My dawg done ate my weddin' ring...

I promise I will stop belaboring my recent streak of bad luck. Really, I'm almost back to normal. I've got a surgery date to remove the extra hardware from my hand, and I can foresee a time when the "s" key will no longer be my nemesis. We're nearly done dealing with insurance companies. We'll be getting upgraded iPods and cameras in the mail, along with a check worth exactly a plane ticket to Paris and a new wedding ring. Which is handy, since we're one month away from a trip to Paris, where we might just do some romantic wedding-ring shopping. (I like to think that if their heirloom rings had to get stolen, Margaret and Helen would want me to spend the insurance payout on a new wedding ring in Paris.)

Things are nearly back to normal.

But this I just must share. Today I was telling a colleague that I'd had to ask for an extension on a project, having realized that I just couldn't make up for lost time on all fronts. I had to ask for some slack.

"Well, yeah," she said. "Your life has been like a country and western song."

And I thought, Yes! That is exactly what it's like. Not like the tragedy and hardship of people in Gaza, or Iraq, or New Orleans. We didn't lose our house to foreclosure or a family member to violence. No, for exactly one month there, it was like we were living the lyrics to a VERY BAD country song.

My dog done broke my finger,
Some som'bitch stole my weddin' ring.
My car got smashed by a big Ford truck,
Oh why oh why do I got such luck?

That is the perfect metaphor. Not tragic so much as absurdly depressing, or perhaps depressingly absurd.