Monthly Archives: March 2008

Pandora’s Drawer

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When it comes to dealing with my children’s growing stockpile of cacophonous debris, my best strategy has been to covertly stow it all away in a location both out of reach and out of sight. The top secret location being a small, inconspicuous drawer in the old computer armoire. They’d set it down, I’d covertly slip it into the drawer. And, up until two weeks ago it was a perfect system.

What happened two weeks ago? Stella found the drawer.

Out of nowhere I hear the following words: “Mom!Mom!Mom! Look what I found. I LOVE these things! Mom! Look! Isn’t this great?!?!”

Entering the living room, I see her standing on Porter’s rocking horse, peering into the drawer.

Yes. Great, Stella.

What exactly did she find? The inventory included 2 recorders, a card that plays The Monster Mash every time you open it, a card that plays DA-DE-DA-DA-DA-DOH-DOH-DA-DE-DA-DOH-DOH-DOOOOOOOHHHHHH in a high pitched chipmunk voice every time you open it, a bag of balloons, 4 super balls and a bunch of those little sticky hand things that Stella always gets stuck in her hair and Porter always tries to eat.

As you might expect, it ALL came out; the sticky, the noisy, the annoying. It took me the better part of a week, but I managed to redistribute all of the items to a new location of safe keeping. A location that will never be revealed to the likes of you, those who would otherwise betray me. Those who think it’s cute, and harmless, and indulgent. THOSE WHO THOUGHT IT CLEVER TO GIVE THEM THAT STUFF IN THE FIRST PLACE.

The only downside is that my newest covert hiding place is not large enough to hide the two new dancing, singing stuffed animals that were received for Easter. The dancing singing stuffed animals that have been allowed to go to school with Stella every day this week in hopes that they would be forgotten, lost, broken, confiscated or dismantled. And yet, as a clear indicator of how I am now being punished for the nasty deeds of my adolescence, they have come home in perfect singing and dancing condition each and every day.

If you hide it, they will come.

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So, Easter turned out to be your usual affair. Eggs. Chocolate. Chocolate eggs. And, the sad realization that not one, but both of my children would sell their souls to the devil for a single Hershey’s kiss. You’ll notice as you flip through the Easter morning pics that both of my children have a faint brown line encircling their mouths. Then you will look more closely and realize that it is not even light outside yet. By 11:30 Porter was already sleeping off his high fructose corn syrup bender and Stella was on her third round of easter egg hunting – insisting that she hide them, then we hide them, then she hide them again. Then she dropped the basket and all of them broke and we were finally given a reprieve – not to mention enough hard boiled eggs to eat egg salad for the next 2 weeks.

We ended up the day in Trinidad with friends, more eggs and some amazingly temperate weather.

All in all, Porter’s only real interest in Easter involved the consumption of candy. You’ll notice that he kept himself a safe distance from all egg dying activities, and when it came to the egg hunt, he stopped after the first egg he found – choosing to sit down and harvest and eat all the chocolate within.

When I picked him up from school today the teacher who leads circle time said that she asked all the kids if they got to gather easter eggs yesterday. My son’s response? He stood up and yelled CHAWWWWW-CUT!

Bolton + Trumpet + 90’s Hits = Yeah, Baby

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In keeping with this week’s theme of STEVE, I give you this picture. It surfaced when we were unpacking our volumes and volumes of books, and I have been trying to come up with a post ever since. Then I said to myself, “Self, this photo needs no context. It stands on it’s 90’s-hits-trumpet-sheet-music own.”

sheet music

Groundhog Day

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So instead of getting a phone call from Steve on Friday morning telling me how awesome it was to no longer have two gigantic tampons shoved up his nose, I instead got a call telling me that he was scheduled to be back in pre-op at noon. Dwuh?

Turns out that although the packing came out of one side fine, when the doctor went to remove the other side Steve experienced the OH MY HOLY JEEBUS I’M GONNA DIE kind of pain. Thusly, the doctor did some investigating. I know what you are all thinking – no, there weren’t any keys or loose change in there. He did, however, find a giant hematoma bulging over the tops of the splints. About the time the doctor started asking if he had eaten yet, it became clear what this meant. Surgery. Again. Today. Non-negotiable.

Considering the surgery was scheduled for 1:00, I spent the next hour lining up my Plan B Team. [Thank you Judi and Andrea for everything.] Once the kids were addressed, we headed down for round two.

Although the first round of recovery was not exactly comfortable, the second can definitely be filed under G, as in Grounds for Divorce. They packed everything tighter to eliminate any additional bleeding, plus going under general anesthetic twice in 4 days is, well, its pretty crappy. Not to mention the disappointment of having to start recovery all over again.

He goes in first thing Monday to have the packing removed. Again. Hopefully with no references to Jeebus this time.

steve