the long-ass birthday weekend
2006-01-09, 1:40 p.m.

It�s the culmination of the long-ass birthday weekend for my Lil Guy, who graduates today from surly pre-teen to full-out teenager. And there was much rejoicing. Yay.

I do him a disservice, you know. He�s not normally surly, except when he comes home on a Sunday night from his dad�s house and has unfortunately glommed onto a certain prevailing attitude, and is tired. Then he�s surly, but he snaps the fuck right out of it when we get home and the dog is so excited to see him that she�s beside herself, and his room with the big comfy bed is waiting for him, and there�s a real, actual home-cooked meal waiting to be eaten.

So you see, he doesn�t waste a lot of time on surly. Bossy? Yes. Bitchy? A lot. Wants things exactly his way? Mais oui. Argumentative because he knows everything and everyone else is lucky they haven�t choked on their gum whilst tying their shoes? Always.

But I raised him this way, so I guess I have to like him.

Friday night, we had a sleepover for him and his 3 closest friends. They drove around in the golf cart, jumped on the trampoline, played video games, ran around outside hollering, and got sucked into watching a couple of movies with DW and me. I cooked hamburgers, which were only probably pretty much the best hamburgers anybody had ever eaten, with a giant chocolate chip cookie cake in lieu of birthday cake, with the words �Happy Birthday, you stinky teenager� written on it in green icing in lieu of candles and sentimental claptrap.

DW and I headed for bed at 11:00, and I didn�t hear a peep ::peep!:: out of them until 2:00, when I woke up to what I thought might be bowling upstairs. Turns out it was running, jumping and hollering. I told them that they didn�t have to go to sleep, but needed to tone it down. That kind of stuff doesn�t belong in the house any time of the day or night.

Then I woke up at 5:00 to what sounded like a herd of boys bickering in the hallway outside my bedroom door. Turns out they were indeed bickering, because a Y chromosome dictates that videogames cannot be played without bickering, but they were up in the loft. Our house sports a phenomenal acoustic feat wherein the sound in the loft magically carries downstairs, down the hall, and under my bedroom door.

So at 5:00, I told them just to go to sleep. 5:00 is no time for anybody to be awake. Plus, there were activities planned for Saturday, and I wanted them to get a few hours of sleep.

Saturday morning, I cooked egg and bacon tacos, told them all that they didn�t have to because I liked them anyway, but if they ever considered washing their hands and faces and brushing their teeth, now might be the time for it. I got cleaned up myself, and we headed off for the putt-putt/go-cart place. We had lost one kid to a morning basketball game, so it was LG and his 2 closest well-behaved friends. Heh. We spent 3 hours at that place, them going around in circles on go-carts, eating chicken wings in the snack bar, playing arcade games, and me doing Sudoku puzzles.

Saturday afternoon, after everyone was deposited into the loving bosoms of their grateful families, I made LG crack the books and make some major headway on a 500+ word research paper that was due today. He was tired, feeling a little sick from lack of sleep and too many chicken wings, so I did what any good mom would do: I made him a pot of coffee. Doesn�t your 13-year-old drink coffee?

Here�s a conversation we had whilst preparing the coffee:

Him: I need more sugar in my coffee. Sugar makes everything better.
Me: Except broccoli.
Him: Poor, poor broccoli.

See? He�s funny like me.

Last night, we went out to eat at all of our favorite Italian chain restaurant, which apparently has replaced its old manager with somebody who has a freaking clue about how to run a restaurant, so we were pleasantly surprised by (1) attentive service (2) accurate orders (3) no fuck-ups whatsoever on their part.

And you probably think that�s enough celebrating for a stinky teenager�s 13th birthday, don�t you? But it doesn�t end there. Today, I went to Subway and took him a special lunch of sandwich, chips and a drink, but to my credit, I decided to buck the tradition of the middle-schoolers� mothers bringing everyone Krispy Kremes for dessert after lunch. The KKs, you see, replace cupcakes once you are in the double digits. KKs=cool. Cupcakes=babies.

Here�s the conversation we had about that issue:

Me: Are you expecting me to bring cupcakes with extra sprinkles to school tomorrow?
Him: [rolls eyes]
Me: Does everyone still do Krispy Kremes for their birthday, or did y�all outgrow that?
Him: Not everyone does that.
Me: Do you want doughnuts?
Him: I don�t care.
Me: If you don�t care, I�m certainly not going out of my way.
Him: It doesn�t matter. Here�s how much it matters. [rolls eyes]
Me: Who all hasn�t had doughnuts on their birthday?
Him: I dunno.
Me: Who all HAS had doughnuts on their birthday?
Him: Only just about everybody.
Me: You and I will start a tradition that you guys are too old for that kind of stuff. Next year, NOBODY will want those baby doughnuts on their birthday.

I did indeed manipulate that for all it was worth, and it worked out to my advantage. Because I am hemorrhaging money lately, and twinny bucks or so for freaking doughnuts? Not so much.

BUT. That�s because I had already figured out what to get him for his b-day, which is actually today, so at lunch I went and got a baby refrigerator to go upstairs in the loft. Sure, it�s an appliance, and sure, we had been talking about getting a little fridge for up there for beer and whatnot, so it�s actually a household appliance disguised as a birthday present. But this is something he said he was considering buying with his Christmas money, and that seems a little sad to me. He should be buying pot and smokes and rubbers and comic books with his Christmas money, not household appliances.