I am packing the girls’ lunches for them in the early-morning kitchen. The dogs are piled at my feet in case I am inclined to throw them sandwich meat. This never happens, but they are ever-hopeful.
I make Kallan’s sandwich . . . ham, mayo, mustard, and a generous messy handful of that shredded Costco cheese she likes. Pack the rest of Kallan’s lunch into her lunch bag. Kallan’s all set.
I move to make Maj’s sandwich. She just likes turkey and a slice of Swiss cheese. No condiments. Easy.
Except we appear to be out of Swiss cheese.
Hmmm . . . maybe I’ll just let Maj buy a hot lunch today.
So I don’t assemble the rest of Maj’s lunch. Instead, I pour myself a cup of coffee and sit on the couch.
Kallan comes bouncing downstairs and makes herself breakfast as she sings and dances about the house. Stuffs her lunch bag into her backpack. Plays with the dogs.
Maj comes down the stairs a few minutes later.
“Hey, Maj? I was going to pack you a lunch, but we don’t have any Swiss cheese left, so I . . .”
I am about to tell her that she can buy hot lunch when she turns on me and yells, “YOU ATE ALL OF THE SWISS CHEESE, MOTHER? OH, THAT’S JUST GREAT. ALL I NEED IS ONE SLICE OF CHEESE FOR A SANDWICH, BUT NOOOOO. YOU HAVE TO EAT ALL OF THE CHEESE.”
Wait . . . what?
“Maj, everybody ate the Swiss cheese, including you. Don’t be silly.”
She glares at me, “You ate it all, Mother. You just sit here at home all day and do nothing but eat cheese.”
OK, yeah . . . so now Maj is not going to get to buy hot lunch. Fuck that. She can just take a crappy cold lunch.
But before I can even get up off the couch to start packing that crappy lunch?
Maj yells out, “Get in here, Mother! You need to pack me a lunch! Are you kidding me? You haven’t even started yet! Pack me a lunch!”
And so then I send her to her room for a bit.
She refuses, “I do not have time to go to my room, Mother. I need to get ready to go to school. Unlike someone I know? I have things I have to do today. I cannot just sit here and eat melted cheese all day.”
OK, people? One time. One time, I melted a piece of cheese in the microwave and ate it plain. Melted Swiss cheese is yummy.
Plus also?
My older daughter is way fucking annoying.
I turn to her, “Guess what, Maj? You do have time to go to your room, it turns out. You must have time. Because talking to me that rudely? Always means that you are sent to your room. You know that.”
She stomps off, “If I am late for the bus, you are going to have to drive me to school.”
I call after her, “Not even, babe. If you are late for the bus? You can walk your butt to school. I am not driving you anywhere.”
During her absence, I discover that we have a bit of jelly left. I make Maj a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
I am about to wrap up her sandwich when Maj reappears, “I don’t want peanut butter and jelly.”
“Don’t care. Eat it or don’t. I am not discussing your lunch with you anymore.”
She walks over to see what I have packed, “Only two cookies? Are you kidding me? I want another cookie.”
“Nope.”
“Why not? There are lots of cookies. Why can’t I have another one?”
She is being such a pain in the ass.
I turn to her, “I need the rest of the cookies, because while you are at school today? I am going to cover them with melted cheese and eat them all. Yup . . . that’s my day’s plan, pretty much. Eating melted cheese and cookies.”
“Might as well. It’s not like you do anything else around here.”
What . . . the . . . fuck?
I take a deep breath, “It is lucky for you I am mostly mature, Maj. Because the immature part of me whose feelings are getting hurt? That part of me almost just licked your sandwich.”
I finish bagging her sandwich and packing her food, “But because I am mature? I am sending you off to school with an unlicked lunch.”
I hand Maj her lunch bag, “You’re welcome.”
She grabs the bag, “Mother, you are so disgusting.”
Not too much later, goodbyes at the door. Maj pauses to look into my eyes, “I’m sorry I was so rude. I am tired, but I shouldn’t have been rude.”
I kiss the top of her head, “Thanks for that, babe. But you know what?”
“What?”
“Your bad attitude this morning is actually going to save me some time.”
“What? How?”
“Because I have decided that all next week? You can pack your own lunch.”
“What?”
“It will be great, Maj. Plus also? It will give me more time to lounge around and do nothing. Yay!”
“I said I was sorry.”
“Yes, I know. And I appreciate your apology. Have a great day at school!”
And off she went.
Geez.
Now . . . about those cookies.
Hahahaha!!
I can’t decide which part I like best.
But cheese and cookies?? Ew.
(Also so very thankful I have boys.)
Oh, I would never eat cheese and cookies together.
I just liked the image of me eating all the cookies with melted cheese poured on top.
Maj is ridiculous, sometimes.
“Maj, everybody ate the Swiss cheese, including you. Don’t be silly.”
Did you leave out the swear words? Because my response to that freakout DEFINITELY would have included cursing…
But guess what?
As much as I swear here in this writing?
And sometimes privately to Mark?
As a mom? I am all G-Rated.
Really.
And I?
swear like a truck driver…
but I prefer to think of it as “regional charm”
To be honest tho there is a lot more of
“oh FUDGE”
and “oh shut the FRONT door”
and lastly, “what the french toast!” going on since the oldest went to school.
Im not asking for outside intervention. ha!
Regional charm . . . snort!
I have referred to this blog as being a place for my thought bubbles, and my thoughts bubbles?
Are filled with swearing.
But as a mom?
I try not to swear.
But to each his own, truck driver you.
Love you.
I love how you handle these situations…
You are not perfect, I am not perfect, there for I will use you as a loose template for my future parenting skills, should the need arise.
I love your writing, your blog and I, we have a thing.
*shhh*
Don’t tell my husband. ;D
So happy to have a thing with you, babe!
Yay!
Plus also? Nope, I’m not perfect. No one is.
But you and I? We are good enough.
Shhhhh.
Ha, you have me in tears here at…that place…where they make you do stuff…and then pay you. Yeah.
Try this: Tostitos chips on a plate. sprinkle shredded marble cheese (chedder/jack) on top. Microvwave for 40 seconds. Enjoy. it was my favorite meal as a kid. Cheese on Chips. I should name shit for a living.
Snort!
Kallan is the queen of cheese over here. We buy those big bags of shredded mixed cheese from Costco, and Kallan is of the opinion that there is almost no food in the world that cannot be improved with melted cheese.
And she is a big fan of Cheese on Chips, which she calls Melty Goo Goodness.
She might give you a run for your money on that naming thing.
I don’t know, I could give her a run for her money with Buffalo sauce.
When I was younger, one of my roomates did a photo shoot for a whole grip of people in one day. He bought like 4 of those meat/cheese/veggie platters for the day and ended up having 2 left over.
We proceeded to get REALLY drunk that night and eat the two platter completley between 4 of us. However, I was putting buffalo sauce on everything. shrimp, turkey, chicken, carrots, broccoli…you name it.
Then I decided to go through the cupboards and put it on other stuff. Captain Crunch, special K,almonds, granola, white bread and i even tried it on ice cream.
my scientific data that I came up with told me and proved that Buffalo sauce tastes good on 84.57% of items you put it on.
OK, you said other things.
But I got stuck.
Captain Crunch cereal is PERFECTION and should not ever, under any circumstances, be subjected to Buffalo Sauce.
That was part of your findings, correct?
Captain Crunch was among the foods not improved by Buffalo Sauce, correct?
Even wasted out of my mind?
I know Captain Crunch cannot be improved.
What is wrong with you?
Okay, first. Kris? Whenever I use my droid to read and comment, your kindle ad wants in on the fun. Unless I zoom way in, no matter what I touch takes me to the kindle ad.
Okay, and it’s chips AND cheese and it’s macho cheese doritos with melted colby jack cheese. YUM
Mark wants to know what sort of Droid you have, as you should be able to use the mobile version of my site.
No ad on that version, and it will work much better.
So your Droid information? Manufacturer and model. We’ll configure the site to give your droid the mobile version.
Mark is all magic that way, apparently.
Motorola Droid X. I can see your site with the mobile version, however, none of the comments show, nor can I get to them by any means while in the mobile version. The same thing happens with my new WordPress site and the mobile version. So if Mark figures it out, please let me know!
Alright, Mark made changes and says to try it again . . . although he is not certain if this will work.
If it doesn’t work? Your phone is being seen as a PC browser, according to Mark.
Some sort of setting on your phone that needs adjusting, then. You need to change that under “Custom User Agent Setting” or “User Agent Setting” to make your droid masquerade as an iphone.
I was thinking…wow, if I spoke to my mother like that I’d be making my own lunch.
Your patience with your daughters’ sassiness is amazing. I hope when I have kids I am half as patient as you.
Maj does not wake up well. Ever.
And I let her stay up too late last night to watch Project Runway. She needs her sleep, or she is just hideous.
And she does not like surprises, even if they are of the “We are out of cheese” sort.
So I have learned to be extra-patient with Maj on mornings like these.
But I did almost lick her sandwich.
Snort!
I second that. I hope when my son is older I can channel the grace to be paitent in those situations.
Awwwwww, thanks.
Thanks, you.
Well, take heart. You are FAR more mature than I am. I think there would’ve been blood shooting out of my eyes if I’d been on the receiving end of that much attitude.
I at least would’ve been vague as to whether or not I had actually licked the sandwich. Let her wonder…hehehehe
Maj does piss me off, sometimes.
But sinking to her level ruins the entire day. Instead of just a few minutes of the morning.
As for the threat of licking?
Maj is all kinds of germ-phobic. If she thought there was any chance her lunch had been licked?
She wouldn’t eat any part of it.
Not even.
I would totally have licked the sandwich. But then again, my kids know they are subject to impromptu licking at any time.
But if I had licked the sandwich?
Maj would not have eaten it.
And she would never again trust any food I ever prepare for her.
That would be a huge pain in the ass.
So I resisted that impulse.
You make a valid point. Which is why I skip the middleman and just lick the kids.
Maj would die.
Seriously.
I always wanted to thank my mom for getting up so early and dealing with lunchmeat at 6 AM. That takes LOVE.
I know!
The smell of lunch-meat first thing in the morning?
Ick.
Your mom loves you.
It’s so refreshing to find a mother who is about on the same developmental level as her 11-yr. old (re what you were going to do while she was in school) because you can relate so well to her, LOL. OK, maybe that was a little inaccurate. You’re more like a 10-yr. old, right?
Oh, and the reference to her butt? Shouldn’t you let sleeping dogs lie given the recent spate of butt issues in your household? No telling where she might apply that butt between your house and the school. eeewww.
BTW: are there plans to take this act on the road, specifically to Boston? I want to buy front-row seats. Laugh a minute.
I am mature enough to not lick Maj’s sandwich, but not quite mature enough to resist fucking with her head a little bit.
A good balance, I find.
Sometimes you have to fight rowdy immature fire with rowdy immature fire.
As for the butt reference? I didn’t even think of that!
I so should have threatened to rub her sandwich on my butt.
Hee hee!
Also?
No plans for a show at this moment.
Although it has been pointed out to me that our more public displays of inappropriateness may someday end up on YouTube.
ACK!
… and would go viral, no doubt.
ACK!
Shudders of horror at the thought.
“Sometimes you have to fight rowdy immature fire with rowdy immature fire.”
so. true.
Funny you mention all this cheese because for the past two weeks I have been craving melted cheese on EVERYTHING. Well, everything except for cookies.
Hmmmmm.
Crazy cheese cravings?
That is so weird.
Hmmmmm.
I’d be afraid to see what my kids packed…
M
ps- I would have totally licked her lunch!!!
You know what, though?
Maj will take this job seriously. She might nab an extra cookie, but she will end up with a regular lunch.
Now if I let Kallan pack her lunch? It would be cookies and a Coke and a big Ziploc bag of shredded cheese.
Snort!
I’m thinking I should let Kallan pack my lunch!
Only Pepsi not coke…
My kids – just cookies and the rest of my stash of Lindt Lindor balls that I still refuse to share. Hey! They were given to me!! I gave them each 2 and then kept the rest (10) for me… I don’t share well at all.
M
You should have just made her sandwich without the cheese and let it be a surprised at lunch.
I try and vote twice a day for Top Mommy Blogs twice a day (home & work. I take this voting thing seriously.
Yeah, I was trying to be nice.
Silly me.
And thank you for the voting!
Thank you very very much.
Great now I am craving cheese and cookies. There goes my diet for the day…
Seriously though? I hope I have as much patience with my son as you seem to have with your daughters. I would love to have the great come-backs you have as well, but unfortunately I am not very witty when I am mad so I will just hold out for some patience. :)
When I get really mad?
I am not witty when I am really mad.
I just yell angrily and chase people up the stairs and into their rooms.
And then I go lie on my bed for a minute and gather my thoughts.
And try again.
I am so glad that you are human and sometimes blow a gasket. :)
I am all human over here.
Very much so.
Much love for you and your girls…even when the oldest acts like the biggest spoiled brat on the planet.
Yes, she has her moments.
But I always love her.
Thank you.
Ahh, this made me smile. I make lunches at night. It’s easier for me that way because if a discussion like that were to occur in the morning, everyone would have a bad day.
I love how you can think so quickly and diffuse a situation rather than incense it. I need lessons.
I have always made their lunches in the morning, but you’re right.
If we keep having crappy conversations like the one this morning, packing the lunches the night before is the way to go.
And thank you . . . I try to diffuse.
Otherwise we’re all cranky all day long.
Not fun.