The Downsides to Five-Year Old Texting

This past weekend promised to be a busy one. DirecTV was coming on Saturday (between 8 and 12, they said) while Russell worked, we were supposed to go school shopping, and Riley and I were going to see the Smurfs on Sunday. I am not in the habit of setting my alarm on the weekends. Why would I? I leave for work between 5:30-5:45 am during the week, I try to appreciate "sleeping in" when I can. "Sleeping in" these days generally means being woken up by a screaming baby at 6:15, or having a five year old bolt into our room chasing the cat at 6:30. I am accidentally becoming a morning person, and I hate it.

Anywho, why WOULDN'T this be the Saturday that Zoey decides to sit quietly in her bed and play after she wakes up, and Riley decides to sneak downstairs and play with my phone? I woke up at 9:00 to Riley yelling "I'M DONE!" (code for "I need someone to wipe my butt for me") and had a series of small, instant heart attacks (Did someone come into my house and kidnap my baby? Did Riley put a pillow over Zoey's face? Why is my 8 month old so quiet?!?). I bolted into the bathroom with the intent to help Riley along and go check on Zee. Unfortunately, Riley had attempted to do it himself (which is great! We've been encouraging that) and has made a complete mess of himself. Further, he decided it would be best to not dispose of all of the toilet paper in the toilet- smart thinking, since he's used a ton of it- and has been dropping it all in the trash can beside the sink. Lovely. So after about 10 minutes of having tiny heart attacks while I clean up Poopapalooza 2011 (Hands were all washed), I throw Zoey's bedroom door open to find her sitting in her crib happily munching on a pink elephant's leg.

So much for my human alarm clocks.

I didn't remember about the DirecTV installation until Russell texted me, conveniently the minute I arrived downstairs, saying "Sorry you couldn't sleep in longer. Did the installer come yet?" Installer... Installer... Shit. I had two missed calls, and a voicemail. I called it and got "Mrs. Bartell, this is Christian from DirecTV calling to......" I could hear him fumbling around with his phone for about 45 seconds before he hung up. WTF was that? I went into my history to find the return number, and saw that I'd received calls at 8:15, 8:17, and had sent a text message to the number at 8:19. It wouldn't let me access my sent text messages, kept bringing me to a browser on which Riley had attempted to buy a Sara Bareilles CD (wtf again?), a search he performed in my address book looking for "Jilly Bartell", two emails he'd attempted to send to sdsklrsgbxgjsdrssl@sfsdrhysglxnalsdg, and the calorie and fat count for a standard piece of "Apple Pie", which he'd managed to search for in my Calorie Counter app (which is, incidentally, the best dieting app ever, and I highly recommend it).

So I called the number in my history, and apologized to 'Christian', who promised they'd be there between 10 and 12 because their first call was running late (lies. They didn't get there until 1) and confirmed that my son had called him back earlier and told him I was sleeping, and had followed it up with a text message that "Didn't make sense". I apologized again and got off the phone. Finally, the text message Riley'd sent popped up on my phone, simply reading "Uh my grandma's tv." (yes, he used punctuation. I was proud). That's what I get for sleeping in.

DirecTV sent three installers, one of which spent 30 minutes of the installation hanging out on the floor of the playroom with Zoey and I and talking with me amidst periodic wonderings of "what they (his co-installers) are doing up there". As they left, they thanked me for "hanging out" and pointed out that Riley's phone call and text message were the highlight of their day. I nodded and ushered them off, simply hoping that it was enough of a "highlight" that they'd be willing to forget the fact that they had to run a cable through my bedroom and office walls and I hadn't cleaned my discarded bras and underwear off of the carpet or changed the kitty litter box. I'm high class, folks.

Zoey found this weekend that she is delighted by her newfound ability to climb stairs (and off of stairs! Don't worry, I caught her) so I had to run out and purchase a baby gate.

Zoey ponders whether to proceed up, or just eat lint off the stairs.

Sunday was Smurf day. I was never a fan of the Smurfs, even as a child, so it was double stupid for me, but Riley enjoyed it. And I got to eat fried pickles, so that was nice.

Riley also found a new hobby this weekend- he is OBSESSED with the Sims 2. He doesn't really grasp how to play it. If you were to take a glimpse into one of Riley's Sims neighborhoods, you would see several families with last names like "Happy Place" and "Izzy" (which is my car's name) and first names like "Smiley Owen" and "9th Street Love Monster" (I'm serious. And I am claiming that as my imaginary band name, so back off), with 6 kids, and interesting houses.... Most of his HUGE families occupy 2 bedroom houses that are literally stuffed, wall to wall, with counters. No beds, no toilets, no couches- counters. Counters in the hallways, the bedrooms, the bathrooms, the yard. Oh, and maybe one room filled with lamps. But that's okay, he doesn't want to actually PLAY with the families, he just enjoys making them.

He told me last night that he wants "10 million more" little sisters. I am venturing a guess that he'd want their names to be something along the lines of- and these are some of his actual Sim's names- "Baby Joe", "Joe Hank", "Smiley Face", "Pretty Princess" and "Frank Rose". I'm not sure I could handle more kids.