The Look

The boys had a stomach bug the other day. We were woken at 5am on Sunday morning to the pleasant sounds of Monkey Boy screeching at the top of his lungs because he had just vomited all over himself and his bed.


I should include the background.  The previous night we had a recreation of the boy who cried wolf story. If for any reason either of the boys do not fancy whatever we give them for dinner they immediately develop a pain in their tummy. I wasgiving the boys spaghetti on Saturday night and Monkey Boy started complaining about such a pain. I duly ignored him and kept shovelling spaghetti into his mouth. After scooping up said spaghetti (half digested) off his sheets I had a long chat with Monkey Boy about how important it is to only say you have a pain when it is true.

Anyway, Sunday morning we cancelled our plans to visit Aunty Lemons and settled down for a day of quarantine and starvation. It wasn’t long before Fat Chops was begging for breakfast but I couldn’t give it to him and he wasn’t at all happy about it. I gave them a drink and set them up in front of the TV to distract them and sat in the kitchen because I felt horrible for denying them food – even though the rational part of my brain knew that it was the best course of action for someone with a tummy bug.

They forgot about food as they entered the TV trance and I was left alone for a good hour until the DVD ended. Then the pestering started in earnest. They begged for breakfast, or something nice or toast or anything and eventually I agreed to get them a cup of tea. They love tea and I thought it would keep them quiet for a while but I couldn’t put milk in it because of the bug. I brought them two cups of black tea and Monkey Boy started protesting straight away saying the he didn’t want “red tea” but Fat Chops took his, said thank you and smiled. He didn’t taste it though.

I went back out to the kitchen and sat down. Not long afterwards Fat Chops came out, stood in front of me and GLARED. Hannah gives a great dirty look and having had my fair share over the years, I am somewhat desensitized to the effects. This was a dark, dark look though. He was very clearly wishing great pain upon me at that moment in time. He then went and placed his cup, very gently, on the table. He went back, stood in front of me, looked at the cup with withering disdain and then gave me the GLARE again. He didn’t say a word but the message was clear “F*** you! I can’t f**king believe that you tried to pass off that sh**ty tea on me!!!”

Then he walked out having not said a word. I felt terrible!

Fat Chops' Revenge

Fat Chops has a little bit of a temper.  Nothing major but when things aren't going his way, he will make sure that you (and anyone else with a 50 metre radius) knows all about it.  Even knowing that he doesn't suffer fools I was surprised by his outburst on Friday.

I picked them up and when we pulled up outside the house the boys asked if they could play on the green area outside our house with some of the other children that were out there.  It was a lovely late summer evening and I thought they should make the most of it so I sent them across the road.  Then I went to bring my bag into the house and when I came out Monkey Boy was crying as if he had been shot by a sniper and Fat Chops was hurling abuse at the kids that they wanted to play it not two minutes earlier.

I assumed that one of the kids had pushed Monkey Boy and Fat Chops was fighting his corner.  I ran over to console Monkey Boy and when Fat Chops had finished venting he started bawling crying too.  Eventually I calmed Monkey Boy down enough for him to tell me that the kids had told them they weren't allowed play with them because they were babies.  This was all it took for Monkey Boy to be completely heartbroken and for Fat Chops to be alternately heartbroken/furious.  Well, mostly furious.

I brought them inside and told them not to worry about it we were going to go out somewhere nice anyway.  Monkey Boy soon calmed down and started to play something else.  Fat Chops began to plot.

"I'm going to punch them bold boys in the stomach!"
"I'm going to squeeze them until their blood squirts out!"
"They are bold $%^&"! ^%$$£*!!!"

I don't even know what names Fat Chops was trying to call them but the tone was clear.  They were not on the Christmas card list any more.

I will often play a game with the boys where I ask them to show me their angry/happy/sad face and Fat Chops has always done a good angry face but this was different.  He meant every word of those threats and given half a chance would do his best to follow through.

He knows how to hold a grudge too, we were coming home a couple of hours later (a lifetime to a three year old) and he was still bemoaning how those kids had "ruined his life" and what he was going to do to teach them a lesson.

I'll be sleeping with one eye open if I ever have occasion to upset him!!

Fat Chops and Monkey Boy go to playschool.

There were no tears.  It was quite the opposite.  They got out of the car and walked to the playschool chanting “Gynnis, Glynnis” (the name of their teacher).   I like to think that it’s because they are well adjusted boys that were brought up in a loving environment but it might have something to do with the fact that we regularly leave them with anyone who will take them off our hands for a couple of hours.

Once they got inside the door, they vanished from Hannah’s side and went to play with the other kids.  The school sent out a letter with advice for the parents on how to reduce the potential trauma of leaving your children in a strange place.  One of the tips was to make sure that you said goodbye before they left and reassured them that you would be back to collect them soon.  With this in mind, Hannah went searching for them in the melee.  Again there were no tears, no worrying.  Fat Chops response can be roughly paraphrased as “whatever!” and Monkey Boys’ was something along the lines of “you interrupted my game for THIS???”

I think their childminder took it the hardest.  Hannah took a couple of days off to bring them so the childminder was at a loose end.  She was so curious to see how they got on that she arrived at finishing time to say hello.  I think it shows how lucky we are to have someone who is genuinely interested in our children and not someone who is just doing it purely for the money.  If anyone ever asks what our child minder is like, the best way that I can describe it is that our boys have three grannies.