Our Programs, or How I Learned to Make Do with "Fine"

Scene: 5 am two nights before Hot Cocoa wedding.  Miss Hot Cocoa on the floor of Hot Mama Cocoa's house, boxed in entirely by programs.

Action: She opens one of the programs, and curls, slow motion, into a fetal position.  Program grows legs, kicks her in the shin, and runs off laughing.

Voiceover: "Program 5; Hot Cocoa 0."

Flashback: Four days before Hot Cocoa wedding.  Miss Hot Cocoa picks up printed program insert from printing company.  Insert looks like it was printed by a dot matrix printer; somewhere in the process of pdf'ing the document, sending it via email to the printing company, and the company printing it out and copying it, the resolution got unacceptably anemic.  Mr. Hot Cocoa looks at program, dryly notes that it's not 1990.

Voiceover: "Program 1; Hot Cocoa 0."

Flashback: Three days before Hot Cocoa wedding.  Miss Hot Cocoa hauls ass to Kinkos to redo the program inserts.  Kinkos manager gives her the proof to look over; she signs off.  Five hours later, she returns, looks over the proof again, realizes there's an incorrect page break . . . on a document she's "proofed" at least ten times.  Oh yeah, Miss Hot Cocoa was once an editor and teaches writing for a living.

Voiceover: "Program 2; Hot Cocoa 0."

Flashback: 8 pm two nights before Hot Cocoa wedding.  Hot Mama Cocoa, Hottest Sister Cocoa, and Miss Hot Cocoa sit down to assemble programs.  Miss Hot Cocoa notices that one of the groomsmen's names is spelled wrong.

Voiceover: "Program 3; Hot Cocoa 0."

Flashback: 3 am same night.  Rest of the Hot Cocoas have gone to bed.  Miss Hot Cocoa still stamping cherry blossoms on the inside of the programs.  The programs begin to spawn.  She keeps stamping, but there are more and more of them.  Meanwhile, the cherry blossoms are not drying; purple ink smudges everywhere.

Voiceover: "Program 4; Hot Cocoa 0."

Return to original scene: 5 am.  Miss Hot Cocoa surveys the scene around her.  180 programs. Punched.  Folded.  Glued.  Stapled.  Stamped.  Picks one up.  Finds one more spacing error.

Program wins.  Hot Cocoa gives up.

In my next post, I'll share the details of making the programs.  I'm off to nurse my wounds.

Did one of your DIY projects take on a life of its own and try to consume you?