Why am I Awake @ 5:30am on a Sunday Morning?

Because my son, who decided to get up and play video games in the middle of the night instead of going to bed like he was repeatedly told do so, decided he was hungry.

He went into the kitchen to make some scrambled eggs.

See, I've taught him how to do that. It's good for a teenager to know how to cook a little bit, don't you think?

Well, even though he knows the rules: 1) don't walk away from the stove when cooking 2) be sure to remove the pan from the stove when you are finished cooking 3) be sure to turn the burner off on the stove when you are finished cooking and 4) don't ever cook without permission from and supervision by one of the adults in the house....

... he decided at 5:00 this morning to disobey all of those rules.

Well, we woke to the smell of smoke, thick enough it was hard to breathe. A rush into the kitchen reveals my son standing barefoot in nothing but his boxer shorts with the sprayer nozzle from the sink stretched across the room and spraying water on the electric stove that is at that point on fire.

After the yelling died down (I was doing most of the yelling) and the fire put out, I turn to ask my son what is going on, and he's nowhere to be found. He took off to his room while everyone else cleans up his mess.

What did I find before I found him? He had apparently also turned on the toaster oven to heat it up so he could make toast for an egg sandwich. The toaster oven door was open, the toaster oven was under the wooden cabinets, and it was on broil. Oh, and of course, the refrigerator and microwave doors were both open, the drawer to the silverware was open, and the cabinet for the plates and the other cabinet for the pans were all open.

(sigh)

I love my son.

I really, really do.

I think he's a fantastic person... I think he has so much potential, but this morning, I went through every single bad things he's probably ever done in his life, including the other two times he's almost burned my kitchen down and the three times other than that he's caught something on fire in my house.

I also mentioned the fact he never remembers to flush the toilet, put up his shoes, pick his clothes up off the floor of the bathroom, clean his...

.... well, Ryan told me I went 'woman' on him.

Grrrrrr!

Don't worry - my bark is worse than my bite, in fact, I don't bite. I'm not a hitter, just a screamer. I yelled at him, but good. So I told him he needed to clean the kitchen up from the mess, close the door, cabinets, etc., clean up the water he sprayed on the floor, etc.

About 1/2 hour later, suddenly, he comes into the bedroom bawling with tears streaming down his face saying he can't use his hand at all, it hurts sooooo bad, but he can't tell me what he did to it. Says he didn't hit it on anything, said he didn't burn it in the fire. He says it feels like it needs to pop but he can't pop it.

I don't see anything wrong with his hand, at least, not right now.

Ryan's convinced he's bluffing to keep from having to clean the kitchen. My son says he hurts so bad he needs to go to the ER. He says it hurts so bad he wants a shot.

And then after all that happened, he sneaked into the living room and got into the tub where we keep my medicine and he helped himself, against the rules, to two ibuprofen. Thank God the pills he took actually WERE ibuprofen.

I'm such a sucker.

Can I please go back to bed?

Do I have to lock up my medicine now? Do I need to baby-proof my kitchen from my 13 1/2 year old son?

What the heck is going on?

(sigh)

(groan)

Love ya'll!