I pissed off the tooth fairy

A week ago, my husband said that enough was enough, that the kids were addicted to DVDs and that the TV was going to have to go ‘on holiday.’ This is where the TV disappears overnight and goes on holiday indefinitely. It’s only happened twice before and I don’t relish the memories of TV addicts throwing themselves on the floor and crying for the latest episode of Desperate Housewives. And the kids got pretty pissed off about it too.

I didn't want to go through all that again, so I begged my husband for a reprieve. How was I going to watch my obscure French black and white DVDs in which nothing happens save a lot of people staring out of windows smoking cigarettes and crying, not to mention my trash reality TV? And when I thought of all those hours training Scarlett to use the DVD remote. Such a terrible waste of my energies. She’d perfected it too, seamlessly pressing the buttons to forward, play and eject. Even three year old Sausage could put DVDs into the machine without getting her sausage fingers all over them. We were making progress with the concept of 'Mommy is old and needs a lot of sleep.' Some days I was having lie-ins to oooh, six forty-five, due to the finely tuned routine I had got them into, that they should creep downstairs and slot any old crap an educational DVD into the slot and sit there like zombies until I acclimatized to reality, the world, the fact that I had to get up.

But no more. I was told in no uncertain terms that the TV was going on a package tour to Cancun, and he wasn’t yet sure if it had booked a return ticket.

And then, after some initial hystrionics, a surprising thing happened. It's actually better for all of us. I don't watch TV until the early hours, ending up with too little sleep. Scarlett has emerged as some sort of creative genius, making little picture books filled with stories of mermaids and girls who eat bugs. We play board games sometimes (yes, boring as hell, but the kids like them) and Sausage is not constantly pounding her fists on the floor crying, "Dora! I want Dora." She's also sleeping later. Usually she crawls into bed with me in the middle of the night and wakes up at six and screams, “I want movies!” She now lies there quietly until seven, muttering in a melancholy and deeply resigned voice, “TV gone holidays?"

Every morning the kids look downstairs to check on the TV and are always surprised to inform me it is "still on holidays." I hope it's getting a good tan.

So, things are going quite well, although I may have to get the TV back from Cancun for when schools close for snow closings as soon as one flake of snow flutters from the sky. Otherwise I may go nuts.

I also had a run in with the tooth fairy the other day. There's been quite a run of bad luck on that front actually. Scarlett lost her first tooth in the playground. The second one was lost by, er, me. She'd given it to me to look after. I put it in a Ziploc bag for safekeeping and then lost it.

Next, I found myself taking dictation from Scarlett. The note read:

Dear Tooth Fairy
My mother is an idiot who lost my tooth. I hope this will not jeopardize me receiving a quarter or more if possible.

Scarlett

Obviously, after this letter was written and put under her pillow, neither my husband or I woke up to exchange the note for the cash, and I woke to find her screaming her head off at five that I'd upset the tooth fairy with my note and that she hadn't left any money. I got out of bed and kind of smuggled a quarter in and said, "Whoops, it must have dropped on the floor. The tooth fairy isn't angry, really."

Whew, that was a close one.

For anyone who likes a good escapist read, I am posting a blog novel called Confessions of a Cake Addict here. It's about a cake addict with a lot of emotional problems who finally beats the bulge, and is not at all autobiographical. Check it out!

In other news, I said to my husband today, "Don't you find the day to day grind of marriage incredibly boring? Don't you ever have the desire to just run away from it all and indulge your wildest fantasies?"



I thought he'd say, "Yes of course, I've always dreamed of flying to Las Vegas on Hooters Air and staying in the Caesars Palace Hotel and watching the sunset in a jacuzzi with a bevy of topless beauties, before gambling away a hundred thousand dollars at poker. But I don't because I'm a mature, responsible adult."

Instead, he just said, "No."

Not to be put off, I said, "Well, how would you feel if I took some time off to travel round the world to find myself?"

He said, "Sure, that's fine, but don't be surprised if I've changed the locks by the time you come back."

I'll say one thing for him, he has some good answers.