Sunday, September 24, 2006

Mommy radar

Usually my Mommy Radar works pretty well to detect disruptions in the ionosphere around the house, but today I think it was broken or something. After Catherine "helped" me work on my bike (I cleaned the bike for my next race and took an extra link out of the chain which is always a messy job, "GET YOUR HANDS OFF THAT RIGHT NOW CATHERINE!"), she decided to amuse herself by taking everything out of the medicine cabinet.

Fortunately I had already recently relocated all the dangerous stuff out of reach in the other newly installed cabinets. (Yes, she picked out that outfit herself. Her mother doesn't dress her THAT funny.)

10 comments:

SToby said...

Boy, does this take me back! I was about 4, and I found out I could clamber up onto the bathroom sink. I opened the medicine cabinet and started looking at the things inside. I may have squeezed toothpaste out of the tube or caused other problems, but from my point of view everything went fine till I picked up a little box.

I turned it over and over and moved a lever on the side. I didn't know what it was. Suddenly, blood was streaming all over like a fountain. I hadn't felt any pain yet but of course I screamed loudly. My mother came right away; like Nancy's, her Mommy radar had been down for maintenance. To her credit, she wasn't fazed by what seemed to me to be a shocking amount of blood. She found the source -- my pointer, with a surprisingly small cut in it that was just beginning to hurt. She wrapped gauze around it and rather soon the bleeding stopped and I could see how small the cut was. I didn't even have to go to the emergency room or have the doctor come...yeah...my pediatrician did house calls, which dates me for sure.

In case you're wondering, the mysterious box contained my father's double-edged "safety" razor blades. My mother explained that a very clean, very sharp blade could cut without hurting.

Half a century has passed away foaming in my wake since then, but the memory of that fountain of blood is still the sharpest and most terrifying of my chldhood. Let's hope Nancy has really managed to locate every object that a clever toddler can hurt herself with and put it in a safe place. So far, so good.

PS: I remember watching someone, probably long-suffering Mommy, clean up the spatters of blood after the event. There were spots on 3 of the 4 walls, the floor, the ceiling, and the sink. Editor's note: bathrooms in 1957 were MUCH smaller than they are today.

Trisaratops said...

Now THAT'S cute. But I'm glad she's not in my bathroom. I just finished cleaning it. hee hee

21st Century Mom said...

Dahlink - that outfit? Mahvelous - simply mahvelous. But oh - that little devil!

m said...

Dealing with the same, glad I'm not alone. BTW I think her future husband lives in my home and he just might like that outfit she is wearing. He sure would love her spirit.

Dr. Iron TriFeist :) said...

She's going to be an adventure racer.

Maybe your mommy radar was down but clearly the advanced mommy planning system saved the day once again. Nothing exciting in the medicine cabinet. Good job.

:) said...

I think it's a lovely outfit...

(is that a razor???) ;-o

Nancy Toby said...

LOL! In her hand? No, it's a pair of tweezers.

Iron Pol said...

I only have one question. How did she get up to and into the sink? Details, please, as I need to put counter-measures in place to prevent B-Boy from pulling a similar stunt.

That boy will climb anything to get anywhere. And m's son might find some competition in B-Boy. Any girl that will climb things AND remove every item from a cabinet in such an organized fashion will score points with him.

And to echo Steve with my own experience, HIDE THE AJAX. I ate an entire can as a toddler.

Nancy Toby said...

Oh dear! Yes, the Ajax is up high in the cupboard in the utility room! But I'm quickly running out of places that they can't get into!

She's learning (along with general potty training) to wash her hands in the sink, so I have a little footstool there now. The rest was all her own athleticism and creativity.

Kewl Nitrox said...

Beautiful cabinets... Maybe I should get some for my Tri stuff... Dear wifey keeps stashing them away and I get really up tight trying to find my stuff...

Whaddaya mean? I'm with Cliff, her outfit looks gorgeous!

Hey Steve Toby, I did a similar thing to myself when I was a kid too. A razor which I "traced" around my wrist. Mommy was not amused...