The words keep repeating in an endless loop, over and over and over in my brain. I get tingles all over my flesh whenever my tired brain tries to concentrate again. I'm exhausted. Mentally exhausted.

This all started on Sunday - no Saturday - but in any case I didn't know there was anything wrong until Sunday. When I realized I'd misplaced the car keys. Holy Crap with a capital C! This happen to anyone? 'Course it has. But you look and look all over the place and even though you end up frazzled and twitchy (Mexicans do, anyway), you usually find your prize within a few hours at most. 'Cause the unwritten rule to lost crap is: "If you don't find it within the first hour, chances are you ain't gonna find it at all." It's been two days for me. Two. Days. Those babies are long gone by now, for sure. Thing is, in theory, they have to be somewhere in the house. Not outside, 'cause I remember walking in with them and shit, and I don't remember them going back out. But then the Dud states in her testimony that she never saw me walk in with the keys. But even then, my backyard ain't that big. Well, not to me, anyway, not once I got used having a backyard at all. So now my keys are gone. Inside or outside, I don't know. In any case, my entire family's looked in both. Yes, even Pifas has gotten involved, and he doesn't even live here. He lets this slide off his shoulders, though, and I can't tell how he does it. Always so carefee, thinks money will solve any and all of it.

Back to my previous statement: it all started on Saturday. I got up, procrastinated some, went outside, got Mu�e, gave her chihuahua ass a flea bath, dried her up, took her and Angel to the vet. No, my nephew doesn't need rabies shots... yet. He just went with me to accompany me in dropping off Mu�e. I have her on a Wellness Plan at Banfield Animal Hospital. It's a type of "health insurance" of sorts for pets. It allows free drop-offs. So I dropped her off for a few hours, then Angel helped me pick out a new leather collar for her. He chose a black one with spikes on it. Surprise, surprise. Anyway, we drove home, and by the time I pulled in, kid was out cold. Oh, on the way I stopped for chicken, 'cause 'Ama and the Dud were too lazy to cook the full meal. They had made the rice, mashed potatoes and green bean casserole, though, so I figured that since I didn't help with any of that, I could cough up some dough for the main course. So flame-grilled chicken it was! And Angel fell asleep.

09:56 --> Well, I was interrupted by 'Ama, who came to dump off Angel on me. Who, in turn, was wiggly as hell, so I showed him pictures of him and his parents I have stored up on the computer. He liked them, and wiggled some more on my lap, tried to sabotage my computer keyboard, and then peed. It seeped through his diaper ('cause he wiggled so much) and therefore some ended up on my pant leg. Wonderful. I go to change the kid's diaper, and then we play around some, and then he tries to soak one of my sister's cats to death with a spray pump, then grabbs the nail clipper and tries to hunt down said cat to clip its nails. Poor Kiro. I don't know how he can be so patient with Angel. But I digress. I'm back at my computer desk again now.

So where was I? Oh yeah, Angel fell asleep. I get home, eat, and end up honking off myself. I woke up just in time to rush off for Mu�e at the vet's. As I'm driving home with my dog, my cell rings. It's 'Apa, and he wants to know if he can meet me at so-and-so and if I want a raspa from the raspa stand that's there. It's hot outside, and of course I say yes. Long story short: I meet him at the raspa stand, take a mango raspa for 'Ama and a tamarindo one for me, he takes Mu�e in the van and follows me home. I pull into the driveway, get the two raspas down and... poof. I don't remember what happened to the keys at that point. I turn off the car, grab the two raspas... but do I take the keys? Of course I do. The thing I don't remember is... I'm almost... wait. I took my cell phone and dropped it in... no, that was before. (Bear with me, I'm brainstorming here.) Mu�e's medication was in a paper bag. 'Apa had Mu�eca on a leash. He got to the door first. I had... the bag? Had to have it. Did I? Hm. I... took both raspas. One in each hand. Did I clip the keys to my pants by my chain wallet like I usually do? Somehow, with my hands full, I don't think I did. But I could've. If I clipped my phone to my pants I probably did clip the keys as well. It's just that I do these things so subconciously that I don't even realize I'm doing them. In any case, I had to have... wait. I took the raspas out of the car, set them on the trunk while I stooped back in to get Mu�e's stuff from the passenger seat. There's still mango raspa stains on the trunk of the car, all sticky and sweet. So... I had Mu�e's bag. If I had put the keys in there they should've been in there too. And I was reading in the car, I remember that now. I was reading (or trying to read) the vet's diagnosis on Mu�e's neck (she was developing a rash where her nylon collar rubbed against her skin). At the red lights, I was trying to skim over as much as possible. So when I got home, the papers weren't in the bag. I crammed them back in there, then took the bag. Were the keys included in there? But they're not there now, I've looked already. And the phone? Where was the phone? I have a feeling that wherever the phone was, the keys were. And I put the phone on the table. So the keys had to have gone on the table, but we've already cleaned the table and almost the entire dining room besides. So where the fuck are my keys?!

We went inside, 'Apa first, and 'Ama and the Dud were sitting at the table, waiting for us. Angel ran to 'Apa. Little critter was already awake again. 'Apa had Mu�e. I set the raspas and the bag down on the table and took Mu�eca from my dad to go tie her up outside. I came back in and sat at the table while 'Apa had Angel on his lap and fed him raspa. Everyone talked while I finally got a chance to read over Dr. Garcia-Camacho's diagnosis. He wrote that my dog "needs improvement." Great. Just like all the other aspects of my life. She weighed less than last time I took her, too. Other than that, she's fine, though. So the keys, the keys, the keys... I honestly don't remember anything about the keys. 'Apa and the Dud were talking and laughing at the table about some dirty jokes, and then the Dud suggested we all go see the DVD with the dirty jokes and we all go up and went to her room. I walked in there last, still musing over the vet papers. We watched for a while, then 'Apa went home. I walked him out to his van. No, not all the way to his van. Just to the back door. Did I still have the keys then? He left and that was that. It was almost 24 hours later that we noticed the keys were missing. The Dud wanted to go to Wal-Mart and we couldn't go because we had no car keys. And by then it was too late. Shit.