Today was a day when Henry whined about nothing for 20 minutes, and then at Minute 19 Eli would start whining, and back and forth so it was this completely seamless whine. It was a lot of whining about stuff that didn’t make any sense to me, like Henry seriously sitting on the counter with tears in his eyes because the “water is going away” in his oatmeal. “Yes, honey, that’s because it’s oatmeal. That’s what happens – the oats absorb the water and make oatmeal!” Henry: “Now the water’s! all! gone!” “Yes, honey, that means it’s DONE! Now it’s OATMEAL! YAY!” Then some sobbing from Henry. (They’ve slept enough, but were probably hungry, and Dave’s out of town, which always makes them tweaky.)

From 10 to 11 Eli whined constantly and I have no idea what he was saying. I kept trying to calmly say, “I can’t understand you when you whine” and he kept at it. I think he was actually saying something about how he can’t talk any other way. Then Dave called, and of course Unavailable On-the-Phone Mom totally pushed him over the edge, and he started shrieking, finally culminating in him starting to pummel me, which apparently made him feel much better because then he started to laugh hysterically. Kids are such noxious balls of emotion sometimes I don’t know whether to run, hug them, or spray them with cleanser.

So I did what any self-respecting mom would do. I said, “Do you want a brownie?” and after a skeptical, “What’d you say?” he heartily accepted and he ate it happily and I got some more school work done and now he’s lying happily on the rug listening to music and playing with his diggers.