That's it. Enough.

I've reached my limit.

A few people close to me have been waiting for this minute, watching the Erin Cracks Up poll to see whose guess came closest to winning the jackpot. Well, whoever bet "Wednesday, Sept. 27 at 7:36 p.m. CST" would be the winner.

Congratulations.

My breaking point? Here's how it went down (my low point of 2006):

"No, I will NOT go downstairs and put the clothes in the dryer," I said to myself. Yeah, to myself ("She's NUTS"). "No. I refuse. They will lay right here next to the door, because I am not going down to the dark, cobweb-infested, musty-smelling, 'probably no worse than any other basement in America but I am exhausted and overwhelmed by the thought of going down there and having to watch for mice and bugs or, God forbid, more boxes that need unpacked' basement."

But they're my BEDsheets. I have to go down there, I reasoned. I have to wash them, or else sleep on a bare mattress.

So there you have it, folks. The perfect recipe for a meltdown. Need versus exhaustion and a tendency for the overdramatic, mixed with a house filled with boxes and probably mice.

Instead of just picking up the dang sheets, I left them lay there, and I stared at them for a good five minutes, kind of zoning out at the same time, thinking "I can't move anything else. I cannot even lift these 1-pound sheets. There's only so much a woman can take in a couple weeks."

Sigh. There were expletives uttered and maybe a tear or something while a violin played in the background (yeah, I want some cheese with my whine, go on, say it) and there was a close-up of the tear rolling down my cheek, and it was all very teen movie. I was just waiting for the John Cusak character to show up with the boom box. Then I snapped out of it, and walked away.

After the initial "I've just lost my mind" feeling I got when I was staring at the bedsheets on the floor, I felt better. Not because they're clean. But geez. That was five minutes I wasn't deciding what would fill the shelf in the living room, or how I was going to carry that heavy box upstairs.

I'm OK with sleeping on blankets tonight. No amount of logic or "stop it"-ness will convince me that my doom is not waiting in the basement for me tonight.

And by doom, I mean "that stack of messy boxes that NEED TO BE STRAIGHTENED UP RIGHT NOW." I just can't let a perfectly good box remain unpacked. I want the box gone. Now.

OK -- I'm going to go stare into space now, thinking about how I WANT to go to work because at least there, I don't have to unpack anything. Whew.