Conversations, Travel

Leaving for the Cape!

Jack and I are heading to Cape Cod to stay at the house we used to rent when he was little. We haven’t been there in quite a few years! So exciting!

Jack is currently driving and I’m blogging…

me: Is this car comfortable for you to drive?

(He’s a giant)

Jack: It’s ok.

me: What would you change if you could?

Jack: I’d make it a 6-cylinder Mercedes.

😑

Conversations, math

Need a Job

Me and Jack and Moca

Jack: (looking at used cars on his phone) How much should I spend on a car?

Me: What? You’ll get my car when you’re able to have one on campus.

Jack: But what if I want a NICE car.

Me: you think you can afford something nicer than a 2019 Subaru, loaded?

Jack: (keeps researching) Hmmm, what kind of car payment do you think I can afford?

Me: (silence)

Jack looks over at me. What??

Me: it depends how much money you make at your JOB. (Of which he has none).

Jack: (visibly deflated) Point taken.

Me: Monthly payments assume you have monthly income. Free car sounds pretty good eh?

When you’ve never really worked for a living, you kind of don’t realize that everything you do depends on how much money you make.

Jack at age 3 with Stripey
Rowing
Conversations, School

End of an Era!

I’m assuming this is the end. Anything is possible but when Jack leaves FOR COLLEGE next month, I mean, what other shit can I write about? Will he even call me regularly, never mind provide actual instances that I can quote from for this blog? Hmmmm…

A LOT has happened since May the 4th, my last post. It was a literal whirlwind of activity for Jack’s end-of-senior-year activities, graduation (OMG!), prepping for college and waiting for acceptances to come in, selecting a college (UConn-Go Huskies!) and a major in Engineering, oh and just a few other things like selling our home of 18 years!! Yea it’s been crazy and if you add in a few vacations and Jack’s summer internship, there’s hardly enough time to squeeze in a little blog post.

Jack also finished his rowing career for now. His club had an end of season banquet and they wished all the seniors well and sent them off with some nice parting gifts. It was a fun chapter in his life. Jack wont row for UConn (“they practice at 5am Mom!!!”) even through I really wanted him to try. Ah well. 🙂

Jack is currently in DC for a VHS Collection concert and mini vacay with his dad. nice right!!??

But the weeks that we have left to pack and purge and move Jack to UConn and us out of the house are so few.

me: Jack, when you get back from DC we really have to get your things packed for college and your room packed for moving.

Jack: There’s plenty of time for that.

me: Ummm there are only two weekends left until we go on vacation and then come back and move you to UConn.

Jack: Oh that’s plenty of time! I have all the nights after I intern plus I have Fridays off and then those two weekends. My room won’t take that long.

me: But there’s the entire house to do, not just your room.

Jack: Isn’t that what we pay movers for?

me: Gahhhhhhh!

Ready for prom
The GRR crew
Graduation 🙂
Our trip to UConn for orientation
Last time on the dock at GRR, Housatonic River
The final oar carry

Conversations

Family Resemblance

Ok this one was weird, me and Jack a few years ago using a Snapchat filter to swap faces. (Shudder)

I picked Jack up from school today, and, well ok, actually I forgot to pick him up because I was on a work call and so he had to text and call me to remind me to come get him. i felt terrible!

Jack: Geez mom I’m your only son, how do you forget me? I’ll be gone soon enough!

(Referring to college, where he will be in August. Helloooooo 4 months!!! And Hellooo UConn!)

This was said as we were driving home from me finally picking him up at school. Ok actually he had walked partway home so I actually picked him up on the side of the road. heh heh.

Anywayyyy…

I had on my usual work-from-home ensemble of hoodie, baseball hat and sneakers. And pants. Definitely had pants on.

Jack: Mom. Turn and look this way for a second.

me: What? Why, do I have something on me?

Jack: (poignant pause) You know, you really have Grandpa’s facial features.

Now, mind you, at this moment Jack’s college career was about to become a distant dream and I was visualizing how much yard work I could make him do as penance.

me: But, Grandpa with definite feminine flair, right? (As I flipped my second-day pony tail in his direction.)

Jack: Oh yeah, there’s a flair.

Now at that point, a school bus came roaring by and it distracted me, so I didn’t notice until just now that I didn’t get a very clear answer on that last point. a flair, hmmm?

Yep, of my siblings, two of us look like our dad and two of us look like our mom.

me: Well you look a little like your dad, but only because you’re male and have his hair color and wear glasses like him. And have a giant head like him. The rest is ALL from me! And … Grandpa apparently.

😬😬😬

He didn’t have much to say about that!!!

Conversations

Wiping the slate clean, so to speak.

Photo from a concert we went to Sunday night in NYC. That’s a can of water btw. 😆🥳

I picked Jack up from rowing practice today after work. In the winter they workout at a gym and lift weights and use the rowing machines, etc. Not as fun as being in the water!

(Side note, Jack is in my shower singing “That’s Life” by Frank Sinatra at the top of his lungs. He’s got a great voice, and can definitely sing the low parts haha.)

Anyway, we got home and I remembered the cleaning girl had been there. (I’m allergic to dust!! Don’t judge!!) 😆 She’s amazing and even makes little bows and roses on the tissue boxes and toilet paper rolls. Ahhhh. Such pampering.

me: Hey take your shoes off, the house was cleaned today and I want to keep it that way for at least a little while. Ok? I look down and notice sand on the floor already. Gah!

Jack: I know, I was home after school, remember?

(Totally forgot his dad picked him up from school earlier…I was at the office all day. And that explains the dirt eh?)

me: Oh yeah, I didn’t remember that.

Jack: I wiped my butt with a flower.

me: Sigh.

😵🤣😆

Conversations, Food

Which came first, the chicken or the bagel?

Jack and I are currently on a train heading into NYC for a concert (D Smoke, winner of the 2019 show Rhythm & Flow) If you haven’t seen it go watch it! I didn’t spoil it for you. Everyone knows D Smoke will win. He’s that good!

Because I knew we’d probably be skipping lunch I wanted to make a pretty good breakfast. We had scrambled eggs, potatoes, lox and cream cheese (mine in half of a red pepper, Jack’s on an everything bagel.) So good and so filling!

Jack was inhaling his bagel and a piece fell on his plate. I saw him pick it up and look at it strangely.

Jack: Hey what’s this, chicken?

me: What are you talking about? It’s a piece of the bagel.

Jack: No, look at it. I think it’s chicken.

So I took the piece of food from him, as I have been doing for 16 years lol, and saw it was a piece of bagel.

me: Jack, it’s a piece of your bagel with cream cheese on it.

Jack: Oh it looked like the dry chicken that you…

He saw my expression…

Jack: … you know… when chicken gets real dry, it looks like that.

me: Yeah good save. What I’m wondering is why your first thought is not that it’s a piece of chewed bagel but that it somehow became chicken…

Jack: How would I know, you made it.

Logic 100.

Conversations

December 2021 Is Here!

Yes, yes, so much time has passed, again. Are you really surprised? Busy schedules, weeks turning into months, me being generally forgetful, all contributed to the lack of blog posts. I do apologize. A lot. Sadly, it is not probably going to get better anytime soon.

I will try.

Jack is in the frenzied process of filling out applications for college. I think we will be submitting 5 or so this weekend. Gah! All in the general northeast area. Ivy leagues are next. Gahhhhh! It’s going to be here before we know it… Acceptance letters. Decisions. Financial Aid and Scholarships. College fund draining. Buying stuff for the dorm. OMG.

How exciting though, right? I mean, you all have mostly followed my boy since he was saying sh*t at the age of FIVE! And look at us now!

I’m still sad that the blog URL is shitmy6yearoldsays LOL. I remember being such a NooB in 2010 and starting shitmy5yearoldsays, and being so proud when I updated it the following year. Only to promptly lose all my followers and realize that I was NOT going to change the domain every single Gdamn year. So I stopped at 6 and learned to live with it. And there it remains.

I hope you’ll stick with me for what will probably be the last year of the blog! Possibly. I mean, I can always turn it into a cat or dog blog. Dogblog.com. I’m sure that one is already out there but it sounds funny! How about shitmydogsays? I can pretty much read Moca’s thoughts these days. Sigh.

I currently see Luna trying to climb on the keyboard as I’m typing this. Moca is sleeping in the cat bed ON my bed. PoBo is scowling and staring under the couch looking for her “baby” which is a tiny blue poofy-ball cat toy.

Fun stuff right? Jack is at his dad’s tonight. Not saying ANYthing to me that is blog worthy. So I give you further updates.

Jack is now doing winter rowing, which means they are working out in the gym and coming home sore every night. We put up our Christmas tree and decorated the house. Still have to decorate the tree and put the star on top.

Jack is also going for his driver’s license on Tuesday. He’ll be an official driver next week! Can you even believe it? I will definitely cry when he drives off by himself for the first time. I think you know me pretty well by now. I cried when he rode the bus for the first time. And that was just the practice run before first grade. I drove behind the bus all the way down the road sobbing haha.

I’m assuming he will pass his driver’s test. He is assuming I will cause him to fail.

Jack: Mom, we haven’t practiced parking yet and the whole test WILL BE ON PARKING!

me: You’ll be fine. Your instructor said you were excellent.

Jack: That was over a month ago because you STALLED and made me wait A MONTH after finishing driving class. How can I remember everything??!!

me: You drive every day to school and to rowing, you’ll be fine Jack.

Jack: I need to PRACTICE BACKING IN!

(He’s very much on edge about the parking aspect.)

me: We can go and practice this weekend.

Jack: AND, you’ll forget to take me and I’ll never learn and never get my license and then you’ll have to drive me everywhere!

me: You’re going to pass Jack. We’ll practice on Saturday.

Jack: And don’t mess me up with your parking advice from 1975!

me: I’m sorry, I just don’t see how lining up your shoulder to this line and then lining up the bottom mirror to the middle of this line and then turning the wheel 3 times to the left, etc, makes it easier to back into a spot. It takes an hour. No one has that kind of time and you should use your eyes and look over your shoulder.

Jack: Well that’s how they’re going to test us and i have to get it right THE FIRST TIME MOM!

me: Worst case, even if you don’t pass, you can take it again

Jack: You’ll just be wasting your money on retesting.

Sigh.

Give me strength.

Conversations, Health

Is Jack finally done growing?

At a recent comedy show! We were a bit early 🙂

Maybe Jack finally stopped growing (6’2” and only 16 so probably not?) I have been measuring him semi regularly on a wall inside my closet since he was about one and a half. 😍

There are dozens of marks… I would put what grade Jack was in, his teacher’s name then his height and age and the date. It’s a total memory wall. I measured myself a couple of times over the last decade. After the height went down a quarter of an inch one time I just stopped measuring. LOL! Don’t wanna know! (Lalalalalalala)

So anyway back to the closet. Right to the side of where I measure Jack are the shelves where I keep my folded jeans, pants (slacks LOL) and leggings etc. over the years the piles grew and even styles changed somewhat drastically … I had some wide legged pants and a few boot cut … like what??? The piles were getting out of hand and as Jack got taller, and broader, it was hard for him to squish in to the space between the door and these shelves for me to accurately measure him. It was a struggle and I would just cram the jeans in even tighter to make room.

Fast forward to the last few weeks (leading up to today actually) and me watching many episodes of Marie Kondo’s shows… first the Tidying one and now the Spark Joy show. If you haven’t watched any of these shows, give em a whirl. She makes you want to eliminate all the clutter in your closets, bookshelves and cabinets.

Side note: Jack is in the shower and possibly singing Billy Joel, I can’t really tell. Or maybe it’s Kanye.

Ok, so I’ve been cleaning out my closets and drawers. 5 garbage bags of shirts and misc. clothing have already gone to Goodwill. Five!!!!

Today I got to the jeans shelves. I filled one giant hefty bag full of various pants and pant-like things. Jeans, leggings, camo, cropped leggings, a jegging or two, NY & Co slacks hahahah I hate that word. But now… you can move freely in my closet (it’s a small walk in.) and Jack will comfortably stand tall against the measuring wall the next time we measure him.

me: Jack, go look in my closet.

Jack: Why what’d you do now?

me: I got rid of a full garbage bag of jeans.

Jack: You wear jeans?

me: Go look!

Jack: Woah, you can actually move in here without being assaulted by your shelves.

me: Should we measure you?

Jack: You just did like 2 weeks ago and I haven’t grown since.

me: Do you think you’ve stopped growing?

Jack: I hope so. I’m ready to get serious about buying some clothes.

Hahaha

It’s funny to think about how many times (probably a hundred or more) Jack would outgrow new clothes even before he wore them due to waiting for the right season. He would get summer clothes for his birthday which is in the dead of winter, and then nothing would fit by July. We had to be very strategic or just buy exactly what he needed that day.

Even if he stops growing soon-ish, I think we are good stopping at a size 12-13 shoe and 34” inseam. Let’s not push it any further. I can’t afford the grocery bills!!!

Conversations, School

Lunch Lady… what???

Jack and I were sitting on the couch the other night. He was showing me something from school that I simply cannot remember right now (Oy!) and I had to lean in to see what he was showing me. Then he looked at my arm, reached over and jiggled it. (It’s a wonder he made it to 16)

Jack: Hey your arm jiggles like a lunch lady!

me: Whaaatttt???? (I start winding up for the knock out punch)

Jack: No! No! Don’t worry! The top of your arm is fine and that’s the important part.

(???)