Mornings Suck

This is my second day of summer hours and – as I fully expected – it’s killing me. My company does this wonderful/horrible thing in the summer. They give us the option of keeping “summer hours” where we work longer hours Monday –Thursday and half days on Friday. The wonderful part? Friday. The horrible part? Monday-Thursday. Normally I work 8:00 – 4:30, but in the summer, I’m 7:30 – 5:00 M-TH and 7:30 – 11:30. This means I have to get out of the house earlier, as if getting out in time to be here by 8:00 isn’t difficult enough.


My morning obstacles:

The boy. Because, you see, eleven year old boys are slow. Horribly, achingly, watch paint dry kind of slow. For those of you who have never had an eleven year old boy, let me present you with this mathematical equation to help you understand:

Eleven year old boy minutes ≠ real minutes

You see, eleven year old boy minutes are more like football minutes – they last much longer than actual minutes. How long does it take you to put on your socks and shoes? 3 minutes, tops? Well, in eleven year old boy minutes, that’s seventeen and a half minutes. There’s two minutes of sitting and doing nothing, two minutes of “looking for his shoes” (aka more doing nothing), there’s 30 seconds of “Put your socks and shoes on” “I am”. Then the next two minutes involve you leaving the room to get his sister’s stuff together and coming back in to discover that he has one sock on. Halfway.

Then there’s some more “Shoes and socks” “I am!. Then another two minutes of getting the other sock on. Next up comes “where are your shoes?” “I’m looking for them” “I thought you just looked for them” “that was my socks” “what do you mean – your socks were right next to you” “I’m sorry, mom” The tone on that last one implies that he is sorry not that he is so slow, but that he has an evil mother who makes him do terrible things like put his socks and shoes on. This takes another three and a half minutes.

The next five minutes involve leaving and entering the room several times, being dismayed about the lack of shoes being on feet, threats, acting put-upon, and finally, blessedly some shoes.

Add this to the fact that we have to go through this same routine with clothes, backpack, instruments, homework and karate gear, and you have Getting Ready With An Eleven Year Old Boy.

Next up – the girl. Now she’s a little easier, since she is usually sleeping when it’s time to go and I can pick her up and carry her out to the car. However, if she wakes up and notices that I have deigned to pack clothes for her (or shoes – oh God – especially the shoes) that do not live up to her standards for that day (which change daily, of course – what good is a predictable diva?), all hell will be breaking loose forthwith. A little fashion obsessed, stubborn, screamy princess bomb will be going off and you will be hit with the shrapnel. Watch out. This is where mind reading would come in handy.

Today, there was extra added fun, since my earlier days mean that mr b and I are getting ready at the same time. This would be fun on it’s own, but it’s super bonus fun because he watches me stress out over the morning routine (and I haven’t; even mentioned the disaster of a mess I found the boy’s room to be, after I washed and folded all of his clothes) and then tell me that I shouldn’t get stressed and upset, which is totally awesome of him, considering that he is not the one wrangling kids at the buttcrack of dawn, getting everyone ready and dropping them off at my parents’ house. And I especially love when I complain about running late and then he leaves, rather than perhaps take an extra five minutes and help me out. That’s my favorite. But I wouldn’t want him to miss his morning stop for coffee or cigarettes now would I?

The loser in all of this is me, because I always end up with either my hair or makeup in disarray or my clothes looking like an eleven year old boy dressed me. Today, for instance, I am wearing a dress that – when standing – looks OK. But since I have lost weight, it turns out that when I sit, the cleavage drops a good two inches. So I am spending the day looking like Boobula Von SagginHooters, Crown Princess of Titswana. Hot!

And since I already get up at StillLastNight O’Clock, the first person that tells me to just get up earlier gets punched in the face.