The Heart Puncher

Ah the inevitable "stranger danger" conversation. 

 I've always invisioned this moment, alongside the eventual birds and bees colloquy, the first love and heartbreak tete-a-tete, the holy shit he's sixteen and old enough to drive fiasco.  That grandoise moment of being a parent in charge, teaching this young impressionable mind right from wrong, as they look up at you with wonder and amazement as you explain life, they, bright eyed and awe-inspired with that, "wow my mom/dad is so smart!" look on their face, responding after your spiel, "ok momma/daddy".

You think it's going to go that way.  It's simple; don't talk to strangers. period.  Don't get into strange cars, take that yummy piece of sour patch gummies from a strange person, or listen to a stranger that says something along the lines of,  "Hey your mom told me to come and get you because..."  Never, ever, ever, ever do any of the above.  If you see someone freaky-deaky watching kids at the fence at recess, tell one of the adults in charge out there.  Only go with people you know, and only if I tell you that day it's okay, such as "If I am not at the bus stop for whatever reason, so and so will take you home."

You don't factor in the "but why's" and "why not's" and "huh?" (a favorite of Adam's)

And of course, in the middle of my semi-lecture on the not so niceties of strangers, Adam interrupts with one of his gems:

"If someone tries to take me, I'll just PUNCH THEM IN THE HEART!"  He then proceeds to seriously demonstrate the art of heart punching in the air to me against an imaginary stranger, whilst grimacing his notorious "stink face". (see picture at bottom of blog.)  He continues to exhibit other points on said non-existant bad guy of where he plans to bring on the hurt, in the event he ever (hopefully never, ever, ever) encounters a potential evil-doer.

Yup, I think he's watched Transformers and Iron Man one too many times, as his moves mimic an incognito Tony Stark and Optimus Prime.  But, then again, the kid's got moxie!  I think he's ready for the karate lessons he's been harping me about.

And on a serious note, we do need to re-visit the whole "stranger danger" talk again tomorrow, being that a strange man in a white van has been lurking around a local elementary and middle school this past week, trying to lure kids walking to school into his van, claiming he just dropped off his kid and doesn't want them to be late.  Scary stuff :(






No children were harmed in the writing of this blog...

Lump Sum

Adam has been singing alot lately (suprise suprise, considering his mother!) and of course the whole "Is this a grown up (yay, he's finally saying that word instead!) or a kid song?" everytime something comes on the radio.  It's fun to listen to his interpretations of songs...One of his latest that he's been warbling is Selena Gomez's "I love you like a love song baby."  (Don't judge him, he still likes to sing Master of Puppets by Metallica and AC/DC tunes for my metal head friends)  Anyway, the real lyric goes something like this:

I, I love you like a love song baby
I, I love you like a love song baby
and I keep hitting repe-pe pe pe peat.


And then, there's Adam's version:

I, I love you like a lump sum baby
I, I love you like a lump sum baby
and I keep re-heating peep peep peep peep peeps!!

I can't help but giggle everytime he sings that, why would you need to re-heat peeps when you don't heat them in the first place, lol. Anyway, it got me thinking about how I used to hear certain song lyrics.  For example,  the lyric from Manfred Mann's "Blinded by the light" goes like this:

Blinded by the light,
revved up like a duece
another runner in the night

My version:

Blinded by the light
wrapped up like a douche
another rolled up in the night...

Why the hell would someone want to be wrapped up like a douche and rolled?  I don't know, but that is what I heard and  apparently, I wasn't the only person to hear it that way.  kissthisguy.com Has a laundry list of misheard lyrics, and some are downright funny. Some people have misheard CCR's "Born on the Bayou" as "I'm gonna buy you." or another from CCR "Bad moon rising"

Correct lyric:

There's a bad moon on the rise

Misheard:

There's a bathroom on the right.

What lyrics have you misinterpreted??




No children were harmed in the writing of this blog...

Rated "Why"

“Is that a kid movie, or adult movie?”

This is a question that has been repe-pe-pe-pe-peated for the past month. In fact, Adam’s kindergarten teacher was warmly greeted by him first day of class with this delightful tidbit; “Hi I’m Adam, and when I grow up, mommy says I can watch adult movies!” With a slight snicker on my part, I was quickly reminded of that scene in ‘Kindergarten Cop’, you know the one where the boy informs Ah-nuld his first day of teaching Kindergarten, “boys have a penis and girls have a vagina!” But I digress, allow me to get to the point of what started the whole ‘kids v adults’ convo before not only your mind but entire being has fallen into the gutter!  It went a little something like this: One night, about a month ago, Adam was refusing to become tired and sleepy and was running in circles chasing our golden retriever Sawyer around the house at mach 30, the sugar high minus the sugar, when one of my favorite shows, ‘True Blood" was about to start. (yes, I’m a major Trubie, don’t judge me!) My husband, Michael, finally having enough of his shenanigans, started marching him upstairs, informing him that it was “mommy and daddy time to watch one of our shows” “I can’t watch it?” He stopped, stunned.

“No, but I’ll put a kids movie on for you.”

“What are you going to watch?” Adam inquired.

“Mommy and I are going to watch a grown up show”

Michael tucked him into bed and put one of his G rated flicks on for him. Adam, still not satisfied and still confused asked, “So when I’m an adult, I can watch grown up movies? And because I’m a kid now I watch kid movies? Why?”

“Well, grown up movies sometimes have bad words and scary scenes and other things kids can’t understand yet.”

“And kid movies don’t?”

“That’s right. Goodnight.”

You would think an explanation and a kiss would do it, but no. I forget how inquisitive they are at this age, having witnessed several nephews and nieces grow up. But Adam would take the whole ‘kids v adults’ thing to a new level. Soon it became an obsession.

“Is this an adult commercial, or a kid commercial”

Me: No honey, it’s not a GROWN UP commercial." (trying to instill that word instead)

“Is this adult food or kid food”

Me: No honey, this isn’t GROWN UP food. (still trying)

On the radio, "Is this a kid song or adult song?”

Me:  "No honey, it’s not a GROWN UP song, you can listen to it." (you get the picture).

Recently, on a rare clear sunny fall day, I decided to take Adam kayaking to the nearby lake for perhaps the final time of the season. The inevitable question came up.

“Is this a kid’s adventure, or adult adventure?” he asked as we schlepped towards the boat launch. My answer was simply “Yes.”


No children were harmed in the writing of this blog...

Dress Code

This morning Adam channeled his inner Tim Gunn.  As we stood at the door, putting our boots on and getting ready to meet the 8:40am bus that takes him to school, he sized me up.


"You're not going to wear that when you pick me up, are you?"  A hint of concern in his 5 year old voice.


He's only 5.  In Kindergarten. I thought the whole "I'm so embarrassed by what mom is wearing when she drops me off at school-don't give me a hug and a kiss-in fact drop me off at the end of the street so no one sees you" phase wouldn't commence for another, oh I don't know, 10 years from now.  But it's begun, at 5 years old.


I wake up every morning at 7:30 am.  My routine is fairly common; I get up, make coffee, shower, wake up Adam, get him in the shower, put on my workout clothes, feed Adam drink coffee, drop off at bus stop, head to the YMCA for my workout, come home, shower, yada yada yada....This morning, however I was a tad bit tired (and I got my workout in the night before).  So I woke up, made coffee, woke up Adam, got him in the shower, and got semi-dressed..   A cute lavender fleece tunic, my grey pajama bottoms, black knee length cardigan, Ed Hardy trucker baseball cap and my sparkly warm and cozy uggs.  I thought, even though I had the PJ bottoms on, I looked very 'Hollywood meets NYC junkyard chic'.  It was very Mary Kate/Ashley Olson of me.  I thought I looked cool and somewhat celebrity style presentable. 


But no, he had to go all Tim Gunn on me.  And because we were running late, caffeine fix would have to wait till after bus drop off.


So in the car up the hill on this rainy, cold and glorious Pacific Northwest morning,  I asked him what he wanted me to wear when I picked him up later in the afternoon.


He thought for a moment, then said "One of your dresses."


I just nodded my head.  It's wet, raining, windy and all my dresses are cute summer dresses.  Not gonna happen.   I got dressed up for him though.  He's just going to have to settle with my skinny jeans and sweater, 60's style hairdo outfit a'la Audrey Hepburn.


But, I'm still wearing my sparkly uggs. ;)




No children were harmed in the writing of this blog....

Three Little Words

Toy. Story. Three. 

 Those three little words invoke fear, terror and blood-curdling screams from my five year old child.  Just the mere mention of Lotsa Bear and Co. will send him into an undeniable tizzy. Those three little words are all it takes to get him to finally listen when he otherwise refuses,  after it’s down to my last straw of “pleases” and  begging (I will not negotiate!)  and “I’ll take away your....”  (fill in the choice toy of the day) .  No, the horns just rip through my halo as I finally have had enough and exclaim, " If you don’t pick your jacket up off the floor, I’ll put on Toy Story 3!!!)

He drops whatever he is doing INSTANTANEOUSLY.   The magic expression  of the three little words has been spoken.  "Noooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!" He covers his ears and runs like the proverbial chicken with it's head cut off.  "I'll put my jacket away!" 

Okay, so it's mean,  but it's effective.  And I haven't done it that often. Once or twice.  Don't tell me you haven't gotten to your breaking point and made such a threat at one time or another!  And after all, it's Toy Story 3, I'm not telling him he has to spend the night with Stalin or that I'm dropping him off for afternoon tea with Mussolini.  No, he feels that witnessing Buzz Lightyear having to habla espanol is by far more disturbing then any monster that may be lurking in the closet.  Much more terrifying then any bumps, creaks and (un)settling noises that the house emits at bedtime. Creepier then a bunch of mutant sunflowers being hand-delivered to your door, carried by a member of Insane Clown Posse...(wait, that's my nightmare....moving on!)

Now, let me tell you something about Adam.  This is a child, who since the age of two, has been completely obsessed and fascinated with Halloween.  Forget Christmas, in fact, last Christmas he wanted anything that would resemble  Halloween.  Remote controlled zombies, a book on the undead, a skeleton puzzle....This year, save for a couple of days,we have spent EVERY DAY at one of the two Halloween stores in town.  It's like Disneyland to him.  The gore!  The zombie babies! The jumping spiders! The lurching vampire!  There is even an animatronic "Scream" character that , when you pick up the phone, says random quotes from the movie.  He wants that for his bedroom, to go with his collection of various skeleton wall hangings and outdoor Halloween decor.   But he absolutely, positively, refuses to watch Toy Story 3.

All because of that damn fluffly and pink Lotsa Bear changing the batteries in Buzz Lightyear.....




No children were harmed in the writing of this blog....