Sweet dreams

Ape #2, my 8 year-old son, has recently decided that my bed is his bed. I don't mind, since I figure my days of cuddling will be rapidly coming to a halt anyday. The only catch, the child is like an octopus on fire. Absolutely like an eight-legged furnace. We aren't talking normal body heat exchange. The kids puts off some serious heat, along with legs going in all directions. So much so that I am often waking him up several times through the night to urge him to move over. Oh yeah, not only does he emit vast heat, the only side of the bed he will sleep on is whichever side I am on. Every time.

The other morning, he awoke, barely, to stagger into the bathroom, stating, "I gotta go pee." He did is job, then returned to my bed. I don't think he opened his eyes once in his travels. He climbed in next to me, threw his arm around me, and very groggily murmured, "Mommy, I love you."

I laid there and soaked in every bit of heat I could. My days of this are numbered.

Anxieties

Ape #2: Mom, when you were my age did you like somebody?

Me: Of course.

Ape #2: Well, did you ever talk to him?

Me: Well, sometimes. I would get nervous, though.

Ape #2: Yeah, I get nervous gas, so I don't talk to her.

Match-maker

Ape #2: Mom, I think you should be the next Bachelorette.

Me: What?

Ape #2: Yeah, go on the show. Find a husband.

If only it were that easy...while I thought this was incredibly sweet for him to say, it also made me a little sad.

Who needs a dictionary?

Ape #2: Mom, what does moist mean?

Ape #1: Chewy, wet.

Ape #2: Oh, like foggy water?

Me: Exactly.

Post-Christmas gluttony

Shortly after Christmas...

Ape #2: Mom, I wanna buy this with my Christmas money!

Me: Really?

Ape #2: Yep, it's the best thing ever.

Me: Okay, but you have to carry it the entire time we are shopping.

A couple nearby stifled their laughter. Their toddler boy was behaving perfectly in the shopping cart...

Me: Just you wait. In six years, you are going to be dragging around a 3-foot long yellow remote-controlled Corvette too.

Housekeeping

Ape #1: Mom, can I bake cookies?

Me: Yes, but all good cooks clean the kitchen before and after beginning any project.

Score one for the home team....I have a clean kitchen, fresh-baked cookies, and I didn't lift a finger. Youth are so gullible.

Extrordinary uses for everyday objects

Ape #2: Mom, check out how fast the back tires go on my remote-controlled car!

(demonstrates)

Ape #2: It can shave your back, it goes so fast!

Tomayto-tomahto

Ape #2: Mom, do we have a suspefic bowl for popcorn?

Me: Specific

Ape #2: Suspefic

Me: Spe-cif-ic

Ape #2: Suspeficious, suspicious, suspefic

Me: You got it that time.

Health-conscious

The following conversation occurred while Ape #1 was in kindergarten...

Ape#1: Mom, can we stop at McDonald's on the way home?

Me: No, Mommy is on a diet.

Ape #1: Oh no, Mommy don't do that! I had diet-rrhea once and it was AWFUL.

Mini-mouse multiplying?

My garage has a distinct odor of mouse. Do you think that means there is more than one? I'm terrified that one day I'm going to go out to my garage and have beady little eyes looking at my from all angles. I mean, really, the possibilities are endless. This spring, I could pull out a cooler to go camping and find a family of mice playing poker inside, smoking stogies!

I would d-con the buggars, but there is one little problem with that....I hate dead mice more than I hate live mice.

A story...

Several years ago, while camping, I offered to empty the bucket of waste water. There I was, enjoying the fresh mountain air, sun shining on my back, walking to the drain, humming a happy little tune. My humming did not stop when I began to pour. No, my humming stopped when it was rudely interruped by plop, plop. I stopped, looked down, and found 2, possibly 3 dead mice on the grate of the drain. I can't recall exactly...I've tried to block the memory. After a seconds of muttering "oh god, oh god, oh god" to myself, I hightailed it out of there, tossing the bucket behind me as a put one foot in front of the other as quickly as I could, screaming the entire way. As I arrived back at camp, I had no fewer than 7 adults and equally as many kids looking at me like I had seen Elvis in the woods. When I breathlessly explained that dead mice were in the water bucket, the smirks came out and the laughs were stifled. The only question I was asked was, "where is the bucket?" My nephew, then 7-ish, volunteered to go retrieve the bucket, which remained in the general vicinity of the dead mice, an area I was now adamant to avoid. Several minutes later, the nephew and bucket returned. When asked what took so long, he explained, in vivid detail, how he poked and prodded the mice. Sick youth.

The best thing of all...Ape #1 had to write a book in school the following year. OF COURSE SHE WROTE ABOUT THE DEAD MICE. The only saving grace was that a bird pooped on Grandma while sitting around the campfire, and the children thought that was much funnier.

Alas, HOW DO I SOLVE MY MOUSE DILEMMA?

By the way, HAPPY NEW YEAR!