Just wait until your father gets home

Tonight was a turning point for me, I surprised and disappointed myself, I used the ultimate ridiculous threat.

Twin boy and I had a falling out.  He was so naughty that I couldn’t even shout.  In fact I went to the other extreme and used my super quiet growl, the one that sets the dogs hair on edge.

In fact my choices were use the growl or attempt a Homer and Bart moment.   Because of the laws around choking your child in the UK I found the growl more appropriate for the occasion however I think Homer’s infamous choking hold may have offered me more satisfaction.
(Again its a crime to do it people but not to think it!)

But do you know even the super scary mum growl is completely ineffective against twin boy.  He just doesn’t care about getting into trouble.  As I crouched down on his level (just as Jo Jo says to) explaining why his behaviour (not him just his sodding behaviour) was bang out of order he merely grinned like an imp and swung his hips whilst trying to turn his jumper into Batman’s cape. 

“Sorry mum”. I heard from somewhere inside his top, in a voice that clearly wanted to say “am only sorry I got caught and let’s speed up the telling off bit as twin girl is pretending to be The Joker downstairs and I need to zap her with my supercool invisible gun.”

“It’s not good enough.” I retorted trying to extract his head through an arm hole.

But he’d gone, in the few short seconds I had lost eye contact twin boy had forgotten what had made me so cross and instead he was off in his own fantasy land fighting baddy mummies who wouldn’t let him play.

However I have lost my childhood ability to pop off to Neverneverland at a moments notice and was still bloody furious; so I began to list my punishments, intending originally to only issue one but since my clever clogs five-year old had an answer for everything I decided to add a few more.

“No scooter for a week.” Me
“You said it would rain anyway” TB

“No watching Batman for a month.” Me
“I’m Batman I don’t need to watch me, zap zap baddy mummy.” TB

“Fine, no chocolate for a year.” Me in a slightly high pitched tone
“Don’t like chocolate anyway I’ll have sweets.” TB in a normal I don’t care what you say voice.

“Fine, I am telling your father what you did.” Me

Silence

More silence

Silence broken by wails of remorse and full begging on his knees for me to keep his naughtiness a secret!

Well I don’t get it.  Firstly how have I run out of decent punishments so that I have had to play the dad card and secondly when did he who helped create them turn into something to fear?

I want to be feared! 

I get laughed at and mocked and zapped by a supercool invisible gun.  He who helped create them has done nothing to earn this reputation, I have put hours of practice into my different shouts and growls, and it seems I am merely a spectre of ridicule; not even fit to play a real Batman baddy.  But he who helped create them he gets star billing.  He is the equivalent of Voldemort to Harry, Darth to Luke, Robbie Rotten to that pink haired chick.

Note to self: must try harder

Second note to self: use the line ‘just waits till your father gets home with caution, don’t over use it, it seems to bloody well work!’

Sorry to bother you Santa…

Dear Santa,

How you doing old man?

Stressed I imagine?  I have to say respect to you for still managing to ho, ho, ho throughout December.  If I were you I would send all these letters back return to sender.  How often do you get mail January to November and then suddenly everyone wants a piece of you when the snow starts to fall.  And does anyone, apart from meals on wheels, ever pop in to see how you are doing?  It must be lonely since Mrs Claus ran off with that elf.

It’s snowing over in blighty at the moment; I bet that has you off ho-ing.  Whole bloody country has ground to a halt and not one person has even thought of asking you about the magic sledge.  Could be a second income for you, hiring out the sleigh for a fee, you could even charge extra for you to drive,  ask for cash in hand though or the tax for working your bollocks off doing two jobs barely makes it worthwhile.  I am sure you would appreciate the alternate conversation instead of “Santa can I have” you will get some pearlers like “what time are you on to?” and “been busy?”

I have a question, how do you decide who goes on the naughty list and who is on the nice.  Is it an immediate cut off point or do you have exceptions to the rule.  For example my son bit his sister this morning which to me is a naughty offense, but to be honest if you rock up on Christmas eve with only presents for her the next day is going to be utterly unbearable so can we leave it that I’ll deal with him and you can carry on building his skateboard?  Also when considering adults on the list do you look at the stresses they are currently under?  I mean I only murmured ‘little shits’ the other day and I am sure the kids didn’t hear me.  Yes, I know it not nice to call your children names at the best of times particularly ones which are ‘bad’ words but the little shits had used all my Jo Malone bath oil and soaked the bathroom in their attempt to make a Harry Potter potion.    They were hoping to turn invisible, sadly it didn’t work.

Anyway I have sent the kids lists to you up the chimney.  Well actually we placed them on the electric fire as we don’t have a chimney and when the kids weren’t looking I whipped them off and stuck a stamp on and posted them to you.  See you didn’t have to make a house call so I saved you a job; hopefully you can start scribbling my name back on the good list?

Anyways, let’s presume all is good between us so this year I only want two things please, can I have a bag full of patience, I lost mine last year and life is pretty hard without it.  Also my libido has stopped working since I had three kids so can I have a new one or you can have a bash at fixing the old one.  Cheers Santa.

Oh one last thing, I know you are busy but Movember has ended, you can lose the tash!

Merry Christmas

NorthernMum