Animals' cruelty

I love cats. And dogs. And bunnies and all nice fluffy, cuddly animals.

The only one I currently own - also known as The (Stupid) Cat - is a very welcomed addition to my household. That is my opinion, and for sure not my husband's.

Despite this, in many occasions I get to philosophize - usually this happens between 2 and 4 am, so bear with me, the quality of the philosophical part of my internal monologue might be slightly questionable:

• Is the clock showing the right hour or I am dreaming?
• How many times did The Cat wake me up already? Is The Cat inside and wants to go out or the other way around? What door should I open - it's f... dark outside and I only hear some scratching, no idea if from upstairs or downstairs?
• Does The Cat realize it is asking to be nicely kicked out of the house at -5 degrees for no reason whatsoever?
• What does The Cat try to express when climbing on my curtains at 2 am? 
• Why don't I wear any slippers so that I can throw one towards The Cat's head? Maybe I should buy some and just keep them next to my bed?
• Should I finish the beer I still have in my glass because I was too tired to finish it last night? Oh, it's 5 am so might not be a good idea to start the day with a beer. Or would it?...
• Does The Cat communicate with the children on a hidden channel and only wakes us up at 5-6 when the children sleep later than usual?
• How come when the children wake up at 6, The Cat seems abnormally tired and it's not even moving from the bed - making it difficult for me to go and stop the screaming kid from waking his brother?

All this brings me to the idea that there is such thing as animal's cruelty.

Might be a stretch, but what if they just hate our guts and find ways to show it to us and we are too dumb to get it? Or they just want to get even. Either way, it's working.

Five years old wisdom: love and kids

My son has a girlfriend. Here is a sentence I hoped I would not write (or think about) for the next 10 years or so. Because he is five and a half. And because he is practically going steady, as they have been friends for more than 2 years now.

They are planning on living in a house in the trees. He recently told me that they want to have only one child, as it is too difficult to deal with two. I wonder how he figured that one out :-D

Then things got weird.

*Disclaimer: the opinions that follow are in no way my own - especially since I suspect the girl's parents might be reading this*

He said that the child will be a boy, but should not be like his little brother - hey, I get you, dude, your brother is at times a major pain in the a#@ - and so are you, but who's judging?
Anyway, back to the weird part: he proceeded to tell me that he wants a boy because boys are more intelligent than girls. To my utter disbelieve accurately described by a "huh!?" he explains that girls believe in princesses. So I am still in my WTF moment and say "but princesses do exist, unlike Transformers and dinosaurs'. That might have been my mistake as he ended the argument with "but dinosaurs existed and Transformers might exist, what do you know?" and moved to another topic.

I conclude that:

1. I am stupid because I read romantic novels and some might mention princes and princesses; 
2. I am an inept mother who convinced her kid that two children are too difficult to manage; and 
3. I failed miserably to prove to a five year old that girls'/women's IQ is not below men's. 

Despite all this, my son has a girlfriend and he tells me he loves me, even if we are both - me and the girlfriend - inferior human (!) beings, so I still believe that all is ok in the world. Just one more proof that love is blind and hopeless.

"How do you know" series: Tiredness

To follow the "how do you know?" series I was not aware I started here (that time it was 'how do you know you're losing your mind') - I'm now trying to understand how do you know you are too tired to function.

I knew I was in that case on day when I was taking a nap in my dorm room at the University (how wonderful we had time to do that back then!). When I woke up I remember that while I was sleeping, someone dropped by, I had gotten up, opened the door, talked to her, then went back to sleep. It was awesome that I remembered that part, ‘cause I had no freaking idea what we had talked about. At least I remembered who the person was and went to tell her I had been basically sleep-walking when talking to her.

Then again, during my University years, I had joined a summer course with a student association and the organizers were actually killing us. It was a two weeks course, with real classes at the University in the morning (starting from 9, so wakeup call was at 7!) & in the afternoon, and then... the fun began. All evening and night it was party time. You know the 'work hard, party hard' thing? They lived by it. You had no chance in h@$% to go to sleep before 3 or 4 am (and they cleaned after that! I don't know how they did it). After one week in this rhythm I remember I did not know what language I spoke (we were students from all over Europe, so it was supposed to be English), I did not remember much of what I was studying and probably I made no sense at all. I know that at the end of the two weeks, during the exam - yeah, we had one of those - I just finished it as fast as I could so that I could get some sleep right there in the classroom. Those were the days!

Back to current times... why did I bring this on? Of course, I have two active sons and blah blah, I am so tired... but it's actually not that. It's stupid, really. For no specific reason, a couple of days ago I realized I have reached the bottom again: after waking up (if we can call it that), I went to get my toothbrush and then got back to bed to brush my teeth. 

QED

Conversations with a 5 years old (aka Innovation, as good as it gets)

Him: I want to invent a machine that works when the electricity fails.
Me: hmm... what would it look like? (thinking: oh boy, the innovation gene strikes again)
Him: like a box with a green button... and a red one...
Me: ok... (thinking: I can zone out now, should be safe enough, just keep agreeing with him)
Him: ... .... (blah blah I don't listen to...)... and then there will be a white button
Me: ah really, a white one?
Him: yes, right next to the yellow one!
Me: oh. Right. (thinking: wtf? there was a yellow one I missed somewhere?)
and this goes on and on...
... and I zone out again...
Him: and then the problem is to put a sign saying we have a box that saves you when there is no electricity.
Me: Riiight. (thinking: so now I'm selling boxes to save people from lack of electricity. And I need a marketing plan)
Him: Yup, we'll just put a sign to say this. But then I think the bubble is a better one.
Me: What? What bubble?
Him: the motorcycle bubble!
Me (remembering THAT conversation): Oh yes, so it won't rain on you.
Him: yes, it's a better invention, don't you think?
Me: I totally agree. (thinking: Note to self: throw away every other sock from his wardrobe so that he can match the mad scientist image - my sister in law figured him right)

Maybe if I act like that...

How many ways to feel you're losing it are there?
I wonder, as I get the feeling quite often. And for various reasons, not for doing the same dumb thing over and over again. At least I am creative.

A simple example, of which I already talked on this blog: I feel I am losing my mind when I see (my) socks everywhere in the house. Every.f@$%ing.where. And I am the one leaving them there, there’s no mysterious creature spreading socks around my house.
When I am using ten cooking pots to make one dish of food.
Or when I am ironing twenty t-shirts for one kid.
I remember ironing my jeans when I was at the University. My roommate pointed out that, even though I am usually and no longer surprisingly crazy, it seems that love does weird things to me. Yes, I was very much in love with someone at that time. Not sure that was the reason, but a good excuse all in all.

Going even further back in time, I remember studying for the famous Baccalaureate. I knew I have totally lost it when I realized I was looking at three different books at the same time (I think it must have been Maths, Literature and Physics...). I went as far as thinking that I grasped some Universal truth, that all of it makes sense and they are deeply related. And then I closed all the books and left for the beach.

I'm in a similar situation now, as I realize I am reading several books at once. I have one on my Kindle and not sure how many - do I even know how to count up to there? - close to my bed. And I read some pages from one, and then move to another and so on. I think there's smoke coming out of my ears. Might be just the heat, though.

So what I think I'll do, as it's raining and I have no hope of going to the beach and leaving the mess at home, is that I will focus on one and write here something about it. Then move to the next. Hopefully it will stay in a state of almost-controlled-mess for a while. Or I'll just feel I am losing my mind. Several times a day anyway.

I realize quantity is getting to me. It's not about one pair of socks, one t-shirt, one casserole or one book. It's about many. Lots.Tons.
That does it.