When I was growing up, my dad had a classic response, if my brother or I asked him a stupid question:

Let’s say, for example, I said, “Hey dad, can I make me and my friends martinis tonight? I promise not to drive.” (Actually, for the record, I would never have been dumb enough to ask that. This was more my brother’s territory. But, I did ask dumb stuff.)

He would look at me, very calmly, not even pretend like he was about to come out of his skin, and respond back:

“Would you like that in one word, or two?”

Our choice of replies were, of course:

“No.” or

“Hell, no.”

Flash forward to 2010.

My oldest child (and I use the word CHILD on purpose, because even though he is an awesome, amazing person, at the age of 16 1/2, he is still a CHILD) is full throttle, head-on, we’re-on-our-own-planet-so-don’t-bother-us in love with his girlfriend, that both her mother and myself are slightly taken aback, to put it mildly, at our children.

It’s hard to explain these two kids unless you see them in action.

You know how you hear about babies that are multiples making up their own language that only they understand?

Evidently teen love birds can do the same thing.

They look. They stare. They gaze. They giggle. They’ve cried. They’ve laughed. They’ve been grumpy. Boy, have they been grumpy. And then they gaze some more.

Well, apparently they’ve shared so much oxygen lately that they’re starting to lose brain cells.

Kloey’s mom planned to babysit her brother’s children this weekend, while their parents went out of town.

We’re talking 4 kids, including a set of 1 year old twins, and I believe the oldest is maybe 6 years old.

Lord knows, those parents needed a weekend away.

So, Kloey’s mom was spending the weekend, and she recruited our love birds to stay with her for the weekend and ‘help out.’

I gave Tyler permission to spend the weekend with them, and Kloey’s mom and I, who by the way have become friends in a we-better-get-to-know-each-other-quick type fashion, agreed on all the sleeping arrangements.

Kloey would be shackled to her mom at bed time, Tyler would take the couch. And, her mom would sleep with one eye open, and the home alarm motion detector on. Just in case, you know, someone decided to move around the house in the middle of the night. Not that that would ever happen. Just in case.

Friday rolled around, and from the look of the kid’s Facebook pages, you would have thought they were going on a weekend marriage retreat.

I finally stopping reading after I saw one of them, can’t remember which one, say that he/she was excited about their ‘weekend adventures.’

Lord Jesus, please help me. Jesus and I have been talkin’ a lot lately.

So, the cute couple started to tell Kloey’s mom about this terrific ‘fort’ that they were going to build. You know, the kind you make when you’re a kid. They said it would be under the kitchen table, blankets, pillows, the whole nine yards.

Kloey’s mom was of course thrilled at them ‘entertaining’ the young boys and responded back something like, “Wow, that is GREAT! The boys will LOVE a fort.”

SCREECHHHHHHHH.

Their little lovey heads snapped towards her mom, and they stared at her blankly, as if she had just said, “Hey, I forgot to mention that next week we are moving to Tahiti, and I forgot to tell you. Sorry.”

They stared and finally said,” The kids? We weren’t building that fort for the kids. We were going to build that for us. We WE’RE HOPING WE CAN SLEEP THERE.”

And yes, dear friends, they were heart-attack serious.

Now, if you have children of any age, surely you just spit coffee of whatever you are drinking, right out your nose.

These two teenagers asked a parent if they could BUILD A FORT AND SLEEP TOGETHER IN IT.

Just take a minute and think of how you would respond to that. 

I thought Kloey’s mom’s response was, well, perfect.

She looked straight at those oxygen deprived kids and said:

“Are you out of your fucking minds?”

(Sorry for the f-bomb.)

When she told me this story later, she apologized profusly for using that word around Tyler. Ha.

I let her know there was need to apologize. Apparently he has lost his mind. They have lost their minds. I think if he had asked me that, I probably would have responded in a similar manner, and perhaps followed it with a massive whack upside his head.

I guess they think we just went from like the age of 11 to 40, and skipped everything in between?

They did not build a fort and sleep in it.

They slept according to the said arrangements.

But, now we  have an ongoing joke, trying to guess what the next ridiculous request will be.

Here’s mine:

“Can we take showers together? We promise to keep our clothes on.”

Would you like that response in one word, or two?

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