OMG I'M ALLERGIC!!!

Ok, I used to have two cats, I have a grandbaby kitten whom I've played with, but dear LORD I am dying over here!!! I spent the afternoon at my friend Donna's house, who has two cats and a labradoodle, and I'm leaking from my nose, my eyes, and I've got a total case of the itchies. I left her house to go do some errands at Sams Club and was wandering around the store FOREVER trying to find the liquid hand soap. I went and got laundry detergent, nope, no hand soap here, must be by the pharmacy and shampoo and other bar soap. I push that huge-ass cart to the other end of the warehouse, wander around, try to sneak past that freaky guy that is always asking me if I want to put new windows in my house. I swear I go there every couple weeks and he asks me EVERY TIME, "What are we doing to the house this year?" I smile politely, because I'm a nice girl, but I really want to tell him to shove it up his kiester and LEAVE ME ALONE, but alas, I was raised almost correctly, and I don't say that. I go to the bar soap isle.

No, no liquid hand soap here. Really, it's not here.

It MUST be back by the laundry detergent and I just missed it. All the while I am itching, my nose is running, and it's starting to move into my legs under my jeans. I reach the laundry detergent, and no, there's really no hand soap here. It occurs to me I have never seen hand soap anywhere in all the times I've been in Sams. Didn't we buy the last gallon from Costco??? I hear an employee behind me pushing a pallet and as soon as I realize I NEED HELP, I can't stop itching nor can I find the FRICKIN hand soap, I turn to ask the employee, but he's gone. Vanished like a puff of smoke in a magic act. CRAP!!! I finally drag myself back to the pharmacy, knowing full well there's always an employee there. I go the SUPER long way to avoid creepy window man, and I ask the tech in the pharmacy, "Can you PLEASE tell me where they hide the hand soap??" She points to the last isle and says, "Right outside the bathrooms."

Oh.

The only isle I've never been in because I thought it was all Depends and Kotex in that isle. Then I see it, carefully stacked between the Slimfast and the pee pee pants. Thank GOD and I'm right next to the registers!!! Woohoo!!!

But, I digress. I'm dying. Whatever happened to me when I was pregnant obviously changed my chemistry enough because I can't spend much time around felines. Oh, they are so cute, and fluffy and cats LOVE me. But... I've got the ITCHIES BAD!!! My kingdom for antihistamines!!

Later.

I called Donna and told her my dilema, told her I was broken and OMG, I'm ITCHY NOW EVERYWHERE!!! She laughed and said Marcel, one of her cats, causes everyone to react. He's super feline or something. Oh. I guess I was being just a teensy bit dramatic.

I will take this opportunity to apologize to all of those I have known over the years who have had allergies and I thought you were being wussy or "geez, can I get you a tissue, you snot gurgling thing??" Ok, that was mostly Jesse, my cousin, who had the worst allergies in the summer and Grandma (God, rest her soul, {Amy crosses herself}) was too cheap to keep buying boxes of kleenex so Jesse carried a roll of toilet paper around with him all summer. As I remember, it wasn't even the good stuff, so his nose was all red and raw from constantly wiping it with cheap bath tissue. I think I called him Rudolph or maybe Bozo, or both. I'm sorry I was mean and insensitive. I'm sorry I made fun of his pain. I'm sorry I got pissy when he blew his nose in the middle of the night and it sounded like a fog horn from the coast of New England. I'm sorry I gave him grief when he blew his nose into his hands in the shower (I only knew because the fog horn traveled throughout the entire house into the kitchen and I knew there were no tissues in said bathroom and you can't use toilet paper to blow your nose when you're in the shower and please God, tell me it's not just going everywhere because I shower in there, too) when we were in high school and I realized he wasn't using a tissue and thought that was the grossest thing I had ever heard of and wouldn't touch him for a month. That still makes me gag. Yuck.

But, again, I digress.

So now, I feel fine. The benadryl kicked in and I feel almost normal again. But now I'm tired and I think I need to go get some chai.

Mmmmmmmm, chai. It almost makes it all go away. Almost.