It’s Monday and I have been around people of the male gender almost constantly for nine days straight.  Someone please help de-testosterone my body by sending estrogen, perhaps a little Premarin. Though I would prefer bio-identical hormones over pregnant horse piss, beggars can’t be choosers.

I swear to God, if there is one thing about men that could make me turn lesbian it’s the length of time they spend in the bathroom.

As a result of such non-stop exposure to skid marks, ball-scratching and burping, my brain is somewhat mushy. It’s difficult for me to form coherent much less witty thoughts.

However, I did hear on the radio the other day that consumer inflation has remained steady over the past 25 years, if you exclude food and energy prices.

So for those of us who do not need to eat and live in a cave lit by pine torches and still get from tribe meeting to tribe meeting via a horse, we are doing great!

Don’t you love good news?!

Now for a bit of bad news. Girl Scout cookies are out, if you didn’t know already. Personally I’m bombarded with requests to buy them every where I go but perhaps you have escaped the stalkers. Lucky you.

What I find perplexing is how excited people get when the cookies come out. Have these people tasted the cookies? They aren’t good. I know because I guilted myself into buying a box of Samoas from a friend’s daughter and ate the entire box. I kept eating one after another, waiting for that moment of gastronomic bliss, for the flavor to explode in my mouth, because surely this is what gets people excited about these cookies?

It never happened. Unless you count the taste of cheap chocolate as gastronomic bliss, which I don’t.

I wonder, the next time I’m asked to buy cookies from a Troop sitting outside of Wal-Mart’s doors, can I be completely honest and tell them I don’t want to buy the cookies because they taste like crap?

Next year when I’m asked by friends to buy cookies from their daughters, can I tell them I don’t want to because they taste like crap?

How do you escape the Girl Scout Cookie trap?!?

I think the reason people get excited about Girl Scout cookies is because they can’t escape the trap and in order to preserve their ego, they convince themselves they want the cookies.

I’m determined to escape the trap next year. If only I knew how…

I’ve only had my Le Creuset two days and already I am a wiser and more accomplished cook.

And this is where I was going to write about one of those awesome numerical posts, detailing exactly what I’ve learned about Le Creuset in just two days. But screw that shit, I have a national emergency here.

I HAVE LOST MY WEDDING RING.

My large-and-pretty-we-could-never-afford-to-replace-it-now-that-we-have-children-and-a-mortgage wedding ring.

Is 9 am too early for a glass of Mad Housewife merlot?

I can’t even remember when I took them off. I vaguely remember taking them off last night to put on lotion, placing my rings on the kitchen counter, FAR AWAY from the kitchen sink. But the memory is so fuzzy. And it’s winter, so I’ve taken my rings off a hundred times for lotion, am I even remembering the right day?

I also vaguely remember a clinking sound while in the kitchen last night, like something falling. I think? Where was I? I’m not even sure! The kitchen? (Boy, this convinces me to stop cooking with wine!) I can remember looking down at the floor, wondering what that was, but not seeing anything that caught my eye. WAS THAT MY RING? OMFG!?

So I spent about 30 minutes in utter terror that my rings went down the kitchen drain. Then I got smart, grabbed another one of my rings and tried to make it go down the kitchen drain. The drain holes are too small. Or it really pays to have meaty fingers, whichever, I don’t care. What a relief that my rings couldn’t have gone down the drain.

And just then, I started to thank God for that miracle, but now I’m wondering if I should be mad at God. Is this punishment for me bragging about my Le Creuset steal and using it as proof God loves me?

Right now I’m convinced God wants to keep me humble and Le Creuset was actually a gift from the devil.

I’ve ransacked my room in search of my rings. I pulled out the couch cushions and dug through the cracks, finding enough whale cracker crumbs to cover snack time in Parker’s class. But no ring.

I went through my pants and jacket pockets of the clothes I wore yesterday, and even the clothes I thought about wearing but can’t because I gained four pounds over Christmas. As if my rings would magically insert themselves into the pocket of my skinny jeans. This is desperation setting in.

I looked under my buffet table in the kitchen. Under the cabinets, behind the boys’ backpack stations. I’m about to get out the screwdriver and look under the dishwasher and then brave the army of dust bunnies under the fridge and look there.

I even got out my son’s metal detector (yay for smart, nerdy kids!) but the thing beeps at every damn thing.

I suppose I also need to dig through the kitchen trash, in case my rings got swept up in a mountain of school papers as they went into the trash. Damn kids and their fucking education, always screwing shit up!

Is it expecting too much for Wally to rush home from work to help me find my wedding rings? I can’t believe I have to deal with this travesty alone because he has a job. What the hell?

Fuck, I can’t take this anymore. I would make promises to God that I will never ever ever put my rings anywhere again but in their proper place, even for lotion! But I’m mad at God right now.

Instead, I’m going to knock myself unconscious and spend the rest of the day in oblivion.

UPDATE!

I found my rings. You may now proceed with your own lives.

I found them in the strangest place, and you people will either think I’m really stupid, or really crazy. Or maybe you’ll believe me, and if so, that makes you my most favorite reader.

They were in the pocket of the jeans I’m wearing. But I SWEAR upon all that is holy, such as a bottle of Kettle One, I checked my pockets several times and they weren’t in there.

My boss called me after she read my post and got me to calm down, walked me through a meditation, and less than 5 minutes later the rings appeared in my pocket. I say ‘appeared’ because, I’m telling you, they were not in my pocket before that.

Weird, huh? Especially since I joked about my rings magically appearing in my skinny jeans and that’s exactly what they did. Except not in the skinny jeans, which is really thoughtful of my rings because it’ll be 4 weeks before I wear those again.

Now if I could just meditate a winning lottery ticket in my jeans pocket, that would be great.

I don’t know if you are aware of the most recent world crisis, but apparently there will be a shortage of Eggo waffles through the middle of 2010.

This really puts into perspective the insignificance of universal health care. Who gives a damn about that, what we really want to know is how world leaders will avert a famine-induced Eggo Apocalypse.

My guess is the government will take over Eggo production and we’ll be forced to appear before committees, testifying why we deserve to receive our weekly allotment of Eggo waffles instead of death.

Well, thank God you’re reading my blog, because this full-blooded American has a solution. Power to the people! and all that revolutionary, anti-government Beatles/John Lennon shit.

Today I will explain how to make your own waffles, again without pictures. But pay attention anyway, even without the picture pages! There is a lot of classified & highly intellectual stuff in here that Eggo wouldn’t want you to have, like the ability to pronounce all of the ingredients in your waffles.

First, plug in your waffle iron to begin heating, then crack two eggs into a bowl, preferably one with a pour spout.

Next, mix in…

1 3/4 C. milk
1/2 C. oil
2 C. flour
4 tsp baking powder
1 tbsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
dash of vanilla

Just dump it all in and then whip all of it together with a wire whisk until smooth.

What, that’s it?

Yes, for quite a while, Eggo had me thinking homemade waffles were more complicated too, but it’s an easy recipe.

Now! Pour desired amount of batter into the griddle. This part is a bit tricky. If you pour too much, the batter will ooze out the sides and back which makes me utter cuss words before 8 am, it’s a huge pain in the ass to clean up that kind of mess. So, pour less than you think you need to fill up the griddle sections and then spread the batter around to see if it fills in. If not, add a little bit more.

Close your griddle. Give it a couple of minutes, but once you see a good amount of steam coming from the iron, lift it up and check. My boys don’t like crispy waffles, so I take mine out when lightly browned. Adjust brownness for your tastes.

See? That wasn’t hard at all and I averted an apocalypse. You’re welcome.

In other world-stopping news, here are my children home from school, ELECTIVELY PLAYING WITH TOYS INSTEAD OF VIDEO GAMES. TOGETHER! WITHOUT FIGHTING! OMFG.

Also, stop the presses, here’s the laundry basket, devoid of dirty clothes. Because I’m all caught up with laundry.

This moment lasted all of 2 hours so it’s vitally important to record such historic moments for posterity, people. If we don’t, these memories can be lost to vodka tonics and tranquilizers. Don’t be like me and learn this the hard way. Look at my kitchen.

It was clean for a good 5.78 seconds, but stupid me, I didn’t grab the camera within that time and before I could turn around, it looked like that.

Don’t let history pass you by.

What is okay and what is not okay to share on a blog?

Like right now? I’m making my chocolate chip cookies. Should I share my secret, custom recipe, along with all the stirring and gadgetry tricks that has taken about 599 million different tries and approximately 650 pounds lost and gained in 5 pound increments to perfect?

Do I share that with you too, because the pumpkin fudge recipe post was actually fun for me. Though it wasn’t my recipe. The chocolate chip cookie recipe is my recipe, and what if I want to do something with it? Like sell it to…I don’t know, someone. Someone who will make me rich off of it. Or get a job at a bakery, all through the awesomeness that is my cookies, even though I’ve never worked at a bakery and have lazy objections to working on the weekend.

But if I’ve posted my recipe here, everyone has access to it so why would they need to buy my cookies or hire me for my cookies, I PUT IT IN GOOGLE CACHE!

Gesh, ego demands I have a plan. I a 35-year-old desperate housewife with both children in school and in an economy that is almost impossible to find a job – I NEED A LIFE PLAN! Even if it’s an imaginary plan.

But like Paula Deen and Rachel Ray became famous by keeping their recipes secret.

In other questions of over-sharing, over here we’re talking about energy beams up your vagina. Should you? Or no? It’s a personal decision, I suppose, whether to allow alien technology up your lady parts, but she did ask so don’t hesitate to chime in.

And did you read Neil’s advice on bl0w jobs? I mean, really. Get your questions in to us while you can before we become famous. Energy beams up vaginas and a man’s advice on giving blow jobs. It’s inevitable, people.

It’s such a special day. This is the first recipe post here on my blog. I’m convinced I could steal all of Pioneer Woman’s readers if only I weren’t lazy and had quality pictures. Or even a picture. But whatever, my readers use make-believe and we know that’s more powerful than knowledge.

Now there are some weirdos out there who don’t care for fudge, even though they have tasted mine. I’ve heard this odd behavior is a side effect of a botched lobotomy so don’t even try to understand them. Pity them instead

This recipe is not of my own but comes from Southern Living, also known as the Golden Compass of all Southern Cooks.

The directions come from me, but really, it’s like coming straight from God such is the magic when my hands meet sugar and butter and chocolate. I will tell you all my confectionary secrets pertaining to fudge. Except for one. It will cost you $19.95.

Pumpkin Fudge

(imagine pretty picture of fudge here)

Ingredients
3 C. sugar
¾ C. melted butter
2/3 C. evaporated milk
½ C. canned pumpkin
2 tbsp corn syrup
1 tsp pumpkin pie spice
12 oz. package of white chocolate chips
7 oz. jar marshmallow cream
1 C chopped pecans
1 tsp vanilla

First things first when making fudge – your pot. Oh my, this is important. This is my fudge pot…

…I don’t know the exact size, sorry. It’s the tallish one. You want it tall so your butter/sugar/milk has room to rise as it boils AND it’s deep enough to get a proper reading on your candy thermometer.

Second things first when making fudge – your candy thermometer. Get one.

Third things first when making fudge – your spoon. There is only one spoon I will use to make fudge and this is it:

It’s the best spoon in the world. Notice the partial metal handle? Stirring fudge is stiff business. All plastic spoons flex and bend as you stir in the chips & marshmallow cream and that’s annoying.

A wooden spoon probably works good too, though I do think spoons are like the wands from Harry Potter – the spoon chooses the confectionary wizard. My spoon chose me. Okay, it was really Wally’s spoon from college, but he chose me, so whatever.

Now onto the actual cooking.

(insert here professional-looking picture of all of my ingredients pre-measured in pretty bowls, such as Paula Deen’s bowls. Right now I don’t have these or any pretty bowls since #1 the economy sucks and #2 what the economy doesn’t suck out of me monetarily, my children do. School picture packages cost HOW MUCH?)

Melt enough butter to clog the arteries of 10 different people. This is where you melt butter.

In a microwave. That is clean. Please verbally appreciate the cleanliness of my microwave since no one in my home ever does.

Pour your sugar, melted butter, evaporated milk, pumpkin, corn syrup & pumpkin pie spice into your pot. Grab your spoon and gird up your loins in preparation of a lifetime of constant stirring.

Turn stove eye onto medium-high heat and stir your ingredients together.

Keep stirring. Do not stop. Do not pass go. Do not do pour a glass of wine, cooking fudge takes concentration!

Keep stirring. Constantly. Your life depends on it. Do not stop!

(insert here culinary picture of Heather stirring and stirring and stirring and stirring until she finally props herself up on the stove from fatigue.)

Once sugar mixture begins to boil, insert your candy thermometer (in the pot and not elsewhere, you nasty freak) and keep it in there, waiting for the temperature to reach 234 degrees. Keep stirring!

Now, some recipes will tell you to do that or simply boil the sugar mixture for 12 minutes. THIS 12 MINUTE THING IS A LIE. I’m convinced this lie is propagated by certain chain fudge companies so you will fail and keep buying their fudge.

So use the candy thermometer and keep stirring. Be strong!

(insert picture of Heather’s fingertips turning red from potential steam burns.)

Check your candy thermometer a thousand times. While it doesn’t take that long to go from 0 to 230 degrees, it will take three light years to go from 230 degrees to 234 degrees.

Once it reads 234 degrees, immediately remove pan from heat (don’t forget to turn off eye) and quickly stir in the white chocolate chips until melted. Then stir in the marshmallow cream.

You may want help at this stage. My arms tire by this point so I call in the husband. I have feminine arms and no matter what Jillian’s 30 Day Shred thinks, I will never be a she-man. I need a stirring partner.

Once the marshmallow cream is blended in completely, stir in vanilla and pecans. Pour into a greased (with cooking spray) 13×9 casserole dish. Now lick the spoon and pot. But don’t burn your tongue, idiot. That stuff was 234 degrees just a couple of minutes before.

Allow fudge to cool and set, preferably overnight. Cut and enjoy. And then thank me for all my wonderful insight.

If for some reason the recipe doesn’t work for you, please send in $19.95 and I will tell you what you did wrong.

It’s a 2-for-1 Friday. Neither of these ramblings call for their own post, but I love to hear myself think out loud, so it’s two mini-blog posts rolled into one.

As you know, we’re on this no artificial dye lifestyle. It’s one step closer to us becoming European since the UK bans six of these dyes, and, how interesting, they have lower rates of autism and ADHD than us. Hmm.

Next stop? France; where French women don’t get fat. I’m only 5 pounds away from my size 8s fitting perfectly. Funny how eliminating artificial dyes also eliminates a lot of crappy food you can buy and voilá! You lose 5 of your 10 pounds without even trying.

Of course, Wally and I haven’t eaten dyes in over a month either, but we both ate something with red dye once this week. Within a few hours we felt agitated, restless, and imagined there was something we should be stressed about, though we couldn’t think what.

I searched my mind for this hidden worry: is there some money issue I should be stressed about? School problem? Car repair bill? What is IT?! I must find the reason I’m stressed!

Then I realized I had red dye #40.

Obviously artificial dyes cause delusional stress, so let’s all do ourselves a favor and stop eating them, then watch a lot of people in the US come off their anti-anxiety meds. Look out for that pesky red dye #40 especially, but even the yellow dyes are nasty culprits too.

Of course, my personal Prozac goes by a different name: vodka martinis. And you know what? I’m not drinking as much of those either. Who needs them when there is no school drama 3 times a week, when I’m not getting phone calls from principals and constant requests for parent conferences? Not me.

_______________________________________________________

We’re trying to save up for a Disney World/Sea World vacation. Apparently I say ‘fuck’ too much on this blog to be sent on any of these mom blogger trips. But that’s fine. I’m not giving up the F bomb just to save $4000 dollars. I have principles, you know.

Unfortunately those principles also dictate I not sell off my firstborn in order to afford to go, which is pretty much what it takes if you want to stay on the park. My god. And let’s not talk about the emotional pain of actually planning the trip, what with the 100,000 different ways to do it? Maybe Orlando vacations have more to do with people taking Prozac than artificial dyes. It could be a draw.

So lately I’ve been looking for ways to save money to put aside for this trip. Hopefully before the boys are in high school. I decided the best way to do this might be by cutting back the grocery budget. This idea came to me after a local blogger was featured in our Sunday newspaper, on the front page no less.

I’ve visited a couple of these grocery bargain blogs. There are only as many of those as there are hotels in Orlando. But I picked a couple, including this local stay-at-home mom bargain blogger who claims, with a family of four, that she only spends $110 a month on groceries.

How do they spend this little and still provide adequate fresh fruits, vegetables, and protein every day? I don’t see how that’s possible.

I asked two of the bargain bloggers, politely, of course, since I do have principles. Neither has answer my email asking for clarification on the fruits, vegetables and meat purchases, and one of the bloggers won’t approve my comment out of moderation.

What the hell?

I say bullshit on these cutthroat budgets.

End note to this cheap grocery budget thing: I used those bargain blogs shopping tips to do my grocery shopping this weekend and I came to a realization. This is focusing ALL the wrong way. Instead of humping the newspaper boy’s leg for the next coupon insert in the paper so I can spend hours stacking coupons and comparing sales and driving to four different stores to save $20, I’m going to focus on being rich enough it doesn’t matter.

I’m not sure how or when this happened, but my daily beauty routine now includes plucking gray hairs from my temples.

(A financial tip for you in these tough economic times: Buy stock in Clairol. It’s about to go up.)

If there’s a silver lining to this depressive new step in my routine, it’s that I’m not plucking wiry black hairs from my chin. Yet. It could be worse. I could be my husband who no longer worries over gray hair but transparent hair instead.

On Monday, I was so excited because I purchased a new wrinkle defense system and could not WAIT for bedtime so I could wash my face and apply these miracle creams. The next morning I hopped right out of bed and inspected my face, especially around the eyes, hoping to see a miraculous reduction in those fine lines in just one night. I was disappointed. The fine lines are still there.

This is what my life has become, over-enthusiasm for wrinkle cream. That, and being surrounded by people who don’t appreciate awesome poetry. What the hell? Someone else got 175 comments on her poetry and it didn’t even rhyme, nor was it in the shape of a penis. If I were a mean(er) blogger, this is where I would say “fuck you too.” But thank god I’m not that kind of blogger.

I used to be a person, you know. A person of interest! I used to take pride in my intellectual abilities. Now my pride stems from knowing the best way to remove dead skin from my heels, my homemade cookies and my children. Not that I shouldn’t be proud of my children, but my god, really?

Where did I go?

Did you know I wanted to be a primatologist? I wanted to roam the jungles in Gombe with Jane Goodall and pick parasites out of each other’s hair, ooh and ahh over chimp poop and what its contents meant. I thought chimpanzees were the most fascinating beings on earth. I had this career revelation at the beginning of my junior year in college.

What happened?

I don’t know. Realizing it would mean transferring to an out of state college with a tuition rate over ten times higher than what I was paying, parents without the means to support it. At the naïve age of 21, it seemed insurmountable without both the financial and emotional support of my parents. And, gesh, I would be throwing away 2 years of college too. Two whole years! It seemed like a long time at 21.

It was just a silly dream, I told myself. Who am I to reach so far? I’m nobody, nothing special.

Did you know I played the piano once? I was a kid, about Payton’s age. And I loved it. But I quit because I was too shy to get up in front of people and perform at a recital.

I never wanted to play for anyone else. I didn’t care to show it off to other people. I simply wanted to play for myself. I still do. There are moments I’ll hear a certain tune played on a piano and I have a visceral reaction. My heart swells and my fingers ache to draw sound out of ivory keys again, even now, 25 years later. I want to do it again. Why don’t I? I don’t know.

Did you know I voice trained with an opera singer? Yeah, I did. I always wanted to learn how to sing, again not for anyone else but for myself. I swore I would do it before I turned 30. By god, I would have the balls to get in front of a stranger and show them how terrible I sang! Surprisingly, the embarrassment didn’t kill me. More surprisingly, my teacher survived it too. I was pretty good, actually. She said I had a natural ability and only needed training a bit.  But maybe they say that to all those with mediocre ability. That was six years ago. I’ve completely lost my range.

I thought for sure when my youngest child started kindergarten I would get back on my way of being Heather. I would pick right up where I left! Wherever that was.

Parker is in first grade now and here I still am, no closer to getting back to Heather than nine years ago when I started this mom gig.

I look in the mirror and see those gray hairs, those fine lines starting around my eyes, and I don’t even know who I see.

Who is that?

So guess what.

I’m pregnant.

Oh, haha. Of course I’m not pregnant, though I can’t get rid of baby fever completely. I had a dream where things were getting steamy with Wally and me, and in the heat of the moment he said he wanted to have another baby and I was like, great but you’re sterile, man. Wally said he knew that which is why one of his coworkers (a real sexy one, by the way) would help us out with that little hitch in the baby-making plans and I was like, hell yeah, we’ll totally pretend it’s your baby and not his!

Wow, anyway, weird baby fever dreams aside, I’m not pregnant. I just said that so my real announcement would seem anticlimactic.

The real thing I need to tell you is that I’m not cut out to be a drill sergeant parent. I considered trying for a Mother Superior parent instead, but I tried to give up sex, smoking and alcohol before and it was the worst 10 minutes of my life. But all the drill sergeant approach has gotten me is a better behaved kid and a horrible case of diarrhea.

So obviously a career as a drill sergeant is hazardous to my gastrointestinal health, but my kid is now behaving and I’m two pounds closer to my size 8 jeans. If this keeps up, people will beg me to write a how-to parenting book, I’ll fit into skinny jeans again, and there will be a bidding war between Charmin and Desitin over who gets me as their spokesperson.

Granted, it could have been the red dye thing and not that Payton was just being an asshole, which in turn makes me look like the giant asshole for blaming him and going drill sergeant on his ass. He’s been an awesome little boy, both here and at school, ever since the red dye got out of his system.

Or it could have been the drill sergeant approach.

Man, I just *love* this parenting gig! The good news is I have yet to do anything to royally fuck my kids up, but have done just enough so they’ll have something to hold against me when they’re older. Isn’t that the perfect balance we parents all strive for?

I had a couple of people point out – well duh, Heather, can’t Payton just take his own books to the library? Yes, yes he can. But he doesn’t want to. (Aww, I’m raising another masochist to take my place when I’m gone.)

Really, you people are offending his sense of justice. Payton doesn’t want to take his own books because he thinks the librarian is wrong and he wants to fight for the right to…no, not his right to party, but to read harder books.

I’m raising such a future hard-core motley crew leader for nerds. Welcome to my world of raising a stubborn child with a deep sense of justice.

So of course I’ll stand behind him in that noble right. Stand up for what you know is right! Civil Liberties Union, hear me roar!

Or I could teach him to pick his battles, and to hell with this one, just bring your own books. Dalai Lama, show the way to peace! Make love, not war, let’s listen to some Beatles.

Another parenting situation I can’t win for losing, which probably means I won’t screw it up too bad no matter which way we go. So I’ll just do what I know works – flying by the seat of my pants. Maybe it means drill sergeant, maybe Mother Superior, maybe the Dalai Lama. Who knows.

I am totally awesome at this mom gig, obviously. Now would be the perfect time to tell you I’ve thought of starting some kind of “parenting the quirky kid” series on my blog and writing on how I’ve found ways to make it work. Now that you see how I so clearly know what I’m doing, I know you’ll flood my email box with your burning how-to questions.

“Payton is a complex boy.

“Why does he have to make things so complex?!”

Complex, complex, complex.

I’ve been using that word a lot to describe Payton and this path of raising a child like him.

But is it true? Can I know it is absolutely true, Payton is complex?

Maybe Payton is the one who is simple. And the world is full of complex schizophrenics off their meds.

School is complex, perhaps more so now than before as our society becomes more schizophrenic, but I can’t know that is true either. So what do I know?

Complexity = confusion.

God, do I know it. My mind has been a rat in a wheel, spinning around and around with complex thoughts. It’s time to get off the wheel that goes no where.

What do I possibly have instead? A simple kid entering a complex environment of confusion.

Why would I expect that transition to go smoothly? Why do we expect him to go happily into this, to go without a fuss or fight?

Payton wants to read. His near photographic memory commits the information in his brain and he devours non-fiction books in his interests (which actually extends beyond marine biology) faster than I can supply them. And so he wants to read harder books. Of course he does. Why read books that offer you no new information or, in the case of fiction, new entertainment? Simple sense, right there.

It seems simple, doesn’t it? A child loves to read. Children need to grow their reading skills, an admirable and worthy goal of schooling. This child wants to read harder books, which will naturally grow his reading skills, thus reaching the school’s goal. Simple, simple, simple. It can’t get any more simple than that!

But no.

Said child can only read books in this section right here, only the section this computer test says you should read. We’re sorry there are no non-fiction books of interest, really, few non-fiction books period in our library. Yes, your mother offered to donate more non-fiction books to our shelves and we never got back to her. But you still must stay in this little section right here that this computer tests says you must stay in, regardless.

Who is making this complicated?

Payton wants to learn. He wants to learn new things, grow his knowledge, he wants to hurry up to college so he can teach other people about marine science. And save the planet. And all endangered animals. And trees. Basically, he wants to save us from ourselves. Learn, move on, learn, move on, learn, move on. This is all he wants. It sounds simple.

But no.

Payton, you must do this worksheet that you did in 2^nd grade. You must prove again and again and AGAIN mastery of this subject. You have to wait for the other kids to grasp it too. You can’t go forward. Wait, wait, wait. You may not act out in boredom and frustration. Wait patiently and quietly. Wait because no child will be left behind, though we’re well aware this also means no child gets ahead. Wait.

Who is making learning complicated?

Why does anyone expect a child like him to go quietly into mediocrity?

Note: This idea of complexity is confusion isn’t my own. Of course it isn’t because there are no new ideas, just like there are no new problems, as per Byron Katie. I read it in Byron Katie’s work. I think she’s one of the most insightful people into human behavior of our time and this entire post is me doing her “process” publicly on my blog. You moms out there like me, I can’t recommend her work enough to help you work through your mindset of your child and how he/she fits into the world.

It’s important you know the state of the union:

The Island of Shake Shake is at DEFCON 1.

This means war within the nuclear family is imminent and/or ongoing and vodka has been upgraded to bourbon, straight up.

Every person who lives on the Island of Shake Shake and lacks two X chromosomes is in a deep pile of shit. Even Parker, the malleable, agreeable, blue-eyed boy, is in trouble because of his school conduct report yesterday. (It was minor, however, CONSISTENCY!)

Wally, I can’t really get him in trouble. Gesh, we’re adults, after all. However, I will think of some way to convey the message I am beyond pissed at him too. As soon as I finish the exorcism I’m performing on Payton.

After the blow up last Thursday, Payton had a perfect day at school Friday, was wonderful all weekend, and another great day Monday. But yesterday? Apparently the gates of hell opened up with a direct portal to his classroom and evil demons possessed Payton’s body to spread mayhem and anarchy.

Payton was sent to Mr. Principal not once but TWICE yesterday. This went beyond not completing his class work and being a disobedient nuance and into what I can only call criminally insane. Not that he did anything to hurt anyone (of course not) but he did attention-seeking things that were fucking crazy, even for him. Taking into consideration all of the odd and quirky things I’ve witnessed him do, that’s saying a lot.

Mr. Principal had to call me up to the school to deal with him.

Did you read that? I WAS CALLED UP TO THE SCHOOL BECAUSE MY KID WAS ACTING LIKE AN INSANE ASSHOLE THE SIZE OF THE GRAND CANYON!

OMFG.

How does a kid flip like that? Now you understand why I said I would give up the contents of my liquor cabinet for life if I could get inside his head. I mean it.

I do what a parent is “suppose to do.” I do the positive reinforcements, enforcement of consequences, avoid negative attention. I’m not saying I could write a book on it, but I do it like the majority of other regular parents. I do that shit.

So what the hell am I supposed to do now?

I’ll admit it to you, reader, even though I know I’ll be judged for it. I spanked Payton on Thursday and again yesterday. Wally and I used to use spanking for punishment, reserved for only the most severe offenses. But then we decided a while back we would stop even that because it’s still wrong, even when used sparingly. It’s just wrong and only ineffective parents resort to that type of punishment. We’re better than that! We can discipline and be effective without it! Rah!

And so we stopped.

But, I swear, I no longer know what else to use to deter that kid. I’ve tried the usual removal of privileges – loss of tv, video game time, extra crummy chores given, sent to his room, positive reinforcement when he starts getting back on track, all the usual stuff. I’ve used it all in the past. It works on Parker, but Payton? Obviously it’s not working.

And quite frankly, to simply take away video/tv time after what he did, the punishment does not fit the crime. That would be too lenient for the shit he pulled.

I do not understand why he goes from such a wonderful kid to a Grand Canyon-sized asshole just like *that*. It fucking baffles me.

I told myself maybe it’s his final larger-than-life push before he settles down. His kindergarten teacher, who is the absolute best at behavior modification, pointed out that trend in children – that they dig their heels in the deepest right before they finally relent. I’ve found that to be true, but still. Payton has to learn he’s too old to play that game every year.

So is that what happened, digging in his heels one last time? I can only hope.

Or is it something else?

Over the summer, I conducted more experiments with Payton’s diet. I know he has something close to a reactive hypoglycemic thing going on. If his blood sugar gets too low, here come the headaches, lethargy and irrational behavior. So we learned to manage that quite well and it helped a lot. But we still had random crazy moments.

Another mom emailed me about her young son and asked if I’d played around with Red dye #40 in Payton’s diet. I hadn’t but I decided to look into it  after hearing her story.

Sure, it’s strictly anecdotal evidence, but Wally and I saw big behavior differences whenever Payton ate something with not just Red dye #40 but also yellow dyes too. When he ate something with either of those, he started in with the ridiculous irrationality and irritability. You couldn’t breath the same air with him or he’d find some reason to pick a fight over it.

Payton has been sick with a cold, and Monday night I had to buy a different medicine than what I usually get. Since it was cherry flavored, I don’t have to tell you what dye was in it.

Oh, it’ll be such a little amount, only 2 teaspoons. Surely that won’t affect him too much.

That’s what I told myself as I gave him a dose of it before school yesterday. The school nurse called me because Payton complained of being dizzy. I thought he was simply trying to get out of class. The principal said Payton complained of having too much energy and couldn’t sit in his desk, which is uncommon for him.

Is that the connection, the red dye #40? Lord knows he has a sensitive body – his ears, his skin, the special detergents I have to buy, even down what kind of kleenex he can use without his skin breaking out. Did that one ingredient, after weeks without it, turn him into a crazy little shit?

Or maybe I’m coming up with excuses and I’m just raising an asshole. Fuck, I don’t know.

Oh yeah, I’m up over at The Mouthy Housewives today, answering a question about how to control an unruly 4-year-old. I tell you this because (HAHAHAHA!) me answering that question is such a fucking joke right now. Now I’m sure you want to hurry over and submit your own question.  Maybe you should ask about how to stay sane when your kids act like assholes. I can answer that one. I think. I don’t know, it may be too late for me.