I Am My Own Husband

I'm sure that you own a vacuum cleaner. Right? I'm also sure that at some point in your life you have answered that dreaded knock on the door by a Kirby salesman. Right? No? Really? Oops, I think someone's at your door. You go ahead and go get that and I'll see you in three hours.

Here's what happens, in case you didn't already know. The guy knocks on your door, you answer and he says, "Well, hello there. I would like to come in and clean your carpet! Just clean it and then I'll be out the door, no strings attached!"

Then you say "Woohoo! What an amazing Christmas miracle, please come in kind sir!".

Then he leaves three hours later, and maybe you bought a Kirby vacuum cleaner, maybe you didn't.

I'll go ahead and spoil this story for you. I own a Kirby vacuum cleaner.

On the way home one cold winter night I had Madison in the car with me and called home to let Joe know that we were on the way. Joe says, "Oh this guy just came by and said he would clean our carpets."

"Noooooooooo! Get him out of the house now! Oh my God!"

Then he says, "Oh, he's not here now, he just ran out to get the cleaner out of the van."

"Oh good. Lock the door."

"I can't do that Amber, he's just going to clean the carpet. Come on."

"Joe." I said, "Joe, I'm on the way home. I don't want that man in my home when I get there."

I was home a few minutes later. No van in the driveway. Phew. We walk in the door. Now, please remember, I had just worked all day and still had to come home and cook dinner. I see a stranger's coat hanging on the rack and some snow boots that I didn't recognize. I thought to myself, "Well, looks like someone left without their coat and snow boots." Naive, I know.

I am welcomed by my beaming husband and a stranger. Poor Madison was stuck going to play in her room while this guy cleaned our carpet and my husband smiled the biggest freaking smile I had ever seen.

Immediately I am attacked about the face and neck with facts about this fabulous machine! It does this and this and this and look and it can unfold and BOO it's Joseph Gordon-Levitt and then hit this button and BAM he turns into Jensen Ackles, turn this switch and it's a BRAND NEW CAR! And a year's supply of A-1 Sauce. (if that's what it really did I would have paid anything for it...anything)

I don't care what they were saying. Joe wanted the Joseph-Jensen-car and I wanted to be able to pay our regular bills and maybe get some food. Food that didn't required A-1 sauce.

Finally, well, so I thought. I just gave in. I grabbed the checkbook and put it on the table and said, "You want it, you write the check."

That sparked a whole nother conversation about making joint decisions, the sales guy whipped out his wallet with pictures of his daughters (one is getting married in the summer), he also called his boss about three times to lower the price from one million dollars to five-hundred thousand. It was literally three hours. 3 hours. 180 minutes. I'm tired. Joe is still reeling from the Kirby vacuum fumes, this man was freaking excited about cleaning the carpets, the furniture, the mattresses. They made it clear that I wasn't the best momma ever unless I had this vacuum to suck up all of the bugs in our child's mattress. The sales guy was also sure to mention that it was usually the husband that didn't want the vacuum, not the wife, and that we were ten kinds of back ass wards.

I don't know when it happened, I was deliriously tired and had low blood sugar, but that guy left and when he left he didn't take the Kirby with him.

The Kirby that has a dog brush attachment, a belt sander attachment, a massage attachment, a carpet shampoo attachment, a crevice attachment, a rotating brush attachment, an inflate/deflate attachment and a stair vacuum attachment. No, I am no joking about any of the a fore mentioned attachments. I am 100% serious and that makes me sad.

The picture above does not show the rotating brush attachment or the sander/massager attachment. I promise they exist and I have them.