This is sure to incite further irritability

Tomorrow morning before dawn my dad will be driving to the airport in the next town over to catch a flight to Dallas for his first week of training for his new job. Since my brother is still in Oklahoma driving the family's second car (on a donut tire, because he's in college and is So Busy He Can't Go Buy A New One), my parents have to figure out The Car Situation.

I know, you see a solution immediately don't you? Sharon will get up and drive Kevin to the airport.

Congratulations! You've just come up with a completely useless plan you problem solver you, because since finding out that she'd be home alone for four days, my mom has developed what I believe the Victorians referred to as Female Hysteria.

Let's pause for a lesson in 19th century medicine, shall we? Wikipedia defines Female Hysteria as

a once-common medical diagnosis, made exclusively in women, which is today no longer recognized by modern medical authorities as a medical disorder. Its diagnosis and treatment were routine for many hundreds of years in Western Europe. Hysteria was widely discussed in the medical literature of the Victorian era. Women considered to be suffering from it exhibited a wide array of symptoms including faintness, nervousness, insomnia, fluid retention, heaviness in abdomen, muscle spasm, shortness of breath, irritability, loss of appetite for food or sex [editor's note: gross, I'm not going to speculate], and "a tendency to cause trouble."

Seeing as my mom is displaying all these symptoms, I think Gray's Anatomy might want to consider a rewrite.

My mom is nervous driving in new places. I can't fault her for that, mostly because I've committed to writing my shortcomings in that area. But let me just say that these are the very specific directions to the airport: Get on I40 East; take exit 210; turn left on NC 68; arrive at small regional airport. In other words, EASY PEASEY.

Yet Mom can't be convinced. We've come up with an elaborate plot involving car switches, timed meetings and a buddy system. Whether or not my dad gets to the airport is an irrelevancy at this point.

When the government finds out about this plan (as they inevitably will), I'm certain to be recruited to the CIA. Because if by tomorrow afternoon everyone is where they're supposed to be, I'll have successfully negotiated a mission worthy of confounding even the most seasoned of spies.