Monday, January 15, 2007

Ave, Caesar, morituri te salutamus. ("Hail, Caesar, we who are about to die salute you.")

Seg’s new favorite word: Shit.

Fuck.

Also, everything that comes out of Seg’s mouth at the moment is a whine, right out of the gate. There’s no escalation because he’s being ignored or denied, it just automatically emerges as a whine, and more often than not, a LOUD crying sort of whine. I am at my wits’ end.

On the other hand, Primo doesn’t even need the flimsiest excuse anymore to poke, prod, pinch, punch, trip, smush, or hipcheck Seg. His new favorite thing to do is snatch Seg’s beloved baseball hat off his head and throw it somewhere semi-inaccessible, like behind the couch or down the laundry chute.

Here’s how stir-crazy *I* have become: I snapped at Terzo this morning, “I don’t WANT to read your book right now. Can’t you watch TV with your brothers?” (In my defense, I had already read both Duck is Dirty and The Wiggles Learn about Shapes about sixteen thousand times before breakfast.)

I pin the main impetus behind all this insanity to the rain – the seemingly never-ending, cold, dreary rain that has been pissing down for almost six straight days now. My backyard is a mudpit, everything feels clammy, and we haven’t seen the sun in way too long.

Today’s plan, because we are all off school due to MLK Day, is to get some of the yayas out: we are meeting some other moms and kids at the church to take advantage of the wide-open space of the parish hall, to play some soccer or football and run around like loonies. Then I promised my boys a special-treat lunch at McDonald’s, the one with the giant indoor Habitrail, er, playground, to finish off the rest of the yayas while I plug away at The Emperor’s Children which I am finding tough going because there is not single character I give a shit about in the least. (Holy run-on sentence, Batman!) Anyway, they’re all self-absorbed assholes, and the writing is self-consciously convoluted. I will give it a few dozen more pages and then it will be put aside for Intuition.

9 comments:

Joke said...

And yet you stubbornly refuse to develop an opium habit as I have suggested.

-J.

Anonymous said...

I feel the same way about The Emperor's Children. Ugh! I put it aside about a month ago and have had no desire to pick it up again.

lazy cow said...

I've heard that about the Emperor's Children but still have it on reserve at the library and will give it a go.
Urgh, wet, clammy weather. We're having scorching 'total fire ban' days where it is agony to be outside. I'm thinking movies (Charlotte's Web?) or library (so I can get Saffy's Angel?)
And, as for the whining? Welcome to my world. The Boy could whinge for Australia, and the Girl does her best to foster that. Sigh.

Anonymous said...

OMG - I just gave up on it this weekend and began the first book of the Lytton trilogy. When I'm a quarter of the way into a book and I still am rolling my eyes at the characters, it's time to move on.

Thanks for the recommendations for the Lytton books.

Gina said...

The only character I cared about even remotely was Annabelle, and you don't get nearly enough of her. The rest of the characters are just types and short hand. Blech.

Anonymous said...

Life is too short to read books you don't like. If I'm not enjoying it by page 50, I don't read any more.

I'm reading "A Morbid Taste for Bones" per your rec, and I'm liking it. They just discovered the murder. Too bad I have to do things like cook dinner and take care of the children when all I really want to do is read.

Suse said...

Son #3's default voice is Whine. How can the word 'mum' contain four syllables, I ask you? Every time he opens his mouth to speak these days I jump in quickly with 'Say it in a loving voice'. Sometimes works.

We're going crazy indoors too but not from rain, from heat. Too hot to move, go outdoors, cook, play, move, breathe, did I mention move?

Sarah Louise said...

ooh look, it's snowing!!! (says SL, who lives .5 miles from Babs.) (Yes, overnight, the weather changed, BIGTIME!!)

That is a fab idea to run around the church hall!! Hope that got some of the yayas out!!

Could I recommend Vive La Paris? (Yes, it's a kid's book, but I have already started reading it over again. It's wonderful!!)

Caro said...

It's not the rain.

I was thinking today how badly I needed a vacation from every living thing in this house.

I want to spend a whole day, make that weekend, where I don't have to feed anybody else or listen to anybody whine, spouse included.

Wanna run away with me?

And SJ was singing so sweetly the other day, kind of an aimless "la la la" tune, only when you listened very closely, he was singing, "fucky fucky fuck fucken' fucky fuck."

If you need me, I'll be burning in hell.