Too Much Information

I'm not kidding. If you are one of my brother-in-laws, or my father, or an uncle, or for any of many excellent reasons that I can think of, you would prefer not to become intimate with the inner workings of my digestive system, you might want to move on. Try Marinka, or Vodka Mom, or Backpacking Dad or the Norwindians or Steenky Bee. They are really funny and not currently as obsessed with poop as I am. I don't think.

Biology lesson. You know how when you're pregnant (I know a lot of you know, the rest of you really ought to think about skipping this one), your whole digestive system slows down? Every thing is sluggish and painful and uncomfortable as your body apparently attempts to wring every last possible ounce of nutrition from your cup o'noodles and pepsi. No easy task. Some women get very constipated. Not me, I remain very regular, I just get Old Man Syndrome. Where you have to sit on the pot forever feeling shaky and sick and sweaty until finally things move along (as I'm sure some of you are now doing).

I haven't taken a shit by myself in about three years. Under normal circumstances, I don't care that much. I'm in, I'm out. If they join me, there's not much time for wreaking havoc and if they sit outside the door crying and asking me pressing, cannot wait another second questions, it's short lived.

At the moment, I'd really like a little privacy. Yesterday, feeling particularly nasty, I put Ess and Gee in front of a movie at a strategic time, got Cue a huge sippy cup of milk and went for the solo bathroom mission. FAIL. The movie worked, but the milk lasted all of about three minutes and then Cue rammed the door full steam ahead. His wrath that it did not admit him immediately knew no bounds.

Cue: Momma!! Momma!!
Me: Drink your milk baby, I'll be right out.
Cue: MOMMA!!MOMMA!!MOMMA!!

I put my head in my hands and tried to ignore him. He continued to pound the door with his furious little body. I tried not to cry or shout obscenities at him.

Cue: MOMMA!! MOMMA!! MOMMA!!MOMMA!!MOMMMMMMMAAAAAAAA!!
Me: Cue, listen, it's okay, I'll....
Cue: MOMMA!!!MOMMMMMAAAAAAA!!MOOOOOMMMMMAAAAA!!!!

He started to pound his head against the door as a symbol of his distress and growing desperation.

"Cue...Cue." I considered ignoring him, I even wondered about the odds that he would knock himself out without seriously damaging his brain, but he already appears to have a significant speech delay, so allowing him to give himself a concussion is probably not the best parenting plan. In resignation, I reached over without raising my head from my other hand and opened the door.

He spilled into the bathroom, eyes puffy, face blotchy red with outraged fury. He buried his face in my lap and sobbed for a few minutes at the indignity of being excluded from the bathroom.

Yes, my child, I know a little something about indignity.

Fully recovered, pathos reduced to a few hiccups, he smiled at me and toddled over to the bathtub where he immediately found an interesting bar of soap and started tunneling deep furrows of soap onto his finger nail. He held them up to show me with a happy gurgle. I thought about the fact that I had not bought that soap, had no idea of its origins, but decided to be comforted by the fact that soap is fairly clean, right, and surrendered fully. I put my head back down on my arms and tried to ignore him and the full movie report floating in from the other room.

Gee: MOMMAA???!!!
Me: Yes.
Gee: MOMMMMAAAAA????!!!!!
Me: Yes.
Gee: The grasshoppers are angry.
Me: Really?
Gee: Yes, yes they are.
Me: Great.

I glanced back at Cue. He had discovered the perfect place for his soap furrow shavings in the space created between my ass and the back of the toilet when I leaned forward a little to put my aching head on my arms. He held each one up to show me, proudly, before he dropped it into the water.

Gee: MOMMMMAAAAAA????!!!!!!! MOOOOOMMMMMAAAAAA?????
Cue: Plop! Ah-ah-Ah.
Ess: (arriving in the doorway) Momma! The ants are making a bird.
Me: Fabulous. Please. Go. And. Watch. Them.
Gee: MOOOOMMMAAAAAAAA??????
Me: Yes, Gee?
Cue: Plop! Ah-ah-ah-ah-Ahhhh!
Gee: The ants are going to get angry at the grasshoppers.
Me: Really? I can't imagine how they feel.

PLOP!!!!! SPLASH!!! I didn't even have to look. I knew it was the whole effing bar of soap. Which my darling baby immediately wanted BACK because that was the most satisfying plop in the history of plops. Was I Hitler in a past life? Did I torture baby kittens? Because I'm fairly certain I haven't done anything in this life to warrant this level of humiliation.

I finished my business while straight arming the whirling dervish of wrath formally known as my baby boy to keep him from diving into the toilet after the soap bar or alternatively dropping every single thing he could get his little hands on into the toilet. So yeah, that was a really fun twenty minutes of my life that can never be regained. And, in case you're curious, yes, yes you can flush a toilet with a bar of soap in it and the soap bar remains in the bowl. At least for the first flush.

On the rest of the shit front:
1) Gee has put every single bit of his poop in the potty for four consecutive days. I cried a little this morning in gratitude.
2) There are gecko droppings in my cereal cupboard. I don't mind geckos and their droppings are small and easy to clean up, but they are skeevy in my cereal cupboard.
3) A bird pooped on me in the tropical gardens at the Hyatt the other day. And it was red. From berries. That you could see. Shit is raining down on me from the skys.
4) Ess would like you to know that SHE always puts her poo poo in the potty. She does. It's wonderful. Thank you beautiful.

I think that sums it up. This is AnyMommy, reporting on AnyFamily crap since November, 2007.