You know that something has gone wonky when you are blissfully enjoying a shower and hear the Dad yell upstairs, "The Captain's tricycle is going to good will!" Ah shit. Nothing can destroy a perfectly good Saturday quite like a proclamation that involves good will, sales to gypsies, something about underprivileged kids in Africa, or anything involving eBay. All made the worse by the fact that you have that terrible reminder that your Dad's words are falling out of your mouth. Intersperse with that the sound of wailing and screaming and the visual effect of your kid lying on the porch with his head in dirty crushed leaves and a somewhat ailing Mediocre Mama trying to hold everyone together in the background. Boom, now that's a weekend.
I tried to intervene and had him and the Dad calm for a good 10 minutes, only to have it explode in my face when the Kid threw a plate of slice up grilled cheese sandwich so that it landed butter side down on the table. Fortunately we put him down for a nap, a parent's ctrl-alt-delete button for kids, and upon waking up he was a new kid and has been all weekend.
I never understood why parents went all crazy when their kids had off from school. But holy underwear, with the Captain hold up at the babysitter's place all week and some less than forthcoming information about how he did from the sitter, I think I'm coming to appreciate the dilemma. He gets so messed up when school is off on holiday and the Dread Pirate Captain Kid seems to come out in full force. So much so that I'm pretty ready to sign on board with all these school advocates who want year-round schooling, having absolutely nothing to do with the quality of the Captain's education. In my book, "no child left behind" means putting safeguards in place (like a regular school day environment year-round) so that I'm not tempted to leave my child behind somewhere when he's being awful. Is it just me?
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7 comments:
More importantly, what kind of grilled cheese sandwich comes with only one butter-side? Where I come from, a falling grilled cheese sandwich can only avoid landing butter-side down if it falls and remains on edge, and if it has sufficient rigidity to support its own weight in that position, then it wasn't sufficiently buttery and juicy or had been left out too long and was already dried out and beyond repair.
As far as the education thing is concerned, I would just prefer boarding school to year-round school.
bobby b: My thoughts exactly on the grilled cheese. One butter-side?
Bobby -
It was the plate that landed butterside down if you read it again. I.e., the side that had the food on it. For visual effect he didn't merely throw it across the table and have it land neatly together, the entire thing flipped over.
MM
That's ok, they are back in school now. At least you can console yourself with the thought that the Kid is not yet old enough to reason. After I spent an hour planning a fun afternoon for my graceless brat, he declared he'd rather sit in his father's office and play with the computer than spend time with me. Sure, there was no thrown food or screaming, but I wanted to.
Okay, I'm glad to hear that you're not single-sided grilled-cheese butterers.
I saw some pictures of the ill-fated tricycle on your other site. You should add some sort of In Memoriam caption. Also, DD is looking a little more svelte than he did back in Espana. Are those vintage 80s shorty-shorts he's wearing, or can you still buy pants as short as those some where these days (outside of the Ladies Wear dept)?
Have there been any problems similar to those you had at Christmas explaining to the Captain why you don't celebrate Easter like the other kids by looking for colored eggs hidden by a gigantic bunny rabbit? Emma enjoys the practice so much that she wants to do both the hiding and the finding, and her short attention span makes it actually possible.
Sorry to be all over the place.
Bobby -
Funny, the Captain hadn't a clue about Easter and truly could have cared less. We took advantage of some fine weather on Sunday to set up his basketball hoop (a Hanukkah present) and then he was just happy to help me with some gardening. The neighbors were outside searching for eggs and the Kid was totally oblivious (what the hell did that easter bunny fuck to get that egg anyway?).
--MM
PS - agree on all points on the shorts.
I'm still wondering what is going on with the babysitter. Perhaps you could buy spy gear on Craig's list and hide it in his overall's pocket. Or just do what I did (more times than I'd admit too) sneak around the house peeking in windows, and press your ear to the doors and windows, listening. I've seen this trick too.. Deviant Dad has some reason he can't go anywhere and could he just wait in the kitchen with his laptop for an hour or two.
- Melissa H
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