Full Charge

I’ve decide that Troy is like an iPhone battery. He tries to run it completely down before recharging it. Except instead of a battery, he does that with his bladder. Every time I ask him to go potty, he refuses. It’s not until he’s holding his wee-wee and dancing that he finally decides enough is enough. And then, it’s about a fifty-fifty chance that he’ll actually make it before he pees on himself.

Upset

Me: “What’s your dragon’s name?”

Troy: “He doesn’t have a name.”

Me: “Well, you have to give him a name, so he knows he’s loved.”

Troy: “If you give him a name, he’ll be upset.”

Me: “Okay, we’ll call him ‘upset.’”

Troy: “Nooo!”

Me: “But you just said he’ll be ‘upset.’”

Troy: “Exactly! If you give him a name, then he’ll be upset.”

Me: “That’s why I’m calling him ‘upset.’”

Troy: “Dada, you are not making the correct choice.”

Doctor Suckers

Troy: “Dada, did you get this sucker from the doctor’s office?”

Me: “No, why?”

Troy: “It tastes like it came from the doctor.”

Me: “How would you know it came from the doctor? How does a sucker from the doctor taste differently from a sucker from home?”

Troy: “The suckers from the doctor taste like gummy bears.”

Me: “Got it. If it tastes like gummy bears, the. It came from the doctor. So, does that sucker taste like gummy bears?”

Troy: “No.”

Me [laughing]: “Well, then why would you’d think it came from the doctor?”

Troy: “Because you just went to the doctor yesterday.”

Me: “That was last week, and it was the dentist. I don’t think the dentist would be giving me a sucker.”

Troy: “Oh.”

Me: “What flavor did you get anyway?”

Troy: “Coffee.”

Me: “Let me see.”

Troy [showing me the wrapper]: “See.”

Me: “That’s root beer, and it most definitely does NOT taste like coffee. How would you even know what coffee tastes like? You’ve never had it.”

Troy: “I don’t know.”

Me: “Do you want to know what coffee tastes like?”

Troy: “Yes.”

Me: “Dirt. Do you remember that time you were playing in the backyard and got mud in your mouth?”

Troy: “Yes.”

Me: “That’s what it tastes like. Wet dirt. I’m pretty sure coffee grounds actually come from the dirt under the plants where the grubs live.”

Troy: “That’s disgusting!”

Me: [imitating the wolves from the Storks movie] “I agree, I agree, I agree!”

Troy [licking his sucker several times very quickly]: “It tastes like flowers!”

Blueberry Pretzels

Troy: “I am very disappointed, dada!”

Me: “Why, bud? What’s wrong now?”

Troy: “You didn’t put blueberry pretzels in the bag. You should have put blueberry pretzels in the bag!”

Me: “Sorry, but I couldn’t. There weren’t anymore left. You ate them all the other day.”

Troy: “Well, you should have gotten some more and put them in the bag. I’m very disappointed, dada.”

Me: “Well, I’m sorry you’re disappointed.”

Troy: “I guess I’ll eat the cheesy bunnies today. But I wanted pretzels. Not good, dada. Not good.”

Sharing is NOT Caring

Ever since we’ve been back from our trip to Greece, Troy has had a stuffed up nose and congestion. Which I guess is the joy of him going to school with other sick kids and getting their germs. But it’s not enough that he got sick, he feels the need to share it too.

There’s been several times over the last couple of weeks that I’ll be carrying him in my arms, and he’ll suddenly have the urge to cough. Now, he’s sitting there with his head on my shoulder, and he could easily cough behind my back. But instead he’ll raise his head, look me square in the eyes, and say, “Dada?” When he’s satisfied that he has my full attention, he’ll open his mouth and cough full in my face. As I wipe the germinated spit from my face, I’ll tell him, “Gee thanks, Troy. You got me right in the eye.”

I thought I’d get smart and make him go piggyback instead. All of a sudden, I felt something brush over the back of my head. When I reached back to touch it, I realized Troy had licked the back of my hair. He’d start laughing at my disgusted reaction, which tickled his throat, and then he’d cough on the back of my neck. Epic fail.

When I put him in his car seat in the morning to send him off to school, he wanted to give me a hug and a kiss. I generally love this moment with him…except maybe when he’s sick. But I obliged him anyway, thinking it was just a little peck on the cheek. Only this time, he came at me with his mouth wide open, tongue shaking around in the air. When he connected, I could feel his tongue and lips encompassing the entire left side of my face.

Awww, Biscuits!

Troy [dropping his chicken nugget on the floor]: “Aww, biscuits!”

Me: “What happened?”

Troy: “I dropped my chicken on the floor.”

Me: “Then, why wouldn’t you say ‘Awww, chicken!’?”

Troy: “You’re weird, dada.”

Seriously?!

Me: “Oops! I accidentally knocked your castle down, Troy.”

Troy: “Seriously?!”

Me: “Sorry. I was kicking the ball, and it got away from me.”

Troy: “Well, stop it, dada!”

Me: “Yes, sir, your highness.”

I'm Trying to Stop

Troy: “Dada? Will you take me swimming today?”

Me: “No.”

Troy: “Why not?”

Me: “Because you’re sick. Listen to your cough. Besides, we just spent all night in the emergency room.” We can’t get your ear wet yet.

Troy: “But I’m trying to stop coughing. I’m trying to stop being sick.”

Me: “I know, bud. And that’s good. Getting well starts with getting your mind right. But you also need to wait a couple of days to see how things go. Let’s start with blowing your nose.”

Emergency Millionaires

Tonight, when I was putting Troy to bed, he asked me to hold his ear. When I asked him why, he said because it hurt. Since it seemed like more of an irritation to him than causing him serious pain, I brushed it aside, thinking to just monitor it the next day. Big…mistake!

At around 10:30 pm, he sat upright in his bed and started wailing. It took us a half an hour to finally calm him down enough for him to tell us what was wrong. We tried giving him some Tylenol for the pain, but he kept going through bouts of wailing and being calm. My wife took him to the couch in the den and turned some TV on with the hopes of distracting him long enough for the medicine to kick in, which mostly worked. Until around midnight, when he started wailing again.

At this point, we made the call to take him to the doctor. The only problem was that at this time of night, the only thing open was the emergency room. So, we took to Texas Presbyterian around the corner from us. We’d never been to this hospital before, but it was close, and we were exhausted. It was also close enough to the house that we could make a run home if needed.

The staff was extremely nice, and we were literally the only people in the emergency room that night, so we got taken right in and were given everyone’s full attention. They were also overly-gentle with Troy, since he’s just a munchkin. After a drawn-out fight over them sticking something in Troy’s ear that finally required three nurses and myself to hold Troy down, the doctor determined that he had an ear infection. He gave Troy an antibiotic, which thankfully we were able to get Troy to drink eventually. Unfortunately, it took them so long to bring the medicine into the room that Troy had fallen asleep before they came back. So, we had to wake him up, endure another wail fest, and calm him down again.

By the time they were finally ready to discharge us, it was around 2:30 in the morning. That’s when they hit us with the bad news…the bill. It was over $5000 for our two hours in the hospital! $1100 of that was simply for the privilege of going inside. That’s it…just for the use of the room. The rest was for the privilege of having a doctor come look at our son. It was so ludicrous that I have no words. How can they justify charging people that?! Then, at the end of the night, they drive off in their $100,000 car back to their $3 million mansion.

The stupidest part is that had I taken heed when Troy mentioned his earache to me, we could have taken him to urgent care and paid $95…total. So, let’s recap. We could have gotten the exact same level of care for $5000 less if we’d acted two hours sooner. How does that make sense?

Chicken Legs

Today, on our way home from the daycare, Troy and I saw an SUV with two giant champagne glasses on the back window. I’m not sure what the purpose of them was, but maybe they’d just gotten married or something. Maybe they were toasting life. Maybe they were weird. Who knows?! The point is that when Troy saw them, he asked me why that car had chicken legs on the back window. The more I looked at them, I had to admit that they did in fact resemble chicken legs. In fact, much like the face in Idaho, I couldn’t see anything but chicken legs after that!

Growing Out of Me

We arranged a play date for Troy and his friends today at Kids Empire. Since they have split up the classes at school, Troy no longer gets to see some of his friends. We run into the parents at drop-off or pick-up sometimes, and it was generally discussed that the kids missed each other. So, we coordinated everyone’s schedules to try to converge on today.

Things don’t always work out like you hope though. Misha couldn’t make it, because they were out of town. Sasha made it for a little bit, but her dad had brought her, and he didn’t want to stay very long (consequently, he also brought work with him, and he sat by himself and refused to socialize with anyone). Numair was going to come until his mom got sick at the last minute, and they all stayed home. But we still had Charlotte and Jacob, and Sasha for a little bit. So, it wasn’t a total bust.

I have mixed feelings about these play dates. The kids have a blast together, running around and wearing themselves out, but I’ve noticed that Troy is now old enough that he no longer needs me to play with him. And well…I kind of miss it. I’ve been conditioned for so long that I feel like one of the group. Now, I’m relegated to the sidelines with the other parents forced to stand still and speak adult. It seems odd to me. Luckily, the kids still needed me eventually…or at least my money. At various points, I was called upon to swipe my card on the machines, so they could bop a minion, or claw-grab an alien, or chase each other on the motorcycles. It wasn’t as fun as chasing them through the play sets, but I guess it’s my new lot in life.

The Jerk

There are times, like last night, when Troy gets so incredibly tired that he becomes unreasonable and illogical. For some reason, he woke up at 3:30 this morning and came downstairs. He laid down on the couch and started crying. I came out and retrieved him, putting him in the “big bed,” but that’s when everything started to fall apart.

Nothing was right. The pillow wasn’t straight. The blanket wasn’t up to his shoulder. He didn’t have the correct fluffy. He couldn’t find the water. His mama shined the light in his eyes, while trying to help him locate the water, which hurt his eyes. He didn’t want dada around for no reason at all. His mama didn’t hold his hand or rub his back, even though he never asked her to or said that he’d like it. And he was mostly communicating in grunts and screams, which made him cry when we didn’t understand or respond appropriately.

At those moments, I’m fighting to remain patient. One half of my brain is telling me that he’s just exhausted, and it’s not personal. The other half is telling me that it’s 3:30 in the morning, I’m also exhausted, and he’s not helping us help him. So, you stand there, waiting impatiently for him to give you some indication of what he wants, debating whether to keep standing there or to just leave him to the fates and go to bed at the other end of the house. But I know my wife is also exhausted, and I don’t want to dump the burden of decoding Troy’s grunts onto her.

So, I stand there, running through every possible thing I can think of with the hope that Troy will let me know when I get to the correct thing…while at the same time thinking that he’s just being a giant jerk for putting us through this. He’s getting special treatment. He’s getting our attention. And he still won’t make it any easier on us. My mother-in-law would say that he’s just being a four-year old. But my mother-in-law doesn’t have to stand in a dark room at 3:30 in the morning trying to reason with this four-year old who is intentionally making it difficult. So, to me, he’s just being a jerk.

The Bump Seat

Troy wanted to take his T-Rex and Therizinosaurus toys with him in the car on the way to school today. When he got out, he tossed them onto the seat next to him and left them. I honestly forgot about them back there.

Later, I was driving home when I hit a bump in the road. All of a sudden, a loud roar erupted from the backseat. I hit another crack in the road, and I was greeted with another roar. All the way home, Therizinosaurus was roaring at me, and I couldn’t stop laughing.