Slugs

Do you ever feel like a big ol' slug? It usually happens on Sundays.
 
I forced myself to turn off Trading Spaces: Inside out at 11:16 Saturday night. I really wanted to see Hildy's house in Paris but I knew my parental duty must come first and yon wee one is usually up at the crack of dawn. I have to drag his skinny behind out of bed on a school day at 6:50 but on the weekend he is up at 6:00 sometimes 5:30.  He says his brain just wakes him up because he has lots of playing to do on the weekends.
 
We tried the "I don't care what time you get up but you are not coming into this bedroom until 7:30" Well then he would just stand in the door way "Mom!! Mom!!! will you get up already I am staaaarvvvinnggggg!!!!!! But this morning as I  turn my head to read the glowing red numbers I realize it says 8:17. OH MY GOD, he must be dead!! I race to his bedroom and there he is still fast asleep flung among his blankets like a stuffed animal. He is perpendicular to the bed and the only thing visible are his legs from the knees down. Those look like his knees, I am pretty sure it is he. I lightly tickle the bottom of his foot to make sure he is still breathing, his healthy kick tells me that he is. To what do I owe this reprieve? I wonder. Maybe the boy finally just ran his battery down too far. I am disappointed to realize if I had known I was going to get to sleep in so late I could have stayed up to see the glory that is Hildy's house and see what Doug is like in real life.
 
I stumble to the kitchen to make my coffee. I assume my husband is out running because he is no where to be found. While my coffee is brewing, strong and dark I try to clear my head. It feels as if someone has stuffed it with cotton batting.  My eyes don't feel like they will open all the way. I go to the bathroom and splash cold water on my face but all that does is make my face cold and pink it does not make me more awake. I try the coffee, mmmmm "Damn fine coffee.........and hot" (Twin Peaks anyone?)I stare at the newspaper waiting for the caffeine to kick in so I can actually read it.
 
I realize Son still isn't up and it is now 8:50. I flush the toilet, turn on the hair dryer, close the door really loudly, stomp around in my slippers trying to make enough noise so he will wake up on his own. He does not, I give up and go back the couch and wait some more. Eventually he comes stumbling out of his bedroom dragging his blankets behind him and drops into his usual spot on the couch. He yawns and rubs his eyes and says "I'm still really tired". He also has a case of cotton head. We had no plans for the day, no soccer games or birthday parties or trips to the zoo so we could lounge for a while, you know, till we "wake" up.
 
My husband comes home from his run showers, eats, changes clothes to mow the lawn. All the while Son and I remain inert on the couch watching Sponge Bob Square Pants and the Fairly Odd Parents and whatever else is on Nickolodeon because we are too lazy to find the remote and change the channel. My husband makes a few vain attempts at conversation but he gets frustrated at our noncommittal grunts and gives up. While my husband goes about his day Son and I remain couch bound. The world moves around us but we are motionless, except for an occasional trip to the bathroom. We remain like this for most of the day. We just can't seem to shake the bed head.  My husband drifts in and out of our lair occasionally inquiring "Aren't you going to do anything today?" I thought we were doing something just not something useful or important or requiring anything but the most basic level of consciousness.
 
After a few hours of this the guilt is starting to come.  I should not allow Son to watch this many hours in a row of mindless TV.  I make a concerted effort to find the remote and change the channel to Animal Planet. He barely seems to notice.  Now it's educational,  guilt assuaged.
 
Sometime in the late afternoon, I have drifted off and am having a nice little cat nap involving me and some friendly dolphins with pink saddles. I hear a crash followed by a bellow. Son has tried to reach the soda on the coffee table without rising from the couch and has fallen off and whacked his head. While I try and quiet his cries by reaching my hand towards him and patting the air in his general direction and say soothingly  "there, there honey you'll be okay, you should probably just relax till your head stops hurting" I realize just how long we have been here, we have not eaten, bathed or brushed our teeth.  I am a big boneless, squishy, amorphous slug. I feel as if my muscles have liquefied and my bones have melted and I am unable to move them in any coherent fashion. Try as I might, I can't seem to get my butt off the couch I think someone has coated the bottom of my jammies with super glue. This can not go on.
 
With great resolve and determination I rise from the couch, in small stages. First I raise my head and put my feet on the floor. Then I rest my elbows on my knees to stop the ringing in my head from sitting up (not to fast, just at all after so many hours of inertia). Slowly pushing off my knees I stand. Hurray I am vertical!!!!! I decide what I need is a shower. This accomplished, I actually do feel more or less human. I force Son to take one also, this is accompanied by much protest and whining until I snap and say "do you want to spend the rest of the day sitting on the couch in a big ol' time-out?" Dumb question." How is that different than the way I spent the rest of the day so far.?"  "It will be punishment, it won't be fun" To which I get the eye roll and "whatever Mom." 
 
We finally enter the world of the completely awake just in time to make dinner after which my husband is ready settle down on the couch to "relax" for the evening. Son and I join him. My what a day we have had! Hey everyone needs a slacker day once in a while.