Cat. Mouse. Slipper.

It’s no secret that I’m not overly fond of the kid living in my house.  Let’s face it, the snot on the bedroom wall shot off my scale of cope-ability and into my “dead to me” zone.

But let’s face it; it was forced down my throat, so I was dragged here against my will.  I didn’t want to go back to having a school kid.  I thought we had covered this off early on in our relationship; and we did.  But the Harridan, that thing still firmly clamped to his back, has spoken and so we turned our worlds upside down and moved house and I was the not-so-proud step mother of a hideous 16 yo boy. 

Part of the biggest issue is that I have the kid more than his mother but it would appear that my opinions do not count – at all.  In fact, I’m not even allowed to have them.  Frankly, if I weigh up my success rate against theirs, then I think they should give my ideas a shot.

I’m 51 years old and am smart enough to have had children when I was young and to raise them as I was raised, with tough love and the odd slap to the backside.  In return for that, I got 3 perfectly lovely young adults that all work, all care about others and the world, love me and would do anything and fly in from anywhere to help me.

Don’t get me wrong, two of my children were freaking vile as teenagers and handed me more grief than most people ever know.  I still have nightmares going to court with one and seeing some kid awaiting his turn wearing a black t-shirt that said “dead girls don’t say no” – it was horrific.  But they were well grounded and came out the other side as great people.

This kid has never known the sting of a slap.  He is told repeatedly by his half-witted, velvet wearing mother that he is gorgeous, smart, clever, witty, perfect!  Can do anything he wants!  I wouldn’t approve of that style of child rearing even if it were true; when the kid is none of those things, I find it bordering on cruel because life will prove different.  Not everyone can win.  Sometimes you are a loser – take it and get the hell over it.

Lately, my groovy white Starbucks mugs started to disappear from the cupboard, so I asked the Squeeze where 8+ of my mugs can have vanished to.  Of course he had no idea.  Today, I’m down another 4.  Yes you guessed it – they just disappeared!  Without a trace!  The new house has a Bermuda Triangle cupboard!  Call the newspapers!

Now I know that I’d be looking into where the kid was and suspect I’d find him on the grassy knoll when JFK was shot; but seriously – how does anyone expect me to believe a thief is crawling in and out of my house, purely to steal mugs?  But what am I supposed to do about it; when I know they are missing and short of a stranger stealing them, it can only have been the kid taking them home to put them in mummy’s slipper!

And now it’s Friday and I’m off to relax.  No kid until Monday night and my beautiful niece is up tonight and I’m cooking pork belly and keeping the champagne cold!