Today we are driving to the store, cruising* down the highway, when I hear a voice pipe up from the back seat:
"Tissue!"
...
"Mom, I need a tissue!"
...
"Mom, do we have any tissues?"
Since his stuffy-voiced self was asking more urgently each time, I finally paid attention. (Heh. Kidding. No, I don't ignore him. He just repeats things at quarter-second intervals until you acknowledge and answer. And then you have to repeat yourself at LEAST another three times. And then you have to scold him for not paying attention. After you repeat yourself one last time. Yelling. Just typing that makes me tired. UGH.) I tell him I'm driving, he'll have to wait until we get to a stop where I can get him a tissue.
(For the record, we DO have tissues in the car. It's just that they are over in the glovebox. Stashed away, keeping the rest of the car nice and organized and presentable and UNCLUTTERED. Which, you know, would TOTALLY BE A LOST CAUSE IF THAT TISSUE PACKET WASN'T KEPT FIRMLY IN THE GLOVEBOX. Where it belongs. The little outcast.)
ANYway.
So I tell him he needs to wait.
"But, Mom, look!"
I look. And ask "What?"
"A boogie!"
Indeed, a boogie. Right there, on the edge of his finger. A boogie which he has just extracted from his nose with said finger. A boogie which is now precariously close to becoming one with the interior of our minivan. And I mean that in the grossest way possible.
GAH. But I can't get him a tissue. We will surely have an accident and DIE. So all I am left with is the same injunction:
"You'll just have to wait." (I'm pretty sure I preceded that w/ an "Ewww, Fruit Loop!" And quite possibly** a wince and an eyeroll at my lot in life. You know, the part in the mom job description that says I will be the boogie picker upper.)
Okay, so, fast-forward to our destination. Just before we get out of the car, Fruit Loop says his nose hurts a little inside. I tell him that often happens when you have a cold, raw skin, blah blah blah.
A few minutes later, as I come around to get him out of the car, I ask if he needs his tissue and where the boogie is.
"I put it back."
You put it back??
"In my nose. That's why my nose hurts inside. Because of the boogie. It's hard."
He put it back. I don't know whether to applaud his resourcefulness or just...ewww, Fruit Loop!
I ended up just laughing. Which, of course, he thoroughly appreciated.
Take-home lesson of the day: Be prepared. In case, you know, you pick your nose and have nowhere to put your petrified boogie.
*Not really - it's Friday, and that means TRAFFIC. But not important. This time, anyway.
**No, definitely.
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