It was an Apple fritter kind of week (standard:humor, 910 words)
Author: Godspenman	Added: Jan 30 2011	Views/Reads: 2867/1847	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
Have you ever had a week where everything went exactly as planned? Neither have I. Every week I start out believing this week is going to be different from all the other weeks of my life. This week everything is going to turn out the way I planned. If thi

Have you ever had a week where everything went exactly as planned?
Neither have I. Every week I start out believing this week is going to 
be different from all the other weeks of my life. This week everything 
is going to turn out the way I planned. If this has ever occurred, I 
cannot recall it. 

Take last week, please! I start every week about the same. I
meticulously prepare my weekly to-do-list. This is not to be confused 
with the Gracious Mistress of the Parsonage's honey-do-list. Her list, 
and I learned this by experience, takes precedence over every other 
list in the world. 

My weekly to-do-list is a very important part of my week. I chronicle
everything needing accomplished during the week along with appointments 
with people that I need to see. With the religious ferocity of the 
Pharisee, I follow this list throughout the week and dutifully check 
off each item as it is completed. Then, Saturday evening I can look 
back with a great deal of satisfaction and see what I have 
accomplished. 

Unfortunately, I can also look back on my list and see what I have not
accomplished this week. With a deep sigh, I carry these items over to 
next week's to-do-list. Just between you and me, some items I have 
carried over for 36 consecutive weeks. By this time, I usually drop the 
whole notion and get on with my life. 

My philosophy is, if you aim at nothing; you will hit it every time. I'm
not exactly sure what that means but what I take away from it is simply 
that if I do not aim to do something I probably never will do it. 

I live day by day by this weekly to-do-list. If it were not for this
marvelous tool, I would never get anything done during the week. It is 
my great joy late Saturday night to workout the following week's 
to-do-list. 

Sometimes my wife will look at me, sigh and say, "You're not working on
your to-do-list, are you?" Then she says something that actually 
irritates me. Not everything she says irritates me, but this one does. 
"You know, if you would spend as much time actually doing those things 
as you spend planning to do them you might actually get something done 
during the week." 

I developed this to-do-list so I would not have to keep trying to
remember what I was supposed to do during the week. They kept me free 
to think more creatively about things that needed that kind of 
attention. All I had to do was consult my to-do-list and find out what 
needed to be done. After all, I don't want to tax my brain too much. 
Who do you think I am? The government? 

Then last week it happened. Something I had feared for many a year. 

Tuesday morning I looked around for my to-do-list and the more I looked,
the more elusive it was. I took a deep breath trying to keep panic at 
bay because I knew that would not help me. Verging on frantic, I began 
searching the house. 

"What are you looking for?" my wife asked. "Maybe I can help you find
it." 

Now, I faced a very deep quandary. Do I confess to my wife that I lost
my to-do-list? Or, do I forge ahead on my own hoping that I will find 
it myself. Life is full of these deep, dark quandaries. 

Finally, I confessed I had lost my to-do-list. Then she said, "Where did
you have it last?" 

If I knew that, I thought to myself, it would not be lost. I mumbled
something along the line that I could not remember. At my age, not 
being able to remember comes with the territory. 

"You didn't have it in your shirt pocket, by any chance?" 

Of course, I always have it in my shirt pocket. I never go out of the
house without my to-do-list in my shirt pocket where it is readily 
accessible to me. 


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