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Tuesday, July 9, 2013

Cruel Summer

OK, can I just get this out of the way and say Summer can bite me?  Big time. Dudes, I cannot be the only one.  Can I get an Amen up in here?  Other than offering me a variety of frozen blender drinks, there isn't much to it that I enjoy.  Or my kiddo.

Let's start with the nonsense that is ESY(extended school year) aka "Summer School".  For six weeks in a row, he's got school four days a week and only half days. I get the joy of dealing with mixed up schedule stress six weeks in a row.   Like you know the idea of a long weekend should be a blast but then it's not.  Not for a schedule needing kiddo.  That's just six meltdowns I know are coming.  Plus, let's break what this session is down.  It's not quite camp but it's not quite school either. (Hello, 180 days you had my kiddo going to school five days a week.  Now it's four?  There's the first problem.) So I'm going to call it what it is, "Diet School".  Same place, same faces but less filling on the actual education stuff.   For example, "water days".   Is it a science lesson in physics when he is using a Slip N Slide?  Then there is the utter delight of having to have him ready for the bus 45 minutes earlier than he had to be ready all year.  Shoot me.  Really, somebody just put me out of my misery.  In autism time, 45 minutes is HUGE!  Oh now I got to add putting sunblock on him daily?  Sensory torture for the win!  Oh what's that?  Water balloon day (which maybe it's a history lesson and they are recreating the storming of Normandy Beach) so send him in a swimsuit, yeah right, like that's gonna happen!  I got a kid who cries when the seasons change and he can't wear his winter coat anymore.  Now I got to send him to school in a swimsuit?  In the backpack it goes and Good Luck Teach!  Guess you're gonna be really earning your paycheck today.

And it's just to damn hot.  My grandparents are from Ireland.  I am not genetically made for this weather.   Sitting in a playground most hours is downright disgusting.  Thank god we got a pool but let me tell ya, even that gets old.  The kiddo is a real fish and he would be in that thing all stinking day, which we have done on many occasions.  There's no sitting on the sidelines on a lounge chair with a frozen drink and a good summer novel with him.  I have to keep eye on him at all times.  So I sit there and sweat and listen to my hair expand to the point where I look like a reject from a Def Leppard video.  Swatting bugs off my ankles and wonder how many bites will be on the kiddo for me to contend with later.  At least my Wifi works in the backyard because I'm writing this as his goes down his playground slide for the 463rd time.  "Yes honey, That was very fast.  Try again!  No Mommy can't fit in your playhouse.  I have fun watching you.  Really.  Honest."

Which brings me the movies.  Not the cool summer blockbuster action flicks that you might actually want to see.  I'm talking a layer of Hell that Dante forgot to mention.  Kids Movies.  Now you are thinking "But hey Pixar makes some great flicks" and I won't disagree with you there.  I don't mind sitting through those.  Heck, I actually like going to those but for every really cute kid movie, there are a hundred completely terrible and awful ones.  Please explain to me what evil son of a bitch came up with The Chipmunks?  Honest to god, if I could of ripped out of my eyeballs and stuffed them in my ears I would have during last summer's "Chipwreck".  Don't even get me started on The Smurfs. I'm sure it violated terms in the Geneva convention.  Plus the formula seems to be, if it's really god awful, they'll be sure to make a sequel by next summer!   I want to design a family theater for crappy movies like that.   It will have chairs for the parents that face the back while your kid faces the screen.  You then get ear buds to listen to whatever you want and a small head lamp to read a book or play with your smartphone.  Your kid can lean over and tap you when they want more popcorn or have to pee.  Or to tell you your snoring is disturbing other people.  Keep it down. The other moms want naps too.  Also, a glass of wine wouldn't go amiss.  I'm just saying.

The part that really grinds my gears?  By the time we finally got a good groove going, ESY will end.  Then we will have a bank of time with nothing to do before September.  More upset and more routines out of whack.  Then September and homework hell returns.

If someone could just put me into a medically induced coma till mid fall that would be great.  Please. I'll buy you a side of fries. 

5 comments:

  1. Ha!! That is so true!! The summers suck - their routines are all screwy and its the parents that suffer the most in my book. My kids' internal clocks are going crazy and they are taking it out on me and each other - fun times

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  2. AMEN! I agree with everything from applying sunscreen to the Def Leppard Hair. LOL!!!

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  3. Been there, dear. You've got friends here. We don't have a pool, and ESY was nixed for the kids this year. We've just started watching the He-Man series on Netflix. Holy moly. Time to catch up on my blog reading.

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  4. I wanted to say that I have enjoyed reading your blog and I can so relate because I am the mother of an Autistic son who will be 23 at the end of this year. I have been where you are now and I wanted to share with you what saved me and helped me with what little sanity I have left. I started using a wall calendar with my son, before he could read we used pictures. He is able to look at his schedule and future dates well in advance and we would talk about his schedule daily. He still uses it today and it helps make the schedule change/transition easier...with my kid (who will do anything for M&M's - plain not peanut). I have learned it is all about the schedule preparation. He also has a sensitivity to noises and it took me 12 years to discover ear plugs...DUH right. Anyway good luck and hope your summer is short and sweet.

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  5. I wanted ESY so badly - I wanted it to be longer (ours is a measley 4 weeks of 4 2.25 hour days). He did so well in regular school this past Feb-June (started preschool in Feb). I thought ESY, yes, bring that baby on! But he has a different teacher. Some different kids. And now, b/c the hubs is back at work again, he gets to have it followed by daycare or grandparents/therapy. Starts this past Monday. Week was pretty hellish, I'll tell you. Not helped by him having his ear get effed up full of wax for no reason other than to torture him.
    And whether he has ESY or not, there's still sunscreen, b/c he is outside for daycare. Sunscreen. Horrid.
    And in the evening/weekends, it rains or is too damn hot & the mosquitoes around here come in cloud-form. Can we have spring again? Please? Endless spring. I'll even deal with allergies.

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