Chalk It Up

An excerpt from the bestselling Clintons' Guide to Raising Awesome Children.

Sometimes the best lessons can be demonstrated with a story.

Picture a beautiful Sunday afternoon.  We just watched our favorite football team receive an old fashioned butt whoopin'.  The entire time, my son actively cheered for the opposite team, while displaying alarmingly poor fan etiquette by mocking our players.  This is actually standard Sunday behavior; he has chosen to throw off the reins of tradition and cheer for the team that is playing "our" team.

(Even as I type this, hours later, he just looked over and quoted some stat about how many interception our quarterback threw today.)

Since Sunday is a day full of endless football and futbol, we had to force an unwilling child outside for some vitamin D.  He acted like we were asking him to go shovel out the stables (they are just on the other side of our lake, by the garage with vintage cars).  There was the whining, then the attempted defiance (squelched quickly by his tyrannical mother), and finally the sighing and eye rolling.  This is new behavior.  I find it rather annoying.

He took one step outside, sat on the patio and continued to sigh and audibly demonstrate his displeasure.

As a responsible parent, mature and aware of the need to correct unacceptable behavior, I took the following action (with the help of Marina's sidewalk chalk).

This one was particularly brutal (he lectured me on not capitalizing his name).  

Eli tried some retaliation with a stub of pink chalk, but since he wrote in cursive then dragged his knees through it, the sting was taken out of his "Mom's farts smell disgusting."

I tried to get a picture of him rolling his eyes... but he was too quick for my camera snap.  

As you can see, instant results.  I'm filing this one under "Proven techniques, guaranteed results".  

Note:  I tried this on the cats when they wouldn't stop fighting.  "Fat Linda has no skills" and "Lorenzo licks his butt" had no apparent result.  I am now adding a "Does not apply to animals," in the fine print of this chapter for compliance reasons.  I also have to figure out a way to get this marker off the walls.  

If you would like to book me for a child rearing workshop, please contact my manager, Fat Linda Clinton.

Cattiness

There is a war waging.  I have declared a trashy local cat my enemy.

Let me start at the beginning...

One day last year, I saw a cute cat that looked remarkably like Fat Linda trolling around our "nature".  (nature definition:  the wild, untamed wilderness behind our chain link fence that is still considered our property).  I generally have friendly feelings toward wildlife, be it bunnies or feral cats.  The wandering cat (let's just assume it's a  'he' for fun) would occasionally make appearances throughout the fall.  As it got colder, I started to get concerned for his well-being.  Where did he go at night?  Was he cold?  Was he hungry?  I even considered putting a bowl of our weight-loss Iams out for him.

One day my sister told me she saw a Fat Linda-looking smashed cat on the road.  I mourned his untimely death.  I felt very sad for the way the hungry, cold little guy was struck down.

Weeks later, my feline friend showed up again!  So it was another sad cat that was flattened!  My friend was alive!  But then winter came and I didn't see him anymore.  I assumed he died, curled up in a sad little ball somewhere.

Then at the beginning of spring when all the birds were chirping and bunnies bounding about, the cat showed up in our nature again.  He survived the winter!  When I crept closer, I observed that he wore a collar.  Turns out he belonged to someone.  A few days later, I called my kids over to watch the cute kitty.  We were making Fat Linda comparisons and admiring his beauty when all of the sudden, he pounced into a bush and came out with a baby bunny in his mouth!  The kids were screaming; I was horrified.

How wrong I had been!  My cat friend was no friend at all!  He's a bunny murderer!  And I love bunnies.  They rank very high on the cutest scale, right next to little squirrels.  I read online that domesticated cats who go outside, kill four out of every five times they go outside.  They don't do it for the food, they do it for the sheer joy of being crapheads.

Since that day, I continue to see him in our nature, only now it's not cute.  Now I see him crouching down in an army crawl position, stalking my baby bunnies.  I've decided I'm not going to take it anymore. I've been running outside yelling to scare him away.

Then, last week, I saw this (look closely at who is sitting on the deck railing):

I have now identified the cat's home.  

I ran him out of here three times this week.  That's in the after-business hours, who knows what he is doing when we are gone all day - probably torturing endangered species and baby deer.  

What do I do now?  I've never taken an active dislike to a cute animal before (ugly animals I don't mind disliking - like the opossum.  Call me shallow.), so this is all new to me.

I told myself I could throw a rock at him.  It's rather self-assured to think I could actually strike him from any distance.  When I saw him yesterday, I stood by the rocks for a full minute, but just couldn't bring myself to do it.  What if I really hit him?  What if I gave him brain damage?  

When I suggested a sling shot and frozen peas, Eli seemed pretty strongly opposed to that course of action. Maybe rubber bands?

Yesterday Mark gave me a little scolding when I came back in from the latest chase.  He asked what if the neighbor saw me screaming and yelling at their pet.  I told him too late, the neighbor opened their screen door while I was in mid sprint after their murderous beast.  The kids were both standing on our back step chanting, "Mom! Mom! Mom! Mom!" I told him I didn't care what they thought, it's their stupid animal trespassing in my nature.  

So the war is on.  Not only with the cat, but now with the neighbors.  I'm in a fairly belligerent mood now.  I'm going on Amazon to look for sling shots.  Maybe I'll pelt him with diet Iams food pellets and spray him with a high-pressure hose.