Nope, Not Even Betty White

This Grandmother Protection Plan (GPP) describes the protective and mitigative measures to be employed during the pre-adolescent and adolescent years (i.e., years 9 through 19) of the Frecklepelt Eldest Child Project (the Medium Fry).

The GPP has been prepared in order to minimize the potential impacts identified at the onset of the Medium Fry, namely that there is no such thing as a GILF. Therefore, the primary objective of the measures included in the GPP is to prevent Frecklepelt becoming a grandmother before the age of forty. Within each section of the GPP, measures to be addressed by Frecklepelt are noted and described as they pertain to potential reproductively hazardous situations that may be encountered by the Medium Fry.

1.0 Pre-Adolescent Measures

- The Medium Fry shall be relentlessly subjected to scientific trivia and dorky humour from a young age such that it pervades her being and she is unable to suppress expression of her deeply ingrained nerdy tendencies.

- The Medium Fry shall be enrolled in lessons at the earliest age possible for a musical instrument that cannot feasibly be construed as sexy by teenage males. Possible examples include violin, tuba or bagpipes. 

- The Medium Fry shall be assigned household chores, responsibilities and other extracurricular activities sufficient to limit the amount of time available for interacting with boys.

-  The Medium Fry shall be allowed full freedom to express her inherently poor and/or insane fashion sense. Frecklepelt may choose to limit such freedom in situations which may result in an adverse reflection on Frecklepelt's parenting abilities, although strict supervision of the Medium Fry is recommended at such times.

2.0 Adolescent Measures

- Music lessons shall be encouraged to continue for the duration of adolescence. If a change of instrument is requested by Medium Fry, care should be taken to ensure the selected instrument is not cool, sexy, awesome, etc., or of a size or proportion that could be utilized in an untoward manner during band camp.

- The Medium Fry shall be subjected to orthodontic treatment, including head gear, if at all possible.

- The Medium Fry's curfew shall be way earlier than all her friends'.

- The Medium Fry's parents should generally strive to be the most embarrassing people on the planet.

- If Medium Fry develops hips, breasts, any measurable degree of coolness or hotness, or fashion sense that begins to approach mainstream standards, immediately commence the Emergency Homeschooling Contingency Plan (Appendix A to the GPP).

All measures contained within the GPP are subject to all applicable laws and the inalienable constitutional rights of Medium Fry and should not be interpreted by Frecklepelt in a fashion that could be in violation of such rights, including - but not limited to - freedom of movement, freedom of association, and the right to bear cosmetics.

It is recommended that a separate, project-specific GPP be prepared and implemented for any additional children as they near adolescence, particularly those of a different gender. 

Who Let the Claws Out?

I asked Medium Fry to wash the supper dishes the other night. She goofed off for so long that she managed to stretch that single sink full into nearly an hour and a half of sudsy angst, then was enraged that she didn't have time left to paint her nails before bed. Like, no bedtime hug enraged, and for her that's serious. Whoopty-doo, right?

W.R.O.N.G. The little brat soaped my toothbrush in retaliation.
(Oh yes she di-id!)

You have not seen mad like I get mad when someone interferes with my obsessive oral hygiene regime. Frankly, I had never seen it either because I've never had anyone put soap on my toothbrush before, but I assure you I was plenty displeased. Because Medium Fry was already in bed by the time I discovered The Soaping, I had the whoooole night to weigh the merits of each potential sentence: a reciprocal soaping? Dishes FOREVER? A good old-fashioned beating?

Meh, none of the above. She's a good kid. The next day I asked if there was anything she wanted to tell me and she promptly burst into tears and apologized. All I really had to do was make sure I got all my laughing done before I confronted her so I could keep a straight face while she blubbered. In fact, she was so contrite that when I told her she had to buy me a new toothbrush out of her allowance, she didn't even think to point out that there are about sixty spare toothbrushes under the sink. (Now there are about sixty-one.)

Between the fury and the blubbering, I've got a pretty solid guess as to what's going on. As the prophecy stated, thus has the time of darkness descended upon us: puberty.

Which is terrifying enough in itself, but can you even imagine the horror if I had waited until I was forty to start having children, instead of, er, "waiting" until I was twenty-two? - good lawd, we'd have puberty and menopause occurring in the same household at the same time. A poorly-timed toothbrush soaping would be nothing short of a death wish.

Similarly, given Medium Fry's current emotional state, it occurs to me that if the child discovers all the things I've posted about her over the years - based on her going completely over the edge over a sink full of dishes, and assuming her reaction will be proportionate to her degree of wrathfulness - I *could* be in hot water. So dear readers, don't be alarmed if you don't see any more Medium Fry stories on here for the next eight years or so - I (probably) haven't killed her off, I'm just hedging my bets to try and ensure she extends me the same courtesy.

Bare Necessities

Some things are just a necessary evil. Shoveling snow, dentist appointments, hair removal. But I'm okay with necessary evils, I've made my peace with them. 'Cause they're, like, necessary and stuff.

It's the plain old evil evils that really piss me off: those things that are so indescribably villainous and vile that it's hard to wrap your brain around how you can possibly be expected - in modern civilization, in a free country - to be subjected to them with any sort of regularity.

Yes, I'm talking about you, Timesheet.

Dear Timesheet: Did you know I have to get drunk every Thursday night just to cope with you? You're like a Pap test or a family gathering or something, except way worse because I can avoid that shit for most of the year but you - you happen to me every week. Depending on how month-end and long weekends fall, sometimes even more than once a week - o, the humanity!

Timesheet, you nasty bastard, when you're not freezing or crashing, you're going so damned slow that I can feel you sucking the life force out of me with every passing minute. I mourn the countless hours of my precious youth that I've wasted waiting on you to decide whether you were actually going to save.

You know, if you would just come out of my computer we could settle this like men: I'd kick your ass by the bike racks then we could shake hands and move on with our lives. But instead, you hide behind your electronic facade, torturing me every week with your capriciousness. Why, you're a regular cyber-bully! I buy a lotto ticket for every draw and dream of how I'm going to leave your sorry ass and go live in the Bahamas.

Alas, my ticket for last night appears to be a non-winner, so tonight we meet again, Timesheet. You may have won this battle, but you haven't won the war!

Diphthong

I've been naughty lately. Soooo naughty. Alllll night long.
To look at me you might never know, but for a certain je ne sais quoi in my smile...

Yup, I've been grinding my teeth. Hey, who knew.

Hey, my dentist did. So, super anti-climactic story short, I am now the proud (?) owner-operator of a night guard.

Thooooo thexthy.

The kids couldn't stop laughing. No matter what you say or how sternly you say it, with a night guard in it's a fact of nature that you're going to sound like Daffy Duck, spraying spittle and all. Which is probably why they don't call it an "evening guard" or a "late-afternoon guard": you need to be 100% coherent at those prime yelling-at-your-kids times of day or they're just not going to take you seriously.

Night guards also have a super hawt bonus feature where your face doesn't quite close all the way so you wind up drooling on yourself slightly. Like, Saint Bernard slightly. But since I'm an optimist I'm always looking out for the positive angle:

"Hey thweety, doeth thith thing make me look younger?"

"Do you mean the night guard or the bib, Mom?"

"The night guard, thmart ath. And it'th not a bib, it'th a thcarf."

"Oh, sorry, it just looks a lot like a tea towel."

"An abthorbent thcarf then. Gawd, it'th all about themanticth with you lately, ithn't it? Now quit hathling me and anther the quethchun."

"Uhhh, no. You look mostly the same but kindof a little, like, weirder or something. Why do you ask?"

"Thit."

Chicken Soup

For the Environmental Consultant's Soul

By working faithfully eight hours a day, you may get to be a boss and work twelve hours a day.

Robert Frost

It was a clear spring day in 2012, full of the kind of hope and promise only a spring day can hold. But even though spring was Pam's* favourite season, she hardly noticed what a beautiful morning it was. All Pam could think about was work.

Pam had been involved in an all-engrossing project for months. She had harboured hope for it when it was only a twinkling in a client's eye; nursed it through the tricky cost estimate stage; celebrated with pink cigars when she was awarded the proposal. That was when the the first warning signs had cropped up: "But they told me specifically not to put that in the scope, how is the budget going to cope with that change?"

Things had gone steadily downhill from there. The client seemed to be withholding several crucial pieces of information, while rapidly and randomly changing others. The timelines were practically tripping over one another. Pam wasn't allowed to make half the calls she needed to make, and the ones she was weren't being answered.

In short, Pam was overworked, overwhelmed and over budget, and that wasn't even the worst of it. What bothered Pam the most was the direction this whole project was taking. What she had initially believed was an exciting and important project appeared on further scrutiny to be a boondoggle at best, and a deleterious debacle at worst.

"What is the point of all this?" thought Pam. "Am I really going to spend the rest of my career facilitating more holes in the ground? Where is the positive impact I once dreamed of making in the world?"

It wasn't long before Pam was having a full-blown crisis of conscience. She began spending her lunch breaks perusing job ads, but she had a mortgage to pay and it seemed as if all those soul-satisfying positions just didn't feature paycheques that could support her lifestyle. How would the children ever be able to go to private kindergarten if she left her job now? Pam's golden handcuffs grew a little tighter each day.

Dissatisfied and disillusioned, but with no discernible way out of the pickle she was in, Pam continued her work on the project. When final deadlines began rapidly approaching, she started working weekends as well. This is where we first encountered Pam, unhappily braving crappy weekend transit schedules to make her way to an office she resented, to work on a project she no longer believed in, on a beautiful spring day that she barely noticed.

Pam was cranking through the final details of the project when she discovered something that stopped her dead in her work. "No," thought Pam, "it can't be..."

She ran through the evaluation process again, and then, with growing excitement, once more just to be certain. "It is true! It is!" cried Pam. "And all this time I've been so worried, for nothing!"

In that single, simple moment it was as if Pam had found a new lease on life. All her doubts about the purpose and meaning of her work, all her questions about the moral and ethical value of her projects were laid to rest. What Pam had discovered was this:

The project would have no significant cumulative effects.

Pam was so very surprised. It looked as if the kids could go to private kindergarten after all! Pam treated herself a new designer dress to celebrate.

* Names have been changed to protect privacy.

Influencing the Weak-Minded

Is it wrong of me to use the Jedi mind trick on my own kids?

'Mom! Mooooommmmm! Come play race cars wif me.'
You don't need me to play race cars with you.
'Mom, where are you?'
This is not the parent you're looking for.
'Mom, why are you hiding in your bed?'
I can go about my napping.
'Awesome! I'm coming in to play fort wif you!'
Dammit!
'Mom, that's a bad word.'

Not that it ever frigging works, mind you.

I am fully convinced of the Awesome Untapped Potential of the Mind. Trouble is, that "untapped" (or, in this case, un-desired-results-producing) business makes it tough to maintain my conviction sometimes. It's not that I'm lacking motivation in my efforts, though - for example, there have been a few** "select" situations over the years when I've been really desperate to make some small interloper or another go away, but I always figured it didn't work those times because my attention had been diverted to somewhat more compelling anatomical regions, ergo my brain was clearly not operating at its Jedi best.

And today, well, I think it's pretty reasonable to chalk today's failure up to my being half asleep. Full Jedi mastery is always easier when I'm not in my afternoon slump.

There's a slightly trickier alternative theory as well: it may be that the Jedi mind trick only works in the expected way on adults. Kids, on the other hand, will always do exactly the opposite of whatever it is you actually want them to do - except when they don't, which further complicates things - so in order to effectively manage their behaviour through mind control techniques one may have to employ the less well-known art of Jedi reverse psychology:

'Mom! Mooooommmmm! Come play race cars wif me.'
I am the best person to play race cars with you.
'Mom, where are you?'
You don't want to play race cars with your sister.
'Mom, why are you hiding in the basement?'
Race cars are less fun by yourself.
'Awesome! Let's play ball hockey! I'll get the hockey sticks!'
Dammit!
'Mom, that's a bad word.'

Or maybe I just haven't got the little hand wave down right.

** Possibly more than a few. You know how it is.

The B's Knees

Many aspects of being a university student with a small child at home weren't easy. Aside from some obvious student-parent issues - for instance, How to Feed a Family on Twelve Cents a Day - I generally found myself with an issue that perhaps doesn't quite fit the student mold as it's commonly viewed: namely, I had far more brainpower available than time. Therefore, in order to maximize overall results (i.e., GPA), my brainpower needed to be harnessed in the most effective manner possible given the allotted time.

Unfortunately, my brain is a lazy slug that plays nasty tricks like setting my body off cleaning the bathroom then taking a rest itself. I figure the equation looks something like this:

GPA = (b/t) - P

Where b = brainpower, t = time and P = my propensity for endless procrastination via household cleaning.

So I made two things: one, a schedule ('You can wash the floor for ONE HOUR and then you HAVE to study, got it?'); and two, an Excel spreadsheet. I used the schedule to relentlessly nag my brain into action, and the spreadsheet to calculate the precise minimum amount of effort required to achieve a 4.0 in any given course, which assisted me in prioritizing all the nagging I had to do to myself.

Sure, there were bumps along the way - Physics springs to mind - but it was actually a pretty good little system and once I had that parchment With Distinction in hand I felt pretty darn smug for having cracked one of the great mysteries of studenthood.

A few years later I have come to understand that no one - not one single person, entity, potential employer, no one - gives a shit about my GPA. They never have, they never will. It just doesn't matter. The only person who ever cared about it one iota... was me.  I would have been well served to set my sights on a B average and get some more sleep.

This past weekend, I took Small Fry to the dentist for a check up. "Oooh!" they said. "Aaaah!" "You know," said the dental hygienist, "I don't think I have ever written this on a file before, but I am definitely writing it this time: Excellent home care!"

Do you hear that, people? Excellent home care. Excellent. I excelled at prying those miserable little jaws open every night for the past four years, risking life and limb patience and digits to floss and brush those minuscule, razor sharp chompers, and finally - finally! - my time for recognition had come. I swiftly touched up my makeup and unfolded my prepared speech.

Interestingly, despite my high GPA - which could theoretically be used as a proximal measure of (at least!) a keen ability to cram information into my brain in a reasonably thorough and retrievable way - it seems I just never learn. Because, guess what? No one - not one single person, entity, potential employer, no one - gives a shit about whether there exists in a filing cabinet somewhere in Calgary's northwest a note that my child received "excellent" daily hygienic care on his deciduous teeth. Once again, the only person who ever cared about it was me.  And, once again, I would have (in fact probably the whole household would have) been well served by me setting my sights on "pretty good" and enjoying life a little more.