Mousetrap Car Debrief

Not the science fair, but the same principles apply.

Earlier this month I wrote about my high school freshman’s physics assignment. Here is the sum total of what my child learned from the mousetrap car assignment: Nothing.

Ok maybe nothing is a stretch, but I know that I got more out of it than he did. Here’s what I learned from the mousetrap car assignment. I will apply this knowledge to the next set of children who go through this torture assignment. Because one of the most important pieces of any idiot group project at the office or at school is the Lessons Learned debrief. That’s where you track all your dumbass mistakes and swear on the name of all that is good and holy that you’ll walk through a river of fire before you ever put yourself through this agony again.

1. No matter how much of a non-helicopter “do it your own damn self” parent you try to be, you’ll still end up involved with the mousetrap car assignment. Make it as easy as possible on yourself and your student. Don’t reinvent the damn wheel. Find something on Wikihow, Pinterest, or YouTube, and follow their specs to the tee. I found out way too late in the game that you can even buy mousetrap car kits on the web.
2. Work this shit. Cameron, who will be a freshman in three years, can invest in his college education by making these bad boys and selling them down by the downstairs bathroom where rumor has it all the weed smokers linger and other illicit dealings take place. 200+ kids in physics classes at $50 a pop (a VERY reasonable price) for a completed mousetrap car would turn a nice little profit. Work it for all four years of high school? That’s a hell of a nest egg.
3. Self-awareness is important. If your kid knows he’s not up to doing this on his own, make sure he partners up early and quickly. Go find Sheldon Cooper or Malcolm in the Middle. Or the kid with the engineer mom.
4. Unless your child has NASA ambitions, this assignment is not about building a mousetrap car. Because who the fuck needs a mousetrap car? Toy designers have come up with working Hot Wheels cars and race tracks for a reason, namely so you don’t have to MacGyver your own ridiculous hillbillyass car toy out of Bic pens, balloons, and CDs. This assignment is about taking other people’s ideas and executing them to the best of your ability. Think that’s not a real world application? Ask Nikola Tesla how he feels about Thomas Edison.
5. Find your minions – parents, lab partners, peers, teachers, or the people at Ace Hardware, and command them to do your bidding. This goes way beyond Physics. David might be a step ahead of me on this one.

Anyway, I still don’t know anything about physics, and I’m not sure my kid does either. Well played, Eastern Carver County Schools.

© Jennifer Alys Windholz, 2015

 

There Will Be Blood

Sometimes after picking kids up from three locations after school, helping with homework, making dinner, dealing with your freshman’s stupid mother effing mousetrap car project, and trying to figure out why a microwave that was working fine a minute ago just up and died, you pretty much end up phoning the rest of the night in.

Cameron: “Mom, if you type in the coordinates 52.376552 and 5.198393 on Google Earth it shows a guy dragging a body into the lake.”
Me: “Okay.”
Cameron: “Mom, seriously, look at this.”
Me (glancing at an aerial view of a deck and a splotch while cutting up strawberries): “Yeah, I don’t see anything at all.”
Cameron: “Really, it’s there. Look! I’ll zoom in. You can see the blood trail.”
Me (yeah, sure, that might be a body): “Gross.”
Cameron: “I know!”
Justin: “I wanna see the blood trail.”
Cameron: “No, you can’t.”
Justin: “Why did Mom get to?”
Cameron: “Duh, she’s an adult.”
Justin: “Show me!”
Cameron: “Fine, but don’t blame me when you have nightmares.”
Justin: “Where is it?”
Cameron: “Right there, see all that blood by her head where he’s dragging her into the lake.”
Justin: “Yeah.”
Alex: “I didn’t get to see! Let me see!!!”
Cameron: “You can’t, you’re too young.”
Alex: “Well ha ha, I saw anyway.”
Cameron: “No you didn’t.”
Alex: “Yes I did, I saw the blood trail.”
Cameron: “No you didn’t.”
Alex (crying): “Yes, I did!!! Mom! MOM!!! Cameron, let me see it!!!”
Cameron: “NO!”
Alex (turning violent): “Cameron!!!! It’s no fair, LET ME SEE IT!!!”
Cameron (evading a lunge): “NO!”
Alex (jumping on Cameron): “Yes!!”
Cameron throws Alex to the ground, Alex starts wailing.
Me: “OH MY GOD, CAMERON!!! JUST LET HIM SEE THE DAMN BLOOD TRAIL!!!”

Would moms of girls ever make that demand?

Update: Upon further review, the Google Earth photo of a body being dragged into a lake is an urban legend. It’s apparently a very wet black lab whose trail of water makes a wooden dock look red. Don’t try telling Cameron this, however. He’s 100% behind the dead body theory.

Act Now, Think Later

A note to my children. I appreciate your need to ask questions, even to respectfully question authority . I encourage it. I love your inquisitiveness and curiosity. Don’t ever lose that. Critical thinking is vitally important, and I want to raise children who are independent and in-depth thinkers who scrutinize sources of information, and wonder why things are done the way they are.

That said, you still need to consider context. Allow me to offer an example. When your mother tells you, with a sense of urgency in her voice, to “go get a plunger” that is a time for action, not questions. It should be a reflex. When you hear the word plunger, you jump into action. Plunger. Action. Plunger! ACTION! PLUNGER! IT’S FUCKING GO TIME!!!

Because unless someone is telling you to retrieve a plunger from a burning building, the consequences of NOT getting a plunger will always be worse than getting a plunger. ALWAYS.

Once the crisis is resolved, there will be a debrief. THAT is the time to ask, “Why?”

So, if you must know why, here is the answer. Partially eaten celery sticks WILL clog a toilet.

And as long as we’re asking questions. WHO took the plunger out of the bathroom in the first place? I’m not even going to bother asking about the celery.

© Jennifer Alys Windholz, 2014

Leftover Arguments

8:00 in the morning. One kid wants pancakes for breakfast (leftover from yesterday when I was trying to be nice), the other wants leftover macaroni and cheese. Right fucking now. A heated argument over whether or not it’s gross to put fresh raspberries on pancakes. Another about whose turn it is to let the dog out. And yet one more to determine what TV show to watch. Then…the crime of the century. Justin ate Alex’s chips and cheese. The ones that sat out over night, getting stale, the cheese hardening into a rubberlike substance that only non-ionizing microwave radiation can regenerate as an edible substance.

“HE ATE MY LEFTOVER CHIPS AND CHEESE!!!!!!!”

Histrionics ensue. Demands of restitution. Accusations of targeted thievery with malice aforethought. A third party gets involved, telling both of them to quiet down, stepping on them and on someone’s stomach as the aggrieved parties wrestle on the floor. Godzilla on a much smaller scale. More crying, this time in pain.

The kid who already ate a pancake drenched in syrup and raspberries assembles a mountain of tortilla chips and covers it with an avalanche of shredded cheese. These will surely go largely uneaten since he had zero interest in them until his brother sniped them. Now they chirp each other for no reason other than to establish the upper hand going into the next fight.

“You’re stupid.”
“No I’m not.”
“Yes you are.”
“No I’m not. You are. You don’t even know math.”
“That’s because I don’t like to add.”
“Well, you should.”
“You don’t know anything about football.”
“I don’t care. I don’t like football.”
“Well, you should.”

Four. More. Days.

UPDATE: Next fight has already broken out. Over a softcover Scholastic book called Mice on Ice. Who is the rightful owner? I can’t even be the arbiter because I bought it, and several other books for them for Christmas, and I can’t recall who got that particular book. A book that no one has touched for the past three months. Now more valuable than a first edition Mark Twain, all because someone else wants it.

© Jennifer Alys Windholz, 2014

Love Love

I played a lot of tennis as a kid, honing my skills by using the outdoor racquetball courts at the local community college as a backboard. Not many of my friends played tennis, especially anyone in the neighborhood, so my usual partner was my little brother. He was not an especially gracious loser. A typical match with him consisted of multiple contested line calls, abrupt rule changes, scoring arguments, and fits of pique that often resulted in him launching tennis balls over the fence. Many times I would just get disgusted with him, and stop playing, which resulted in him declaring that if I “quit,” he would be the winner.

Flash forward 25 years later, and Justin has taken an interest in tennis. I love that, because it gives me an opportunity to get back out on the court again after a very long hiatus when I had tiny kids. Unfortunately the experience is eerily reminiscent of those old days with my brother, leaving me feeling exasperated, frustrated, and angry.

Yesterday morning I took Cameron (age 11), Justin (age 8), and Alex (age 7) out to hit around. The fun began when Justin insisted on playing “a real game,” despite the fact that he can only get one of five balls back over the net. Of course that is my fault because if I hit one to his backhand side, he complains vociferously. “Stop hitting it there! I can’t do LEFTY!!!” But if I hit it to his forehand, Cameron would step over and attempt to hit it in front of him, resulting in clashes over whose ball was whose.

Justin’s biggest problem is that his expectations are way too high. He thinks that even though he’s never had a formal lesson, and has only played a handful of times this summer, that he should be playing at the level of a Roger Federer or Andy Murray. And when he misses a shot, he swings his racquet in disgust, yelling at himself like John McEnroe.

We arrived with three cans of tennis balls, nine balls. At one point I used the last ball in my pocket, and Cameron hit one that rolled to the fence by the far court. I needed another ball to start a rally, but only saw the one that had been hit over the fence, still lying in the grass. What happened to all the balls? I asked Justin how many he had in his pockets. Evidently all of them, which he refused to give up, and insisted I run over and get the one that was by the fence. Eventually we coaxed him to let us use some of the balls from his pockets, but admonished Cameron when he hit another one astray. “I’m not letting you use my balls if you keep HITTING them!”

Ages ago I got clocked in the face while playing the net. The ball hit me right in the eye, bruising my cornea. My pupil was constricted for a week. That was more enjoyable than what was happening with Justin at this moment. Another car pulled up, and out jumped a dad and his two kids, an older boy who was quite good, and a kid about the age and talent level as Cameron. “Care if we join you?”

“Sure,” I said, secretly thinking, “Do it at your own risk.”

Justin then couldn’t concentrate until we retrieved our ball that was on the side of their court. “MOM! They have our ball!”

Nothing could convince him that it wasn’t a big deal, and that I was sure they’d kick it over when they had a chance. That’s when Dad started barking orders at his kids in Russian. Or maybe it was just coaching. Kind of everything spoken in Russian sounds ominous. Chalk it up to growing up during the Cold War. But Justin was intimidated, and refused to play on the side of the court adjacent to them, but of course Cameron wouldn’t trade places with him. After hitting about ten balls onto their court, I suggested we move to the kid-sized courts on the other side of the fence.

They actually did a little better on those courts, but everyone wanted to be on my side. There isn’t enough room for three people on a junior court, but every time I moved to another side, someone would follow me, and someone would cry about being left. Finally I just told Justin and Cameron to play a set by themselves, and Alex and I would hit on our own on another court. That remained friendly for about two minutes, and then the arguments about line calls, scores, etc. began. My favorite of Justin’s arguments: “It’s not fair if you hit it good and I can’t get it! That’s MY point then.”

The day came to its inevitable conclusion when each one insisted he was the winner, and Justin threw his racquet at Cameron.

Game. Set. Match. We’re outta here.

© Jennifer Alys Windholz, 2014

 

No Girls Will Want My Hair Like This

Justin and Alex were having a conversation at dinner last night about having kids.

Justin: “Mom, will Alex be the uncle for my daughter?” (Justin has decided a while back he’s having a baby girl.)
Me: “Yes.”
Alex: “Can uncles be girls?”
Me: “No, uncles are boys.”
Alex: “And Justin will be my uncle.”
Me: “Your kids’ uncle. And David and Cameron’s kids.”
Alex: “I KNOW! That’s what I mean. Will I be uncle for David and Cameron?”
Justin: “Yeah, Alex. And me.”
Alex: “But how do you even get babies?”
Justin: “Shhhh! You know.”
Alex: “Oh yeah, Mom, we know. Dylan, on the bus, told us.”
Jennifer: “Oh. Ok.”
Justin: “Yeah, but I’m not gonna do the thing. I’ll just adopt my kids.”
Alex: “Eeeeww, I’m not doing the thing either. I just won’t have any.”
Me: (Silent. Wondering what exactly they think “the thing” is.)
Justin: “What if you don’t find a wife?”
Me: “You’ll find one.”
Justin: “But no, what if you don’t?”
Me: “Then I guess you just stay single.”
Justin: “And that’s it?”
Me: “Don’t worry, you’re cute. And sweet. Lots of girls will like you.”
Justin: “No, I’m not cute. My eyes are weird like this.”
Me: “You have pretty eyes.”
Justin: “Well, no girls will want my hair like this. They’ll want it, like, cut, and with a style.”
Me: “Maybe.”
Justin: “And I can’t eat bad stuff because then my mouth will smell, and girls won’t like that. For kissing.”
Me: “Better keep brushing your teeth then.”
Justin: “And my eyes don’t look good.”
Me: “Why don’t you like your eyes? You have beautiful blue eyes.”
Justin: “But I’ll have to do something to my hair.”
Me: “I guess.”
Justin: “Can we go play tennis?”

© Jennifer Alys Windholz, 2014

Conversations I Never Thought I’d Have: Part I

He can’t wait to punch something that won’t get him in trouble.

Conversations in a household populated with four boys can be interesting, to say the least. And the most ridiculous part is when I try to respond. I start off perplexed, and end up being totally vested in it.

Justin: “Mom, what’s worse? Getting stabbed with a knife or a scissors?”
Me: “I don’t know. I suppose it would depend on where you’re stabbed.”
Justin: “But which is worse?”
Me: “Neither of them would be good.”
Justin: “But which one is WORSE?”
Me: “A knife.”
Justin: “How about a chainsaw, or, um…a pitchfork?”
Me: “Definitely a chainsaw.”
Justin: “A machete or one of those…like what do you call those ninja knives?”
Me: “You mean throwing stars?”
Justin: “No.”
Me: “A samurai sword?”
Justin: “No, like just a knife with a curve. Like this.” (Draws a swoosh in the air with his fingers.)
Me: “I don’t know. Probably a machete.”

© Jennifer Alys Windholz, 2014

Close Call

You know how when two airliners come within a hair of colliding in mid-air? Even if nothing really happens, no one gets hurt, and everyone continues on their merry way, it’s still a major screw up, right? Someone, the air traffic controller, one of the pilots, both of the pilots, the ground crew, someone fucked up big time.

That’s kind of how I feel about this morning. Our day went on after the critical error, but I think some sort of review board needs to convene later today to discuss the incident, and talk about strategies to prevent future emergencies.

My husband is a fitness fanatic. He gets up at zero dark hundred every morning to work out downstairs. That’s what he does while I deal with the three-ring circus of waking kids up, getting them breakfast, brushing teeth, clothing drama, making sure homework is in backpacks, making lunch, and inevitably trying to fend off some ridiculous meltdown.

Today’s crisis involved a misunderstanding that happened when Alex crawled into bed with me at 6:00 in the morning. He excitedly asked, “Is Halloween tomorrow?” I said yes, we talked about what his friends were dressing up as for Halloween, and he fell back asleep for like ten minutes. Then he got up and told David, who was getting ready to leave, “Happy Halloween!” Then he woke up Justin, and said, “Happy Halloween!” As we were getting dressed, he said, “I’m so excited today is Halloween!”

“Tomorrow is Halloween,” I corrected.

Fire up the seismograph because the earthquake rumblings are starting, and by the time all is said and done, this thing is going to register at least a 7 on the Richter scale. “YOU TOLD ME TODAY WAS HALLOWEEN!!!!”

“No, I said it was tomorrow.”

“You said tomorrow was today!!!”

“What? How can tomorrow be today? It’s ok, Halloween is tomorrow, just one more day. When you wake up it will be Halloween,” I said, realizing that nothing I say at this point will contain what is happening.

“I already woke up. YOU TRICKED ME!!! You’re a horrible parent, you can’t trick me and say it’s Halloween when it’s not. I want Halloween to be TODAY!!!!”

This went on for some time. Things were thrown. Alex proclaimed that he wasn’t going to school. Justin got caught in the crossfire, which resulted in retaliation from both sides. Poor Penny was sitting on the bed, hoping to go back to sleep for a while, looking at us like we were all crazy. Again. Finally, after a good fifteen minutes of drama, I managed to calm Alex down by giving him a hug, and explaining that I was sorry that he misunderstood what I said, but everything would be all right. He relented, let me help him get dressed, and was ready to go brush his teeth.

At this point, Barry came upstairs.

“Good morning, guys!” he said cheerfully.

“Tomorrow is Halloween!!!”

I froze, shivers going up my spine, hoping Alex had truly come to terms with the fact that Halloween was indeed tomorrow. No visible reaction from him. Crisis averted, but that plane came about 15 feet from shearing off our wing, and protocols need to be put into place before a tragedy occurs. Next time we won’t be so lucky.

© Jennifer Alys Windholz, 2013

Are You Going To Nap All Day?

This is me trying to take a lazy Sunday afternoon nap.

1:00 – Justin hits Alex in the nose, prompting a tearful Alex to lament that his nose, which is already stuffed up, is broken, and he goes in my room to snuggle up with his blanket and to seek protection from me.

1:02 – I sense that this could be an opportunity to get him to take a nap.

1:03 – He’s completely relaxed and lying quietly. Very rare.

1:05 – I make the decision that we are going to have the most epic nap ever.

1:07 – Justin comes in, asking to go to Target to get baseball cards. Request declined.

1:10 – David comes in to get the Kindle.

1:11 – Alex wants the TV turned on.

1:12 – My phone chimes to notify me that it’s my turn on Words with Friends.

1:15 – Penny scratches the door to come in.

1:20 – Alex wants to watch Peppa Pig instead of Spongebob.

1:24 – Penny hears a noise and wants to go out.

1:28 – Justin comes in. He’s decided that he wants to go to Lifetime, tries to go through my purse to find my pass.

1:30 – I hear Cameron go outside.

1:32 – Barry loudly complains that, once again, no one replaced the empty toilet paper roll.

1:34 – Alex wants to watch Spongebob instead of Peppa Pig.

1:35 – Alex’s thumb hurts. I need to get him “medicine” to put on it.

1:39 – Justin wants me to get something from the top of his closet.

1:42 – I hear Cameron come back inside.

1:45 – Penny scratches on the door because she wants back in my room.

1:47 – Alex wants a drink of water.

1:50 – Alex wants to know if I’m going to be a grandma someday.

1:52 – Alex is back up, messing around, and I can tell the window for the nap has sadly passed.

1:55 – I close my eyes.

1:57 – Penny leaves again.

2:00 – Alex leaves, David and Cameron are watching baseball with the volume up as loud as possible.

Meanwhile, Barry is downstairs in his recliner, napping. I’m going to shut my door and make a second attempt. $100 says he’ll come up and make a sarcastic comment asking if I’m “ever” going to get up.

2:20 – Justin comes in, wants apples with peanut butter. And so it begins.

© Jennifer Alys Windholz, 2013

Vacation? Muah-hah-hah. Not Bloody Likely.

My husband took this week off. He thinks this will be a vacation. He’s in for a rude awakening. Because as soon as he’s done with his morning workout, I am outta here. And he can deal with things like this, things that really can’t be articulated when he wonders why I’m so frustrated by the end of the day.

Alex: “Justin, what’s your favorite movie?”
Justin: “I’m not telling.”
Alex: “Because you don’t have one?”
Justin: “You don’t have one either.”
Alex: “Yes I do. The Wizard of Oz.”
Justin: “That’s your favorite?”
Alex: “Yeah. The Wizard of Oz and Brave.”
Justin: “Brave?”
Alex: “Yeah.”
Justin: “Why do you like Brave? I don’t like it anymore.”
Alex: “Because it’s about a kingdom.”
Justin: “But, what do you like about it?”
Alex: “I said. Because it’s about a kingdom.”
Justin: “It’s not your favorite movie.”
Alex: “I have two favorite movies, Brave and The Wizard of Oz.”
Justin: “That’s stupid. You don’t even watch Brave.”
Alex: “I don’t watch it anymore.”
Justin: “It’s the worst Pixar movie.”
Alex: “I know.”
Justin: “You still watch it.”
Alex: “No I don’t.”
Justin: “Yes you do.”
Alex: “NO I DON’T!”
Justin: “Yes you do. You said.”
Alex: “NO I DON’T!!! Mom! Moooo-ooom! “MOOOOOMMMMM!!!”
Me: “Alex, it’s ok if you watch Brave.”
Alex: “I DON’T watch it!”
Justin: “Yes you do.”
Alex: “MOOOOMMMMM!!!”
Justin: “You watch it because I go outside and you don’t even go outside.”
Alex: “Yes I do.”
Justin: “No. I go outside the most. You stay inside and eat taquitos.”
Alex: “No I don’t. I do for lunch.”
Justin: “No, for breakfast.”
Alex: “NO I DON’T!!!”
Justin: “Yes you do.”
Alex: “I do NOT!! MOM! MOOOOMMMM!!!
Me: “What???”
Alex: “Justin’s being really mean to me.”
Me: “No he’s not. Just ignore him.”
Alex: “Yes he IS! Tell him!!!”
Me: “Justin, leave Alex alone.”
(Justin has moved on, knocking on the bathroom door while Cameron is in there.)
Cameron: “JUSTIN! STOP!!!!”
(Justin continues.)
Cameron: “JUSSSS-TINNN!!! STOP!!!! I’M GOING TO THE BATHROOM.”
(More knocking.)
Cameron: “MOOOOOOMMMMMMMM!!!! MAKE HIM STOP!”
Me: “Justin, knock it off. Now.”
Barry: “What’s going on up there? Cameron, so help me…”
Cameron: “I didn’t even DO ANYTHING!”

Repeat this about 20 more times, for possibly even stupider arguments, and that is my day. Every day. The entire summer. Happy vacation!

© Jennifer Alys Windholz, 2013