Malcolm is getting a babysitter tonight. Amy has work functions, and rather than be a responsible parent and take care of my child by myself, I am outsourcing the job to a babysitter so that I can go out with my friends, drink beer and play poker. I guess I’ll play softball at some point too.
I was thinking earlier this week that I would have to skip the game, as I couldn’t think of anyone who would be willing to stay with Malcolm while I went out and ruined myself. I posted an email to our neighborhood listserv and one of my neighbors gave me a referral for a nanny who is looking for nighttime work as well. Some parents may have checked on references, cross checked against the sex offender list, and interviewed the prospective sitter. I on the other hand, did this: 1) retrieve phone number from email, 2) called “Gabriella”, and 3) asked her if she could do it. She had me at, “I’m available!” I am not sure whether my computer or Malcolm, for that matter, will still be here when I return, but my team needs its third baseman and I have a better than average shot at winning the poker game. It’s a good thing, too, because I need to win just to break even for the night. $15 an hour for babysitting?! He’ll be asleep most of the time!!! At that cost, I am expecting our refrigerator to be cleaned up when I get back. I guess I just hope the fridge is still here when I get home.
In order to ready the house for the arrival of a stranger, I have been working all day to make it look like Malcolm and I don’t live in a fraternity. Amy has been gone early in the morning all week, and has been returning late in the evening, so she hasn’t really been able to notice that our house has been taken over by clutter. So, I have spent the day furiously eliminating all traces of my domestic ineptitude. I started in the office, the room that connects Malcolm’s room to the family room. The room is scary, and I don’t like to go in there if at all possible. It is the place where everything else in the house goes before other guests arrive. By now, it looks like the underside of a bridge, so I had to find a new place for all the junk that has no other place in the house. After a mere four hours of stashing stuff either under the desk or in the closet, I downgraded the room to messy, which is good enough for the babysitter.
I next moved to the kitchen, where removing a few days worth of gunk and stains proved a little more difficult than imagined. I felt a little conflicted, as Rosie, our house cleaner is coming tomorrow and I didn’t want to spend too much time doing something she is going to end up doing (better) tomorrow. I ended up throwing out a fair number of screws that had accumulated on the kitchen counter, and I couldn’t help but wonder how they all got there. Something is definitely going to be falling apart soon. Cleverly, I put all the empty wine bottles into the recycling, masking how Amy and I spend our evenings at home.
Finally, I made me way to the family room/Malcolm play room. Good thing too, for, in my infinite wisdom a few days ago, I allowed Malcolm to play with a canister of toothpicks. (He called them his “friends” and played baseball with them. He is definitely settling into his role as single child!) I imagined what a child care professional would say after Malcolm dragged her over to his table and proudly pointed to his favorite “toys” to play with, only to find that they were 200 or so small pointy sticks. I piled the toothpicks into his drawer and gave a little prayer that she wouldn’t go prying around and come upon them unsuspectingly. Then again, for $15 an hour, she probably is a pretty good private eye too.
Tags: drinking, messiness, parenting
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Hi there,
I am trying to contact you about contributing to a new site for dads…can you email me? experts@daddybluez.com or the email on the form.
Thanks!