Monday made me do it.

Wore my uncomfortable shoes this morning, because it was raining and I don’t care if they get soaked, plus I wasn’t planning on doing much walking today.

Dropped off the kids and arrived at work, crossed the street from the parking lot toting my purse, my lunch, and a six pack of 24-oz water bottles through the light rain. Bumped my purse into the staff door’s sensor pad so my badge would register.

Nothing happened. I bumped again. Still nothing.

Dug through my purse, wondering if the chip was finally going in my badge and if I had to get a new one, maybe I should get a new photo, too—one that wasn’t taken the day I came back from my last maternity leave and might not look quite so much like me—and realized that the sensor couldn’t register a badge that wasn’t there.

Trudged back to the car to look for it, figuring that if it wasn’t there, I’d wait for a coworker to arrive and follow them in.

Did I mention it was raining? And that I was schlepping my lunch bag, purse, and nine pounds of water instead of an umbrella? And that my shoes hate me even more after stepping in that puddle, which was an accident?

Found my badge and lanyard, which had wrapped around the parking brake. Freed it, slung it around my neck, and trudged back.

Rain. Heavy. Hurting. Ow.

Bypassed the stairs and headed for the elevator, which took its own, sweet time, and then took me UP, when all the buttons I’d pushed had told it I wanted DOWN. Pushed them again and was punished by stopping on every, single floor on the way to the one I wanted.

Slogged to my desk, wondering why I’d bothered to brush my hair at all, shed my coat and pulled my sweater straight, only to find that my badge had embedded its metal clip in the weave and I’d just yanked a bunch of threads into long, festive loops, directly over my right nipple.*

Did I mention that this is a brand new sweater and the first time I’d worn it?

Took off the sweater, which I don’t really need in our department, since we share space with the boiler room . . . And learned that due to everyone in reference calling in sick today, I’ll be spending the day at the desk not ten feet from the front entrance.

Did I mention that it’s raining even harder now? And the wind likes to come in and browse the new DVDs whenever a patron opens the door? Which is probably why reference keeps calling in sick?

Logged into my workstation to check e-mail for the ten minutes left before I had to clock in, and remembered that I hadn’t written a blog post yet.

Here.

Monday made me do it.

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*It was suggested by a co-worker, who shall remain nameless, but not forgotten, that I should pull matching loops over the left one for “symmetry” and also to boost the library’s popularity.   As librarians can’t accept tips—and I wouldn’t find the place some of our patrons might want to put tips at all acceptable— I didn’t really see the point.