Tuesday, January 13, 2009

if this house is a-rockin'....

Friday was a rough day. Rough as in yes, I’ll have a vodka on the rocks. Lunch was a complete disaster. My daycare is on the food program which means that I promise to feed the kids healthy meals and fill out mountains of paperwork and the government pays me back for some of the food. And that also means they have the right to come to my house at any time during operating hours and check up on me. It’s the ultimate Big Brother. Well, Friday I was happily cooking tacos for the kids and I got a phone call. It was Big Brother (in the form of a woman named Pauline) and she was coming to my house to do a check at lunch.

I follow the rules. I’m doing everything by the book. But I’ve also talked to other people who operate home daycares and they all have horror stories about how terrible the food program people are. Immediately, I panicked. I saw that the lettuce “best by” date was the day before and threw away the entire bag. Then I tripped on the way to the table with the corn, spilling it all over the place. Winnie, apparently having given up buttered corn for Lent at some point in her life, stood and watched as I frantically tried to sweep it up. By the way, have you ever tried to sweep up a bowlful of buttered corn? It’s like riding a BigWheel on a gravel road.

The lady showed up late which was okay by me because not one kid ate anything – note to self: Self, don’t serve tacos anymore. The visit went fine. She was quite nice and was more interested in the wooden playhouse in our backyard than in what I had served for lunch. And to think that I spilled corn for her.

I made it to naptime and thought the rest of the day would be smooth sailing. I had all the kids laying down and I was settling in to watch Maury on mute (probably not good for little kids to hear the show but since they can’t read the closed captioning…) I was just about to hear who the father of Shawnda’s baby was when the doorbell rang. Six times. I jumped up as fast as I could and got to the door. I threw the door open and saw my little neighbor boy.

He just turned four years old and he loves to come over to our house, usually at really bad times. Like the minute I return home from the hospital after having a baby or moments after Wesley pukes in the back seat of the car or while five kids are sleeping in my house.

I was mad – I explained to him that he CANNOT ring the doorbell at our house. He said he wanted to play with Wesley. I told him Wesley was asleep (or had been until the doorbell rang) and that I would come get him when Wesley woke up. And then I told him again not to ring the bell. I was probably a little mean but at four years old, he doesn’t take hints well so you have to be pretty blunt.

Two minutes later, the doorbell rings six more times. I think at that point, smoke might have come out of my ears. I was all out of nice. I threw open the door and said in a not very nice voice, “I told you not to ring the doorbell. What do you want?”

“I just saw a airplane fly over you guys’s house and I wanted to tell Wesley if he could come outside and see it.”

Once again, I informed him that Wesley was sleeping and that he shouldn’t ring our doorbell.

I kid you not, one minute later, the doorbell rang again. By this point, all my kids were awake and I was ready to commit a heinous crime against a certain little person. I threw the door open and saw him smiling up at me again. “What do you want?”

“I wanted to tell you that the mail guy just put yall’s mail in the mailbox.”

Just to make sure that he didn’t miss my point this time, I told him to go home.

Added to my to-do list: disconnect doorbell.

1 comment:

jrh678 said...

There is nothing that gives me more thoughts of bringing serious physical harm to others than someone making noise/waking my kids from their naps!!! Does your neighbor kid have a mother?!