Day #7

Today is Day #7 of no school. I believe it makes 11 days total since January. My boys are about to loose their minds. It is the law of the universe that siblings must fight on snow days, especially when those days drag on for almost two weeks. The problem in our house is that Cade doesn't have a sibling to fight with. No brother or sister to pick on to relieve some of his pent up frustrations. And don't think that they grow out of that just because they are pushing 34 years old. We have the perfect storm brewing in our household….Jay and Cade are getting on each others nerves.

Yesterday I got a text before 9 am. Cade was already wearing Jay out with various football facts and questions. He wanted to know the worst teams, the best teams, had Heinz Ward (Steelers player) put on weight because he thought it looked like he had, was Auburn the best college team, was Arizona any good, etc. In the afternoon I got another text – Jay was playing NFLopoly circa 1994 with Cade.

By the time I got home last night I was tired. I ate a very late lunch so I wasn't hungry and they weren't satisfied with what I told them I was willing to prepare for dinner. We drove to Subway. On the way there Cade started using a British accent. We got him a WWII Wii game for Christmas so he was repeating the phrases the RAF pilots used so he could work on this new way of speaking. I asked Jay if we had a Will (guy from church who can imitate almost any voice) in the backseat. Jay said "I think he sounds more like Rickey Repeat". Apparently this was not the first time Cade had worked on his accent that day.

At Subway I sat down and let the two of them battle it out while they were ordering. Cade came over to the table and I could tell he was ticked. He had two little red spots on his checks and he threw himself in the booth. He told me he was mad at his dad because Jay ordered him the wrong sandwich because he couldn't hear what he wanted. And Jay didn't hear him when Cade said he wanted it cooked (toasted). At that exact moment my phone buzzed with a text from Jay, who was standing 5 ft away from me. He was irritated with Cade because he whispered when Jay was trying to find out what he wanted to eat. I about lost it.

When we finally got home everyone separated for a few minutes. Then we got the phone call that confirmed they would be out for day #7. Cade looked like he might cry when I told him the news. Jay didn't look much better. We rented a movie so a little later the three of us sat down to watch it. I was on the couch, Jay was in the recliner and Cade was on the loveseat. Cade walked over to sit with me and he had to walk in front of Jay. I can't describe it, but the way Cade looked at Jay and tossed his head I thought he gave Jay a dirty look. I said something about it and Cade whispered "maybe" as he was snuggling down beside me. That's when I decided we needed to call Memo. The two of them needed a break from each other. Unfortunately that didn't work out because we woke up to more snow this morning. Cade put his head down and cried when we told him he had to spend another day with Jay.

They have got to get back to a normal routine. I think they spent some time in separate rooms this morning. Then they went to the school for awhile. I saw on Facebook that there is no school again tomorrow. If that is true it will make day #8. I had a customer come in yesterday who knows us pretty well. His first question was if the snow days were creating a little too much one on one time for Jay and Cade. Since his wife worked and he farmed and they had two daughters I'm sure he can sympathize with Jay. He would've been the parent home with them when it snowed. Jay should give him a call. Maybe he'd have some good coping techniques….