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blanket. And a pillow. The tent is a fully stocked sex tent.
    The kids show no interest in the tent after that first day. They don’t even go inside it during the day. It’s ours, all ours. Weeks go by and the tent stands strong.
    At one point, our elderly next-door neighbor asks:

    Which I think is really her way of saying, “Are you ever going to take that ugly tent down?”
    But we pay no attention. Nothing is going to get in the way of our freedom and newfound sexual liberation. That tent will stay up forever.
    Until one morning:

    It is gone! It completely disappeared. The only thing remaining is a brown patch of dead grass. I’m shocked and confused and angry. Someone stole our sex tent? Who stole our sex tent? Why would someone steal it?
    As I step outside to look for clues, the wind whips my hair and clothes.
    Then I see it, across my neighbor’s yard, ties flicking in the wind and all lopsided.

    The heavy winds last night must have managed to fling it up over the fence. Then it tumbled across my neighbor’s yard, where it snagged itself on a mulberry tree.
    To make it even more embarrassing, I notice that the half-used bottle of massage oil is lying on my neighbor’s grass. And a pillow. We left the tent’s door unzipped! All of the sex tent contents spilled out and are now on display on her lawn!
    I perform the walk of shame as I walk across my neighbor’s yard and collect our things and chuck them over the fence back onto our yard.

    Then I work as quickly as I can, trying to disentangle the poor, shredded tent from the tree and the surrounding bushes. It is a large tent and the poles are still in the sleeves, so I have to stand there and dismantle the entire thing. It is taking an excruciatingly long time and I’m frantic, hoping not to be seen.
    But my worst fear comes true. I hear the familiar creak of my neighbor’s door swinging open. She casually walks over to me and says something about the heavy winds last night. I’m mortified and apologize profusely about keeping the tent up for so long.
    To my complete shock, she tells me not to worry about it at all. Then, with a knowing wink:

    She has never been so right.

CHAPTER
HORMONES
& ANXIETY
    (OR MY POOR HUSBAND)
    All of the following stories happened while under the influence of female hormones.
    This is the part of the book where you’ll want to send Crappy Husband a bottle of vodka or a batch of cookies out of pity.
    I’m not always like this. Just every month.

PMS DETECTION
    Everything is going wrong. I’m a mess. My sky is falling. I have no idea why. What is happening? Why is everything so horrible?

    My life is ruined.

    He reminds me that I had a midlife crisis last month too. And the month before that.
    Women vary in terms of how they respond to the mention of PMS. Some get angry and throw things. Some cry. Some implode. Some morph into fire-breathing dragons and eat people.

    But I’ve always reacted with complete relief. I actually thank him if he reminds me. Huge sigh of relief. I’m not going insane! My life isn’t actually ruined! I’ll be totally fine!
    Until next month when I forget and it happens all over again.
    JUST DON’T TALK TO ME
    There is one time when nobody should ever talk to me. Never, ever. When I’m getting ready.
    Not just ready for a normal day, but getting ready for something special. A dinner or a party or some other fancy function.
    I’m just not myself. I’m an angry, self-conscious version of myself, a rabid hyena. Not particularly pleasant to share a confined space with.
    I’ll stand in front of my closet and try things on and then take them off and then try things on and then take those off and then put the original thing back on, but with a variation. It is a very complicated process of elimination that always results in me selecting the same exact outfit I wear to every fancy function.
    This ritual is sacred. It is a personal form of self-flagellation that I must endure.
    Nobody can intervene or