Old Coot Dirty Talk

This was our conversation on the way to dinner:

Kurt: We’re old…mostly you.
Me: Really, you were born in 72 and I wasn’t even alive yet.
Kurt: Ok I’m old and you’re a young whipper snapper. Coot.
Me: My cooter isn’t a snapper.
Kurt: I beg to differ; it’s a Penis Fly Trap.

We went out for Chinese food and Sophia played with all the tea cups as if they were stacking cups. I suppose they do stack nicely. Kurt poured tea in ours and Sophia insisted that she also get some. Hers received a complimentary ice cube. She promptly and purposely dumped it all on the seat just as she dumps the water out of the toy watering can at swimming; only the Chinese restaurant wasn’t in the middle of a pool.

After Kurt finished his tea Sophia had two cups, two saucers, and an extra plate meant for us to share our food with her. We did give her some of our food to try and she did try it in a manner of speaking. She tried using a fork to put the rice in a tea cup, and she tried tipping the tea cup to empty the rice back into the dish. She also organized the dishes. The cups fit neatly in the middle of the saucers and she organized them this way. She then stacked the cups together, and in a separate pile she stacked the saucers together. Kurt and I were impressed by her categorization. Of course after dinner we loaded her into the car and she began chewing on her books. Not as impressive.

My fortune for the night, “Remember three months from this date. Good things are in store for you.

“I’ve stopped taking my birth control pills.”
“Oh, you guys are trying?”
“No.”
“Ha! Well unless you stopped having sex, you’re trying.”
“No we aren’t.”
“Uumm yes you are.”
“We’re just letting it happen.”
“You’re trying.”
*Audible sigh*

*Three months later*

“I’m disappointed that I’m not pregnant yet.”
“I thought you said you weren’t trying.”

Flash Fiction Friday is hosted by g-man. You may also visit Flash Fiction Friday 55′s, a blog dedicated to hosting 55 Flash Fiction Friday posts.

I received my new credit card with my new name on Monday so I replaced it with the old one in my wallet and put the old card on top of the shredder downstairs. That night I decided to go to Kmart and Target to see what they carried for bicycle trailers and left Sophia downstairs with Kurt.

I came back home within thirty minutes empty handed. Neither store had anything or at least nothing in stock. Kurt told me that when I left Sophia grabbed my old credit card off of the shredder, went upstairs, put her jacket half on, and knocked at the door hoping to come with me. Aaaww

I asked Kurt to wake the baby from her nap yesterday because I was making dinner. She didn’t fall asleep until three but I didn’t want her to take too late and then not go to bed at night. He went up and I heard Sophia crying, then Kurt laughing. He came down with fussy baby in his arms. Though I was curious as to why the crying baby made him laugh, I wasn’t looking.

Kurt: I’m guessing when you put her down for her nap she was fully dressed?
Me: Yes

I looked up. Sophia had no pants and had pulled her left arm out of it’s sleeve through the neck hole. She looked like a cave baby with a diaper.

I hate electronics, computers (except my laptop *petting HP Pavilion*), and gadgets of all sorts (except my digital SLR *petting Nikon D60*). Anytime something is made in order to make our lives simpler it complicates things. It’s just one more thing to break. *grumble*

Last week we had a bit of heat wave. Shut up you out-of-staters! It was hot. Even I thought it was hot. I, who used to wear a poncho at work to make a statement about how fucking cold the office was during the winter or anytime the AC was on in the summer.

Even though Thursday was two degrees cooler than Wednesday, according to the weatherman, that day truly tested my patients. Truly. It actually started out well. Knowing I wanted to spend the day in the sun, I packed a soft-sided cooler big enough to hold at least a half-rack of beer. I didn’t pack any beer. The cooler was way more than I needed for snacks, but I brought a lot of water because it was going to be HOT.

Sophia and I went to her swim class then I took her to the beach. It’s not really a beach. There isn’t any sand, but it’s all we have, so it’s a beach. The parks and recreation department recently made “improvements” to the area and added a playground. It sucks ass for toddlers or anyone who is prone to motion sickness. The person who chose the park equipment apparently LOVES climbing and spinning in circles. The first is fine, the latter not so much. Spinning Sucks! We moved on to a different park within the area. It hadn’t been updated since the ‘70s. When was my last tetanus shot? *shrug* Oh well, at least there wasn’t any spinning.

So far, we had been in and out of the car three times. One more stop before heading home. I had to pick a couple things for dinner. I used the car remote to simultaneously lock and arm the car alarm as usual before heading into the store with Sophia. I grabbed the couple of things I needed, paid, and headed back to the car in the now blazing sun with my recently purchased perishables. I pushed the button that should simultaneously disarm and unlock the car. Nothing. Pushed it again. Still nothing. I pushed it another 500 times, each time thinking, “it’s gotta work *this* time.” No go. Poor Sophia, her toddler head was baking in the sun. I grumbled and headed back to the entrance of the store with the cart and Sophia to call my hubby. “How do I open this stupid piece of shit remote and what battery does it need?” I asked.

I opened the stupid remote and out fell the battery and the metal piece that is supposed to hold said battery in place. SHIT! I went back to the car. Holding the battery in place while firmly pressing on the metal piece to try and give it just enough of a connection I pressed the button. The alarm system was not convinced. Many sailor words, which some oddly refer to as “French” as in “Please excuse my French”, few out of my mouth. I don’t understand why it’s referred to as French. If they were at all French they would be spelled completely different. Shit would be “shautet” and pronounced something like “saw-eh” and Fuck would be “faucket”, pronounced “fock-eh”. Neither have the punch of a hard consonant ending that I sought. Don’t get me wrong. I love the French and their language sounds beautiful. They just add too many useless damn vowels. Except for maybe ex-president Dubya, one always knows the origin of a word like entrepreneur by the number of vowels.

With one last GODDANMIT-STUPID-FUCKER-WORK-ALREADY I said screw it and opened the trunk with the actual key. The alarm went off, of course. I put the groceries in, slammed it shut, and tried to open the door with the key. No go. Once the alarm goes off the doors remain locked. Bastard.

I wheeled the cart and baby back to the store to purchase a new battery. EVERYONE in the parking lot stared at me. I went back to the car with the remote and new battery. Nothing. Thoughts ran through my mind of being able to get into the car someday and then happily backing over the remote repeatedly. It made me smile briefly. I think the remote knew it. Bastard.

I didn’t know what to do. Everyone I knew was at work. If I called a towing company there still wouldn’t be anyway for me to get home. Even if they were inclined to give rides it would be illegal for them to take me without a car seat for Sophia. Oh wait! My friend who lives close is on maternity leave. Yay! I opened the trunk to retrieve my rotting-in-the-sun perishables, which set off the alarm again. People stared at me, again. I called my friend to pick me up.

I sounded like a lost kid calling mom, “can you come get me?”
“Where are you?”
“Fred Meyer”

Seriously, that’s how the conversation went. I was a pathetic lost puppy. Poor Sophia was confused about why we couldn’t just get in the car and why it kept making that sound.

Remembering that I had brought a cooler I went back to the trunk of the car and opened it one last time. The alarm went off AGAIN and people stared at me AGAIN. After removing our snacks and water all my groceries fit into it. Yay!

The last time I hung out with her, I noticed she looked thinner. I didn’t say anything to her. It didn’t occur to me until after the fact that I should mention it.

I relayed my thoughts to Kurt.

“Yep,” he says, “you’re such a guy. I love you. You’re a man with a vagina.”

Flash Fiction Friday is hosted by g-man. You may also visit Flash Fiction Friday 55′s, a blog dedicated to hosting 55 Flash Fiction Friday posts.

I started Sophia in swimming classes when she turned six months but because of work, scheduling, and not having enough arms to get Sophia dressed after class and then hold her while I got dressed, that six week session was our last for a while. I didn’t start her up again until she was nearly a year old. Not that she screamed or anything, but It took her a month to become used to being in the water. I think it took a lot longer to warm up to her swim instructor, so a couple months ago when he had to take so much personal time off that the class would switch to another instructor Sophia didn’t like her at first.

The new instructor sang a lot more songs with less free time for the moms to chat, which also bugged me at first, but she also made sure to spend some time with each child. She tries more to get to know them and get them to interact with her specifically instead of just allowing the moms to move the baby hands at the appropriate time within a nursery song. She asks each toddler to splash the water or blow bubbles and to give high-fives. Upon receiving a high-five, she will dunk herself in the water. Most of the kids are enamored by this and caught on quickly. Sophia was too reserved to extend her hand, so for weeks I did it for her, not right away mind you. I did give her a chance to try on her own, sometimes I just let her sit there, and the instructor would touch her own hand to Sophia.

Finally last week I saw a change. Sophia’s other instructor had taught a couple of the previous classes and so this day the new one was back and Sophia was excited to see her. She kept reaching for her from across the pool. She finally came over to us for high-fives and Sophia smacked Melissa’s hand on her own.

On Tuesday Melissa came to Sophia and asked her to splash the water with her hands then to blow bubbles. Sophia wouldn’t do it. She instead reached for Melissa’s hand and tried to smack it with her other hand in order to dunk her swim instructor. Melissa didn’t go down and instead started to talk with another child, so Sophia began splashing her hands as previously asked. Anything to get what she wants; she truly is a little shit.

At one of the two playgrounds I frequent with Sophia, I overheard something that just made my ass twitch. This particular playground has a toy that mimics a front loader by use of two handles; one that lifts the ‘bucket’ and one tilts the ‘bucket’. A boy of about six or seven was operating the stationary front loader. He hadn’t been at this toy for more than five minutes. His mother stood right next to him. A girl walked up and politely asked the boy if she could have a turn. The boy’s mother in a syrupy voice said, “Oh she asked politely. I know you’ll do the right thing.” The boy stood up with his head down and left the toy to the girl. His mother began to praise him but he didn’t look up. She took his arm to turn him towards her and said, “I’m so glad that you made the right choice. I’m very proud of you.” The boy with his head still down, simply moved on without acknowledging any of the praise for his ‘choice’.

She didn’t really offer a choice and I don’t think he learn the lesson she wanted to teach. All he did was probably save himself a few minutes of nagging and lecturing where he would sit perfectly still gazing blankly at something while drooling from boredom. Poor kid. By the reaction of the boy I’d guess that this isn’t a new technique that mom is trying out. I bet that she proudly displays a helicopter mom certificate over the mantel which made its way there by her passively aggressively ruining her spouse’s “dogs playing poker” painting that once hung in it’s place.

I know everyone wants his or her child to be polite, courteous, and nominated best toy sharer on the whole planet but there is something to be said for the kid that can look another in the eye and say, “Not right now it’s my turn and I’m not done yet.” It shouldn’t matter how nice the other person asked. Maybe the girl needs to take a few lessons in waiting her turn.

Seriously can someone explain to me why giving up his turn was the ‘right’ thing to do just because she asked nicely?

Random woman: May I please have sexual intercourse with your husband?
Me: Well shit, I guess I have to say yes since you asked so fuckin’ nicely.

(Kurt, don’t get all excited. Nobody has asked for your hot body. Even if they ask nicely, I won’t say yes. It’s my turn F-O-R-E-V-E-R. *maniacal laugh*)

My actual problem with this hovering mom isn’t the lesson she was failing miserably to teach it was that she stepped in at all. Go sit on a fuckin’ bench already and let the damn kids work it out themselves! It’s a playground. It’s a place meant for playing. It is possible to learn appropriate social interactions without perpetual guidance.

Sophia had finished eating so she was playing in the living room while Kurt and I ate dinner. Sophia signaled that she wanted onto the recliner. Dutiful daddy Kurt got up and helped her up. He came back to the table to eat. The lounging toddler, who constantly reminds us of Al Bundy from Married with Children except that she doesn’t keep her hand tucked into her pants, made the sign for milk. Dutiful slave daddy got up and brought a sippy cup of milk to the toddler lounge.

Kurt: I can’t believe I’m serving an infant
Me: Tell daddy you’re not an infant you’re a toddler
Kurt: If she’s a toddler she should toddle her own ass to the fridge!

In a cupboard or in a drawer nothing is secure. Tossing items left and right everything is strewn about, out of place and all around the room. No matter the contents, nothing is sacred when the toddler tornado comes to town. After a nightstand dissection, I’m thankful she cannot yet ask, “Mom, what is this?”

(click on the picture to see the movie)

Flash Fiction Friday is hosted by g-man. You may also visit Flash Fiction Friday 55′s, a blog dedicated to hosting 55 Flash Fiction Friday posts.