A Whale For Mother's Day

Happy Mother’s Day, yesterday, if it applies, and happy Monday if not. Since I had the privilege of dealing with Mother’s Day, I’m going to inflict the same on you. I’m like that.

First, my kids are teenagers, let’s just get that right out there.

I did not get served breakfast in bed at the crack of dawn. Not because my kids are incapable, or because they knew I’d rather sleep in if given the choice, but because they slept in even later. The Girl did it last year, which was cute, then realized it was a lot of work and sleeping is just as rewarding and appreciated. There was never any real danger of The Boy getting up to burn waffles and cut up strawberries for me.

Being left to sleep in by the kids was appreciated, although Jingles didn’t get the memo. She stood on my pillow and purred viciously at me at about 6:30 am. Hubby was kind enough to boot her furry tail out of our room. (Having a cat is sort of like having a toddler-teenager hybrid, but purse-sized, with shedding.)

After being allowed to go back to bed and wake when I wanted to, I was permitted to have the teenage version of the breakfast of champions: white chocolate covered caramel apples. Someone clearly learned something.

I was lavished with extravagance including such items as a bulk pack of gaming dice (because Yahtzee is really interesting when playing with non-standard dice). The Girl has wanted a blue orchid for a long time but doubts her ability to keep one alive, so I now have a pink one as a trial run.

The Girl and I bonded with some inane TV for a bit and she told me about a modification where it rains whales in Grand Theft Auto 5. Naturally I looked it up. Then I showed her little brother who was, of all things, playing GTA5 at the time. He rained on our parade. It doesn’t really rain whales and told us how it was actually done. Sensing my disappointment (and possibly in a vain effort to get me to stop encouraging him to write a script to make it rain squid, then spiders in Minecraft – which he should want to do because his sister would love him then hate him) The Boy went and set up GTA5 on his PC and called us in to see the whale. Yes, my son turned into a humpback whale for me for Mother’s Day.

He flopped around as a whale for a bit, then became a cat and got hit by a car. Honestly, the cat looked mad before that, so it was sort of hard to feel bad for it. Being a mother, I naturally took the opportunity to point out that he should always look both ways before crossing virtual streets. Tired of being a (dead) cat, he changed into a crow and flew around. That was fun until he went to land. Keeping in mind this child has spent a wasteful amount of time on his flight simulator games, it was really hard not to laugh when he crashed and killed himself again.

The crow not being as awesome as he imagined, I challenged him to get in a car then change back into a whale. Hey, it was my day and I wanted whales. So he did. The car sort of exploded into shrapnel around him, that was cool. During all this, he was still online with his friends (who were ignoring their mothers, shame on them) and The Boy was narrating everything he did while I cheered him on. His friends all decided I am the coolest mom.

Yes, yes I am.

But then I had to wait before I could tell him to turn off the games and go do his chores so I didn’t lose my standing with his friends. I don’t think I really won that round. Now he’s off playing video games again when I need him to do homework. When I nag, I get the excuse “But Mom, I’m a whale!”

“Actually you’re a toothpick, and I’m going to snap you in two if you don’t do your homework.” That’s what I’m going to say just as soon as I get my fill of watching him flop around as a whale, crushing cars and bouncing off buildings. It’s funny.