Sunday, March 23, 2014

Maybe I Could Find a Non-Murderous Sitter On Craigslist

Genius is home for Spring Break. The problem is...nobody else has Spring Break this week. That means I have to babysit him. Not so much babysit him as in keep him from drinking bleach under the sink. He didn't even do that as a toddler. We didn't childproof for him. The biggest problem was preventing him from climbing up the refrigerator shelves to grab his bottle (yeah, he was a late weaner), and from removing the labels off 250 video tapes before stacking them to build a city. We did not succeed.

Now, as then, he's night owl. Unlike then, he now takes a nap. He got home yesterday, chatted a bit, then lay down on the short couch for a snooze. A three-hour snooze. The only thing that woke him was his phone. Then he took off to soothe a friend in a crisis until 2:00 a.m. He's a good friend like that. A good boarder, not so much.

On Friday, his original plan for this weekend was to go to the city Saturday, spend the night at the home of a college buddy, and then return to our open arms and open Frig. Plans changed. Seems the others making that trip decided to go to Atlanta instead, to run a marathon. Those wacky kids and their spur-of-the-moment travel plans. Genius said he had originally joined the pact for Atlanta last fall, but since he didn't have time to train for a marathon, he couldn't see forking over $500 for a trip to Atlanta to stand on the sidelines (thank you, Even Steven!) and watch.

Maybe I should be careful what I thank Even Steven for. This afternoon, I gave Genius the debit card to buy us some phones. The house phones are in a sorry state, what with my office landline having a cracked antenna, besides being as big as a shoebox like Jerry's cordless in season one of Seinfeld. The one out by my basement recliner has a rattle. The one I use upstairs has static. The wall phone in the master bathroom rings no more. And the kitchen wall phone only gets a dial tone if you jiggle the wire just right. Don't even suggest that we simply carry our cell phones from room to room. We barely get reception in the living room. Forget putting any walls or floors in between that satellite signal. So...we are $100 poorer, but now have four new phones. The wall phones will have to wait until Genius finds the right units.

He's going to a movie tonight. Tomorrow he's on his own. And the rest of the week, too, because we all work, and I have parent conferences two nights this week.

I suppose I'll see him in passing. He keeps vampire hours, you know.

9 comments:

  1. I can only imagine how busy your household is, but one day when all your kids are launched and gone you'll think back on these busy moments and miss them.

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  2. I agree with Stephen. One day, they won't even come home for Spring Break anymore, and you'll miss them.

    But until then...

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  3. If mine threatened to come home I'd move and not leave a forwarding address.

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  4. You do know that a friend in 'crisis' is another term for PARTYYYYYYYYYY!

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  5. Stephen,
    Wait! My kids are leaving? Who will make their sandwiches?

    *****
    Sioux,
    Okay, I might as well go put my head in the oven...except that I might break that new element I waited four months for.

    *****
    joeh,
    You must have a new oven element, too.

    *****
    Linda,
    NO! They're not even spelled alike! Actually, I think this was a real crisis, or else that pair went to elaborate lengths, asking if the Crisis Friend could spend the night here.

    No way. I'm not going to be that family who takes in a spoiled kid and then puts out $13,000 in lawyer fees so the kid can sue those parents for support.

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  6. I am a night owl as is my son. My daughter loves mornings. (She is weird that way.) And any night owl loves a 3 hour afternoon nap!

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  7. Birdie,
    I'm a night owl, but 20 good minutes can do it for me. I mean 20 GOOD minutes. Like, with a lake-size puddle of drool, and an REM stage with a weird dream.

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  8. Yes, you will miss them. I miss mine and I love to see them come .... and after a week I love to see them go!

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  9. Kathy,
    I'm to that GOING point right now. My internet connection has gone all wonky. The computer Genius says he did nothing to it. However...he does admit to connecting and using it. Funny how it worked for months, yet the very day he's been on it, everything goes to not-heaven in a soon-to-be-manufactured handbasket.

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