Vee: I'm sorry to say that this is an actual event- what's omitted is the half-hour argument that ensued. I swear the guy has oppositional defiance disorder. Ya. The mental state usually associated with bratty eight-year-old boys.
You tell him not to do something, and he immediately goes and does it. Like a force compels him, as if purposefully being a jackass will prove something.
His mum once told me a story about little James and the TV. He would go up there and fuck around with the buttons, no matter how many times she hollered at him or slapped his hand away. Eventually, it was so frustrating and impossible to stop him, that she just put a sheet of plywood in front of it.
I've tried this method, but now that he's a grown man, he can easily shift things far beyond my power.
The plus side is, reverse psychology works wonders... although I think he's getting wise to it, because the last time I told him to absolutely not touch the dirty dishes in the sink, he actually left them alone.
Jaime: I know that St Patrick's Day is supposed to be a momentous event, filled with spectacular party potential, but I've never actually managed to celebrate it.
Not even once, and and not for lack of trying (I even lived in 'Miramichi, New Brunswick' while it was on, a tiny town that holds a St Patrick's Day Parade and has a giant shamrock painted on the side of their water tower that proudly proclaims it to be the 'Irish Capital of Canada')!
A totally random and unforeseeable series of events will inevitably lead to my inability to drink green beer and urinate in public... which is probably all for the best, really.
