Listen to your Mama

I think WE learned a very important lesson last night.  Yesterday was his girlfriend's birthday.  I asked him what he was going to get her and he said nothing, because she told him she didn't want him to get her anything.   Silly,silly boy.  I, along with every other female he told the story to, told him that he should NOT listen to her or he was going to be made to regret it for the rest of their relationship.  As of yesterday morning, he still hadn't got her anything, so I picked up a cheapo bouquet of flowers for him to give her.  He grumbled about it, but brought them along when he went to her house for a birthday supper last night.  Yep, just as I told him, he instantly became the greatest boyfriend in the world.  It's amazing what $6 worth of daisies will do for your reputation.  And I"m sure that with a bunch of flowers in his hand he looked much better than that "stupid french guy" who's living at her house.

Other than being told I was right by my 16 year old son, the only highlight of my day was cleaning out the chicken coop.  For some reason, the whole time I was shoveling, Shelia E's song The Glamorous Life was stuck in my head.  Irony, thy name is chicken poop.  Though cleaning chicken coops isn't on my short list of things I like doing - I definitely wouldn't have stopped by that booth at the high school jobs fair - it's not so awful.  When I could get Shelia E out of my head, I pondered how I was living the exact life I want to live.  Not the one I'd planned on living when I was an 18 year old, wide-eye high school graduate with my big 80's hair and pink and green tube of Great Lash mascara stashed in my purse, but the perfect life for me as a grown-up.  I wouldn't have things any other way.  Though I just may not be waxing so poetic on the rural lifestyle in 2 weeks when we start decapitating and yanking the feathers off that flock of poop factories.

Today is the first day of school.  Angel #4 is happy to be an 8th grader, though I'm sure she'll be much more excited next year when she becomes a real live high schooler.   WE, on the other hand, is a bit less than enthusiastic.  He's chosen his Junior year to get all those tough classes out of the way so he can do a bit more coasting during his Senior year.  That, and he's one of the few teenagers who realizes how good he's got it and isn't exactly looking forward to graduation and facing the real world with its bills and problems.  He'll survive because he's a smart kid, but I'm thankful I don't have a kid constantly whining about how they can't wait to move out so they can do whatever they want without parental interference.  We always joke that he'll be 42 years old and living in our basement - he's such a homebody.  But he's already making plans for the future, so I'm not too worried about having to finish off the basement just yet.