So here we are, more than a week since my last post! This is going to be harder than I thought! I knew that I was busy, but I guess I didn’t realize how busy. For those of you who may be newcomers to the saga that is my life I will recap.
My oldest son, Raider, will be 18 in July and is out in the big blue world on his own now, so he doesn’t have a lot to do with the current chaos in my life, other than the fact that I don’t hear from him nearly as much as I would like… Ahhhhh…. Such are the ways of teenagers! Occasionally I lament the days that I was one... just to be able to have no real responsibility of my own and to have that sense of certainty that no matter what, I was always right.
Of course, if I am to be fair here I guess I would have to say that, being a woman, I am! ;0)
My next oldest is an eleven year old who seems to have some sort of soccer function at least every other day. He is one of those kids who is pretty damn good at just about everything he does. He’s on the Principal’s Honor Roll, is a star member of his soccer team, (Who are currently kicking butt in the playoffs… they won their last playoff game 9 to zip!), he is always either the captain of any of the teams that the neighborhood kids put together, or the first draft. I’ve always been told that kids like this require a lot of stimulation to keep them from being bored but, seriously, his inexhaustible boredom usually reduces him to a “huh-un… uh-huh” argument with one of my toddlers. The only loser being, of course, MOM, as they are capable of doing this all day without missing a beat.. Don’t even get me started on the who’s touching who game! UGH! I figured that by this age he would have grown out of that kind of thing, but I guess there are some things that kids just never grow out of… especially boys! Too bad it’s always the annoying things they keep around for eternity while the cute little things they do are the first things to get kicked to the curb… DAMN THAT ADOLESCENCE!
I also have two toddlers that have no idea what it means to sit still for more than two minutes. The older of the two, DJ, seems to think that the younger of the two, Drake, is nothing short of his lackey. If I tell DJ to do something, he delegates that task to Drake. Generally this would be considered an admiral leadership trait; however, when DJ Calls Drake into the bathroom as he is busy doing his business or “going doo-doo”, as it is commonly referred to in our house, curiosity gets the better of me and I quickly follow to investigate. Thank heavens I did because DJ, my ever-clever, responsibility shirking three year old was explaining to Drake, my pudgy, eager-to-please two year old that he needed him to, “Wipe my butt just a little”. Seriously?! At what point did delegating authority equate to royal privileges?!
*DJ in a haughty, goody-two-shoes voice*, “I say there good chap… do us a favor and wipe our royal tushy… That’s a good fellow now… run along!”
The youngest plays his “I’m a cute little fat kid that nobody can resist” card far too often with far too much success! I have to admit, I am the biggest sucker when it comes to those dark puppy dog eyes framed by long irresistible eyelashes and plump little cheeks. One smile or bat of those eyelashes and he knows that I’m all his! Woe betide the fair maiden who plans to ensnare this chubby little charmer, for it will be she, not he, who finds herself entranced! He has it down to a science! When he wants something that DJ has, he plays his “I a big boy too” card. When he’s trying to sneak up to nestle himself in mommy and daddy’s bed so he doesn’t have to go to his, or to convince us of his dire need for his beloved binky, he flashes those big brown eyes up at us and declares, “I da baby mommy!” I have definitely created a monster with this one, but since he’s the only one of any of my four boys who will sit and snuggle with me and still has little fat cheeks, on both ends of his body, to pinch I guess he is a monster with benefits! LOL!
My husband, Dave, is more of a child than all of my children put together, except on the days that he pulls an “Al Bundy” and lazes in his recliner with one hand resting in the waistband of his underwear, drinking his Jim Beam and Coke and grumping at everyone like he’s 80-damn-years-old. At what point did my husband who is younger than I in years become older than I in body and mind, (please don’t mistake mind for mentality. We are talking cantankerous, not clever!) I think the worst thing we could have done was buy that 35’ RV that we have and make plans to retire to it in 3 years, give or take. I think he is doing his best to settle into that lifestyle now so that he won’t endure so much culture shock when he does retire! I’m lucky if the man isn’t asleep in his recliner by 9:00pm!
To be fair, he does get on the ground with the boys almost every night like clockwork and wrestle and play with them until they are bouncing off the walls and ceiling. Too bad it is usually about 30 minutes before I want to put them to bed that this happens. I guess I should be happy that my husband is happy hanging out with his family, if that means stocking up on Ensure and Depends for him and benedryl for the kids then I guess that is a sacrifice I am willing to make. ;0)
The rest of my family consists of two very large, but otherwise, very different rescue animals that we adopted. The first is an overweight beagle that feels that she will wither away unless she is allowed to eat and drink constantly… never mind that she KNOWS that she's on a diet! In her eyes, that’s all the more reason to be a pain in the ass!
She and I also have conflicting ideas on what the requisite number of bathroom breaks for a canine should be and how long each afore mentioned breaks should last. She contends that every two minutes I should accompany her to the great outdoors where she should be allowed to frolic, snuffle, and poke around for a minimum of 20 minutes before deciding whether or not she will grace my lawn with the privilege of her bodily waste. If she deems the area of choice as less than worthy it is expected that I should return her to her palace and avail myself to her the next time she needs to go out… which is, inevitably, 2 minutes later.
I, on the other hand, believe that I should have to take her outside a maximum of 6 times a day, at which time she should take no longer than 5 minutes for a simple urine job or 10 if feces is required.
The reality is that I take her out when she scratches at the door. I allow her a few minutes to find a suitable spot to do her business and, about 60% of the time I give her a good 10-15 minutes to “figure it out” before I impatiently drag her rotund, usually wet, carcass back in the house. Two minutes later she scratches at the door again and I repeat the cycle before I wise up, bring her back in the house, and put her in her kennel until she is serious about needing to go outside.
Finally, I have one fat lazy feline that does nothing but sleep all day… that is, up until the point that a freshly tanned client comes downstairs, then he feels the need to rub his white, corpulent, constantly shedding mass on their freshly spray tanned leg. This is something that I am still quite amazed by because the only time that he comes around me is when I am wearing black, at which point, I am his best friend and he insists on letting me know by attempting to transfer every last fluffy white hair he owns from his body to my outfit. I am quite certain that this is premeditated every time that he sees me wearing a dark color. I suspect that his hearing handicap has heightened his other senses and that his color perception borders that of the most incredible human… a talent that he reserves for the most cunning of purposes… to sabotage my keen sense of cleanliness, all the while making me sound like a lunatic for accusing a simple house cat of plotting against me! Yeah… you know what you’re doing Jay Jay! ; an up-and-coming, demanding new business AND an insatiable appetite of my own to go, see and do EVERYTHING while in Okinawa this time around...
Dysfunctional though we may be, we are happy and I would never trade it for a Ward Cleaver kind of family. Although our dysfunctionalism is somewhat symbiotic in nature, it works for us and I wouldn't change a thing! One thing about it, life is never dull, although I had no idea that it would be so difficult to chronicle some of our more interesting capers on a day to day… or even every other day, basis! UGH! I suppose I shall just have to play catch up and hope that nothing interesting happens between now and the time that I am able to bring you current on the goings on of the Okinawa Mulder Clan.
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