Logged at 05:34:00 PCT.

It has been 3 days now since mom left dad and I alone in the house to fend for ourselves. Her conference isn’t over for another 4 days, but we won’t survive that long.

Today the toilet paper ran out. I’d ripped off the last piece, and the spinning cardboard sounded hollow, ringing out my death knell. Dad and I don’t know where she keeps extra rolls. God help us. This couldn’t have come at a worse time.

Yesterday we tried to turn on the stove. We did not succeed. Dad held the box of Mac’n’Cheese and cried. Dinner of mayo on bread brought no comfort, and putting sugar into water we’ve learned is no substitute for Coke, which ran out the first day because dad was eating Fritos. The pantry is a great mystery. A box of “Rice Pilaf,” jars of flour and powdered sugar, apple cider vinegar, cartons of Healthy Choice cereal–ew no. Tonight we’re mixing diced tomatoes with Pedigree dog chow–there’s no alternative because Denny’s is closed again.

We need to poo and can’t. There is no god damned toilet paper. We’ve used all the napkins and Downy. Dad was eyeing the hand towels, but it makes no sense to survive now only to be killed by mom later.

Apart from that, we can’t get anything done. We’ve watched full marathons of Game of Thrones and 24. Mom’s not here to regulate, and it’s showing in the dark beneath our eyes. Dad tried to put mom’s eye drops in and missed–it’s useless. The whole mad thing.

And now I write this in the heat of battle with the washing machine. Dad is scooping suds up into the laundry basket, and the machine just keeps spewing more. Damn you perma press… damn you to hell.

I fear that you will find this, mom, and we will have been vanquished by domestic chores. I’m sorry that we could not do better. I fear…. I fear that the world was always too harsh for our kind. So I go now to fight alongside my father. Once more into the bleach, dear friends, once more into the bleach!

-CJ