Friday, February 19, 2010

My kid, the cutter

Alex is on his way to becoming that kid who, in elementary school, cut off the tip of his nose with scissors and damned generations to follow in the VH school system to using nothing but the blunt-nosed kind forevermore. It sounds like an urban legend, but I swear, it happened! Right? The part about the nose tip falling into a pile of dried beans the class was using for math purposes is still up for debate.

Alex’s nose is intact, thank God, and he didn’t do any real damage, but yesterday he came home flaunting an accident report pinned to his school bag and a Band-Aid on his thumb. “We were using plastic knives to spread marshmallow cream onto apple slices” the note read (and here I’ll add an editorial ‘ew’). “Alex cut his finger while ‘sawing’ on his apple with the plastic knife.” Translation from the soft-centered language spoken by sweet 4K teachers the world over: “Your kid was using his plastic knife for unsanctioned purposes. Don’t blame us.” I asked him why he was sawing on the apple instead of spreading (ew) marshmallow cream. He looked at me like I’m quite dense. “There was peel on the apple. I couldn’t eat that!

It wasn’t long after when I noticed a perfectly straight-edged hole in one of the knees of his jeans. The third time I said “Alex, did you cut that with scissors?” I got a reluctant but earnest “Well yes I did, but I don’t know why I would've done something like that!” This makes me wonder about the brand new pair of khakis that came home recently with a gaping hole in BOTH knees, and while he insists (vehemently) that he most certainly did not take scissors to those pants, and in fact finds the very idea quite offensive—I have to wonder.

If he doesn’t start making better choices when it comes to common utility tools, he’ll eventually be the 40-year-old man who cuts his steak with a rubber-coated spoon and clips coupons with his teeth.

Baby Girl is doing great. Strong and loud heartbeat of 157 bpm, measuring right on track, not yet forcing my blood pressure into the danger zone the way Fetal Alex did. I’ve gained quite a bit less weight than I'd imagined, considering my newfound appreciation for Snickers ice cream bars and Limited Edition Publix Premium Strawberry Shortcake ice cream. And hot biscuits with I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter and strawberry jam. Mmm...

3 comments:

  1. You know he sliced the khakis, right? I'd be checking out your own clothing just to make sure it's intact. Be thankful he doesn't yet have that little sister. Cullen did at that age, and she had beautiful red leather church shoes just begging to be *ahem* trimmed about the buckle area. Cullen sure did love those scissors. He's also very lucky to be alive, since he also decided that a lamp cord needed cutting. Fast forward 9 years and the fascination transfers to knives and BB guns.

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  2. When I taught Kindergarten, the logical consequnce I issued for wayward scissors was having them tear required cutting items for a day. I found it quite amusing and it usually fixed the problem. By the way, you nailed the tranlation of the soft spoken teacher language.
    I also found it amazing that those blunt so-called-scissors could actually cut holes in clothing.
    There is nothing wrong with marshmallow cream, it is pretty good straight out of the jar. :)

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