My cell phone was sitting on the table playing music through its speaker. I went to the bathroom, and when I came back, I noticed my phone was quiet.

Hmm. I picked up the phone and examined it to see what the glitch was. The phone was off. That’s odd.

It wouldn’t turn back on. It was just dead. Calfgrit4 was the only one around, and he had an uneasy interest in my investigation.

I asked him, “Did you mess with my phone?”

“I dropped it,” he said. “In my water cup.”

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . <- that’s me holding my tongue while my head throbbed.

Oh my God! Oh no! That phone is my tech baby. It’s my phone, my music player, my camera, my little notebook for numbers and notes. It’s my one piece of tech luxury. I love that little thing more than I like my car.

Calfgrit4 assured me he dried it off.

Yes, the outside was dry. I ran with the phone back to my bathroom and put the hairdryer to it with the hopes that I could somehow resuscitate it. I blew warm air into the cracks and crevices of the phone to dry or blow out any water inside. I tended to my little baby for a good half hour, praying and wishing the whole time.

I’m not sure what Calfgrit4 was doing while I was so completely occupied. He might have been testing the water resistance of all kinds of other electronics, but I was focused too much right then to care. I wouldn’t really miss the TV if he destroyed it. But my phone — my phone is my one and only real piece of modern technology. Hell, even my computer is about six years old.

Fortunately drying out the phone eventually brought it back to useful life. Oh thank God!

When I finally came back out to find Calfgrit4 playing nicely — no electronics sitting in water, and no water dripping over electronics. He said, “I’m sorry I wet your phone.”

“Thank you for apologizing,” I said. “But please don’t ever mess with my, or Mommy’s, phone.” I explained about water and electronics (and electricity), but I don’t know if he understood it all.

Later, I learned from Cowgrit, that he had used my phone as a bridge across the top of his water cup. “Building a bridge. Maybe he’ll become an engineer when he grows up.”

“Yeah,” I said, “that would be cool.” I didn’t add, So long as he’s not an electrical engineer.

Bullgrit

I feel like I tell my little boys “no” all the time. I hate that. I don’t want to be constantly denying them things and actions.

“Good Parenting” guides say a parent should redirect or tell the child what they can do instead of saying “no.” I try to do that, but after a while, it gets tiring and difficult.

Standing in the checkout line at the grocery store, CalfgritX says, “Can I have this candy?”

Catching myself from just saying, “No,” I think and instead say, “How about we get it, but you can eat some of it for dessert after dinner.”

“But I want the pudding we have in the ‘fridgerator for dessert.”

“Your choice. Which would you rather have?”

“This candy, now,” he says, sweetly.

I fall back on the old, “No.”

And there are times when the boys desires or actions come rapid fire such that anything longer than one syllable just won’t work.

Boy takes toy away from other boy: “No.”

Other boy pushes boy for taking the toy: “No.”

Boy hits other boy for pushing him: “No.”

Other boy kicks boy for hitting him: “No.”

Boy snaps whip on other boy: “No!”

Other boy swings big stick on boy: “No!”

Boy pulls switchblade knife on other boy: “NO!”

Other boy brandishes butcher knife on boy: “NO!”

Boy draws pistol on other boy: “NO!”

Other boy aims machine gun at boy: “NO!”

Boy calls in cruise missile strike on other boy: “NO!”

Other boy presses big red button for nuclear detonation on boy: “NO!”
“DO NOT MAKE ME GET UP FROM THIS HAMMOCK AND PUT YOU BOTH IN TIME OUT!”

I mean, sometimes I don’t even get to take a breath between “no”s.

Bullgrit

We’re closing on the sale of our house August 20. Our agent asked us if we were going to the closing. This question surprised me – I thought we had to be there. We told him that if our presence wasn’t required, we had no urge to spend half a day at an attorney’s office signing paperwork.

This past Monday, the closing attorney called me to ask if we were coming to the closing. I told her the same thing I told our agent: if we don’t have to be there, we won’t go. So she asked when could we go by the office to sign the paperwork. I told her I needed to check with my wife, and I’d call her back.

I called the attorney back Tuesday morning. I told the receptionist on the phone who I was calling, and she asked who I was. I told her.

When the attorney answered the phone, I said, “I’m returning your call from yesterday.”

She asked who I was. Now, why did the receptionist ask for my name if not to give it to the person she’s connecting me with?

I told the attorney my name, and reminded her that she called me yesterday about setting up a time to sign the paperwork for closing on our home.

“OK,” she said, “let me pull up your information.”

I waited a few moments for her to get caught up. Then she said, “OK.”

I waited a few more moments for her to give me more info on choosing a day and time. Then she asked, “Hello? Are you still there?”

“Yes, I’m here,” I answered. Apparently she was waiting for me to tell her something. The closing date, 8/20, is a Thursday, so I offered, “How about Friday? Can we do it on Friday?”

I was thinking Friday, the 21st. She thought I meant Friday the 7th – this coming Friday.

“Oh, that early?” I said. “I figured we’d need to do it near around the closing date.”

“Well, you can,” she said. “But anytime is fine. Whenever is convenient for you.”

This “anytime” thing was a little confusing. Any time that is convenient for me? Really?

“I was thinking,” I said, “Friday, the twenty-first.”

“Oh,” she said with a hint of condescension in her voice, “the closing is on the twentieth. You need to sign the papers by then.” She didn’t say, “Duh!”, but I felt it implied at the end of her sentence. So “anytime” isn’t quite so “any.”

I said, “How about Wednesday, the nineteenth?”

“OK,” she said. “What time?”

I didn’t say, “six o’clock,” which would have been a good time for me. Instead, I asked, “What hours are you open?”

“Nine to five,” she answered.

So this “anytime” concept gets trimmed down even more. Lawyers.

I think, if I leave my office at 4:00, I can be there by 4:45. “How about four forty-five?” I say.

She almost guffawed at that. She did give a slightly exasperated sigh. “Can we do it at three o’clock?” she asked.

So, if I ask for your closing time, then suggest coming in fifteen minutes prior to that, surely I actually can come in two hours earlier? She’s asking me to leave my job almost half a day early so that she can do her job. You know, most service industries set their schedules around their customers’ schedule. When I need milk, I don’t have to take time away from my work to go pick it up from the store. And the grocer ain’t paid $250 an hour.

Here’s an attorney who surely is being paid more than I (probably a multiple of my pay), and she expects me to cut off work early to accommodate her time. Now, I’m fortunate in that I can cut off work early –- I can either make it up later, or take paid time off, or just not worry about it as I’ve surely worked over hours enough in the past that my boss won’t mind (or even know) –- but it’s the principle of the damn thing.

She explains that the attorneys have to schedule things on the hour, so she can’t do 4:45. She says this like she’s teaching a child in how the world works, like it’s obvious to an adult. This woman is just rubbing me the wrong way in this whole telephone conversation.

We settle on 4:00. Fine.

So this whole idea of not having to be at the closing, isn’t really like not having to be there –- we just have the option of being there at another time, before the closing time, within the hours of 9 and 5, on the hour. Customer’s convenience be damned.

Bullgrit

The last time I posted anything on WoW was last December. I played only a time or two after that post, and I let my account expire in early January. I was just finding the game, “meh.”

But then in March, I had the hankerin’ to explore Azeroth again. I reopened my account, played a couple of times over that week, and then let the account expire again.

Now, it’s been another few months since then, without playing WoW, and I’m again feeling the urge to explore a fantasy world. So last night I restarted my account. Unfortunately, I had to download all the updates that have come out since March.

I would like to say that after downloading the updates, I at least got to log in and see my old characters. But the updater was taking so freakin’ long that I just went to bed before it finished.

I think that fact that my regular, real-world, face-to-face, game nights are only once a week — at best, when we don’t have to cancel for one reason or another — that makes me long for the instant gratification of logging into WoW for some adventure.

Will this newest attempt to get back into WoW play stick, or will I again find it lacking the real feel of fantasy-world adventure that I’m looking for?

Bullgrit