Buy It Now

I took Chandler for his late afternoon walk yesterday. We stopped and had a little chat with Diane and her dog Olivia, then Chandler stopped again for some rolling around on Carolina's front lawn. All in all, we were gone for about a half an hour. When we got back home I took off my shoes, sat back in the big fluffy chair and watched some television. Some while later I noticed that the sun was low on the horizon and there was no aroma of my dinner being prepared. So I popped my head into the kitchen to find out what was up. No Mark. I looked into the bedroom. No Mark. So I picked up the phone and called him. In the background I could hear voices and mall music. Mark had escaped while I was walking the dog.
    "Where are you?"
    "I'm at Jo-Ann Fabrics with my friend."
    "But it's dinner time."
    "Look in the refrigerator and eat some leftovers."

This is nothing new. Mark has been haunting the malls since he was a child and figured out how to steer a car towards the light. What is bothering me the last few weeks is his activity on the internet. Lately packages have been arriving at the house. Large flat boxes, large square boxes, small boxes, every kind of box, with return addresses from around the country. Mark has discovered Ebay. I don't know how much he spends on it, or what exactly he is buying. Some of it is hard to hide, like the dolls, but whatever he is buying I hope it is just as easy to resell on Ebay when he goes broke. Of course the up side of these online shopping sprees is that it keeps him closer to the kitchen, where he belongs.