Bariety

The last few days I’ve been driving down a particular street past a KFC restaurant. To my absolute horror and amusement I saw this on the KFC marquee

Yesterday we had our first significant rain storm of the year. Rhys fell asleep in the car on our way to picking Henry up for his dental appointment. He napped as we drove to Manhattan Beach. As we left the parking area I outfitted Henry in his raincoat and equipped myself with an umbrella. I did a good job balancing my Mary Poppins bag and while carrying a still sleepy Rhys I instructed Henry to stay close and hold onto me.
Please note that there is a TV on the ceiling to better distract the young patients! The thing protruding from Henry's nose is laughing gas. Orange scented. You can choose from a vast selection of scents. In addition to the laughing gas he was also given an oral sedative. Almost 2 hours later we were escorted to the car by the dental assistant who was kind enough to walk us back. The sedative Henry had been given had not worn off, he was still a bit dizzy and we could not trust that he would not collapse. He had 2 spacers put in to retain the place for his permanent teeth (this is due to the bad teeth that had been pulled out previously) and 2 cavities filled.

See Henry's shark teeth? The front two are really loose, and the permanent teeth have already broken through behind them.

Rhys surprisingly was pretty well behaved. He entertained himself by watching Cars and then Happy Feet which the office had piped onto the endless amounts of TVs located in the every room; some two to a room. Towards the end he got a little restless so he pulled out a pair of surgical gloves from the cabinet and out of desperation I decided to blow some balloons with them. They make it look a so easy on TV! It was hard to do. Sloppy and wet. Yuck. The only good thing was that it smelled nice and actually tasted a bit like mint!

Afterwards we went to grab a bit to eat. Henry got a shake since the doctor did not recommend chewing until the anesthesia wore off. We came home and rested a while before leaving for our play date with the twins in Henry’s class.

They had a blast! All four boys ran all over the house and played on the jungle gym in the backyard. Henry and the older twin settled down to watch cartoons while Rhys and the younger one engaged in a battle of wills. Their mom and I got a chance to chit chat. And all of the sudden it was almost 6p!

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I came back early from my walk this morning and was greeted with the image of Rhys hanging from the waist out of the broken window! His tear stained face looked up at me as he heard me approach. “Mommy!” he said relieved and smiled. I can only imagine that he meant to escape through the window to look for me. I immediately checked to make sure he was ok and then looked at the window. I was shocked by his new adventure, but so very glad to see that he had not gotten himself cut! Although the glass was missing there were edges of it still left all along the metal frame. This is one lucky boy with a very hard working guardian angel! I found Kenny in the back and told him what had happened. He was also extremely shocked and a little angry at the danger Rhys had put himself in. We will have to take care of that window pronto!

It’s 2p and Kenny just got home from running a few errands with the boys. He came in the house LIVID! They were at Toys R Us looking at the toys in the Lego aisle when Rhys ‘poof’ disappeared. Immediately Kenny began looking around and calling for him. After about 5 minutes of futilely searching, Kenny notified the staff and they put the store in a Code Adam lockdown. Everyone was looking for him! A few minutes passed before Rhys came strolling out of nowhere, calmly walking towards Kenny without a care in the world. Kenny said he was soooo angry, he picked Rhys up and told him NEVER EVER walk away from him in a store again! They came straight home and I was told the story in horrifying detail.

We are learning that each of our kids require a different handling technique. Obviously what’s worked with Henry is not working for Rhys. Rhys requires a sterner hand. I told Kenny today that Rhys is forcing us to grow up and be the disciplined parents.

Kenny is now more than ever convinced that Rhys will turn to him and say “Father how did you like that challenge? Get ready for the next round” in an evil Stewie Griffin voice. I wonder if this behavior in Rhys is somehow a result of drawing these characters for a living? He made a comment this afternoon that Rhys is payback for every single bad thing he’s done so far in his life. As an aside I’d like to point out that having been formally introduced to Seth McF by Kenny the last time I was at the studio, I feel qualified to say that he is an extremely attractive man.

We had a yummy dinner at mom and dad's.