Calm Before The Storm?

Alright. I'm officially scared. This really makes me nervous. I really don't even want to write about it, but I'm afraid that I'm not going to make the blog quota that my editor (a.k.a. my mom) has set for me. But writing about this right now is kind of like talking about a perfect game in the 5th inning. And this woefully makes me feel like Joe Buck (Minus the Miller Lites and the vasectomy.) And you know why I'm getting that jinxing feeling? Why I'm so nervous? Because nothing's happening. I have absolutely nothing to write about. Jaxon hasn't pooped in anything other than a toilet for almost a week. Cole is going on eleven consecutive 'good days/great days' from his teacher. Nobody's grounded. Grades are improving. Their rooms are relatively clean. Altogether, the kids folded about 17 loads of laundry yesterday.....and didn't complain. A small part of me was a slightly disappointed that they didn't complain, because I had a bunch of witty retorts lined up for their bitchin. (Just kidding. About being disappointed. Not about having the retorts lined up.)

So here are a couple of funny little stories about everyone. (Note: I put headers on top of each story to let you know who that particular story involves. Just in case you have a favorite character and want to skip ahead.)

Jaxon
Like I said, Jaxon has been relatively good lately (emphasis on the word relatively), so I took him to the park. Here's some video.



Racheal and Keith
Keith's laid-backness finally came back to to bite him in the Kardashian. It's not his fault, really. It could've happened to anyone. Last week he was just about to go run some errands, when Rach came in and said, "Hey, I've got some errands to run too. I just have to go to the store. We should go together." Now at this point, Keith SHOULD have lit himself on fire and jumped out of the nearest window. I mean, let's pretend for a minute that Keith had the wherewithal to say no. And let's say that Racheal's errands involved simply going to the grocery for bread. And that Keith's errands involved going to the Bermuda Triangle to cure cancer. I would bet my life that Keith would come back first. So I could completely understood the look on Keith's face when he got home that night after being gone for approximately 9.5 hours. His look was a mixture of fatigue and confusion. Like he had been trying to box a caffeinated monkey for 9 hours. He started to tell me where he had been, but I already knew. He had been everywhere, yet gone nowhere. He had shopped for everything, but purchased none of his intended items. Essentially, he was in the exact same place as where he started. About ten minutes after he got home, and once I stopped laughing at him, I realized that Racheal had not come inside yet, "Where's Rach?"

"Oh, she just dropped me and Jaxon off back here. She had to go to the store. We never actually made it there." My wife, ladies and gentleman.

Tori
That same night, I had to bring Tori to softball practice. But before I did that, I had to figure out what we were going to have for dinner. Now that might sound like an easy task for most people, but you've obviously never been to our house. You see, I live with a swarm of locusts that would chew the sheetrock right off the walls if they didn't have so much paint on them. (Seriously, we've painted our house so many times, I'm worried about the dwindling square footage in the house. It's gonna kill our property value. Oh by the way, Rach wants to paint again. The whole house.) We go to the grocery store about 4 times a week, but it's never enough. And if you try to tell me that I should go to Sam's Club, I'll punch you in the face. Because it doesn't matter how much food we have in the house; no matter what, it'll be gone in two days. So saving 13 cents by buying a gallon of mayonnaise is not going to help, because that would just cause the kids to eat mayonnaise sandwiches for 37 hours straight until it was gone. I don't think we've ever had a bag of chips even make it to the pantry. We've even tried buying healthy stuff like fruits and vegetables, but they eat that too. A friend of mine gave me 8 huge boxes of family sized multi-grain cheerios because they made his pregnant wife sick, and my kids devoured them in about a week. Anyway, that night I managed to find 5 lbs of ground meat, taco seasoning, and a stack of small tortillas - Gracias a Dios por los Tacos!! (That's how you say 'Thank God for tacos' in Puerto Rican)

Anyway, by the time Tori got home from practice, the locusts had ravaged through all of the tacos. I didn't even realize it was happening. I honestly didn't know they were all gone until Tori came and sat next to me on the couch. And I use the phrase 'sat next to me on the couch' a lot like you would say 'Maine sat next to California on the US map'. Arms folded, staring straight ahead, looking like she was trying to make the TV explode with her eyeballs. So I asked, "Did you get something to eat?" And then it happened. She was taken over by a demon. No, really. It was as if Linda Blair herself were sitting across from me on the couch. Her head spun around 360 degrees and her eyes started glowing red. The only thing missing was projectile vomiting pea soup, and Uncle Keith throwing water on her, "The power of Christ compels you! The power of Christ compels you!"

Tori: No! I didn't get anything to eat! There's no more tacos left! You know how much I like tacos! And you didn't even save me any! Uggghhhhh! Now there's nothing to eat!

Me: I'm sorry. I forgot, um -- (Yeah, maybe I shouldn't tell the lunatic preteen that I forgot that she didn't eat.) I, um, there's none left? Why don't you make yourself a sandwich or something?

Tori: I don't want a stupid sandwich! That's all we ever eat! Sandwiches! I hate stupid sandwiches! What'd we eat last night?! Sandwiches!

Me: Umm, Actually, it was leftover chicken.

Tori: What'd we eat the night before?! Sandwiches!

Me: Umm, yeah, that was sandwiches. But the night before that was meatloaf!

I really think that if she had a knife, she would have stabbed me in the neck when I suggested that she make a sandwich. But then five minutes later she was back to being our normal fun, smiling Tori. Ca-Razy. Man, I can't wait for her teenage years. I'm looking forward to it about as much as my first prostate exam.

Scarlett
Friday night, Scarlett lost another tooth. Normally, Scarlett will tell you that she has a loose tooth for three solid months before she'll ever let you near it, but this time, she just pulled it out. Surprised the hell out of us. Anyway, the Tooth Fairy in our house is in desperate need of an organizer. Our kids have got to wonder how the Tooth Fairy has been able to keep a job this long with all of her missed appointments. It's terrible, I know. I'm thinking of farming out Tooth Fairy duties to Uncle Keith. Is that allowed? That night, Scarlett fell asleep in our bed watching TV. Later, when we were going to sleep, I carried her back into her bed. Saturday morning at about 7, Scarlett came into our room, crying like someone just told her they didn't like her shoes. Through her intermittent sobs, I was able to decipher that she was mad at me because I moved her while she was sleeping, and that the Tooth Fairy didn't know where she was, and that she'd never be able to get her money. She told me that she put the tooth under the pillow that she had been sleeping on in our room (Racheal's pillow). So I go back into our room, frantically looking for the tooth, bouncing Racheal's sleeping head around the pillow like Weekend At Bernie's 3. I found nothing. After ensuring Scarlett that we'd find it, and the Tooth Fairy would be back tomorrow, she mentioned that the tooth was IN the pillow case. So I snuck back upstairs, grabbed the tooth from inside Bernie's pillow, and inserted a five dollar bill. A little while later, I told Scarlett that she should double check the pillowcase, because maybe the Tooth Fairy put it IN the pillowcase. Sure enough, she came back down with the money, and a snarky look on her face. So then I had to listen to 15 minutes of 'I told you so's and 'I can't believe you didn't know where it was's from a 7 year old, while I made excuses like, "Well I guess she must've taken the tooth before I moved you." Man, I can't wait until she's a teenager.

Cole and Gavin
I took the boys to the gym with me yesterday so they could play basketball while I worked out. I had planned on just working out, but we ended up playing 1 on 2 basketball for almost an hour. It was the first time that I was able to bring just Cole and Gavin, and didn't have to worry about them fighting with Scarlett, or have to deal with Jaxon eating the basketballs. And coincidentally, it was the first time we were able to play a semi-real game of basketball. I was showing them how to run a trap, how to play defense, how to make the defense guard you before you pass the ball, how to take open shots, etc, etc. And they were listening to everything. And it wasn't just Gavin. Because Gavin would run himself into a brick wall for 2 straight hours if you told him to. But Cole was listening too. At one point, I had a rough time getting around a pair of 9 year olds. I mean, I still whooped up on them. I haven't fallen off THAT far. But they made me work for it. I definitely need to find a way to get the two of them on their own more often.

Maxine
Yesterday in church, we sat behind a bunch of aggravating, disrespectful teenagers. They were being typical teenagers; snapping each other's bra straps, texting, talking, slapping each other. Just being outright annoying. And they just so happened to be sitting directly in front of Maxine. And if you know Maxine, you know that she's got the same amount of patience as Michael Jackson's doctor. At one point, one of the teenage boys leaned back to stretch, and in one quick motion, Maxine slapped the kid's hands and apologized for it all at the same time. It was quite impressive, really. We eventually had to make her move seats so we didn't get ourselves kicked out of church. But then she was fine five minutes later, back to being sweet Maxine. Man, I'm glad I wasn't around when she was a teenager.