Keeping up with Marcy.

Good morning. It’s 5:35 a.m. In case you’re nervous that I’m turning into an insomniac, I really didn’t plan to get such an early start on my Wednesday activities and fully intend to creep back to bed within the next half-hour.

So far my plans for today include sending Sam to Wal-Mart for foam plates, light bulbs and frozen waffles, watching three really short women clean my house beginning at 10 a.m., our semi-monthly Schwan’s delivery at noon-ish and then making a monster-size pot of homemade chicken barley soup after Sam leaves for work at 2. My chicken barley soup, incidentally, is exactly the same as my beef barley soup (see recipe) except I substitute a major ingredient. There might be a prize for the first Howdygram reader who can guess which one, so please send an email as soon as you figure it out. Best of luck. I’m going back to bed now.

Wednesday marches on. It’s 11:15, the maids have come and gone and I just finished mopping up a Coke Zero spill all over my expensive two-line phone ... the one with the big fluffy shoulder rest. For the moment the phone is still working, but you never can tell with electronics because some of them prefer Diet Pepsi. Computer keyboards, on the other hand, are usually “dry clean only.”

I’d better fix some lunch now because Sam’s stomach is making so much noise it sounds like there’s a truck idling in the driveway. Pass the napkins and thank you for reading this.