is gin-based, the other whiskey. In related news, I wonder how my new ‘Squirrel Sobriety’ policy will hold up, when faced with a big long bar full of booze and a chunk of time on my hands at the end of a long, boring night. Is No Drinks At All feasible? If not, will One Drink suffice? If not, can I stop at Two Drinks? If not, does Three, Four, Five, Six Drinks eliminate me from Father of the Year contention?

I return to a streamlined menu. Gone are two appetizers, a seafood, a meat and a salad. (Sadly, the shimp pasta abomination remains. That shrimp pasta natural-law-violator shall outlive us all. It shall bury us.) There’s been a small amount of grief from a few customers as soon as they peruse the menu and don’t find the things they used to find, but what can be done, really. If more people ordered them, we wouldn’t have had to take ‘em off. So … the customers that complain shouldn’t complain to us. They should complain to the other customers who ordered everything but.

Everything in my house smells like pee. My clothes, the sofa, the rug, the bed, her clothes, his clothes, all the linens, the pantry, the living room, the kitchen, the bathroom (though that smelled like pee before, so that’s nothing new. Wife-asaurus has lousy aim), even the back stairwell. That baby of ours has peed so much pee, I can’t believe I’m about to say this, but … I’d almost rather smell our restaurant smell than smell the pee smell currently permeating my house.

I went to kiss Pokey’s nose just now and he punched me in the face. How’s that for a Fine How Do You Do. Punched me right in the face and he might’ve pretended he didn’t mean to, and Wife-asaurus might contend he didn’t mean to, but … I’m almost positive he meant to. Looked me square in the eye and punched. It didn’t hurt. The only thing wounded was my ever-fragile pride. But apparently I let out a little ‘Oof’ upon being struck.

Some moron (Jimmy) had the bright idea to put Alan on the schedule tonight, even though he hasn’t worked a Tuesday for us in … many a moon. Some crap bout us being closed on Thursday so Alan needs to make up the money somehow and Laura wanted to get laid or some crap like that so now I gotta stand there listening to Alan tell me the whole entire backstory of the present he bought for Pokey. (It really was the best present. One of those play mat things for when Pokey’s gotta have his Tummy Time. I’m grateful for the present. It’s so awesome, Wife-asaurus has caught me playing with it, spinning this little spinner thing it has  and looking in this little mirror it has clipped to the side of it. I’d just really rather not have to listen to him go on and on and on and on bout it. Only Alan could turn the best present into a tale so boring and excruciating, it makes me wanna violate my Squirrel Sobriety policy before six o’clock on a weeknight.)

Reason I love Rudy, Number 512: I heard from Jimmy that David’s been calling my kid ‘Ugly Kid’ and then also, in damn near the same breath, saying he’s the father. That’s not anything over which I’m gonna get worked up. If I can brush off his ‘Let me shove a fire extinguisher up your butt’ jokes, an ugly Pokey parentage joke or two won’t slow me down. (Unless he keeps it up for more than … a day or two. Then he and I will have a little chat.) But, the reason I love Rudy is, he heard David joking and told David to shut the fuck up (in Mexican, of course). David continued, Rudy got in his face and David backed down. (The only one who might be stronger than Rudy is Nando, and it’s possible even Nando isn’t. Before I die, I will figure out a way to get ‘em to fight, so I can see, once and for all, quien es mas macho.) That’s why I love Rudy. One reason I do, anyway.

Thursday is indeed Thanksgiving. I won’t list all I have for which I should be thankful (the list will either be so short it depresses me or so long it shames me for being unthankful until I thought out a proper list) but I am looking forward to the day. It’ll be her, Pokey and me. Just the three of us. Normally, we go all the way out to some boondocks suburb to visit with her extended family, but not this year. This year, just this one time, we get to stay home, and if all goes according to plan, I won’t put on pants once. Not one time. Jammies all day. I’m gonna cook a twenty pound turkey (and eat it for days), stuffing, Brussels sprouts, mashed potatoes, rolls, gravy, this cranberry thing that looks awful but tastes good, and these pumpkin ice cream squares. A day’s worth of football, then at seven, the Charlie Brown Thanksgiving. I can’t tell you how much I’m looking forward to Thursday. If Pokey weren’t here, I woulda been stuck on my best behavior, in front of a buncha in-laws. It’s all cause of you, Pokey, so … thanks, Pokey.