Smoke on the Chocolate

The other night, Chris wanted a little something sweet after dinner. So he put some chocolate chips into the microwave to melt them down. Before I elaborate any further, I should probably point out that Chris has a history of confusion related to what exactly it is possible to prepare in the microwave.

I am remembering an incident from my college years in which Chris attempted to make a chocolate chip cookie in my dorm room microwave by placing a golfball sized blob of pre-made cookie dough in a teacup and nuking it for about 4 minutes. Much to the chagrin of my unsuspecting roommate, and the rest of the residents on our hall, at the end of the evening we had only a smoldering lump of chocolate chip charcoal, a destroyed teacup and a stern warning from the RA.

Fast forward about 9 years to the other night. Chris puts a cereal bowl of chocolate chips into the microwave sets the timer for ONE MINUTE AND THIRTY SECONDS and walks back into the living room to sit down. Upon hearing the beep Chris walked over, opened the microwave door and out billowed a cloud of ash and smoke approximately equal in size to that volcanic eruption in Iceland.

Upon seeing this Chris's first though was likely "Oh crap, smoke detector" followed shortly thereafter by "SMOKE DETECTOR... JUST OUTSIDE SLEEPING BABY'S ROOM... OHCRAPOHCRAPOHCRAP!" It was at this point that he took off running in desperate race to beat the chocolate smoke cloud to the smoke detector. He was racing. The air. Savor that image for a moment. Are you savoring?

See, the thing is, he was in his socks on our hardwood floor. So his mad dash didn't result in immediate forward progress. I sat there watching Chris run in place, not very much unlike a cartoon character, encased in a cloud of black smoke from the neck down for several seconds before he actually started to move forward. And I was able to retain my composure in silence until the "Chariots of Fire" song popped into my head. It was pretty much all over after that. He made it to the smoke detector before the chocolate cloud but it didn't matter because by that point I was literally crowing with laughter twice as loud as any smoke detector.

Cookie monster, the father of my child

I would like to preface the posting of this video with the fact that the only person who actually likes to hear me sing is Myles. That said, the look on his face is worth have to sit through my rousing 17 second rendition of C is for Cookie.

Of course cookie monster still does it best and speaking of cookie monster, do you know who does a startlingly accurate cookie monster impression? Chris. His impersonation of cookie monster is so good in fact that the other night when I played the original version of this song, sung by Cookie Monster himself, Myles began frantically craning his neck looking all around for his dad.

In which I re-create the Exon Valdez spill using only my index finger and a jar of Vaseline

So, the doctor sad that we should put a little Vaseline on Myles’s head about an hour before bath time to help with the teeeeeency bit of cradle cap he has. Right. OK. This seems reasonable so I dip my finger into the jar and smear the Vaseline on his perfect little head of beautiful strawberry blond locks. He now looks ridiculous, however, he did not scream, cry or seem even the slightest bit upset. This will be fine I tell myself. I proceed on with my evening as follows:

I feed him his bottle, then his rice cereal, then one final burp for good measure. Wait, what is that warm stuff running down my back? Eeeeew. I change my shirt. Oh and my pants. And my right sock? Nice shot!

OK now time to hose Myles down. I gingerly place my baby boy who is now coated in rice cereal and Vaseline into the tub and begin to wash. I did his hair last. I always do the hair last. The Vaseline did not come out. OH GOD! Look at his head! It looks like the Exon Valdez spill up there. Okaaaaaaaaay. Don’t panic. I look at the bottle. No Vaseline removal instructions. Perfect. Thanks for nothing Johnson & Johnson. I got him dressed and attempted to comb his hair. I thought, maybe it will comb out? Not so much. Myles now has hair that resembles some horrible hybrid of a Donald Trump comb over and that one creepy guy on Lavern & Shirley with the oil slick head.

Then *the* most terrible thing occurs to me what if it stays like this forever? ACK! I am the most terrible mother ever in the history of the world. You know how people say oh, she wouldn’t hurt a hair on his head? Well I did! In fact, I ruined all the hairs oh his perfect little head. ALL OF THEM! GAHHHHH! OK, Think of something positive I tell myself. Look for the silver lining. I comb through the sticky wad of hair and do the only thing I can think of, I give him the ultimate baby Mohawk. Huh, his hair is really getting long.

OH. MY. GOD. FOCUS Woman! What else can you do? Who will know what to do. 911? Probably overkill. Instead I settle for calling my Mother-in- law who raised 3 boys who once attempted to jump down the laundry chute for fun. She can handle pretty much anything. If she doesn’t know what to do I’m screwed. But, alas, she is not there. I leave the following message.

“Hello? *whimper* Hi. Um. It’s me. We are having a baby-hair emergency here. Um, please call me back right away. OK ? No, seriously, I think I ruined Myles’s head and I don’t know what to do. Can you help me? You are not there. Um. Call me back. Yeah.” -Click-

Chris arrives home. After he manages to stop laughing hysterically he assures me that protective services will likely not remove Myles because I put Vaseline into his hair and am unable to get it out. We then proceed to wash Myles’s head THREE yes I said Three times in the sink. This helps a little. He still looks completely ridiculous. I give up and put him to bed for the night.

My mother-in-law calls back a little later and if it wasn’t for the caller ID, I wouldn’t have known who it was because when I pick up the phone I hear only snickering. “You know, “ I tell her “this mom stuff is tricky!”

This morning his hair still looks like he escaped from the set of grease. But some of the Vaseline seems to have soaked in. Chris has been tasked with washing Myles's head at regular intervals today to attempt to remove the residual goo. I am cautiously optimistic.