It's a mellow Monday morning. Intrepid and Gutsy are at school. Spawnling slept like ass and is splayed across my queen size bed like he was most of the night. Of course, this means coffee has already been brewed, poured and partially ingested into his tired parents' bodies. It also means I probably won't over-think a blog post and can possibly write something funny. I've been lacking in the creativity department lately. Stress is a cruel mistress.

Not that I don't always have stress. Remember the whole "three boys" part of my life? That's stress in excess right there, my friends. Yesterday, when said three boys invited two more over to play, I tried to sneak out and do groceries. It was then when I heard the very worst sentence come from my spouse's mouth:

"I might like to do groceries today, Maven."

Children were running around wildly, throwing themselves into walls in some kind of faux superhero battle. A foam sword whizzed past my ear. My jaw dropped to the floor along with the bags (grocery bags, not body bags - they weren't being that loud).

Did he... did he just steal my sunshine? Did the man I graciously allowed to spend his life with me just take my highly coveted supermarket time away?

We have a well-established routine in this house: I wait until it gets really loud and I could use a break. Then, I say I have to go to the grocery store to pick up some "things" (I'm never incredibly specific on account of running out of justifiable reasons to go). I follow that up with apologizing for leaving him in chaos in the name of feeding our children. I follow that line up with something about how busy the store is going to be and how stressful running errands is, and how it's just part of my job and I'm glad to do it for my family.

Then, when my van turns the corner, I crank up the cheesiest pop music imaginable, sing at the top of my lungs, whip into the parking lot, grab the bags out of the trunk and waltz into the store like I own the place.

I get some space, a breather, a few minutes to switch gears and get immersed in a different kind of stress; for while there's definitely some crazy involved in aisles blocked by old ladies tut-tutting over the price of tuna, I don't have my gremlins crawling all over the cart, which means I can patiently wait - it makes the trip longer, anyway. And when I hear children howling at the checkout, my empathetic look is quickly hijacked by a grin that says: Psst. Check out my childless cart. Isn't it amazingly quiet?

I come home refreshed and ready to get slapped by the wall of chaos at the front door: The screaming, the tears, the frustrated faces. But it's okay because I had my little break.

Who needs an affair? Way too complicated. I just go fondle produce for an hour.

And then, out of the blue, my husband offers to go tickle the tomatoes instead? What right does he have? Those are my grapes to grope, Geekster. You have your office job with your, well, office, and desk, and lunch breaks, and bosses who don't scream and you and throw things and tip over chairs (we hope). And I have my damn grocery store. That's my lunch break, ok?

But I let him walk out that door holding my bags, strolling to his car, while behind me in the living room the noise grew louder.

After seventeen years, he's figured me out.

Oh, did I mention that we celebrated our seventeenth date-a-versary on Saturday? On May 1st, 1993, I met this cute boy at a party and talked his ear off for three hours. Even after that, he couldn't wait to see me the next day. And now he's been seeing me every day for nearly two decades. Poor sop. No wonder he needs a grocery store outing.

Our amazing friends graciously took all three gremlins on Saturday afternoon and kept them until after dinner. Other than the fact that I think my friend may have attempted to remove her own uterus after six hours with my boys, it was a good day. Geekster and I were able to spend time in our own house without any children around for the first time in years.

Years.

We've gone out, we've even stayed out overnight a handful of times, but there's something really nice about being in your own home together without any responsibilities. I can't tell you what happened in the first hour after we got home whatsoever - a gas leak, crack in the space/time continuum, alien abduction, who knows? - but after that hour was over, we had coffee, stirfry, cake, watched really soothing nature programs on television, and snuggled a lot. It was bliss.

By the time we picked the kids up, Geekster and I were rejuvenated, happy, calm. That feeling stayed for most of yesterday, which is why I didn't try to hit him with a rubber boot as he walked out the door and headed to my favourite getaway. I then redirected the busy boys to the great outdoors, threw some food at them to keep them quiet, then went into the kitchen and made pasta, bagels and cookies from scratch.

Damn, I'm amazing.

And where is my wonderful husband today? At stupid, wonderful work. 'See you at six!' he said this morning, then kissed me sweetly and walked out the door.

I almost knocked him out with a folded umbrella and stole his keys and building pass, but then realized I couldn't write a line of code to save my life. Not to mention I'm anything but bald or skinny or male, so passing as him probably wouldn't work very well.

He can have his coffee breaks and lunches. I'll have bagels and cookies. On this particular rainy Monday morning, I totally win.