They’re talking a foreign language I tell ya

Grand daughter Jade, her grandma Janice and grandma Carolyn are all messing around with something called Super Poke Pets on their computers.

“Grandma, do you have the tiger sitting on a cloud?”

“I have several and a few gold items you might like.”

“I can send you a panda with angel wings.”

I want to ask what they’re talking about but I don’t want to get sucked into whatever it is they do. They also do something with farms, crops and animals.

Me, I’m into running around getting my arse kicked online with other people dropping bombs and other munitions on top of each other, I have so far resisted having to grow crops and take stuff to market thank you very much.

Rules of the game

Image by JKönig via Flickr

As I don’t work Mondays I usually walk Jade to her school bus as I did this morning.

“Slug Bug black grandpa.”

“Ow!”

“Slug Bug red.”

“Ow again, you know Jade you need to learn the rules of slug bug.”

“Why grandpa?”

“You are meant to call out ‘Slug Bug’ and the color of the car and punch someone in the arm, gently. But you are only meant to do it when you see a VW Beetle car, it can be the old version or the modern version but it the car  has to be the Beetle not just any VW car.”

“Grandpa, beetles, we’re talking about cars not beetles!”

“No, the Beetle is the VW car, oh never mind. Look slug bug blue.”

“Ow, grandpa, that was a bus!”

“I know, I am playing by your rules.”

Barely phased her

Having our granddaughter Jade living with us means she has to put up with grandpa’s tricks and silly japes.  She is getting used to them though and seems hardly fazed.

The other day she was hanging up her laundry and went into the living room to get more from grandma, I crept into her room and hide in her closet which was partly open. She came into her room, pulled the closet door fully open and she saw me standing in the corner of the closet:

“Hi grandpa, you’re weird,” then she hung her clothes up and walked off rolling her eyes (she learnt that from grandma).

Not even a flinch, not a startled scream, dang, time to kick it up a notch.

Out with the clown outfit!

"Here comes grandpa!"

I am strong apparently

We are at our daughter’s with a passel of grand kids, snowed in so our Thanksgiving plans had to change. Sitting on the computer and Aurianna brought over Emma’s sippy cup and asked me to undo the lid as she was having trouble. I unscrewed the lid and handed her the cup back.

“Wow, Grandpa is strong, but old.”

Thanks!

Brownie points

Carolyn and I got back from shopping and while out I had gotten something I thought the grand kids would have fun playing with under my supervision. After putting away the shopping I pulled out the items, opened them and handed them to the kids. Three kids got different colored glow sticks, I snapped them and shook them to activate the chemical and the kids and I went into the bedroom and switched off the lights. They had fun pretending they had light sabers and making themselves look funny colored, Gage who had the green glow stick was pretending he was the Hulk.

The kids were so excited and I scored high on the brownie point chart, just then Carolyn came into the room. “What on earth are you doing?”

“Playing with glow sticks”

“Where did they get them from?” she asked.

“We got them while out shopping; I showed them to you before dumping them into the cart.”

“Glow sticks, I thought they were beef sticks you were showing me.”

“Beef sticks! No, these are glow sticks not beef, they can’t eat these,” just then the decrepit light bulb above my head flickered for a brief instance and Carolyn saw it.

“Yes, you weren’t thinking were you?”

As she said that I turned back to the kids and one was about to put the end of the glow stick into his mouth, “Dang,” I had to grab the glow sticks off the kids among great screams and crying. I saw the brownie points drift away as they screamed they wanted them back.

Carolyn went away then came back and swooped in and collected up the brownie points by showing the kids their Halloween costumes. One was Disney’s Ariel and the two boys were Transformers. Once again the kids were very excited and tried on their costumes. They were dancing around and really happy and loving grandma, but I knew what was coming. Once the kids had been advised that No, they couldn’t live in their costumes for the rest of their lives and they had to take them off and put them away, there was much gnashing of teeth and wailing.

The brownie points were once again back in play.

Can we build it

I went into the bathroom and noticed the pile of empty toilet roll tubes on the back of the toilet is increasing, I counted 25 rolls. After doing my business, spraying some air freshener and burning a rag I went to talk to the wife,

“What’s with all the toilet roll tubes in the bathroom?”

“I’m saving them to do arts and crafts with the grand kids. We’re going to make something with them.”

“Like what?”

“Not sure yet, any suggestions?”

“Let’s see, a fort, spaceship, a didgeridoo, an inordinately long telescope or a scale model of the trans-Siberian oil pipeline.”

“You are no help, go away.”

What?

A miracle

I had to take a picture, not just because Gage and his sister Jade were behaving themselves and next to each other watching a Tinkerbell DVD though. I was amazed at how clean their room was, I heard them running around in there and expected it to be messy. I was further amazed that they had cleaned it up themselves.

Wonders will never cease, now to see how long it lasts.

Putting the kids to work

We had a double birthday party on Sunday for granddaughter’s Jade and Emma, house  was packed with people. Girls had a great time being the center of attention and of course, presents.

Emma got a Dirt Devil battery operated kids vacuüm cleaner. Thankfully it isn’t too noisy, but is hums away while little red and white plastic balls inside swirls around giving the illusion it is working, a light on the front illuminates the way. All the kids had fun with it, especially Gage; he almost “cleaned” every room in the house pushing it around. A few more times so he gets good and although this toy does actually pick up,  I’ll switch the cleaner out for the full size vacuüm cleaner,

Might as well put him to work and it would be one less chore for me to do, now to train some of the others to load the dishwasher

A wooden train, my kingdom for a wooden train

In other news, I have now managed the ability to transform Bumblebee back into a Chevy Camaro. The Transformers that transforms into a jet fighter and a Hummer not so much, I am sure bits are missing. The toy that looks like an explosion in a plastics factory with a pair of googly eyes is beyond me, all I can transform it into is a pile of plastic bits and a pair of googly eyes. Then Gage comes along and informs me; “Grandpa, that’s not a Transformer that’s a Legos Bionicle!”

A Bion-i-what?

What happened to wooden trains and a lump of wood shaped like a tommy gun?

Transformers or booby traps for grandpa

Carolyn texted me that she is in Target with her friend Nancy and did I want anything, I asked her to get the Transformers movie, the grand kids love Transformers and I figured I could use the movie to bribe them or reward them for good behavior.

I have tried candy, but that effect is short-lived, it turns them into something resembling raging maniacal short people on crack!

But for loving Transformers, they seem to keep leaving the toys all over the floor. Poor grandpa gets up in the middle of the night to relieve his aging bladder and ends up stepping on the blasted things. I’m getting to where I can tell which Transformer I am stepping on in the dark.

Yeah, Carolyn got both of the Transformers movies.