First occurrence: “Close the door, honey.”
Second occurrence: “Close the door or all the cold air will rush out.”
Third occurrence: “Close the door.”
Twentieth occurrence: “Close the door!”
“Maybe if you didn’t always gripe about it I’d be more likely to do it!”
Mine’s 15. I just took him back to boarding school yesterday, but he’s been home for 8.5 weeks with no school and only volunteer work.
My lovely child, if I ask you do do the dishes and you take the time to run water in the sink and put in the soap and stand there, could you actually, you know, wash them? I mean, get the stuff off the dishes? Because warm, wet, soapy dishes with stuck on food are STILL DIRTY! ARGH!
See also Instructions for a 15 year old:
- Run water in the sink.
- Hot water
- With dish soap
- Use the sponge.
- Actually, in your hand, pick it up and run it over the dish
- Look at the dish…
etc. ARGH!
Also, speaking of water, why oh why can’t the bathroom floor be cleared of the water that is all over it after you took a shower? Seriously? I mean, first of all, you must shower like the dog has a bath, that is to say, shaking yourself vigorusly everytime water comes near your body, or it wouldn’t look like we keep a lawn sprinkler in there, but if you do that (whatever floats your boat, man) just wipe it up. Please. You KNOW I’m going to yell. You know I will most probably fine you from your allowance for it, don’t you LIKE spending money? GAH!!!
Don’t eat in your room means don’t eat in your room. I don’t care what you eat (I expect 300 dollar grocery bills from a rugby playing, running, weightlifting 15 year old). I don’t care if you eat a lot of food. I care that you eat it in your room, so don’t. Your computer is tiny, bring your game to the kitchen and stuff your face there. The bill for the exterminator when we had roaches and a RAT!!! in your room cause you hid old food and candy there was huge. Plus, yanno, a RAT!! I mean, damn!
Finally, please, my wonderful boy remember to take your keys OUT of the door when you’ve unlocked it to come home. Because if they go missing again it will be the fourth time I’ve rekeyed the locks and I am on a first name basis with the locksmith. $200 bucks a pop for that. STOP leaving your keys in the front door, don’t you LIKE spending money? I want to give you money, but instead you have to pay me back for stuff. Then you mope. Stop mopeing!!
He’s a great kid, and he was keen to go back to school this year so he could play rugby (and oddly so we could talk about getting him into a higher math class) and I miss him when he’s not here but DAMN child. Just, you know, stop that!