The Funny Man

Connor says the funniest things sometimes. He's got a cool vibe. This past Christmas, when I was hangin' with my fam at New Year's, and Zen and the kids were at Ryan and Michelle's house, Zen and Ryan were out shopping for a game I think, and Ryan goes to Connor, "Hey, Dude!" and Connor goes, "My name's not Dude, it's Connor." Put it in a James Dean or John Wayne tone, and you get the idea. Ryan thought it was so funny, and that's why I have the story to tell.

Well, today, we accomplished the impossible, and made it to Church 20 Minutes EARLY. Yep, hell froze over today. It was only because we came early to practice a song for a choir performance. Believe me, being early didn't happen just randomly. Anyway, we got there, nobody's in the chapel yet, and Connor looks around and says, "Hey, it's closed!" I'm STILL laughing! Gets funnier the more I think about it. This is the kid who woke up one morning and said, "My butt's all cracky." I won't tell you his observation about the other side of his body in the morning. Even I have my limitations of what I can say, or write, in public.

And for an encore this evening, I found Emma five minutes after I'd finished bathing and dressing her for bed, wet from head to toe because Connor thought it would be fun to pour water on her. I tracked him down in the bathroom, standing in front of the toilet contemplating the universe while he decided to pee or not. "Why did you get Emma all wet, I just finished getting her ready for bed!" It's the redundant sort of irritated question a parent asks, not really wanting an answer. It's meant to induce guilt, and it's why kids developed the "I don't know" answer. They know saying anything else is kind of pointless. So he says something banal like, "Because," so I gave his naked little hiney a swat so he'll take me more seriously. He rolls his eyes at me and mumbles, "That did't hurt." For a few seconds I had a Mommie Dearest moment, and thought about swatting his butt a few more times, "I'll show you pain!" But I took a deep breath, tried not to giggle, which he noticed and said, "Yeah, it's funny!" So, I breathed again, put on a serious face, and said, "No, it's not funny. Don't do that to Emma, it hurts Mommy's feelings when you do things like that." The guilt card. Yeah, I played it. Sigh. Anyway, I left him there to contemplate things some more, and changed Emma's jammies.

That kid.

Here's a pictoral illustration from a little moment yesterday:

First he wanted to see pics on my camera which he took of Gil's friend, Ty, but I'd already deleted them because they were blurry. So he was all upset about that. And I tried to mollify him with pictures of himself, which he usually loves. But he was having none of that today. "No Mom, I want to see the pictures of Ty!"

No, not pictures of me.

Yep, for some reason we all thought it was funny to keep taking his picture.

Assaulted by the paparazzi. Yep, I've got a therapy savings account for my kids.

He came back later and wanted me to take pictures of his sad face. Weird kid.

I did the old, "Don't smile, you better not smile!" gag. Works every time.

You made me smile! We did this a few more times, and he was mostly over his tears. But he did this thing he does often where he continues on with this kind of fake whimpering for the next ten minutes, having normal conversation in between whimpers. It sounds so funny. I'll have to video tape it sometime.

End Post #75, 2009