My Itty-Bitty Petty Rant about my Itty-Bitty Booklight
First of all, it helps to know that an Itty-Bitty Booklight is exactly what it sounds like. It's an itty-bitty light you clip onto the book you're reading so that you can read at night (or if you're getting old eyes like me it just helps you read). Second of all, it helps to know that reading is my "thing". It's my hobby, my stress reliever, and my soul filler. Third, there will eventually be a relevant point to this story.
For months I've been missing my Itty-Bitty Booklight. I've spent I don't know how much time tearing the house apart looking for it. It is, after all, itty-bitty, and can fall into cracks or crevices or be set who knows where. I have, on separate occasions, blamed each of my bio-kids for taking it. Each swears they did not have it. Everybody in the house knows Mama can't find her Itty-Bitty Booklight.
I could have bought a new one, but I knew it was in the house somewhere and I just plain old never remembered because Itty-Bitty Booklights don't have their own section at the store. You just stumble across them one day in a check-out aisle or there might be a strip of them hanging on end of a store aisle. They're an impulse item that I only remember the impulse when I sit down to read and don't have it.
So the other day I'm working from home while the kids are at school and SD's TV is blaring so loudly that I can hear it from the living room with her door closed. I go in to turn it off and there is- you guessed it- my Itty-Bitty Booklight. Shiny and pink and on her bedside table. Well, of course, I can't prove it's MY Itty-Bitty Booklight because I never actually wrote my name on it or anything. I put it in my pocket.
Later that evening I remember it's in my pocket still. I pulled it out and ever so innocently asked SO if SD had an Itty-Bitty Booklight because I found this one in her room and I didn't want to take it back if it was hers. No, he said, it was not hers. So I mentioned how I've been looking all over for it and wondered why she had it (trust me, in our house there would be no mistaking that this is MY Itty-Bitty Freakin' Booklight that I use and need- she knew she had something of mine that I wanted).
Hmm, he says. He doesn't know except there was this one time he was going to use it...So, I ask, you mean to tell me that your reasoning for SD taking my Itty-Bitty Booklight is that you were going to use it? That makes no sense. He sputters. He grasps for ideas. He says she...uhh...she must have...he changes the subject to something else.
To my mind, the Itty-Bitty Booklight is now a symbol. It is my symbol of a Skid wronging a step parent and the bio-parent flip-flopping between trying to pretend it didn't happen and trying to make up an excuse for why it did. Yes, it is a stupid itty-bitty example, but the itty-bitty irritating pettiness of it is what makes it so symbolic to me. We have to endure so many more egregious examples that even itty-bitty things like Itty-Bitty Freakin' Booklights become an issue or at least another little stab.
Today it's the Itty-Bitty Booklight. Last time or next time it's (sorry, I can't think of all the members' names that go with their stories) the pot in the house or stealing money or peeing on the engagement ring. It's how the bio-parent can't even face up to an Itty-Bitty Booklight, let alone Things That Really Matter. It's how the bio-parents MAKE us have to be the bad guys because they just would rather pretend it's not going on.
So that's why I'm bitching about an itty-bitty thing like an Itty-Bitty Booklight, even though there are horrendous stories going on all over this board, one particularly tragic yesterday, and worse things than the Itty-Bitty Booklight happen at my own home.
For anyone who has read or seen The Hunger Games, which I read without the benefit of my Itty-Bitty Booklight, the Itty-Bitty Booklight is my Mockingjay pin. Symbolic of the treachery upon my people 
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All those itty bitties add
All those itty bitties add up. That seems to be my biggest issue here. Its 1000 itty bitty things just like you described, 1000 itty bitty excuses for bad behavior, 1000 itty bitty special exceptions to the rules that add up and make ONE GIANT problem
I'm relieved you guys
I'm relieved you guys understand why I bothered with the long Itty-Bitty story
I totally hear you on this.
I totally hear you on this. I've been using the same pen for 4 months, it's attached to the book I've been using to plan my sister in law's surprise baby shower. My DH decided in the mist of me planning this, all of a sudden I must plan a sweet 16 for SD, meanwhile, her bday was in December but all of a sudden, it's top priority. So, I started writing her list in my same spiral book. I went away for a week, my biokids were with their father, I come home, notice she has marked in the book and MY FREAKING PEN IS GONE! So, now as the baby shower is approaching this weekend and I have left over things to write and plan, I of course cant find a pen and if I do it doesn't work. WTF with these SKids, they all SUCK!!
Yep, I've flipped out over a
Yep, I've flipped out over a soda before. And I don't even particuarly like soda, lol.
We were all out for a day of errands. Fed the kids lunch right before we left so that I wouldn't get hit up with the "om hungry, I want mcdonalds bullcrap as soon as we got going. We were at the register for the first stop and I told the kids (ss, SD, and BS) that they could chose one thing, either candy, chips or SIDS, from the register... But only one, not a snack AND a drink. Everyone, including Dh, choses a snack. I get a soda cause I am so unbelievably thirtsy for some reason.
We get out to the car, I unload the cart into the back while skids get in and Dh starts the car for some AC, then I load BS into his car seat, and open his little thing of pringles. I finally get into my seat and buckle up. I look over at my cup holder, expecting to see my nice cold bottle of soda. Nope, all there jazz is an empty bottle of soda. Dh had opened it, drank some then handed it back to the skids to have some. The three of them drank it all. Didn't even leave me a sip, or share with BS.
I was fighting back tears it bothered me so much. That they would have so little respect for me. Dh didn't get it at all, just got pissy that I didn't willingly and lovingly share my soda with the skids. It was just a soda after all.
OMG, I would have come
OMG, I would have come unglued!!! How rude and thoughtless!
I know exactly what you
I know exactly what you mean!
For ever and ever I have had the rule that there is NO food/snacks/drinks in bedrooms. None. Period. End of discussion.
My DH decided to take it a step further, and tells my kids that there are no food/snacks/drinks in the family room. Note, we are in the midst of completely removing all carpeting in our home and replacing it with hard wood flooring.
So.... we work on the bedroom belonging to the steps. We move everything out of the room and as I'm removing desk drawers I'm finding wrappers, empty soda cans. After that, I have to WIPE DOWN the walls because there is spilled "something" all over it (behind the computer desk). Guessing coca-cola. Then as I'm down on the floor getting ready to pull up the carpeting, I spy all sorts of chip crumbs, sunflower seeds, etc. Pulling up the carpeting, and the underside is BROWN because of all the (again, guessing coca cola) SPILLS that have occurred.
DH blamed the underside of the carpeting on our dog peeing. Really? Didn't know he was allowed in that bedroom so much that he could do that much damage. The SK's are here every weekend, other than that the door is closed. So, did the dog pee all up and down the wall too? Did he drop his chips and sunflower seeds all over too? WTFE.
I will reiterate the RULE to all. And I will also reiterate to DH that if THAT FLOOR gets ruinied, so help me god I will make them pay. And in the meantime, since DH doesn't want to make the SK's do chores (because they might not want to come over again if he does) he will be responsible for cleaning their room TO MY SATISFACTION every.single.weekend after they leave. Maybe, just maybe he will hate housework more than he hates the fact he might alienate his kids.
Ooh, here's a great one. I
Ooh, here's a great one. I have walked into the living room before and found SD balancing a can of Pepsi on the sofa cushions. Never mind that there's a table right next to her with coasters. I have also found empty Pepsi cans laying sideways on the couch.
So, one day Dh and I are moving the sofa so I can hang some curtains. Pull it out and there is a HUGE brown, almost black stain all over the carpet. You guessed it. SD spilled her soda all over the couch and just let it trickle down through the cushions onto the floor (the couch is built in three separate sections because it has recliners on both ends). I was SO mad, and of course Dh said I can't prove it was SD. Whatever. Now we have an enormous carpet stain.
BTW, whats the story of
BTW, whats the story of peeing on an engagement ring?? That's just horrible.
Ha. Turns out it was some
Ha. Turns out it was some fabrication on someone else's fake blog...but that doesn't invalidate the point (hopefully).
All of us have one of these
All of us have one of these stories. For me it was the Salad Forks....I never thought a teenager could push me so far over the edge by setting the table purposefully with Salad Forks....And yet, after finally pointing it out to DH that she had to have a learning disability, since we had gone over the difference in silverware at least 5 times before....His answer was she just didn't understand what you wanted....Well DH when does she understand, the 6th time, the tenth time or do we need to put her in an instution....Yeah I lost it....
My skids aren't allowed
My skids aren't allowed anything consumable outside of the kitchen other than water (they're 5&7, SD is messy/clumsy and SS is absent minded and leaves things out/open wherever). And yet, I walk into their rooms and find candy/chip/fruit snack/etc bags, bottles of juice, STOLEN bottles of soda (they're not allowed it with us other than special occasions or treats), crackers ground into the carpets, and sticky walls. DH's response is to BLAME THE DOG. "Oh, you know he drags things through the house..." Yeah right, DH. When THE DOG drags stuff through the house, he eats the contents AND the wrappers, because he's A DOG. He doesn't leave crumbs, nor does he have the capability to OPEN the fridge or OPEN A BOTTLE. If you're going to make up excuses for the skids, at least make them believable, silly man.
This is such a great post, so
This is such a great post, so many of us have had that moment, wish I could bump this blog since it buried under the crew drama.
Me too! I love it! I'm glad
Me too! I love it! I'm glad you found your itty bitty booklight!!