Torturing your kids

The week before Christmas is the best time to torture your kids. How you ask...oh you probably already know...don't you do it too? Put beautifully wrapped boxes under your merrily, twinkling tree and then tell them...Don't touch. This is fun! So the mischievous cherubs poke, prod, shake, rattle, stroke, guess until they are shimmying around in frustration. Ooohh it's a parent's smorgasbord of delight. I can't imagine another situation where you can legally torture your children and they make it a national holiday. Then we get to blame all our gleeful manipulation on a fictitious fat man...where do they think these things up?

Blogging prep

I love to blog. It's a great opportunity for me to rattle on to myself and practice writing. I know that's a skill that is sadly lacking in myself ever since I've left college. I have grand dreams of writing a book, so maybe...maybe...I will.

But I now have a routine to blogging that amuses me...First, I must think of an idea of what to say...this could take a minute or at times weeks. I realize it doesn't have to be earth shattering or even interesting...just write. But alas, I am wracked with the idea that I NEED a topic...silly me.

Second, I open my blog page and read all the blogs I have missed. Okay, this does take a while. For that I have to thank Chris...she is a writing fiend. The women can whip them out and they are funny or at time thought provoking. She is my idol! The more I look around, the more blogs that I like, so the time gets a bit longer until I do write. Of course it might be a way for me to stall...nah, that's just silly....

Third, I write. Hell, then re-write...then fix, add, check spelling. Ugh, this is hard. Okay...just do it. The voices in head are being annoying now, chanting in unison..."JUST DO IT!". So off I go...wait, I guess this is me writing... YEAH!

Now I know I am old

I have discovered that I am old. How you ask??? Well, I got out of bed to pee at some god-awful hour in morning (should have been my first clue) and hobbled to the bathroom. Oh my God!! I hobbled like my Grandmother. It now takes me a minute or so to work out the kinks in my ankles, so I hobble. Ugh! Granted I tweaked them playing indoor soccer, but now I look and feel like an old person. Gee what's next...peeing when I sneeze? Oh wait, I do that already...down hill for sure.

Oh, what a smell.

Ever since my last pregnancy, I have not lost my super power for smelling. At times this has been very useful, like when I try to pinpoint a Partylite scent of candle. Other times, it is down right annoying. I can smell, as my loving husband likes to say, a gnats fart at a hundred yards. This has become especially annoying lately since for some reason unbeknownst to me my cats are peeing in my house. Ugh! Overlooking the obvious disgusting element of waste elimination of it's own unsanitary issue, the smell is making me nuts.


Okay, so picture this, me on my hands and knees sniffing madly around the carpet, up the walls, around the furniture looking for the "wet spot". I know that I must find it, it stinks, and if I don't they will pee there again. Cats LOVE going to the last known scene and working their magic, again and again and... Of course my dog thinks this is a game and is licking me and sniffing with me during my exploration. I have 5 cats and that raises the stench potential exponentially, I can almost see the vapors rising as I speak...uummm now where is it!

Low and behold, I find it. So I scurry to pour a gallon of vinegar on the spot...ooohhh...the smell level changes. I abhor the smell of vinegar, makes me nauseous. So as I sway over the offending spot, I scrub the spreading noxious cleaner into the carpet, praying that it will penetrate into the pad below and neutralize the "newest spot". I rise, a bit unsteadily in my sickness, to determine how long a gallon of liquid takes to dry in carpet. So I wait anxiously, then I can spread baking soda on the area, praying I will not make paste or dissolve the pad below. Finally it's dry enough and I scatter white powder all over the carpet, encompassing a bigger area than needed. Gee whiz, more must be better, right? Then I rush to the bathroom to fetch the hydrogen peroxide...oooohhhh...the chemists are loving this part. I truly enjoyed junior high science and this is no different. I watch the bubbles and scrub fiercely...ummm..I wonder if I should have worn gloves..

So, this has continued for about a month, I can't seem to keep up with the little buggers, but I am finally covering all spots. Then we leave for the Thanksgiving holiday, yep you guess it. I come home to a smell that made me retch and a visual Van Gogh of urine and feces on my kitchen floor. Me, the mother of 5 kids who has seen vomit in all colors and lumpy consistencies, who has seen more shit than a sewer worker, is almost spewing at the mess.

My only excuse for my behavior after this was because I was tired. We arrived in late and I had been driving in bad weather and I was still stressed. But, I guess, most of all, I was FED UP!!! If my husband had his gun out, I think I would have shot the offending balls of fur! I ran to the laundry room and grabbed what was sure to be one of the worst mistake I have made in my life. The bleach. Yep, you guess it again, cat's urine is ammonia and did I think about that? Hell no. I just wanted the smell gone. Well, it left alright. As soon as I splashed the floor liberally with the fluid I saw my idiocy. I watched the bubbling yellow puddle in fascination while my brain clicked on what was going to be obvious real soon.

Oh shit! My eyes began to burn and water madly and my nose became more raw with each breath I inhaled. I thrust open the kitchen windows as wide as I could and ran to the bathroom to flip on the fan, screamed at Dave to open the back door. He was staring at me, paused at the entry to kitchen with an expression that clearly said "What the F***!" I hurried to open as many doors and windows as I could, then grabbed the crappiest towels I could find to mop up the chemical disaster I had created. Yelling at Kelly to take the kids to the back bedroom away from the fumes that were making me ill, I quickly sopped up what I could. I couldn't cover my face, my nose, because all I could smell was bleach no matter what I did. My eyes just weeped in fury.

Finally I took the dripping, sodden bleach towels to the washing machine...how much damage could I do there? If the towels made it, great, if not, oh well. I think the smell finally went away, I wasn't sure until the next morning when my body repaired the damage I had done to it.

"So Jo Jo, what did you learn?" Shoot the cats next time!

Filters

I am very fascinated by filters. The filters that we use to communicate with other people, the filters we use to take in information, the filters we use to process what we receive from our senses. What always astounds me is that I don't think I have met very many people who have all filters working.

My husband has a broken filter. We joke about it often and it's a standing joking reference with his friends. He doesn't "filter" out what's appropriate to say to someone...the switch just doesn't work. Oh, you know things like..."why would I want to go to dinner with you" comment when I asked him on a date or maybe, "I like your boobs hanging down like that". At times this can and is amusing...others...let's just say, the pillow when he is sleeping looks very inviting.

My Mother also suffers from the same affliction my husband does. The last comment, "Wow, you've really gotten big", was said to my NEWLY pregnant cousin. And yep, she is on the heavy side and would not be showing for a couple months, at least. God love her, because she was very confused when I told her that it wasn't really a very nice comment, even when well intentioned.

The people who have a broken intake filter are harder to spot. I have one such friend that will take days to process and then suddenly crap on your head because of a comment or action you did a few days ago. I've learned to expect this from her, so it's not so alarming as it once was. The severity usually coincides with her emotional state, so I tend now to pay attention. The bonus is that I can offer a comment or opinion, she will appear like she hasn't receive it, but I get a change of behavior later.

That last one is truly subjective to me. Since everyone processes differently it's always a hoot to find out what everyone experienced or how they "perceived" it. It's like looking at a Rubik cube, changing sides and potential for confusion or solutions.