the antics of youth.....kinda

This post was inspired by two different things. First I was talking to my sister the other day about the crazy things that her 3-year-old daughter does. This conversation got us thinking about the insane things we did when we were kids where either our parent's weren't around (or probably more accurately we didn't know they were there) and the thoughts our parents must have had that they were raising complete fools. Oh how they must have worried about our future....
: ).

The second inspiration came this past weekend when I went to Washington D.C. to visit my best friend Lauren. We have been best friends our entire lives so many of the previous antics involved her as well. Whenever we get together though we talk pretty much 24 hours a day so there are many opportunities for moments when my brain goes a different (and completely wrong) direction than the conversation. So in the interest of a humility, and the fact that these stories just make me laugh, I thought I'd share.

First uh...ya. I uh...... I ate butter. Just plain butter. Like a spoonful. I have no idea why. I think back and remember not liking it at all, but for some reason thinking I should and so I just ate it. Abbey though ate flour and water and food coloring which I submit is even weirder. Pretty sure as a result of this though, now I'm a little weird about butter. I can really do without it in most situations. Ha ha I can just imagine my mom or dad maybe watching that and thinking I was not the smartest of their children....

I read a lot as a child. Lauren and I read a lot. But we never wanted to just read. We had to read in interesting locations. Our favorite was my parents shower. We would drag in I am pretty sure every pillow I possessed and a bunch of blankets and a stack of about 50 books and just read. Sometimes sleeping too.

Also in that shower we would take Berenstain Bear books, paper, and colored pencils, then trace over the pictures and the words, and claim we had made our own book, complete with our names as authors (the only things not traced). Copyright laws meant nothing to us. 

My family had a small garden along the side of our house and one of my favorite summer activities was to go out and help my mom tend to it. I thought weeding was fun, watering was the absolute best and manure was just something the plants needed (pretty sure my mom left out what it is on purpose). Taking care of the hollyhocks was my favorite activity. I had a complex about thinning the carrots though. I knew that it was necessary so that the carrots could grow big and strong. But every time I pulled out the little ones that would get in the way of this, I was convinced I was killing baby carrots. I was a little afraid I would go to hell because I murdered baby carrots quite often. Mom would always tell me to put them in the compost pile but I had trouble letting them go.

Whenever we went to stores or paid for anything of any kind, my mom or dad would pay with cash and I had a game. I would race the cash register to figure out how much change my parents would be getting back. They paid $5 for a $3.84 product? Bam $1.16 change. Surprisingly enough (or sadly enough given my current profession and nerd status), I would most often win this battle. I still do this.

And then there are the times where I hear what's being said and I just don't process correctly. When I was little I used to bug my older sisters all the time to come play with me, especially once we got our trampoline. I remember Abbey was always in her room doing something at her desk and I'd ask her to come play and she'd tell me "in a minute". I would then respond "one one thousand, okay it's been a minute!" But not only would I say this to speed the process along.... I truly believed that was a minute. And they never corrected me!!! Every time I'd say it, Abbey would just tell me one more minute!

And to end, the classic from the past weekend: Lauren was telling me about her great uncle who lives somewhere in Costa Rica or something like that in a hut. Then she tells me "a hut, with no windows or doors!" She kept talking about the hut and the mosquito netting over his bed whatever. I'm sure you all are following this quite well but I was having a problem with the story. I could not figure out the no windows, no doors thing. So I interject "how did he get in? Did they build it around him?" Because for some reason instead of following along with a hut on the beautiful beach next to clear blue waters as having NO walls, all I could think was bamboo hut walls with no windows and no doors! It was then that Laur gives me the strangest look, then starts laughing pretty hysterically and says she's no longer going to tell people I'm getting my PhD. I don't think I will either....

While I pretty much love stories like this, both about me and about anyone else, what I really love, and what I'd like to know the most is what my parents (or whoever else happens to witness my 'moments') thinks. Ha ha ha ha I'm sure their still wondering about my intelligence.