Was Your Day This Bad? Part One - A Tongue-in-Cheek Look at the Difficult Days

One week ago last Tuesday, the morning after we discovered that Captain Chaos put herself to sleep with her Madeleine doll, a 24 pack of toilet paper and three karate trophies,

I was more than a little surprised when I found a small brown blob of stuff in the metal dish of my food scale.



I immediately recognized the small brown blob of stuff, prompting a question that parenting classes never prepare you to ask.

“Who put a chicken on my food scale?”

Not the chicken, as in the chicken breast or the chicken leg or the chicken thigh. A chicken, as in a real, live, clucking type of chicken. We temporarily had a few week-old pullets living in a box in our kitchen. Homeschoolers, you know. We do things like that. It is amazing what children will think of to do with cute little hopping and chirping baby chickens, like weighing them, even if they have no clue how to read the numbers on the scale, or by playing “Bumper Chicks,” sliding the young hens across the linoleum floor and gently “crashing” them into each other.

“I didn’t!” answered General Mayhem, when I attempted to identify the culprit.

“I didn’t!” chimed in Major Havoc.

“Yep! I did. That’s me!” bragged Captain Chaos.

I should have known. She is the ring-leader in this house. If there is mischief afoot, she’s at the center of it. These are the same children who decided that having chicken for breakfast meant placing a bird on the kitchen table next to their cereal bowls.

Later in the morning, when General Mayhem should have been completing his math assignment, I found him on the kitchen floor, setting up a battle scene with his toy soldiers. He has not played with his army men in a long time. I assumed that watching Band of Brothers with his mother spurred his imagination. Moments later, in a Godzilla-meets-Calvin-and-Hobbes moment, I discovered a room full of slain soldiers, trampled to death by…three chickens.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

This took place on the same morning that I sent the children into the backyard to enjoy our wonderful spring weather. Ten minutes later, I thought the back yard was a little too quiet, since there were supposed to be two children running around outside for the first time in months. I poked my head out of the back door only to discover Captain Chaos catching a few rays…on the chicken coop roof.

 
This was all before lunch.


Major Havoc was quiet because he had discovered a mud puddle. Judging by the amount of mud on his person you would have thought the puddle empty, but apparently there was more than enough mud to not only cover himself but also the side of the neighbor’s garage. I learned that the Major threw mud on the neighbor’s garage later that afternoon when the neighbor’s nine-year-old son confronted me in front of our house. He approached me on the driveway, explained that he did not throw mud on his parent’s garage and then asked me to explain how the mud got there.

What the -?

A nine year old. His mother was standing a few feet away while he attempted to take an adult to task for mud on his parent’s garage. You would have had to have heard his tone of voice to appreciate how inappropriate he was. I politely explained to him that this was a conversation for adults, and that I would discuss this situation with his mother.

After the young lawyer left I told his mother that I would handle the situation. Gauging the distance between the mud puddle and the garage, accounting for wind direction, speed, and the distance Major Havoc can throw, left little doubt that he was the offending party. Major Havoc readily admitted that he threw mud on the garage. He took a bucket of soapy water and a rag and washed off the dirt. General Mayhem supervised the clean-up and hosed off the building. I made the Major apologize to our neighbor (the mom, not the boy) and promise not to do it again.

As the witching hour hit, the two hour period between 4 PM and 6PM when I am helping the General wrap up his school work, cooking dinner, and getting the family ready for evening activities, Captain Chaos discovered our new cast iron display. I have a large collection of cast iron that I cook with regularly. I have more than I can display at one time. Captain Chaos sees the pans as a cast iron xylophone, playing them with all of the energy, enthusiasm, and complete lack of musical skill that she possesses.

It was very loud.

The day didn’t end there, but if I continue in too much detail I’ll need another blog. Our scheduled plan to drop off scrap sheet rock at the home of another homeschooling family was shelved for a trip to the Wal-Mart Optical Department for glasses for the Captain. The Boss was treated to the heavy sighs, eye rolling, and constant complaining that are the hallmarks of customer service for “Angela,” the Vision Center clerk who is always on duty when we are in the store. Angela makes it very clear that working in the Vision Center would be a pleasurable job if she just didn’t have to interact with customers. She might have found fitting Captain Chaos with glasses to be easier if she…oh…actually paid attention to the girl, answered her questions, or interacted with something other than complete disgust. Angela never did get the proper measurements to order the Captain’s glasses. It’s hard to do your job when you expend all of your energy complaining because you’ve abdicated complete control to a five-year-old. It took a trip to another store to find a competent employee who obtained the Captain’s eye measurements in two tries, keeping the young girl engaged and talking the entire time.

That was my day, one week ago last Tuesday.

How was yours?