Out, Damned Spots!!!

“JAZZ IS IN MY SPOT!!!”

“GRACE WON’T GIVE ME MY SPOT!!!”

“THAT’S MY SPOT!”

I never used to have Spots in my home. Now, suddenly, I seem to be rife with them. And they are all VERY IMPORTANT spots. Vitally so. So very precious, that one person can stake a claim on one which will last IN PERPETUITY. Like gold mines or some damned thing.

There is a particular chair in the living room. It, in fact, has two Spots on it, which is a problem given how often the child in possession of said chair positions her tiny butt so as to cover BOTH! OF! THEM!

Outrageous! Insupportable! Untenable!

I say “her” tiny butt because only Jazz and Grace are inany way concerned with Spots. I pray to whichever gods oversee such things that none of the other tots are infected with Spots, because they are a damnable nuisance.

I never know quite where a Spot is going to manifest. There is the grey chair in the living room. It’s consistent. (Strangely, the chair across the room from it contains no Spots, possibly because it usually contains a dog, and dogs do not concern themselves one whit with the pleadings of small girls re: Spots.)

Apart from the grey chair, Spots seem to shift. So far, we have had Spot sightings on both of the benches in the living room, on the chairs at the dining room table, and particularly those at the ends of the table, for some reason. There’s a small end table that is a Spot. This despite the fact that they are not to sit on that table. Because it is a table, not a chair. Matters not. It harbours a Spot.

There is a Spot on both of the chairs that accompany the New Toddler Table (VERY EXCITING!!! HIGHLY PRIZED!!!). Not too surprising, those. Rather more surprisingly, the Quiet Stair has on at least one occasion been a Spot. A sleeping cot, a blanket, a particular corner: they have all been Spots.

How do I recognize a Spot? Well, to be honest, I can’t tell a Spot from any other, perfectly innocuous, part of my home.

Grace and Jazz, though? THEY KNOW SPOTS!!! And, from what I can make out, a Spot is always, always, AL-F8#@ing-WAYS inhabited by SOMEONE ELSE. Someone else WHO MUST BE EJECTED from that Spot.

What makes a spot a Spot, far as I can make out, is that YOU DON’T OCCUPY IT. If someone else is in that spot? It is a Spot. And you MUST HAVE IT! At all costs! Accompanied by great squawking, squabbling, shoving and indignation!!!! EVERY! DAMNED! TIME!

For EVERY! SINGLE! SPOT!!!

Spots, if I can be so blunt, are a royal pain in the arse. I am thinking of making a new rule: There are NO SPOTS at Mary’s house. Corollary to that rule: If you see a Spot, you will spent the REST OF THE DAY on the Quiet Stair.

Because, really?

Out, OUT damned Spots!!!