Weirdest thing I heard today

Subtitle: I think Rory’s reached the end of his potty-training tolerance.

“I saw pee come down out of the sky.”
Rory’s brown eyes are wide and quite sincere. I must’ve heard him wrong.
“You saw pee come down out of the sky?”
“Yup!” Guess I did hear him right. He’s very sure.
“You did?” I let my incredulity show, just a little.
“Yup. It falled down from an airplane.”

So there. YOU tell him he didn’t. Me, I just let it go…

All pooped out

Little Noah is totally potty trained, and the thing that tipped the scales for us was not the infamous pee-bottle, but Smarties.

Yup. Good old chocolate-y motivator in a candy-coated package. Noah was told he would get one for a pee, and two for a poo. Suddenly, using the potty was very, very interesting!!

After a week of success, Noah was told that he would only get Smarties for poops. No more Smarties for pees.

He took it well, really. Because really, this would cut his Smartie intake by about 90%. A toddler with the will to pee can drink a LOT of water, and make many, many, many pees in day. But poo? Well, there’s only so much a body can poo.

Or so you’d think.

“I haffa poo, Mary!”
“Away you go to the potty, then.”

And yes, there in the bowl is a decent little arc.

“Good man!”
“I get Smarties now?”
“Yes, you do.”
“Not when a pee?”
“No, no Smarties for a pee. Just for poo.”
“Tank you.”

“Mary, I got to poo!”
“You do? You already did one this morning, but if you have to go, away you go.”

There is substantially more wait time and effort for this one, but, after a minute or so, there in the potty lies another reeking rainbow. Smaller than the last one of only an hour before, but definitely a poo. Wonder what he had for dinner last night?

“Mary, I got to poo!”
“Again? Are you sure?”
“Uh-huh. I got to poo.”
“All right, little man. Do your best.”

He sits. And he waits. And he sits. His face is an intensity of concentration, stern and fixed. He waits some more…

“Mary! I did a poo!”
THIS I have to see.

And there, in the bowl… a smidge, a dot, an iota of shit.

He has managed to squeeze out, by sheerest force of toddler will, the requisite excrement.

Smarties are one helluva motivator, I tell you.

Tea and Pee and ME, first!

I am at that “certain age”, and by and large I think I look pretty fine for all my years. The wrinkles I genuinely don’t mind — evidences of a life well lived — the gray hair I cover, and the various bodily creaks and groans I get seen to by my RMT daughter. (Hee!! Well worth paying her train fare to visit.)

However, the weight? The thickening of the body? That I don’t like so well, and the weight, she does creep on if you don’t pay attention. So I do the obvious — avoid the junk and put a little activity into every day. (Sadly, chasing toddlers doesn’t seem to be sufficient all by itself. I can’t think for the life of me why not. Booo.)

I also have a weight-maintenance strategy (shared, as I happens by Mir): “tea as food substitute.”

When I get that sudden “MUST EAT” urge, I indulge in a little self-talk: “You’re not hungry, you’re bored. Have some TEA!”

So I do. Cup after cup of the stuff. The first one or two in the morning are black and caffeinated, the rest are herbal. Mint, rooibos, raspberry, spice… So much choice — even though they all taste the same: water. Beautifully scented water, but water. I don’t care. What I’m after is HOT and calorie-free.

(I’m drinking even more this week, seeking some form of heat. Minus 28C with a windchill of -39C (-18F and -38F). Even inside, I need two layers and a sweater. Boooo.)

But for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. With all that input, there has to be an output. And so there is. Lots and lots. Copious. Many trips up the 15 stairs. Many, many trips. 15 steps up, 15 steps down. (Which is another way in which lots of tea contributes to weight maintenance. And — I live in hope — semi-decent thighs??)

Problem is, I live in a home knee-deep in toddlers, many of whom are toilet trained. Toilet trained, thus also going up those 15 steps to the bathroom.

Going up them slowly. Sooooo slowly. One-step, one-step, sometimes stopping to check out a piece of lint or take a wee breather or simply stare blankly into space. I could harry them up the stairs, “Hurry UP! I have to pee, too!”

But that takes time, time I may or may not have, so I prefer just to pound on by them. Leap like an aging gazelle over their trundling bodies, whip into the bathroom, claim that premium space with my butt. “Ha! I got here first!” By the time they’re finished all that lint-picking and space-gazing, I’ll probably be done, anyway, and if I’m not?

There are two potties in this house, and one toilet. Let them figure it out…