Monday, February 28, 2011

What a Relief!

I’m not talking about Alka-Seltzer, the plop plop fizz fizz kind…No, I’m talking about Monkey Man and his comic relief. Partner that with my almost daily stress relief of kickboxing, and we got a few funnies out of tonight.

Monkey Man usually stays home with Hubby when I go to the gym. It is very much “my time” – it’s one hour for me to think about nothing but the hundreds of push ups, sprints and punches I’m doing. However, Hubby has a new job that keeps him out late a few nights a week so my “me” time is now “we” time. “We” in that out of 1 hour, 30 minutes of that is spent with Monkey Man calling me over from the side of the room to ask me how much longer. I figure with the amount of stress I’m relieving exercising added to the amount of stress he’s giving me calling me over, they cancel themselves out. I’m not decreasing my stress, but at least I’m not totally increasing it.

Tonight, Monkey Man called me over for the 48th time. “Mom, your hair looks horrible,” he informed me. I am so thankful that he told me! Up until tonight, I thought my bright red, sweaty face, half-soaked tank top, and many pieces of hair sticking out of my ponytail was a good look for me.

And just as I was leaning over to listen to my son’s pep talk, I noticed a big, wet splotch on his homework paper. Take that, Monkey Man. I just totally sweated on your Letter G homework assignment. That’ll teach ya.

Monday, February 7, 2011

Memo From Mom Monday

TO: Hubby’s Ego
RE: Smarty Marty
DATE: February 6, 2011

Remember the other day when Monkey Man was chattering while brushing his teeth about something that was very clever? I don’t remember what it was now, because I’m writing this a few days later and I have no idea what I ate for dinner last night. Oh, yes I do. Tortilla chips and spinach dip – you took Monkey Man to my parents’ house and I was waiting for my friends to come over so I forwent any semblance of a healthy meal and just waited for the chips to bust out at 7 p.m.

Anyway, when Monkey Man said this funny, but now forgotten thing, I called him a Smarty Marty. Because he IS smart, and I have a problem with rhyming anything I can. Then I asked him, as I often do, “How’d you get so smart?” Of course, I always expect the answer to be, “I got it from my mom,” but I'm pretty sure you've been coaching him.

“From Daddy,” he coyly said, with a big grin on his face. You were in the bathroom, too, and you heard this. “Thanks a lot!” I answered, while you chuckled. Then you chimed in, “Why’d you say that?” To which Monkey Man replied:

“Mommy, I don’t want to offense you (yes, he said offense), but you don’t know how to unlock the levels on Lego Batman or Lego Indy. And you don’t know that much about sports.”

He is correct. When I play Lego Batman or Lego Indy, I am more interested in making my characters do flips or getting Princess Leia to dance on Lego Star Wars. And although I don’t care about sports, I actually shock myself at my basic knowledge of some of the games when he asks questions. However, I don’t know the stats on Cam Newton from Auburn, and we all know you can sit and talk a hole into the wall on that topic. But that’s not good enough. Neither is giving a 10 minute dissertation on Apartheid that I delivered earlier that day while watching a Disney Channel movie called, “The Color of Friendship.” Apparently, unlocking secret levels beats the hell out of South Africa’s history.

So let me just remind you of one thing – he may have gotten his brains from you, but his good looks? Yep, that’s all me.

Sunday, February 6, 2011

Addendum: Too Much Dr. Seuss

Note to Reader: Please read "Too Much Dr. Seuss" first so that this makes sense. Once you've read it, you can now enjoy how Monkey Man's attention was turned to a very bad word. This is why a few years ago, I referred to the bucket. (And now you have TWO posts to catch up on!)

Yesterday, Monkey Man, Hubby and I were in the kitchen having a perfectly nice time chatting while getting Monkey Man ready to sleep at his grandparents' house. Chatting about making books (Monkey Man loves to write and illustrate books, and even more, loves to sell those books to his grandparents), what toys he was going to bring, when his next basketball game was - all perfectly innocent, normal conversation.

Then, he had a question:
"Remember when I didn't know fu@#er was a bad word?"

I tried SO HARD not to laugh, ran into the living room and lost it. I tried to keep it quiet, but inevitably, I began to snort and wheeze so my intentions of inconspicuous laughter were quickly given away. I heard my husband, who did not dart out of the kitchen, try to keep his cool, but my husband gets the giggles worse than a 7th grade girl, so he started cracking up when he heard me.

To answer your question, yes, Monkey Man, we remember those days fondly. And thanks to Grandma, you are now perfectly aware of this word and it's badness. So, yeah, now we're fu@!ed. Great.