Have you ever had one of those days where everything seemed to be going just fine until some tool came along and messed up the whole works?

That’s how today went. I was doing just fine. I had picked up my car from the mechanics after they replaced all of my brakes. I was pretty happy to be able to stop once again so I was feeling pretty chipper about things. I had a project I was working on that I was on track to finish on time and both kids were out for the evening. Son was at geek class and daughter was with her dad, ex #2. I had the house to myself and was looking forward to working in peace.

I sat down to my computer and checked my blog and got the blue screen of death and then it shut off. I turned it on again and it fired up fine. I wasn’t too concerned but thought to myself:

“Hey, you bought an external hard drive to back up everything in the event that your computer crashed again. Now might be a good time to figure out how it works.”

So I did. I did a back up all by myself!

While backing up I noticed the little indicator thingy that tells me I am online had a big red X over it. I was not able to get online. I did a little trouble shooting and could not get back online. I ended up calling Linksys to see if they knew what the problem was.

They didn’t. I got another customer service representative who does not live in these United States and who does not speak English as a first language. He did the same trouble shooting that I did and then told me to connect my PC to the router with an Ethernet cable. I already knew this was unnecessary since the other computer had no problem getting online with a wireless connection but the non speaking English guy had run out of reasons for why my wireless connection wasn’t working.

He asked me for my credit card and told me that once I had procured an Ethernet cable that would go from my second floor to my basement I should call him back and we would fix things.

I told him not to charge my card and that I would take care of it myself.

I called a friend who is an IT god and explained the situation.

We determined that my wireless card died and that I needed a new one. This seemed more reasonable to me and cost less than the help over the phone so I hung up and headed out to Best Buy, a great Minnesota company that let a few people go today.

I bought the card, returned home and began the installation process. All was going swimmingly.

Until ex#2 dropped daughter off at the house.

Ex#2 and I have been rather cool to one another since he announced he was taking me to court. If you need a refresher on that please go here. A few months ago when he was using my truck he got a parking ticket. He said he would take care of it but apparently decided when he was going to screw me over he didn’t need to take care of the ticket. I received a summons in the mail today which I mentioned to him when he dropped off daughter. He shrugged and left without saying what he planned on doing. Of course I didn’t expect him to be a stand up guy but had to ask. And that is all I did. Our days of going round and round about his stupidity and lack of ethics and morals are long gone.

30 seconds after leaving he called me on the phone.

“Just consider yourself ahead of the game and suck up the $75 for the ticket.” He said.

“What are you talking about?” I said

“As soon as we go to court you are going to lose everything you are taking from me right now.” He shouted into the phone.

“Are you high?” I asked.

“Just wait, you will see. You are bleeding me dry and it won’t go on any longer. The courts will see and act accordingly. You ought to be ashamed.” He blathered on and on but I had long stopped listening to him.

I won’t go into details but if any bleeding is happening it is on this end of things. He is an idiot however and will never see it so I don’t bother to explain it to him.

I couldn’t understand why he was so upset until I caught part of his rambling:

“Daughter says you told her she could change her name.”

Ah ha!

I didn’t even know she wanted to change her name but I am tickled that she would. When the nurse came in after she was born and asked for her name I almost gave her my name. I knew then that the marriage was over and I would regret it if I didn’t give her my name but I wasn’t ready to concede yet so I gave her his name. It hasn’t really been an issue until this year where she has to learn to read and write her full name. My last name is common and easy and short. His last name is unique, it isn’t spelled the way it sounds and everyone who has his last name is a relative. When we divorced I went back to my maiden name. No one in our house has the same last name which makes invitations to the family unit cumbersome on an envelope. Most people just shorten it to Jenny and Kids.

I didn’t have a chance to defend the accusation he just kept going on and on about how unfair I have been to him. He then went off on my son. Normally this would have set me off but I don’t care what he thinks anymore and I know that he is intimidated by my son. Son is and has been smarted than ex#2 since he was about 7 years old and now that he has gone through puberty he is twice ex#2’s size. Ex#2 is the kind of guy who is easily intimidated by a person’s size so it’s fun to watch. Son wouldn’t hurt a fly but ex#2 doesn’t know this.

“My son does not bad mouth you around daughter. I have explained to him that that is not permissible.”

“Well he must do it when you aren’t around.”

I’m always around but I didn’t say this. I said this instead.

“Son is not talking or even thinking about you anymore. Yes, he was angry when you walked out on us and didn’t even say goodbye to him but he has moved on from that. I promise you that we do not talk about you behind your back. You do not cross our minds when you are not here. You are a non issue.”

“We’ll just see about that! I hope you read the paper today.” He stated. And then he hung up.

WTF? I had not seen the paper today but I have read the paper online and had the news on TV most of the day. There was no breaking news headline that said Jen watch out your ex#2 has done something that you will wish you had read about in the paper. What kinds of drugs is he taking to suspend reality so wonderfully? How can someone appear to be functioning just fine but have absolutely no idea what is going on in the world? At least this little world.

And what is in the paper?