Archives, eh
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# Further Adventures in My Child
Last night as I was preparing dinner – pizza made with lebanese bread, surprisingly workable – I told tWM to take the bins up to the street last night. A task that hitherto she has not been required to perform but since her yearly exams are over and she is beginning to settle in for some serious and athletic slacking I figured she should undertake pointless manual labour as a character building exercise and..well, because to see her suffer makes me happy.
She made all efforts possible to register her complaint and displeasure at the onerous burden I had placed upon her whinging shoulders, but in the face of my implacability, evil smirk and suggestion that if she didn’t take them that I would henceforth delete the illicitly acquired episodes of 90210 that she has yet to be supplied with, she reluctantly trudged off. With my keys. Within the minute she was back to inform me that she could not possibly achieve the quest given her as there was “stuff” in the way. Such stuff consisting of two wheeled devices – an unused dress rack and an empty garden waste bin – that could probably be moved aside using only the power of breathing hard upon them. I informed her of such because…well, because to see her suffer brings me joy.
She departed once again on her legendary journey with my wife’s keys. Five minutes later I wondered what was going on; I could still hear her, vocalising the depths to which her discomfort ran at this nadir we have come to in her enslavement to an uncaring parent; still hear things moving. So I put up the kitchen knife – with only the briefest of hesitations, I assure you – and ventured forth to ascertain what might be holding up what would otherwise seem a profoundly simple task. Lo! Not only have the two wheeled devices been moved but also several heavier items that to the untrained eye – that is, the eye untrained in the theatrics of complaint via the medium of props – would seem to have been far indeed from the path that needed to be cleared in order for the bins to be transferred from the back of the house to the driveway. Also, she had prepared to take the recycling bin; it wasn’t recycling night, a fact I had not conveyed to her because…well, because to see her suffer makes my heart sing.
I informed her that she could go, go with the garbage bin to the street and I would restore the gentle tranquility of the garage’s prior arrangements. I then locked the back door of the garage, shut the fron t door, went back into the house. Some hours later I once again repaired to the garage to put the car away for the night and lock the doors.
This morning, my wife calls me as I arrive in the office to ask me if I had seen her keys. No, I replied. But they must be somewhere because you went out yesterday but still managed to get back into the house, so clearly you unlocked the front door at some stage. Wherever could they be? Where, oh where? Where indeed, says tWM with affected innocence.
Where are they, we inquired of her because we know through bitter won experience that when tWM appears innocent, it actually means she is guilty of high crimes and misdemeanors.
Well, she replies, when His Heartlessness forced me to take the bins out, he forced me to take the keys and forced me to put them down while I moved things, he must have locked them in the garage. It is his fault. He might as well have held a gun to my head and forced me to throw them into the Pit of Doom in Mordor.
Lo! And I repented of my sins. Or at least I will. After I murder her. Or would it be self-defense, the defense of my sanity?
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# I should start a career as a screenwriter, develop a show about the Wild Monkey
Tonight there will be weeping, and gnashing of teeth. Actually, I am pretty sure the shirt rending and foot stamping has already commenced at school, but she won’t have as much fun with the antics until she gets home and unleashes it upon me.
Anyway; DISASTER!!
CALAMITY!!
HAIR FRIZZ!!
There was earlier this year some concern that the Big Dance Concert that tWM will no doubt be a lead performer in would clash with that other highlight of the social calendar, the Year Ten Formal. And before I go on, allow me to metaphorically chase young’uns off my lawn by pointing out that in my day, we didn’t have formals for Year Ten. And in my day there was a much larger percentage of the year actually leaving school that year for apprenticships, jobs and assorted dole-bludgery; thus a Year Ten Formal would have made more sense than it does these days when practically no-one leaves in Year Ten; therefore making the Year Ten Formal just another milestone in the ongoing seppoification of Australia.
Aaaaaanyway, reassurances were sought from the Dance Teacher that the concert was not going to be on the same day as the formal. Relief!
Until now. The school was moved the date of the formal. No, nothing as obvious and sympathy-generating as moving the formal to the date of the concert. No. It has been moved to a friday night, the night of the last class at the dance school before the concert. Upon hearing this, tWM proceeded to run down her phone credit with SMSs to D so angst ridden that Optus called us to complain that there was a sympo-morphic resonance occuring in their systems causing the SMS network to start dressing in black and theatrically running a straight razor across it’s flesh-belly-white wrists.
What a predicament. The school has cruely forced her to decide between the formal and the last dance class. Sure, it’ll be the first class she misses in twelve years of attendance at the dance school, but you’d think this would be a no-brainer, neh? Teenagers, eh!
Oh, and the Friday the formal is moved to? Dec 5th. Same day as the office Christmas party. This may be a good thing; saves me having to explain to all and sundry on the night that there never was any chance of me coming dressed as a Flintstones character.
UPDATE: And because the date moved, the appointment made with the hair dresser a couple of months ago obviously needs to be moved. Can’t be moved. The hair dresser is a family friend who called all of her bookings on the Friday to try and open up a slot, to no avail. And I quote: “I can’t even have one good night!”
