Notaro - Excuse Me While I Disappear: Tales of Midlife Mayhem

PRAISE FOR LAURIE NOTARO

If Laurie Notaros books dont inspire pants-wetting fits of laughter, then please consult your physician because clearly your funny bone is broken.

Jen Lancaster

Hilarious, fabulously improper, and completely relatable, Notaro is the queen of funny.

Celia Rivenbark

Whenever I pick up a book by Laurie Notaro, I know Ill be in a good mood soon. Because Laurie Notaro makes me laugh. Period.

Meg Cabot

Pure, unexpurgated Notaro... again, she turns on the truth serum and the results are once more riotously funny.

San Antonio Express-News

For pure laugh-out-loud, then read-out-loud fun, its hard to beat this humor writer.

New Orleans Times-Picayune

[Notaro] may be the funniest writer in this solar system.

Miami Herald

ALSO BY LAURIE NOTARO

Fiction

Theres a (Slight) Chance I Might Be Going to Hell: A Novel of Sewer Pipes, Pageant Queens, and Big Trouble

Spooky Little Girl

Crossing the Horizon

Nonfiction

The Idiot Girls Action-Adventure Club: True Tales from a Magnificent and Clumsy Life

Autobiography of a Fat Bride: True Tales of a Pretend Adulthood

I Love Everybody (and Other Atrocious Lies): True Tales of a Loudmouth Girl

We Thought You Would Be Prettier: True Tales of the Dorkiest Girl Alive

An Idiot Girls Christmas: True Tales from the Top of the Naughty List

The Idiot Girl and the Flaming Tantrum of Death: Reflections on Revenge, Germophobia, and Laser Hair Removal

It Looked Different on the Model: Epic Tales of Impending Shame and Infamy

The Potty Mouth at the Table

Enter Pirates: Vintage Legends

Housebroken

Predictably Disastrous Results: Vintage Legends Volume II

Text copyright 2022 by Laurie Notaro

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

Published by Little A, New York

www.apub.com

Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Little A are trademarks of Amazon.com , Inc., or its affiliates.

ISBN-13: 9781542033510 (hardcover)

ISBN-10: 1542033519 (hardcover)

ISBN-13: 9781542033503 (paperback)

ISBN-10: 1542033500 (paperback)

Cover design by Shasti OLeary Soudant

First edition

To the brightest light of my life, Maeby. My darling girl, I hope we deserved you, and that you knew how much we loved you and will always love you beyond all things imaginable.

And to my mom, for (not so quietly) suffering through my entire career. You are mostly anonymous in this book, but you are the funniest person on this earth. Own it.

Contents

Girl Gone Gray

Ive decided, I said as I plopped down in the cushy salon chair. Today is the day.

My hairstylist looked a little shocked, but I nodded. Im going all the way.

Okay, she said. But you have to be sure. You really have to be sure, because theres no going back.

Full steam ahead! I tallyhoed. Make me gray!

I wont lie. I wasnt a mature woman embracing her true self, age, and root color. I had, instead, recently seen a photo of myself in which someone had clearly poured powdered sugar on my head, right down the part, with the surgical precision of an alien ship leaving crop circles.

Look at that! I said to my husband, pointing at the image on Facebook. Someone was eating a doughnut above my head! Why didnt someone tell me?

My husband peered over my shoulder, took a good look at me, and quickly said, I think I hear the teakettle.

Odd , I thought. I didnt hear a teakettle . I followed him into the kitchen. He glanced back and picked up his pace, sprinting into the dining room.

I didnt hear anything, I said as I pursued him through the living room and back to the kitchen. On my second lap, I got a good look at the empty stove.

Theres no teakettle! I said louder as he doubled back to the dining room, where I found him blocked by Maeby, our Australian shepherd. Shed realized that the sheep had escaped the pen and was now frantically herding my husband into his chair.

Theres no teakettle! I asserted again.

My husband threw his arms up. Just as there was no doughnut.

What?

There was no doughnut, he explained. No one dropped powdered sugar on your head.

Okay, I said, beginning to laugh. Maybe it was cocaine.

One of your friends just got a fellowship at Harvard, he stated. Another one runs a hedge fund on Wall Street. One owns a bookstore. Another was the president of the PTA in a snooty neighborhood. And dont forget the one fighting malaria in Africabut, more importantly, Bill Gates knows that ones first and last name. No one is doing cocaine at your Scottsdale cinnamon roll french toast brunches.

Okay! I said, fully laughing. I guess it was a bad light reflection.

It was not a bad light reflection! my husband finally spouted. Its your roots. Your roots are white.

I squinted at him, unbelieving. But I get them done every three weeks. At a hundred and seventy dollars a pop. Plus tip. And Im a good tipper.

Well, the real tip is that every three weeks, they grow backwhite, he said. Honey, I think youre gray.

There was every possibility that he was right. Id found my first gray hair at twenty-two, and after that they just kept coming. Id invested in the occasional box of LOral every now and then for the first twenty years or so. Later, when I was sick of guests inquiring furtively about the brown splotches on the walls of my bathroombecause I apparently rinsed out hair dye as if I were a wet dogI started getting my hair dyed professionally. At first, I made a trip to the salon every five weeks, and then, as I merged into my forties, every four. Eventually, I worked my way up to a three-week rotation. I knew more about my colorist than I did my therapist and was actually offended when I did not make it onto the guest list for her wedding.

Perhaps I shouldnt have gasped when she mentioned that she was using fake flowers from Michaels to create her centerpieces, or suggested lightly, Remember, not everyone can pull off a sleeveless dress. Its true. My sister once fired me from her wedding party when I pointed out that the average BMI of her bridesmaids definitively pointed to arm coverings, unless the Spanx lady had suddenly invented a girdle for flesh curtains.

So every three weeks, when I visited my fake-flower-loving colorist for my fake chestnut-brown hair, I was investing $170 plus a good tip into a lie, and it had stopped delivering returns. The way I saw it, I had several options.

Move my coloring appointments to every two weeks, the cost of which would have decimated my snack budget, even though evidence on my colorists Facebook page revealedto my aesthetic horrorthat the bridal party was indeed sleeveless, despite the fact that photos live forever.

Get a wig. Initially, this seemed like a great idea. Can you imagine putting on your hair like a bra? It would be that easy! Then I actually tried a few on at the malls wig store and instantly transformed myself into an aged prostitute. Not to mention, those wigs are itchy. I thought about seeking out a higher-end wig, but the idea of finding someone elses hair in my food every time I cooked made me want to hurl on the spot.

Become a hat person. I tried to think of women I knew who wore hats or artfully tied scarves regularly, and the vision wasnt promising, being that their faces were typically covered in new biopsy Band-Aids every week, and most of them rode the bus for free with their senior passes. So, no. It also turns out that I have an enormous head, which explains some of my mothers feelings toward me. She most likely still has several stitches in place from October 1965.