YOU SCREAM, I SCREAM, WE ALL SCREAM...

The innocuous source of pure mayhem

I have two boys, now 2-and-a-half and 14 months, commonly known as Bang and Crash. By all accounts things are getting a little easier as Bang can now tell us off pre-tantrum so at least we know why he’s about to turn into a writhing hyena and Crash is walking about and therefore not living up to his namesake as much. (He also happens to tell us off but luckily incy wincy still works a treat on him). 
  
One way I’ve noticed to get them both going in tandem is to offer to buy them ice cream. Now you would think this would be a cause for great excitement and joy in their young minds. And yes there is some of that, but only if you purchase the ice cream in a certain way. Yesterday we did not follow the Toddler's guide to Toddlers rule on purchasing ice cream and we copped an earful as a result.


RULE No. 173: DOGS, CHIPS & SLIPPERY DIPS ARE FUN
We had just been to a park to eat Fish and Chips and watched doggies of all shapes and sizes chase balls into the water. Crash even tried to have a go and managed to nab a particularly wet Labrador’s ball. Luckily the dog didn’t mind as he was more interested in the chip buried deep in Crash’s little fist. To the dog’s dismay Crash ended up with both until I wrenched the dripping ball from his hand and apologetically returned it (always nice to mix some dog saliva with your meal).
  
To extricate the boys from the park my Husband’s standard manoeuvre is to bribe them with a smoothie. This night though he strayed from his usual and offered ice cream (mainly because he wanted gelato for himself!). Bang was so fast off a slide I may have muttered under my breath “Good one daddy” and off we went, smug in how well we mustered toddlers.


RULE No. 68: STATIONARY CARS ARE NOT FUN

It may have been over-confidence, or a lack of thought, but our grand plan of a fun afternoon quickly evaporated into duelling banshees. You see we didn’t take them in to the Ice Cream shop, I stayed with them in the car while my hubby went in. First mistake. They lasted for about 30secs before the whining started, and then some full-blown screaming ensued. I would have paid a digger driver to roll past at this point but instead I screamed “Stop screaming!” I know, I know, it makes things worse but I had silence from their shock for about another 30 seconds and I needed that silence. I was tired and disappointed that all the points we deserved for the chips and the doggies and the slippery dips suddenly didn’t count because they were in a stationary car for more than a minute.

RULE No. 235: WHITE ICE CREAM IS EVEN LESS FUN

Second mistake, hubby forgot to take his phone that I was calling to make sure he got Bang a pink ice cream. On the appearance of a white one, you’d think we had grabbed the child and broke both his arms. “I don’t want a white one, pink one, pink, No, not white one, Noooooooo” was just comprehensible as it came out all dramatic and high-pitched from a collapsed and bubbling face strewn with tears and snot.
  
I know what you’re thinking. And yes we probably should have shoved the white one into his hands and said something along the lines of “You know there are children in Africa who don’t even know what ice cream is, they’re lucky to eat dirt for lunch!” But instead I told my hubby off for not having his phone and upon assessing the mayhem he quickly turned to go and get a PINK one.

RULE No. 4: DO NOT EVER WASH MY HAIR
I can safely say we lived happily ever after (if by ‘ever after’ you mean the 15 minutes until the next meltdown), because once the pink one materialised and the car started moving the hysteria subsided. And besides it’s difficult to moan when you’re using your mouth to move ice cream off a cone on to clothes and car seats. But don’t worry we don’t always pander to their every whim, that night we got them both back by washing their hair. That is definitely a no-no in the Toddler guidebook and we knew it - AH HA HAAAAAA

©MyIdeaLife, 2011, All rights reserved

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Friday Night Lights - Part 2: Flashing

I'm sure my single, not-so-sober self of 2004
would have nothing to learn from this situation

The teenagers were gone and the only hum I could hear was the soft yet extremely annoying sound of my hubby's snoring, but that's why I have earplugs and once they were in I was happily stepping off my cliff to lala land. I had only just hit the ground, Wile E Coyote style, when my cartoon desert melted back into our bedroom, a space suddenly filled with the angry screams of a teenage boy. He wasn't very imaginative in his song to our street, it was essentially various forms of the word "F*CK". Loud ones, long ones and staccato ones with the word 'IT' sometimes applied.

My heart leapt into my throat, "this was my fault, if I hadn't paraded around outside like a deranged fool, then this wouldn't be happening" I thought and worked hard not to show, my hubby needed no more ammo as he stood at the window trying to catch a glimpse of the psycho pacing around outside.

'Is he out the front?' I scream whispered
Boom: 'Shut up...he's in front of next door's place'
Me: 'What's he doing?'
Boom: 'Shut.up' 
Me: 'It's not like he can hear me, the voices in his head are clearly draining all sense of reality' 
Boom: 'I'm trying to hear'
Me: 'Well he's not exactly whispering is he, I'm pretty sure the guy in seat 7D of the plane that just flew over asked his wife "who's that shouting 'Faaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrkkkkk'?' so what exactly are you trying to hear?'
Boom: 'Shhhhh'

At this point with curiosity that has killed many cats and a conscience desperate to be cleared I jumped up too and joined him at the blind.

Boom: 'Go back to bed' 
Me: 'No, I want to see what's going on'
Boom: 'You're opening the blind up too much he'll see'
Me: 'Sweet, the guy is having a conversation with an invisible purple martian that is probably trying to kill him, he's not going to see a 4cm gap in a blind 30m away'
Boom: 'Fine'

For the next thirty minutes we rode the wave created by our screaming friend that oscillated between being lulled into a false sense of 'we can go to sleep now he's passed out' and jumping back up to peek out the window when a renewed round of F-bombs were dropped. As I had already had a nice conversation with a police officer earlier in the evening and was now getting a little bored with the show, I was gagging to call the police.

'Should I call the police?'
2mins later
'Do you want me to call the police?
2mins later
'I don't mind calling the police, what do you think?'

Suddenly the game changed and our lunatic discovered an uncovered skip bin that obviously was the martian's spaceship as he started attacking it physically and giving it a strong piece of his crazed mind.

'I think I should call the police.' was met with around 5 seconds of silence before a much louder crashing sound occurred at which point my usually calm and quiet hubby started yelling 'Call the police! call the police! he's smashing the cars, he's just smashed Ben's car, there goes ours now, call them!'

I dialled 000 and it was then, and only then that he decided to run off. 30 minutes of loud mayhem and the second my fingers touch the phone he disappears. I couldn't believe it. The police arrived and Boom spoke to them briefly and then for about the fiftieth time that evening we crawled back into bed.

A few minutes went by and my cartoon life was returning when Bang decided that the new found silence was disturbing and started crying. Hubby took this one and returned again to sleep, by now it was 1.30am and I was well and truly over all this. But it wasn't the agitation that kept me from sleeping next, it was a knock at the door.

'What the...?'

We opened the door and the police had returned, they needed a full description as another police unit had found our noisy friend, his mind-free state obviously hard to miss. We obliged, of course, and as developments occurred loudly over radios on our balcony it was obvious we were in for the long haul. A full official statement was required, the teen was arrested and my Hubby had to identify evidence and describe everything he saw, all this under the curious eye of his wife and 2 year old, who of course had been woken by now.

At 2.30am we tried to go to bed again, but it seemed this particular Friday night was determined to keep at least one of us awake all night. So my hubby ended up in the spare bedroom for the rest of the night being kicked by a deep-sleeping 2 year old.

There is much to learn from this cautionary tale like:

• don't confront teenagers in your PJs (you'd get a much better reaction in the nude)
• when someone shines a laser in your bedroom pretend you are 17 again, at a dance party and about to pass out intoxicated
• don't introduce your 2 year old to a Policeman at 2am in the morning, he is likely never to sleep again, and my favourite;
• don't be mean to your wife because Karma is likely to be more of a bitch than she is! 

What did you learn?
(Please don't say "You're a nutbag" I am aware of this fact already! LOL)

© MyIdeaLife, 2011, All rights reserved.

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