Eddie wants Mommy to take a time out.

So the boys are being little turds about bedtime tonight. Finally, in desperation, we tell them they are just going to have to be on their own and we leave the room. Soon, a tearful Eddie is in the living room stretching his arms out to me. I take him back to his room to rock and cuddle. He is inconsolable. Then he says, "I want to go in the other room and leave YOU here!" The second time he says it, it sounded more like "I wouldn't go in the other room and leave you here." Either way, he was pissed. He told me it was mean and naughty. Then he said he wanted me to have a time out. So that's what I'm doing. Not exactly sitting still in a corner, but having nearly four decades of experience on him, I think (hope) I can get away with it. Anyway, in the middle of Sobfest 2006, he wanted a tissue (of course. This IS Eddie I'm talking about after all.) Steph got one but he rejected it. I blotted his tears a couple of times, but he yelled that he wanted to keep his tears. I suggested it was as evidence against me and he agreed.

Before this hoo-hah, I was going to blog that Eddie and Chas are like a regular Siskel and Ebert -- they don't agree about anything. I asked them whether Brokeback Mountain or Crash would win the Oscar tomorrow night. Eddie picked Crash, while Chas picked "Broke Broke Mountain." Then tonight, Eddie recounted the fun of today and pronounced it a " lub-elly, lub-elly (lovely, lovely) day." "NO! It not a lubley day!" Chas countered. The bickered until I suggested that it was such a subjective term that perhaps Eddie's experience of the day was lovely, lovely, while Chas felt far less charitable about the merits of the day. This confused them enough that they at least ceased the argument.

OK, so now I can hear that Eddie is no longer bereft and both boys are back to being little turds so I should go to Steph's aid. But not before I choose sides. I think, for the record, that it was indeed a lovely, lovely day. The night, however, seems to be sucking.