The Empress And The Key

Like Elaine's friends from the Bizarro World (Kevin, Gene, and Feldman), Mrs. Hillbilly Mom is a study in opposites.

Today, for instance, she re-enacted The Princess and the Pea. With a few minor differences, of course. Mrs. Hillbilly Mom is no princess. She is the Empress of Hillmomba, by cracky!

I set out around noon to mail some bills, and treat myself to some gas station chicken. That's because somewhere, somehow, a commenter on another blog put the idea into my mind. All went as planned. I got a 44 oz. Diet Coke, because when you're chowing down on delicious crispy gas station fried chicken, you don't want a sugary keg of soda to fill you up unnecessarily.

I put my precious beverage in the cup holder, then opened the back passenger door to deposit my chicken. I have to open the box to let it breathe. Nobody likes soggy, suffocated fowl. I climbed up into the control center of T-Hoe, put a stack of tissues over the top of my caffeine-filled elixir so as not to melt the ice on the way back to Hillmomba, and buckled my seat belt. It was going to be a bumpy ride, you know. Because I live on a gravel road.

The keys were missing!

I could not begin my journey of five miles with a single twist of my wrist. Because the keys were missing! Missing, I say! The keys were missing! And even worse, the gas station chicken was getting cold, and the 44 oz. Diet Coke was getting hot! Oh, the humanity!

Then I remembered where I had last seen the keys. I opened my door, leaned way over, and fetched them out from under my ample buttocks.

I didn't even feel them.

I think, perhaps, that gas station chicken and I should part ways.