All Good.

My wife was scheduled off this Tuesday and Thursday, she called her boss yesterday and asked for tonight off as well. She really needs a break, those overnight shifts are tough. I get home from work at 0045, we hang out and talk. I tell her about our foreman, this is his last week on our shift. He's going back to day shift, taking a cut in pay. He's got five grandkids from eight to seventeen, all play ball. He wants to go to their games, he wants to be with his wife, doesn't care about making fifty bucks less per week, doesn't care that he won't be foreman anymore. He's a lot of things, he can be a pain like all bosses, but he loves his family. He's good to them, he spoils them. When his oldest grandkid ran way over on her cell phone minutes her parents said they were not going to pay for it, teach her a lesson, you know how that goes. She shows up at the dock one night, driving the car that her grandfather helped pay for. She tells him her phone is going to get shut off. He grumbles some, reaches in his pocket and pulls out some money. He gives her the money and asks her if that's enough. She says it's way more than enough, he tells her to keep it all anyway. She lights up, she stands on her toes 'cause he's a pretty big guy, she kisses him on the cheek and says thank you. He just gushes, blushes a little bit 'cause we were all kind of there. Later on he asks me for a dollar so he can get a soda, he don't care that he's got empty pockets. I don't say anything, just give him the dollar. No matter what anyone may think of him at work, everyone knows that he's a good guy when it comes to his family. That is all that matters.

So at 0230 my wife asked if I would go to the store and get a pound of bacon for the girls for breakfast. She makes them hot breakfast every school day, likes to make sure they start their days with a full tummy and a full heart. Doesn't take me long, the grocery store is so close you can see it from our house, it's open twenty-four hours. I shower and go to sleep, wake up at noon when the alarm goes off. I'm a little bit agitated 'cause I wanted to be up earlier, go get my old car. We finished the repairs, just need to get it through inspection. No time for that now, and she left me a note before she went to bed. She's sleeping now' cause she works overnights, it's just better for her to stay on sort of the same schedule even when she's off. The note said pick up some coffee when I pick up the girls from school today. I was just at the store. So I look in the fridge to find some bacon, got bacon on my mind. No bacon left, they ate it all. Now I'm ready to start cryin' and bitchin' like a pansy. Then I see the cast iron skillet still sitting on the stove, odd 'cause she never leaves a mess in the kitchen. I see that the bottom of the skillet is coated with like a quarter inch thick layer of bacon fat, it's cooled and set. You know how that looks, it's kind of off white, got some little tiny bacon fragments stuck here and there. I realize that someone has left a message carved into the cool and set bacon grease.....It's my wife's initials over mine with an "&" in between.

Hey Tommy, can you believe it? She's the best man, I know I've said it before, gonna say it again bro. She's the best.

The parrot is looking at me, we only have him 'cause my wife thought it would be cool. She was right, we got him cheap too. I love that bird.