Tuesday, May 09, 2006

The great guinea pig escape of 2006

this morning I had to take 20 minutes out of my life to find the guinea pig. Geoff decided to put him on the livingroom floor so he could run around a little bit. Then, he left the room to go get a tissue.

I asked him (well, more like YELLED at him) what he was thinking. He said "I left Jackie in charge of him."

Yeah. The dog isn't a guinea pig watch dog. And how would he stop the guinea pig, or alert us that there is a problem?

Sometimes, that boy don't think past his belly, I tell you what.

A guinea pig is like a prison convict waiting for opportunity. The guard is down, the jig is up, the chase begins. Weeks of planning all lead up to that one moment when eyes and expectations are different.

Dude took off and ended up hiding under the couch.

We have a sectional, and I was afraid of moving one of the pieces and having him run under another... and I was afraid of moving a piece and crushing him to death. I was also afraid that he was eating candy wrappers and dust bunnies... both of which seem to end up between, beneath, behind the sections of this couch.

Parents -- here's a free tip for you... never buy a sectional. Your kids will tuck candy wrappers between the sections rather than walk them to the trash. And you will yell at them for years. And they will STILL do it.

I hate this couch, and want to get rid of it. But that's a rant for another day.

Luckily, I figured out a way to trap him and Doug pulled up on the recliner section. I was able to get him out in front of the couch and stopped him with the side of my giant foot, thus preventing him from tearing under the next sectional piece.

The Gordon Show ended early today. I have not had enough coffee to do this.

Geoff is upset that I'm not going to let him get his own guinea pig now. He is on the couch crying now. "I let the pig get away and now I'll never get my own.. Curses! Curse the way I do things and my irresponsibility!" (yes, that is exactly what he is saying. I'm typing as he's crying. It's funny and sad at the same time).

I had promised him once we got to the next house and got settled that we'd get him his own pet, because he's done such a good job of taking care of Gordon. He plays with him much more than Jess does. He feeds him, he sings to him. The pig likes him... and I think this one incident won't ruin that for him. I'll let him suffer for a little while, and then go talk to him.


While we are on the topic of Geoff...

On Thursday of last week he got into a spot of trouble at school. Lately, Geoff has been swearing a lot. The boys like to get him started, and then they go tell on him. Which is fantastic. This happens when they are playing at cub scouts, or on the playground at recess. They'll come up to me and say "Geoff just said H-E-Double Hockey Sticks!"

Yeah. Like you never say hell, you little angel. You probably said "Hey Geoff, say HELL!"

So anyway, Thursday he gets caught saying the F word. Yes, the Queen Mother of all Swear Words. F dash dash dash. His special ed aide catches him and takes him to the assistant principal, with whom Geoff has a very good relationship and a nice bond.

She says to the AP, "We seem to be swearing a lot lately on the playground."

Geoff says "WHO IS THIS WE?!?!" and with the WE he puts giant quotation marks up around his head and bends his fingers. "WE (does the quotation marks thing again) are not swearing. You didn't swear on the play ground. I am the on swearing on the playground! You didn't do ANYTHING."

Gotta love Mister Literal.

So he got a talking to and a day's recess suspension. He said to the AP "I have an addiction. A bad habit. And it's hard to break a habit, you know."

So my son has admitted his addiction to swearing. Intervention and rehab start now.

I told him that he can 'beep' himself the way that they do on TV when people swear. He can say "What the 'beeeeeep!'" and I won't get mad. He can't spell it (he spells Damn as "D A M M!" which cracks me up). He can beep or he can say nothing.

We'll see if this works.


So the guy who is buying our house (neighbor cousin) is coming by today to start painting and doing rehab work in the upstairs apartment.

His crew is rained out at work, and he figured in order to get it rentable by June 1 he'd want to do the paint and paper and stuff all before then. We gave him permission, and he's going to come up today and tomorrow. I'm meeting him to give him the keys today.

The reality of everything has swooped down on me this week. I feel like my head is going to explode. We move in just a couple of weeks. And it seems that I'm the only one really taking the packing seriously.

I had my first bad dream about the move (I will have many more, rest assured) the other day.

There I am -- knee deep in toys and kitchen items, boxes of food, books, and all kinds of detritus... wading through the house calling out for anyone to come help me pack. I'm calling out for boxes. Anyone! Where's Doug! And I look out the window and he's by the fire pit. He has a garbage truck -- a huge yellow garbage truck -- parked beside him. And he is shoveling out garbage and putting it on the burn pile. I'm all like "That isn't our trash! Why is he spending time doing THAT!?! I need him in here! Packing Stuff!" and I start pounding on the window, yelling and calling him in the house. But he plods along slowly, pulling out a scoop of garbage, and dumping it on the fire.

It is a very telling dream.

Anyway -- We'll be alright. I figure this weekend I will really put the heat on and start yelling at people. We have a list of things that MUST BE DONE! and papers from a lawyer, and all kinds of things to take care of.

Hopefully no more guinea pig incidents will get in the way.

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