16 May, 2015

A Day In The Life

16 May 2015
772

R. Linda:

Yesterday morning was my day off. I was going to sleep in when at 6 a.m. I hear "You son of a bitch get out of here now or I swear I will do something drastic!" Of course, I dreamt that in me sleep or so I thought and then I heard, "Oh yeah and I'll call the police and what will YOU do?"

I opened one eye and the room was grey from the dawn light, Tonya was fast asleep and the dog was curled by my side of the bed looking up at me as if to say, yeah I heard that too.

"You try it Bozo you just try it and see what happens."

No, I was really hearing shouting and as I looked at the clock another outburst rang out and the dog growled as if saying she didn't want to be disturbed either. I finally realised it was me neighbours five acres away. The air was still, me window on that side of the house was open and I was hearing them argue. It stopped eventually with a door slamming and tyres grinding at top speed down the driveway. By that time I was not getting back to sleep so I got up, made breakfast, coffee, and cleaned up until the house was up.

I decided (being wide awake) to help get the kiddos off to school and I tell ya it was a trial. I know mornings are hectic with two of us trying to get ready to go to work and the three kiddos getting ready to go off to school and daycare. I told Tonya that I would take kiddo duty so she could enjoy a cup of fresh Joe and not have to gulp it down. Famous last words.

I had one spazo on me hands, that be baby who had developed an alter-ego we call Georgie. The reason he is called Georgie is because I had a cousin Georgie who was the image of the cute blond, blue-eyed babe but underneath all that "cute" was a demon of a child. His middle name was Trouble it was. He couldn't keep out of that muck no matter how much his parents threatened him with all sorts of diabolical punishments. He was the first of our family to run away from home. Yes, and he did it with typical Georgie panache, at the tender age of 10 he hopped a railroad car and made his way from Wicklow to Dublin! Yes, he did.

Well, it doesn't take much imagination or thought to know when young George was returned to his rightful abode, he was in the doggie house big time. He was grounded until the age of 60 his ma said and his da immediately enrolled young George in a boarding school to be taught what being on one's own really means when one is the "new kid" and friendless. It did not take long for young George to turn it all around and find a way to steal his peer's homework, thus achieving academic stardom the easy way. Not only that he had a system of blackmailing the younger students into handing over any and all goodies sent to them by their caring families, and turning around and selling the said goods to the older students who coveted what they did not have. I tell ya.

When George was graduated with honours and released from the said boarding school, he turned a page and became a farmer! Oh yes, he did, forget the academic promise he bought a used tractor and some acres that came along with a run-down farmhouse and there he was, Farmer George.  His parents were not proud.

I lost track of cousin Georgie, but he amazingly reappeared as he possessed me youngest son. We would have head banging on the floor to which one thought the child in a fit of temper would suffer concussion. The worst of the head banging (in which he propelled his arched upper body hard backwards into the back of the hardwood highchair he was sitting in) was the sound of his head's whack on the hardwood. This often as not happened when our youngest was in a fit of temper. Why and how he knew to do this distressing action I have notta clue. Neither of his brothers ever attempted to whack their heads on anything hard (and this was done dozens of times in succession on his part), therefore, I don't know where he learned it unless there was someone in daycare who exhibited same.

So it turned out Georgie was out in force spazing on me, head banging on the pine floorboards screaming at the top of his lungs. This, after I went up to his crib to get him, to find he had stripped himself of his onesie AND his nappy, and was bouncing around the crib throwing everything he could out of it. I somehow waded through a sea of stuffed animals and got him in a clean nappy and jeans, before he kicked me in the mouth and I put him down for a minute to get a Kleenex. He took the opportunity to go crawling backwards down the stairs at a hundred miles an hour shirtless. When I caught up to him he was not letting me get the shirt over his head for the head banging on the floor. My Mam told me to ignore him which is pretty hard to do when you are in fear the child will cause himself brain damage. The dragon lady, me mother-in-law was all for picking him up and hugging and kissing him as if that behaviour never happened. I saw it as a reward to keep doing that kind of thing and told them both their suggestions weren't within me realm of possibility, so I continued to fight to get that shirt over his head as he screamed at the top of his bloody lungs.

Finally, I got our Georgie in his chair where he continued to head-bang until I got his oatmeal in front of him. He was quiet for a minute as he picked up his plastic baby spoon, and then looked at me with slits for eyes while still watching me watch him, he let the spoon scoop up a large spoonful of the porridge and then he flung it in my direction. Before I could wipe the stuff off, he had thrown the spoon on the floor, picked up the plastic bowl (yes, we know not to give him breakable anything) and threw the bowl and contents on the floor where the dog was happy to clean up on aisle five.

I left his care to Mam while I told my middle child to go and brush his teeth and comb his hair and when I saw the older one I took pause. His shirt was buttoned wrong and for an 8-year-old I was rather stunned. I told him the problem, "One side is longer than the other," but he couldn't see there was a problem and for a good 3 minutes, we went back and forth. Finally, I unbuttoned his shirt and re-buttoned it correctly. No sooner had I done THAT than I turned around to see the middle child with hair dripping.

"What did you do?" I asked him.

"I wet my hair in da sink and combed it." He said smugly.

"It is dripping down your face, your chin, your shirt, the floor," I pointed out.

"Iz okay." Said he and off he went leaving me a puddle to clean up.

What kind of kids do I have? One spaz, one can't button his shirt to save his life, and one who thinks putting his hair under the sink and combing it without towelling is acceptable.

Off they all went to school, the two older ones walked to the end of the driveway and the little one me Mam offered to drop off if Dragon Lady would do the breakfast cleanup. She agreed which meant she'd rearrange the kitchen and we would never find anything ever again.

I left holding my head to sit down and veg by meself in the living room. I hadn't sat down for more than a minute before I heard SLURP SLURP SLURP and I realised after a moment it was the dog drinking water, but then I realised the dog dish was in the kitchen, not the hallway. El Stupido was drinking out of the toilet bowl when one of the kiddos left the seat up. We put the seat down expressly because of that. I was so grossed out to find the dog had drunk the toilet dry! Now beside meself, I took meself outside to the back deck where I had left a grill I had bought to put together.

Have you priced grills? They start at a whopping $500 and go up into the thousands. And they last a total of one year. I wasn't about to invest in something that expensive that would last me one season. So I went to Ocean State Job Lots for the first time. It is an inexpensive Walmart as I see it. Right as I walked into this mecca of Chinese goods the first thing in my sight line was the grills. I bought this one:

Looks good now!

There I stood looking down at the box. No tools were necessary, everything needed to construct the grill was in the box. OK, I decided no time like now so I got the box opened and found pieces that didn't look like a grill but okay it said piece A gets attached to pieces B and C. Sounded simple enough. I found the key wrench and the plastic knobs and the wheels and well . . . it looked easy. Guess what? It wasn't. Nothing lined up! I was very frustrated after five minutes so after thirty you can imagine how I was. Dragon, meanwhile, had watched this show of mine from the kitchen window and was snickering (I could hear her). After another twenty minutes of me cursing for real and kicking things, I heard a car door open and close and this oriental man was smiling at me as he came up the deck stairs.

"I hear you need hep wi grill." He said putting out a hand and introducing himself.

It seemed Dragon had befriended him at the only Chinese Restaurant in my area. His name was Chang and he was very nice and very much ready to pitch in.

"I can't get this lined up," I said showing him the problem.

"Oh no Chinnie grill line up straight," he laughed, "you see Chinnie letter writing? It not straight either."

"O K," I didn't know if I should join in the humour or be more humble.

"Here let me do." He took the parts from me and started getting them together as if they were aligned which they were not.

"There, see you jus fass it." He smiled. "That how you line up paahts."

"I see," I said, but not really seeing at all. But he forced the parts to align and while I struggled to hold them steady he used the wrench to tighten them up.

"Now you have Chinnie shiny grill!" Broad smile at me as we both stood back to admire the completed grill.

"Thank you," I said truly humble and feeling like a complete idiot. I didn't feel that for long because Dragon came out when all was said and done and made me feel like a TOTAL idiot.

"He isn't mechanically inclined," she pointed at me as she regaled Chang with horror stories of Mr. Fixit Not. I left them to go in and brew us coffee, all the while wondering if I should have made tea instead. But all I had was Bewleys no Oolong. But then I realised after working with Ms. Jaio that I didn't want to insult him if he was from another tea province. She drank Houkui tea because she was brought up on it. She be from Huang Shan where that particular tea is made. It was no big deal to Mr. Chang, he was good with coffee and a scone with jam. I worry needlessly sometimes about being politically correct and notice Mr. Chang wasn't very politically correct, he was having fun at my expense making fun of Chinese products.

The gist of this grill business is that I reckon it would cost me $500+ for a grill I'd get one season or maybe two. This way me paying $120 I get probably two seasons at not even half the cost. I won't have to send for parts or any of the $500+ parts needed, instead, I'll just go buy another one at $120.00!

Gabe
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8 comments:

mobit22 said...

Roflmao actually been there done that.LOL including the tantrum throwing. It went on for months until one day I got on the floor and threw one next to my son. He looked at me horrified. That was the last of the head banging. None of the other methods had worked.

Gabriel O'Sullivan said...

I should try that.

Fionnula said...

i hope he outgrows the georgie attitude -- weasil didn't

Gabriel O'Sullivan said...

Me too! Well . . . Weasil . . .

Dew said...

I feel sorry for you as parents with the head banging as it's worrying. I had a head banger myself but he grew out of it. The only thing I could do really was remove him to a place where he wouldn't hurt himself and then try to ignore the behaviour which is easier said than done. He grew out of it and am sure your wee Georgie will too! As to the barbecue LOL I feel your pain. I recently purchased a new one as mine was shot ( cheaper one too) and experienced exactly the same issues with the alignment. Took four hours to assemble Gees!

Dew said...

Lol

Gabriel O'Sullivan said...

Had I known, I'd have sent you Mr. Chang's number.

Dew said...

For sure. He could have helped me bang it in where it didn't fit! Oi!