Maybe we should just build an ark.

Ugh.

I have blogger's block. I know that I should write something, but when I sit down and try I have an uncontrollable urge to poke myself in the eye with a fork. Or eat something chocolate, which is usually the urge that I follow and is why my weight-loss efforts have gone the path of leg warmers and high-top tennis shoes. (Or are those back now? I'll have to consult my nine-year-old.)

Anway. Here's an Owen story. It's all I've got, folks.

A couple of weeks ago I was sitting here not blogging, when I heard a scream from upstairs. Seconds later, Owen came running down the stairs yelling at the top of his lungs, "Help! I flushed a yellow paper thingy down the toilet and now it's flooding the bathroom and I think it's going to flood everything and I can't find my goggles! Can we buy a new house?"

Now, charmed as I was by the idea of him floating around in toilet water wearing spiderman goggles, (not to mention getting a new house out of the deal. Sweet!) I decided that there was not enough anti-bacterial soap in the house to placate my germiphobe children, so I called for Josie to turn off the water to the toilet. She did, the toilet was unstopped, and all was right with the world. Well, my world anyway.

That is, until the next time that Owen had to use the bathroom. Then a hysteria erupted that I'm quite sure was heard in the outer regions of Siberia (how about it, Siberian folks? It was intense, was it not?) He is now convinced that the toilet is going to over-flow and send us all to a watery grave, and no amount of parental assurance can convince him otherwise. He has vowed to never poop again, which thankfully only lasted until the next time he had to poop, but still. He is, shall we say....fixated? Paranoid? Constipated? Weird?

Yesterday, I caught him heading to the bathroom wearing floaties. At least now he has a plan.

But can I point out, friends, that he starts kindergarten on Monday? How exactly does that fit into our new little phobia? Do I warn his teacher? Send him to school wearing an inflatable life-jacket just in case he can't wait until he gets home to "do a number two"? I've tried talking to him, and ....oh, you just have to know this child. The phrase "he has a mind of his own" doesn't even begin to do him justice. I think the phrase that fits better is "once he has made his mind up about something, you cannot change it until he moves on to his next obsession," but I think I just made that one up.

So. That's where we are right now. Getting ready for school to start, and worrying that we will all be up to our necks in toilet water at any moment. It's a thrilling life we lead around here, y'all. A flash flood warning is in effect until further notice.

I'm thinking of putting on some goggles and floaties, too. At least if he's going to be weird, he can have the comfort of knowing that it's genetic.