My real gift...

I am weird about toilet paper. Seriously.

First of all, one of the worst feelings in the world is after you've rushed to the bathroom stall at the last possible minute, finished your business, and then realized you forgot to check the toilet paper supply. Oh the horror when you find it empty! It's like going in the woods only without the leaves. You have to ask yourself if you're really brave enough to knock on the stall next to yours and ask the embarrassing question, "Can you pass some toilet paper over?" Then you have to admit that you are a neanderthal who didn't have the foresight to check the supply - an admission made to a stranger sitting on a potty. Not that it's ever happened to me.

Visiting a paperless bathroom at a person's house is just that much more horrific. If you have the foresight to check first, then you get to track down your host - no doubt in the middle of a riveting conversation with her guests about how the ten hours it took to make all of the lovely hors d'oeuvres was completely worth it to her because she knows how much everyone loves them - and you have to interrupt her to point out that in all of her domestic goddessness she didn't restock the paper. Talk about insulting. She's SO going to refill your glass with the cheap wine while you're peeing.

If you don't check for paper until it's too late, then you find out about your true self. Just how important is personal hygiene to you? Important enough to make you turn into an undercover CIA agent and scour every nook and cranny of that bathroom looking for Charmin with your pants around your knees? Important enough to use Kleenex as a poor substitute? I would argue that there are no lengths women won't go to in order to acquire TP. And God bless us for it!

Anyway, the reason I started this whole thing is because there's a hurricane coming, and I just realized that we have six rolls of toilet paper. Only six.

I should note that it's actually only a tropical storm, but a hurricane sounds much more dire. Whoever thought up the term tropical storm obviously wasn't much on word choice because it just makes me think of little pina colada rain drops falling gently on hula dancers. Definitely not anything to evacuate for - more like pull up a cocktail glass and get your groove on.

Anyway, I buy toilet paper at Sam's in giant quantities. When we get down to two of the nine roll packs, it's nearly an emergency. So the thought that the hurricane was coming and we only had six rolls, well, I was disturbed. I mean, what if it floods? We'll need every last absorbent material we can find, and six rolls just ain't gonna cut it! What if it brings with it terrible digestive diseases and Sam's and Walmart have to close because of the germs. We'll only have six rolls. I'll have to go door to door asking neighbors for toilet paper. How embarrassing!

My version of cooking usually involves frozen foods. If you look closely you'd see that I'm not that dedicated to cleaning my house. I have a reputation for ruining clothes in the laundry. Keeping insane amounts of toilet paper is my gift.

I think tomorrow I'll clean off an additional shelf in the laundry room for toilet paper. Maybe if I increase supply by two, then my chances of running so low again are reduced by half. I think I can sleep at night with those odds. I think I can.