Dr. Jekyll
posted in OmegaDotter, Parenting |So after complaining–mightily!–about how horrible Ms. Hyde has been visiting lately, yesterday was a day’s worth of Dr. Jekyll. It was awesome.
First, in pursuit of the goat idea, OmegaDad had been corresponding with the Farm Lady With Champeen Nigerian Dwarf Goats. He finagled an invite to her spread. We went yesterday a.m.
Now, OmegaDad has an ag degree. He grew up doing FFA and hanging with 4H kids, raised and showed pigs and bulls and other livestock. Thus, OmegaDad knows all about birthing and hypocalcemia, the issues of thiamin deficiency, protein content of various livestock foodstuffs, how to inseminate a bull, fat-to-milk ratios of various cattle and goat lines, and acts nonchalant when a three-week-old kid starts sucking his finger.
I, on the other hand, am a city kid through and through. I can navigate my way through Chicago blindfolded, can tell you what time of day to ride the El, where to catch the #36 bus, the free days at the various museums, and where the more obscure park statuary resides.
Everyone has his or her talents.
Anyway, the itty-bitty goat babies were adorably cute. The older goats were pretty and laid back. The Farm Lady was a font of information. For instance, you need to insulate the goat stall, because goats like to huddle up together up against a wall, and when you have days on end of -20F weather, they can get frostbite.
Um.
I gave OmegaDad the hairy eyeball as we were driving away, saying, “You know I’m lazy. I don’t want to end up having to take care of goats!” At which he hastened to reassure me, once again, that the plan was to get the dotter used to small animals that don’t give a hoot how cute you are, but will butt or bite when you treat them roughly.
The dotter was enchanted.
Then we went searching for a new backpack for her, because her old one has bit the dust. Just a note for the uninformed: November is not the month to go looking for kids’ backpacks. September is. If your kid’s backpack goes belly up during any other month, you are SOL and your options are extremely limited.
So we had to go to Wally World. (Cue foreboding music.) At Wally World, the dotter and I both (for differing reasons) began getting crankier and crankier.
By the time we left, with plans to drop me off at home and the dotter and dad to go look at other stores for bacvkpacks, OmegaDad had Had It with the dotter, and laid down the law. This included the line, “I don’t want to hear one peep or one whine or any crying. And if I do…” At which point, I mentally wondered what threat he was going to come up with that he wouldn’t follow through on…
“If I do, you will be dropped off at home with your mother, and I will go shopping for a backpack for you, and I’m going to find you a blue backpack, with Spiderman on it, and you’re going to use that damned backpack until it falls apart and you’re not going to complain!”
Oh, yeah, thought I. Riiiight. Of course, right away, the dotter starts saying something. And OmegaDad roared, “WHAT DID I SAY?!” and OmegaDotter whines, “But I just–” and OmegaDad says, “That’s a peep. That’s it.”
Sure enough, he pulls into our driveway, I get out, the subdued dotter sits pitifully in the back seat, and both OmegaDad and I inform her that she didn’t listen to daddy, she did continue to talk and whine, and she was staying home with me. She followed me sloooowly into the garage, the very picture of abject misery.
Too bad, so sad.
And then, within a half an hour, she had flipped the switch from Miss Whinypants to Dr. Jekyll, my happy, helpful and cheerful companion, and she stayed that way all day long and into the night with not a single whine.
So, anyway, there we are. We will muddle through.
Of course, the thing is, as Jean pointed out in the comments, to be consistent and provide boundaries. There’s a certain amount of frustration in me about this; as an example, let me simply point out that the dotter fastens her own seatbelt without a fuss 95% of the time when it’s just me and her in the car, but she neeeeedsss heeeeeelllp 95% of the time when OmegaDad is around.
(Grammar hounds: Should that be “it’s just me and her”? Maybe I’ll just rewrite it to “me and the dotter”…”the dotter and I”??? Agh.)
Another big plus of the day is that I did not succumb to the cute little goatlets. Damn, they were cute!
