Keeping it Real

I haven't gotten "real" for quite awhile. I think it's about time, don't you? I mean, I live this life every day, then come here and talk about everything but what you really want to hear about. Because really, I know you only come here to read about Angela. Don't say you don't. And even if you don't, be kind enough to lie about it.

Angela has the best imagination of any child I have ever met. I raised her brothers, and they didn't recreate the things Angela does. They didn't even come close. Sorry boys, but all your piles of match box cars all over the middle of the bedroom that you told me were "junk yards"? Yeah, I'm not so dumb! So you found a creative way to not clean up your cars and I let you THINK you had me fooled. Still, that can't hold a candle to your sister.

Angela doesn't watch t.v.

Angela DOES t.v.

Angela makes all of her favorite shows 100% interactive. She'll watch a few minutes, then start chasing around the house reenacting what she just watched. But, don't think she's done with the t.v. and that since she left the room you can now change the channel! You can't because she's not DONE, and while it APPEARS that she is in her own little world at the moment, the kid with the severe hearing loss is listening to her imaginary cast with one ear... and talking back to them...three rooms away...while the other ear monitors the TV status! If you so much as walk within 2 feet of the t.v. you're going to hear about it.

I bet you didn't know that on New Year's Eve, there was a marathon of "Dog the Bounty Hunter" on t.v., did you? Yeah, I didn't either. We were having family movie night with Tyler and Angela, when she decided what we were watching was boring, and she'd rather watch a scheduled movie on the Disney Channel on the basement t.v.

We have a rule about the basement t.v, that when you're done watching it you turn the channel back to the Disney channel, because the electronic set up down there takes the same level of skill to operate as a fighter jet. When this rule is followed, Angela is able to turn the TV on and watch what she wants. Not too difficult since she refuses to watch any channel that doesn't have the Disney logo in the corner. Unless it's Modern Family or The Middle, but I digress. When this rule ISN'T followed, and should Angela get up early on Saturday morning after someone has messed with the channels, she's going to drag ME out of bed to come fix it, which I do because it means one more hour of sleep. And she NEVER asks Dean to do it because 1) He won't. and 2) He doesn't know how to work the flight controls.

Apparently Tyler either didn't know, or possibly forgot (maybe chose not to remember?) that rule.

So Angela headed for the basement to watch the movie she'd been telling me for 10 days was going to be on "New Year's Eve, Eight-Nine Central!"

Three hours later, after a movie, popcorn, and the start of our second movie, it occurred to one of us...who shall remain nameless because it was me... that Angela was still in the basement. (No, I did NOT forget about my kid down there. I was just slightly distracted by Johnny Depp for a few minutes. Is that so wrong?) Since she wasn't running around the house acting out her movie, I figured she must have fallen asleep down there, or maybe (gasp) she was playing in her room!

I went downstairs and was met by the closed basement door. As I opened it, it was pushed back at me and slammed shut. "Who's there!" demanded her voice from the other side.

"It's me, Santa Clause." I said, in my best North Pole voice. (you have to think on your feet with Angela! I'm way better at this than Dean is, by the way. Just say'in...)

"Go away Santa! I'm on a mission!"

What? She's...."On a mission"? 


"But I have presents and reindeer. Wanna feed them a carrot?"

"Enter at your own risk!" she hollered, and I heard the thump, thump, thump of her running away.

Santa was shaking in her boots.

I opened the door very carefully in case she was right behind it. (I have experience with this, can you tell?) and entered the basement.

It was about that time I was tackled from behind, thrown to the ground, and told, "Hands ahine your back! You're under arrested!" as she sat on my back trying to tie my hands up with something...I'm very lucky she doesn't know how to tie, because I'm pretty sure we were going to have a hostage situation on our hands. 


"Hey! I was just bringing presents you ungrateful little girl! What gives? What did I do to deserve this?"

"You were smoke'in cigarettes and drink'in wine!" she growled as she continued her desperate attempts to tie my hands.

Satisfied that I was successfully tied up with her invisible rope, she crawled off my back and army crawled across the room, but stopped 1/2 way to look at something on the T.V.

There they were. Dog the Bounty Hunter and his wife, Beth Chapman. OH NO!!!! We have had to put a strict "NO JAIL/NO HOSPITAL" rule in place when it comes to role playing. Angela has some pretty serious control issues and these two games feed right into that. It's fun for one round, but after that? Yeah, not so much.

I told Angela it was time to start getting ready for bed, then I turned off the t.v. and high-tailed it for upstairs. We were just starting to get into the next movie when I heard the squack of a walkee talkee coming from the front entry. "Yeah, I see 'em.... Over...10-4..... A-B-C-D-E-F-G."

Suddenly I thought she'd passed out or something, the way she dropped the the floor, but I knew she was fine when she army crawled all the way through the livingroom, dining room, and into the kitchen. She spent the next HALF HOUR army crawling around the house. Finally we'd had enough. You see, Angela didn't realize that most people who are army crawling around do it QUIETLY, so as not to interrupt their parents' movie. I redirected her toward bed. Thankfully she was tired and went to bed easily, and it wasn't long after the rest of us headed to bed as well.

3:00 a.m. there was a crash in the bathroom. Dean, being the man, didn't even flinch. Me, being the mom, I sleep with Mommy ears and hear every little sound the house makes. I opened my eyes and listened. That's when I heard Angela talking. Only she was whispering. (rare for her, since she has two volume levels: "LOUD" and "sleeping". ) She was in the bathroom that adjoins our bedroom. I got out of bed and peeked around the corner, tried not to laugh out loud, then scrambled to get my camera... I know, it's pathetic... This is what I saw:

It's kind of hard to tell, but if you click on the picture you'll see she's wearing her leather motorcycle jacket and is putting on lip gloss. She HATES lip gloss!..."Angela, what are you doing? It's 3:00 in the morning, get back to bed."

"I'm not Angela. I'm Beth Chapman. I'm going on a mission. With Daryl. You're not invited."

Do you know who Beth Chapman is? You don't? Oh, well this is her. This is who my darling daughter is aspiring to be. And I'm pretty sure that she's had some more...ummm..."work" done since this picture was taken!

Suddnely "Beth Chapman" threw the gloss in the drawer, and pulled a set of these out of her pocket, which have since been added to the "banned toy" list...

then stomped her way to the kitchen. She wouldn't talk to me after that. She would only talk to "Dog" and "Daryl", saying things like, "You go 'round back, I'll get the door." Then the army crawling again, and lots of talking to Dog. Do you know Dog? I do NOW!

Finally I came to my senses. I mean, it was 3:00 a.m. after all, so my quick thinking parts weren't yet awake. "Hey! Yo! Dog. I mean DAAAAWG. It's bedtime dude. Middle of the night and stuff. Time to head back to headquarters and chill for a bit. In your bed. Quiet and stuff, cuz...like.. all the bad guys are trying to sleep upstairs."

As I crawled back into bed, and pondered the last 15 minutes, I realized where the night had gone wrong. Angela had OD'd on "Dog the Bounty Hunter". I didn't know it was possible to do that, but clearly she was HIGH from that show. It was like SPEED for her!!!! No, it was like CRACK speed, because she was so hooked that for the next few days there was no "Angela" living in our house, only the above mentioned cop wanna-bees. 

On about day 6 of this, I made the mistake of taking a shower. I do that sometimes; take a shower. I came up the stairs to find Angela at the measuring wall. (you know, the wall everyone has in their house where you measure your kid, and sometimes put the line a little higher than it needs to go just to make your kid feel good because they're fake growing?) She was talking to the air, "Alright Daryl...stand still. There. Done. Dog, you're next. Don't move." 

My measuring wall now looks like this:

Do you see all the lines in permanent marker? Yep, that's exactly how tall Dog and all his cohorts are! 

That was it. We had to put a stop to Dog, adding him and his friends to the list of "Not allowed" invisible people in our house! Please tell me you have a list like this!!! A few days later, Angela was missing. I found her here...SOBBING:

Good Lord she cut a finger off or something. "What's wrong Angela? Are you ok?"

"I miss Beth Chapman.....sniff...and Dog....sniff sniff...AND DARYL!!!!!"

Seriously? I had just discovered what teenage hormones do to girls. I could get paid for this discovery, I'm pretty sure.

They're just on vacation for awhile honey, until they can remember all the rules of the house. Not to worry."

Ok, now don't tell this part, cuz it's a secret! Remember the week before I left for Serbia and Bulgaria, and I was desperately trying to get some math homework done? I found several 17 minute episodes of Zach and Cody on demand, but they just weren't letting me get anything done. I mean...17 minutes, ya know? I looked at the ON DEMAND list again, and that's when I found that "Dog the Bounty Hunter" is ON DEMAND on our t.v. line up!!! SCORE! And they were 50 minute episodes! I weighed all my options, and looked from the TV to Angela, as she anxiously waited for me to turn something ON already. I did it. I let her watch all of the "Dog" episodes available on demand. And a few days later I left town, leaving Dean to deal with the effects of the overdose.