Under The Bus You Go.....

Just wanted to take a second at the start here to thank you all for humoring me and reading my blog.  I realize it's nothing special, just words used to describe the insanity that is staying at home with 3 boys, and having 4 boys over all.  But it means a lot that you would take a few minutes and share in that craziness, then offer suggestions, comments, and ask questions afterward.  Thanks to you guys my blog has had over 1,000 hits since January 1st. And it's been picked up and put up on a couple of sites where people can go and search for blogs.  I'll get the info out when I get the exact info myself.  But keep reading, keep commenting, asking questions, etc...   So now that I've taken 45 seconds of your life you'll never get back.  Let's dive into this entry...

I've discovered as I've said in the past that I am a master interrogator.  I can get my kids to crack in seconds when something has gone down.   It takes cunning, guile, intelligence, and a mean, stare a hole through your soul glare...  Or, it just takes two 4 year old children who don't want to get in trouble, so they throw the other under the bus.  Case in point today..  I went to put the Wii controller on the charger as I had noticed it starting to not respond.  I get out into the kitchen, place the controller on the charger, and wait for the glow of the comforting blue light to appear to let me know Wii usage is only a short time away...   A few seconds pass and no light...  So I sit there staring at it like I can control it with my mind.  Still no light,  I shake it because that's what most technically sound people do when faced with a technical problem.  No light..  I sit there and swat and paw at it like a mentally challenged bear, complete with grunting.  Again, no light...  Finally it dawns on me to take the controller off the charger (don't judge me, it's been a long morning).  I lift the controller off and what do I see?  The gold connectors that the controllers rest against to take their charge have all been pulled out and twisted...  And not like "oops I may have just bent that accidentally."  This was full out Lenny from Of Mice and Men, pet the bunnies and snap their necks, bent and twisted...
I loudly say "what the heck happened to the Wii charger?"   Both the twins come sprinting over and stop in front of me and look at me like deer in headlights.  Jonah goes "what happened dad, did YOU break the charger?"  I respond with "no... looks like someone was messing with it and twisted all the connectors on it, who could have done that?"    Josh instantly goes, "Jonah, it was definitely Jonah dad, why did he break it?"
Now, my powers of deduction have taught me over the last year or two that 98% of the time, the first twin to speak up and throw the other under the bus, is the true guilty party...  But to give him the benefit of the doubt, more like I wanted to see how far he'd bury himself, I say "oh, Jonah did it?"  Josh goes "yeah, he must have done it while you were sleeping at night..  Right...  So out of obligation and just to make sure it wasn't him I look at Jonah and say "Jonah, did you do it?"  He goes "it wasn't me dad, it was Joshy."  But in a way that wasn't panicked or sounded like a cover up.  So again, I turn my attention to Josh and sternly say "What did you do Josh?"  I realize that this sounds pretty accusatory but you'd be surprised at how easily and quickly kids spill the truth when you act like you already know what happened or that they did it.

Now Josh looks uncomfortable and I know I have him.  He's taken to doing this thing like detectives do in shows where they rub their chins while they think..  So I ask him again.  "What did you do Josh?  How did it get broken?"   He's rubbing his chin for a moment, stops, and goes.  "It happened while I was asleep..  I must have been sleeping and came down stairs and broke it.."   My mind instantly flies to the episode of Friends where Joey can't lie and tells stories of raccoon's being at fault..   Like this:

  
I stop him as he continues to ramble..   I say "Josh, please just tell me how you did it?"  And he starts rubbing his chin more, stops, and goes "I need help dad.."   That came out of left field....  Help with what I ask..  "With words dad, I need help with words."   I'm conflicted at this point..  I'm pretty angry, but I'm also trying to stifle laughter because he's so random and weird...  I become a little more stern "Josh, either tell me what you did and how you broke it or you will sit in time out for a very long time."    He looks up at me and goes "ohhh fine..."   The proceeds to make little pincers with his thumb and forefinger, and says, "the little tweezers, just used the little tweezers you know.."    No, I don't know...  We to my knowledge do not own tweezers in this household.  So it becomes apparent at this point that I'm NEVER going to find out how the charger was broken.  But I do know who broke it.  And I guess at this point that's enough for me.

They are amazingly quick to throw the other under the bus as I've said.  But what's funny is when I've caught something Caleb has done.  All three boys are sitting in the living room, and I come out and ask "who's done this???"  Knowing full well it was Caleb...    Instantly the boys turn on each other and start throwing the other under the bus..  Wow, talk about no honor among thieves..  They're willing to blame the other for things they had to have known they didn't do...  Then to top it off Caleb will pick a twin and blame him.   This past week, Caleb found it necessary to take my bar of soap and proceed to carve and gouge it with the sail from a toy boat with all the skill of a sculptor who's been hit in the head with a brick a few times...  So I get up one morning, stumble to the bathroom and see this bar of soap on the edge of the bath tub that looks like it suffered some horrific prison shower attack, and now lays mangled and disfigured, if you look closely you can still see the outline of what used to be a bar of soap.... But now only a heap of soap, deeply shanked and carved remains..  I don't think the soap saw it coming...  Probably for the best...  I ask Caleb why he would do that to my bar of soap..  He ponders it for a second and says "Oh, I thought it was mine..."
Ohhhh OK...  Because if it's yours it makes it ok to do that, and makes it less weird and creepy...  I reply with "No, that was MY soap, why did you do it?"   He sits back on the couch and looks up at me and shrugs and says " I was using the bathroom dad, I was reading a magazine and must not have realized what I was doing........"    Um.... WHAT?!?!?      At this point he's won,  not on account of telling the truth or giving a reasonable answer..  But on account that what he said was so off the wall weird that my head exploded everywhere...   I literally had to repeat what he said back to him, just to make sure I heard him correctly...  I say "you were using the bathroom,  and you were reading a magazine and didn't realize what you were doing??"   He looks at me dead pan and says "uh huh, Highlights.. I was reading Highlights."   Second explosion goes off in my head...   Still trying to grasp this I go over it with him, if anything to hopefully point out how ludicrous this really sounds...  I say "ok, you're in bathroom using it, you have a magazine at least in one hand, how do you carve a bar of soap with only one hand?  Because you have to hold the soap steady, then gouge, carve, and stab it with the other."   At this point I'm less concerned apparently with WHY he did it and more interested in the logistics of HOW he did it..    He sits there a second and then shrugs and says "I'm not really sure, maybe the magazine was on the edge of the tub or on the floor and I had my hands free?"   Ok, checkmate, you win..  This mental game of chess is over and I'm beat.  I realize I'm not going to get a straight answer out of him, let alone one that makes sense and doesn't make my head hurt.  I'm starting to think he knew what he was doing....  He figured, if I keep doing this verbal soft shoe with every question he asks, he'll eventually give up...   Well sir, well played...  If you played those chances, you win...   And I tip my hat to you..  Because at 9 years old, you managed to say just the right things to blow my mind and eventually give up because you're so weird and random...  Kinda proud... Kinda scared for the next 8-10 years to see what he cooks up as he gets older..  I have a feeling I am going to rapidly age once he hits 13-14 years old...

What have I gotten myself into?  The only child I have relative control over is Alex, the baby. And that's just because he doesn't move yet...  Outside of that he controls me too... Feed me, change me, entertain me, don't you dare leave the room fat man...  The other 3 I fear are smarter than me already...  My fear lay in them figuring this out...  When they figure out they're smarter than I am it's over..  Just like when they realize there are 3 of them and 1 of me...  I really think they're starting to realize this already..   They attack with the mindset "you might get one of us, but you can't get all of us.."  And usually by this time two of them have decided who the sacrificial lamb is going to be and do away with him and make their get away.    If I had hair it'd probably be gray.  But I think my hair could see the future and that I would have four boys, so it bailed on me by the time I was 21..  But that's another story for another day...

On a positive note, Detroit Tiger baseball is back!!  Spring Training for the entire team officially began today.  The Daytona 500 is this Sunday..  So the elements of spring are starting to pop up..  We just need to get rid of the foot and half of snow we have in our yard....

Anyway, my next blog will most likely be my annual baseball post.  Because I can never talk about baseball enough..  Love love love the game...

Until Then,
Be Well.....

P.S.  I just found these and really want to get them  for the boys...