Now that I have your attention, I shall explain. “The boy” is how my husband and I refer to our daughter’s boyfriend. Since the two of them started dating (Nov, I think?) he’s tried so hard to do stuff to win our favor. He’s almost puppy-dog-like in his eagerness to please.
So today, I gave him his chance. There’s a willow tree outside our back fence. One particularly heavy branch hung over and leaned against the top of the fence. Because the tree is growing in the conservation easement, I’d need to get permission to remove it, but I can prune it back. I have a chain saw. I have “the boy” champing at the bit to win favor. What more could I want?
He came over after work dressed in grubbies and ready to go. I double-checked that he’d used a chainsaw before, then showed him how ours worked. We discussed how to proceed - which small limbs would be cleared so he could get to the big branch. I turned off the electric fence (no sense zapping him) and after we put on insect repellent, we began.
Ah, the joys of teenage boys with power tools! I was impressed that he was careful - I was afraid he might be a bit reckless. He cut and I cleared. When he finished cutting, he helped me finish clearing. Then I raked, and he put the saw away. All told, 15 minutes.
I sent him to the guest bathroom (he brought clean clothes with him - that surprised me) and I took my dirty self to my shower. The tree is pruned, “the boy” earned points, and I got to start a thread with a suggestive title.
Good job FairyChatMom! I wish my ex’s parents were more like you. I made similar attempts at gaining favor but they just kind of hid from me and blew me off and then complained that I never came around.
True enough. Exgineer would have settled for a six pack of MGD, whilst “the boy” is now out there somewhere, performing various illegal acts on your innocent child.
Ex, you curried lots of favor with your poetry and haiku. But if you ever get the uncontrollable urge to visit Florida and do yardwork, I’ll give you my number.
Coldfire, “the boy” and my daughter are in the living room watching TV. He’ll be going home in 15 minutes - it’s a school night after all! And anyway, she can kick his butt and he knows it, so I’m not too concerned about unspeakable acts…
Now, now, in Coldie’s defense, he’s not posing as a beer snob. He’s saying you drink piss beer. Two completely different things.
Oh, and FCM, excellent parenting job. Not so much the free labor aspect of it, though that’s good too. No, I’m admiring the subtlety with which you’re telling the boy “we have a chainsaw, and it cuts real good.”
Ex, you don’t have to worry about me offering you cheap beer. I don’t drink beer, therefore I don’t have any in the house. But I’ll put on my June Cleaver apron and pearls and make you some nice lemonade and cookies…
Wood, huh? I dunno, maybe he’s miswired. When I logged off my computer last night, he was playing computer games on her machine and she was playing “Fur Elise” on her keyboard. Does it get any more wholesome than that?!?
ROFL! I thought about the chainsaw thing too while reading FCM’s OP. I had this picture of FCM and “the boy” out in the back yard, with her revving up the chain saw and saying, “See, boy, I know how to use this reeeeeeeeeeal good!”
I, too, have the feeling that “the boy” knows perfectly well that ThePerfectChild [sup]TM[/sup] could beat the crap outta him anytime she so desired.
The pain is mine. Sunday, I was shoveling and moving dirt to fill in some doggie-dug holes. Yesterday, I weed-whacked and mowed the yard before “the boy” showed up to play lumberjack.
Did I mention it was over 90-degrees out these last 2 days (and today too) and that the conservation easement behind our house is actually a wetlands area, and it’s kinda soggy and buggy?
Oh yes, the pain is in my shoulders.
Or do you refer to something else, GMR? Am I missing a subtle naughtiness? Or are you somehow aware that her computer chair is a torture device that’s been banned by many a Human Rights Commission?
So, then, what other tasks can I lay upon the lad? I have to install a section of fence - dare I trust him with a posthole digger?
