No S**t

So another weekday evening descends into chaos in my household. I shouldn’t be surprised, you kind of just get used to it.

On Wednesday my wife was working in the evening and of course that meant I was left with the added responsibility of meeting the puppy’s needs as well as my contractual child looking-after duties. “It’s no problem”, says my wife as she left for work – “Just keep a eye on her, take her outside when she wakes up, feed her at 9, give it another 20 minutes and take her out again”

What could go wrong?

Well, firstly the puppy decided to wake up just as I stepped out of the bath. Remembering my instructions, I hurriedly threw some clothes on. The inside out, back to front t-shirt was testament to my efforts, but by the time I got back downstairs there was a large wet spot on the rug. Ok, so now, here is the dilemma. Do I get the puppy outside first and let the pee settle into the rug – or quickly try and get some kitchen towel to catch the worst of it and risk more serious effluent arriving.

I decide the latter, but am no sooner dabbing away when I see the inevitable and imminent arrival of some puppy poo. I drop all the cleaning up gear, grab the puppy and manage to avert disaster by getting her outside just in time, Phew, a close call.

I come back in, finish the cleaning up and spray the carpet cleaner / disinfectant spray on the rug. Only it wasn’t the carpet shampoo, it was a liquid bleach bathroom cleaner I had picked up by mistake. An easy error to make. How am I supposed to know which spray to use? I mean, when do I ever do the cleaning ?

The wife is now going to kill me for wrecking the rug, but hey I figure it's going to be replaced anyway – given the puppy’s tendency to pee on it. Anyway, I make some effort to rinse it out, but I can already tell I’m going to be in bigger trouble than the pup.

During my domestic disaster, my daughter is also repeatedly asking me to help explain the history of the Anglo Irish Agreement as part of her homework. She got short shrift as you would imagine, particularly when I told her to “Google it” and she said she couldn’t find it, in that sarcastic voice that really meant she couldn’t be bothered looking for it.

Grrrr. When I was her age we had to go to the bloody library and search the reference cards, then find a few books, then find the right paragraphs, and then write it down by hand – and she can’t even type it into a search engine without a carry on, before cutting and pasting the answers. Kids nowadays!

Anyway, after a bit of an argument, I end up helping her find something like 3000000 hits on the subject and point out she didn’t try very hard. She ran off to the toilet, with me thinking this was just an excuse to avoid the reprimand. However, she protested “she really had to go”.

About 30minutes later, I’m climbing the walls thinking she has pushed her luck too far. I get distracted by our son, who also needs the toilet and can’t go because “his” toilet is occupied by his sister. I tell him not be silly and to use the one downstairs – but because of his autistic traits, he refuses because he’s already decided he was going to the one upstairs.

Meanwhile, the puppy has been chewing my discarded newspaper which it managed to get off the sofa and there are now shreds of newsprint everywhere.

Eventually, daughter exits toilet, son enters.

“Eughhhh” screams son. “The toilets blocked and it stinks up here”. Being particularly sensitive to smell, I figure he’s probably overreacting and I shout up just to flush the toilet again.

I count about four flushes, and then son appears saying it’s still blocked. Fortunately he does see sense and goes to the other bathroom, so that’s one less worry. I head upstairs to investigate. As I pass my daughter, she looks flustered.

Well, I tell you. I have never, ever seen a human poo that size before. I’m talking the diameter of a coke can, by the length of a baby’s arm. I shit you not. How that came out of my poor child, I’ll never know.

I won’t go into the full gory details, but let’s just say I had to get my hands in there at one point. 

At which time, my son appears and because of his OCD tendencies starts to become really alarmed. So he’s bordering on meltdown and I’m trying to reassure him that I’ll get cleaned up properly and it will all be okay.

With impeccable timing, daughter arrives to announce the puppy has just pooped on the rug.

Who deals with all the crap in this house? .....well, me obviously.