And other things they didn't cover in the manual

Recently, Owen has been doing this thing where he gets upset because we're not giving him something he wants, or not doing something he wants us too, or not peeling his grapes and carrying him around on a feather pillow. So he's upset and he'll start to cry and then he'll start to be all,

"Mah Eye! Mah Eye! Mah Eye huwrts!"

And I'm taken aback. Because where did that come from? And do I believe it? I feel like the minute I was breathing a sigh of relief that my kids were old enough to tell me in words that they are in pain, they also became manipulative enough to FALSELY claim they are in pain when I dared to thwart their will in some way.

But if I believe that his eye hurts when he cries, what do you suppose that's about?

You don't think it has anything to do with the fact that he likes to stroke his eyeball with his dirty stanky homma blanket that he also likes to put up his nose and in his ear, do you?

Fierce cheesy snacks

Chris and I got home from from an evening out to find Owen with his head in the lap of our babysitter, Cake. (I mean, some people might call her Kate, but that's not really as catchy, is it?)

My youngest son's expression was one of man who has seen too much.

"I think he had a bad dream," Cake tells us.

"Dere were Cheetos on my wight," Owen pipes in, sniffling. "Dey fewl on me and bited my skin off."

Jesus Christ those were vicious, vicious, cheese puffs.

I'm like 99% sure he meant that there were cheetahs on his light, which, while not making a whole like more sense, at least doesn't make me want to burst out laughing in the face of my obviously traumatized son.

Parenting. It's a delicate line we walk. Between scarring the children by using them strictly for entertainment value and squeezing every last bit of enjoyment out of the little buggers.

Why is blue?

Yesterday, somewhere between "Are squids nice?" and "How do you make pets?" Sam asked, "Mom, can we take a second and talk about violence?"

Um. No?

"The worstest thing you can do in the entire world is shot somebody."

Not going to argue with that.

Because it would be weird to list things worster than that to a five-year-old.

"When Merton Looter King got shotted, one good thing is that the man who shotted him went to jail."

I mean, I guess if you're looking for a silver lining there.

"If you shot people, it is so bad you have to go to jail and live there. So you should never play with a gun and point it at people."

Word.

"Why are there no superheros?"

It was a Very Special Conversation Sam had with me there.

Today he asked, "Is that a penis?"

Instead of being embarrassed like a normal parent I was all, "BOOYAH!! Yes it IS a penis! What NOW, Question Boy?"

Ms. Manners

Okay. So here's the thing. Sharing an office isn't as great as having my own, but it's really not that bad either.

Except . . .

What am I supposed to do when I have gas?

Mind you, it doesn't happen to me a lot. But it does, occasionally, happen.

And I'm nervous about how to handle it.

Before, it didn't really matter. But now I've got five other people at my mercy.

And vice versa!

Which is another question.

What do you do when someone else has gas? Does that ever happen? Is there cubicle etiquette I should be aware of? Do we warn each other? Is that what it means when someone has to go "check the fax machine?"

Any other office-sharing landmines (so to speak) I should be aware of?

Is is okay to eat tuna fish for lunch?

Talk about Lilly's poops with Chris during lunchtime phone call?

Eat candy if I don' have enough to share?

Last week: Thoughts, Observations, Lesson's Learned

1) Good lord. Lilly just poked me in the nose so hard that she may have broken her finger.

2) I understand the dying-in-the-cold scene in Jack London's novels a little better now. It would, apparently, be quite cold.

3) I'm going to go ahead and file "anal fistulas" under T, for Things I've Accidentally Read About that I Now Actively Hope Not to Experience.

4) While researching for a lecture on bullying in schools I found out that "teasing overweight girls" is on the list of things you shouldn't Google search because it's not going to return what you think it's going to return.

It's like I live in a wildlife preserve

I was sitting in bed yesterday when, from, TWO INCHES AWAY,

Peep.

Peep-peep-chirp.

Furiouisflappingfuriousflapping

Like, RIGHT BEHIND MY FRICKING HEAD.

I was leaning against the wall which is actually the fireplace wall that we have put our bed in front of. Because fireplaces are actually less useful than walls 'round here.

There was a BIRD trapped in our chimney.

It was upset.

Which made me upset.

But I couldn't exactly imagine pulling our king-sized bed away from the wall and opening the fireplace so it could fly out, frantic and soot-covered, into my bedroom.

But the alternative to that was listening to it die a slow and painful death in there.

Which might be hard to sleep through?

Fortunately, I came up with a third alternative:

Go to Target and forget about the bird.

It actually worked quite well. By the time I went to bed last night, the bird had either escaped or died. But I'm going to go with escaped.

It seems likely that the bat (you all may have heard about The Bat) came from the same place.

We should probably go ahead and get that chimney capped.

It's nice to know I'm not just grumpy

Yesterday as I was driving Sam and Owen to the grocery store, Sam started in with his usual,

"What is a bruise?" and "How do we laugh?" and "What does it mean to jump?"

Owen piped up and asked, "What is a cookie?"

And I just laughed. Because his tone of voice was so . . . familiar. It was clear he was imitating his brother. Which means that I'm not crazy. That Sam is asking an absurd number of questions recently. Even Owen is noticing.

Also, I know what a cookie is.

Then Owen asked, "What is a jumrip?"

"A what-now?"

"A jumrip. What is a jumrip?"

Okay, now you're just making stuff up.