Two nights ago, I was laying in bed, desperately trying to finish a book while Bucket got increasingly annoyed that I wouldn’t turn the light off until I was done. The kids had been in bed for a half an hour, and I noticed that Bucket was texting one of them. (Let me insert here that in my house we have an extremely annoying habit of communicating by cell phone instead of getting up and going to another room to talk to a person. I know. I’m annoyed by it, and I’m just as guilty as the rest of them.) I asked him what was up, and he said he could hear Pitcher on the phone. Pitcher has been in denial for a long time about the fact that due to some cruel ductwork, you can hear him talking in my bedroom when he’s standing in his. We’ve told him, but I don’t think it sunk in.
Anyway, about ten minutes later, just when I can start to feel Bucket’s annoyance at my reading like every thought is burning a hole in my back (but hey, I was in the last chapter and I can’t stop at that point until I’m done), Pitcher knocks on our door. He sticks his head in the door (he’s still on the phone, by the way) and says, “Don’t laugh at me.” I set the book down, cause whatever is about to happen, I can tell its going to be good. He then hops into our room on one foot and shows us the padlock he has managed to lock onto his big toe. Yep. He asks for the combination.
Now, this is a cheap combination lock we got for our shed after learning that Pitcher was hanging out in the shed burning stuff. To cut off these pyrotechnic tendencies, we decided to lock the shed up. The problem was that the lock was difficult to put on and we had lost the combination.
I think you can see the reason we weren’t laughing out loud. While Bucket goes downstairs to help Pitcher try to find the combination, I finished my book. Hey, I was in the last chapter. Not much takes precedence over that.
I came downstairs as Bucket was getting a HUGE pair of bolt cutters out of the garage. This made me very nervous. I examined the toe in question and realized there wasn’t a lot of wiggle room, so to speak. Furthermore, Pitcher, far from the toughest of young men, yelled every time I tried to maneuver the lock to see if there was any possibility of sliding it off with the assistance of vaseline or butter. I determined this was not a possibility. Therefore, I ended up sitting on Pitcher’s leg while Bucket tried to get the bolt cutters into a position that would only cut the lock, and not amputate the toe. Pitcher continued to whine. Bucket, who you’ll recall was already feeling sleep-deprived, was not in the mood to humor Pitcher. Much snarking went on. Bucket tried to close the bolt cutters. Pitcher yelled and I closed my eyes. Bucket determined the bolt cutters were not going to work. He returned to the garage. I looked at the lock and tried to turn it very slowly, feeling for the click that would let me know the numbers were right. It was a cheap lock, and I got the first two numbers, but couldn’t feel the click on the third number. Too bad I was never a theif, I guess.
Bucket came back in with a grinder. Seriously. We put Pitchers foot up on the hearth and I gave Bucket the “Are you sure you can do this without permanently maiming our child?” look. He nodded. He turned on the VERY loud grinder and touched it to the lock. Sparks flew and Pitcher all but screamed. We stopped to put a cloth over Pitcher’s size 13 foot so it wouldn’t be burned by the sparks. Bucket grinded a bit at a time. Pitcher kept wanting to talk strategy. Bucket was not in the mood. I kept advising Pitcher that if he wanted Bucket to be as careful as possible, he may want to keep his mouth shut.
At some point Princess came to the top of the stairs, sleepy. I said, “Everything is fine. It’s going to be loud for a while. There’s nothing to worry about. We’ll tell you all about it in the morning.” She turned around and stumbled back to bed. Miraculously, Monkeyboy and Prankster slept through the commotion.
When the little metal bar was finally thin enough, Bucket got the bolt cutters into it and snapped the lock off. Pitcher hoppped around rubbing his toe and whining like a five-year-old.
Bucket and I tiredly went up the stairs and fell into bed. And that’s when I exploded into giggles.
