Did You See That?

Forgive me if I’m all over the place today…it’s been one of those days. I’m relatively certain that it’ll all make sense by the end of this post. We shall see, oh faithful readers. Maybe the barometric pressure is to blame…between temps in the high 90’s (what are we…Florida?) ridiculously high humidity and the serious threat of tornadoes (Kansas? What….?)…I think everyone’s feeling a little loopy.

Tonight’s topic is an interesting, yet universal one: Sneakiness. Everyone at one time or another has been sneaky…although, when you’re a toddler and just learning the finer nuances of it, you get caught almost every time. Probably due to the fact that you’ve got that incredibly guilt-ridden face that you haven’t learned yet how to mask…kinda the same look that Metro gives me when he’s gotten into the garbage (again), or accidentally-on-purpose pooped in front of Taylor’s computer (a mystery we’ve yet to understand).

Metro can be very sneaky….stealing tissues are his favorite. You’ve no idea the joy he displayed the day he realized that if you pull one tissue out, another one appears….and another….and another. The theft of said tissues serves only one purpose, as far as Metro is concerned: He brings the pilfered item to the nearest human and with tail wagging, waits for them to give him a carrot, or suffer the consequences of “chase the puppy around the house”, where you’re basically pulling pieces of tissue out of his severly-clenched jaw. Good times…. it’s really our choice…how this drama plays out. Lately, it’s been too hot to play the chasing game, so he’s filling up on carrots pretty quick.

Then there’s the speed trap on our local relatively-busy road. No dummies, the law enforcement up here…they’ve given new meaning to the word “sneaky”. They’ve got a car set up in one of three designated spots…the windows are all blacked-out….(and here’s the killer) they’ve got a “For Sale” sign in the windshield…on the passenger side, so as not to obstruct their vision when they peel out of the lot and bear down on the unsuspecting speeding motorist. The first time I saw this “for sale car” off the road, I thought it was kinda strange-looking….as it vaguely reminded me of something….now I know what. Lucky for me, I was not the object of their interest the day I saw them duck into traffic…but by then, the jig was up.

Our children are no dummies, either…lest we think for one moment that they’ve got less brain cells than their dear old parents. My friend Margarete’s son, Eric, is a fan of the Nintendo Wii (along with about a kazillion other guys, including mine) and lately he’s taken a shine to the fitness disc they’ve offered. “What a smart kid!” I enthused. “He must be exhausted after all that running/skiing physical exertion required to keep the rather malicious Wii-pseudo-trainer in his good graces…” “NOT…(according to Margarete, who will always tell it like it is…she and I are totally down with the no-rainbows-and-unicorns version of parental storytelling). Eric has figured out a way to sit on the couch and shake the wireless controller up and down in exactly the correct configuration to make said Wii system THINK he’s performing the marathon running moves required to complete the level and sufficiently impressing the computer-generated-trainer into saying things like “Gee…you should really consider the triathlon, buddy…we’re mere jello to your Baked Alaska.”

Or something to that effect.

Honestly….I don’t know whether to be proud of him, or very afraid of him. I’m equally afraid of the glint I saw in Taylor’s eyes when I informed him of this little tidbit of video-game-knowledge. I’m sensing Margarete feels the same. This will need to be discussed over several glasses of wine, possibly at Barnes & Noble, where we’ll have the entire Parenting section to peruse and then we can hit the Self-Help aisle to see if there’s any hope for parents who refuse to grow up and believe that each glass of wine is the emotional equivalent to one session of therapy.

And finally…(for yes, people…I’m almost done). I had a discussion with Taylor (age 16) about his up-and-coming Regents exams. Taylor is one of approximately five thousand students at the high school here (yes, I spelled out that number so it could not be mistakenly misread) and the people in charge have got the “teen-mentality” pretty much down to a science. So, I was not surprised to learn that he couldn't bring his cell to school during regents week(s), or his iPod…and that his scientific calculator was going to be checked to make sure all prior calculations were properly cleared from memory, lest he actually remember the last scientific calculation he DID in class.

What I didn’t understand was the announcement that “no water bottles are permitted”. What? No….water? Is this a joke?? It’s 120 degrees outside…and probably 150 in the building…and you can’t even have a bottle of water?? What gives?

Taylor supplied the answer: Evidently, some genius cryptically wrote the answers to some of the test questions on the paper portion of the water bottle…and he got busted. So, not only did he fail the test, but now the other 4,999 students get to be dehydrated as a result.

Way to go, Einstein.