times and pi

Sometimes, as I sit and ponder life or drive around pondering life or try to sleep and ponder life I am a little surprised but the weirdness of it all. Everything feels weird to me most of the time. I don't understand it. Why do I think it's weird that at any given moment of the day I can hear someone mowing their lawn? I have never noticed incessant lawn mowing before I moved here and I wonder why I notice it now.

Amelia calls it "mow lawing" and honestly, I could die from the cute.

I think my kids are weird and I think my husband is weird and I think my siblings are weird and my parents get weirder by the day.

I know I am weird, but I always knew that.

This morning Holden was outside with the dog and when he came inside the door, 2 feet from me, the dog tripped him and he fell. I laughed real hard-like. He just cried. I asked him why he couldn't laugh at funny things and he asked me why I had to laugh at him?

I know the answer to that. Two things make me laugh uncontrollably. When others have the hiccups and people falling. I apologized but asked him to keep in mind that I will laugh if people fall. That's just the way I am.

He can be mad at God for that but he can't be mad at me.

Side note: Once my mum fell off the couch and mercy, the laughing was inexplicable.

I wanted to show Holden that it's funny when people fall and it's okay to laugh at yourself. I tried to find the clip on You Tube of Chandler Bing falling behind the couch at Central Perk. The same clip that made me laugh till I cried many moons ago. I think about it on occasion. It used to be really easy to find on YouTube. Now, not so much. And I couldn't be bothered searching for it.

So, he never did come to appreciate the funny-ness of falling. Poor kid is so weird.

Anyway, I have a 12 year old son whom I simply do not understand at all. He is going to make some very lucky woman consistently frustrated one day. He is the one child I exhaust myself trying to get along with. He has terrible problem solving skills and will ask me the most inane questions, which frustrate me. The other day we had a chat about him trying to solve his problems before he asks me things like "Have you seen that thing?" or "Where is the linen closet?"

Are you serious? Like the closet moves on occasion and maybe is hard to locate today? What the????

Last night, I was hiding in my room and he came in and said this: "I need a calculator for my math final tomorrow."

Me: "Okay." I'm refusing to ask the questions I want to ask which I know will annoy him and most likely cause a fight. So I sit quietly in the hopes he'll throw me a bone.

He stares at the floor for what seems like enough time to solve global warming issues or the war on terrorism. Finally he looks at me and says, "I don't know what to do."

"Neither do I, son. Neither do I."

So let's get this straight, shall we, it's June, which means he's been in school for ten months already in this current year. It's the night (a Sunday which equals no shopping in our house) before the final and he declares that now, finally, after ten months, he needs a calculator?

I don't understand. I can't help it, I need to ask the questions.

"What happened to the calculator I bought you in September?"

"You never bought me one." This is a lie but I don't say anything because I am certain it will ignite WW3 and plus it's obviously lost.

"What have you been using up until this point?"

"My teachers calculator."

I want to ask "Why are you waiting until now to tell me this?" But I know better.

So instead I say, "Hmmmmmm, it's a conundrum."

To which he responds with further staring at the floor. He knows I want him to work this out but I can see he doesn't have a clue. I'm going to have to throw him a bone. But I sit for a few more minutes.

"Can I take your phone?" He says in the hopes that this idea might be deemed genius. It is not genius and I merely raise my eyebrows. "Never mind, we're not allowed to do that."

I see panic set in and I see that clearly he needs his mama so I told him to go google Walmart store hours and if they open early enough he'll have to ask his dad to take him there, buy him a calculator and then drive him to school.

Relief floods over him and he sets off for a visit with the Google. Which I end up having to do myself because clearly they don't teach them how to google stuff at school. The kid couldn't get it to save his life.

Open at 7. School starts at 7:45. It will work. He finds his father and presents his plan, which only leads to more questions asked by dad to which I clarified things because without the mama to translate things get real crazy up in here.

Dad says yes and also, "what kind of calculator do you need, son?"

Jack says, "Oh, just an easy one. One with times and Pi."

Times and Pi? It's no wonder the kid can't find the linen closet.