9 AM

So, this morning was like any other morning right up until it wasn't anymore.

Up at 5:30. Normal. Trouble getting Maya to stay awake to eat her cereal. Normal. Go to check on Maya to see if she's dressed, only to find that she's gone back to bed. You got it. Normal.

Things didn't get weird until about 8:30 this morning, when I needed a bottle of wine  in a big hurry.

On the way to school, I saw a Facebook alert that my friend Sam's birthday is today, which led me to shout, "Crap," for about the fifth time that morning. I'd been really proud of myself for remembering to pick up a nice bottle of wine for another colleague's birthday,  but didn't realize that Sam, who is also a colleague on the same team had her birthday as well. Confused? YEAH! ME TOO!

To make it worse, Sam is a smart cookie who knows the difference between a bottle of bottom shelf crap we bummed from someone's emergency stash (which probably doesn't exist because it's a school), and wine that is worthy of gifting.

Luckily, colleague number three, Troy, assured me that, Jumbo, our nearest big supermarket, opens at 8AM every morning. I have a free period at that time, so problem solved, right? HAH!

Let me preface this by saying that what I'm about to write is not a slam against Chile. Every metropolitan area, from downtown to the burbs, has a certain time every morning when everyone who could potentially piss me off, cut me off, or just generally not get the fuck out of my way, feels compelled to get in their cars, vans, and busses, and hunt me down. Stray dogs feel compelled to lie down in the road in front of my car. People cross the street slowly in front of me, intently focused on texting, kind of like the Walking Dead, but with wifi. Seriously, the five minute drive down the hill to the grocery store couldn't have been more challenging if zombies had formed a line in front of my Hyundai and thrown puppies at my windshield while I tried to bat them away with the windshield wipers.

Okay, so I get to the store, fly through the place, find a bottle of wine from a winery I know and love, which isn't exactly challenging here. Interpret that as you will.

I get the register, where the clerk rings up my peripheral birthday-related purchases. When she gets to the wine, it makes the register shriek, and I honestly don't understand why. Neither does she, until she reads whatever her monitor says. She looks at her watch and says, "You can't buy alcohol until 9AM." (By the way, this conversation is in Spanish, for all of you who thought maybe I lapsed into some alternate, English-speaking Chile.)

Still confused, I offered, "But it's a gift."

She smiled and shrugged her shoulders, "It won't ring up until 9."

I peeked at her watch. It was 8:34.

"So," I asked, "does that mean it would be bad for me to start drinking at 8:34 in the morning?"

She grinned, "Yes, I think that would be bad."

"But in 26 minutes, it will be fine?"

And then she delivered the best line of the morning. "You could come back then." I'm not sure she was trying to be funny, but it cracked me up.

So, just to be clear, our lesson for today is as follows.

Drinking at 8:30AM? Bad.
Drinking at 9:00AM? Good.

Happy Birthday, Sam. I did manage to go back for your wine. I'll bring it in the morning, but paws off until 9. Got it?