"What Shall We Do With A Teenage Sluggard?"*

Previously, I've talked about heritable traits on my side of the family. But there are some things that run on the Clark side worth mentioning, too. In specific, with the Clark men.

Not one of 'em gets out of bed perky. To a man, they are pretty much useless until about 9am. Oh, they may get out of bed earlier, but they stagger around bumping into walls and nursing coffee for at least an hour before their brains wake up. Which has its comic moments, believe you me!

But the trait most difficult to live with is what I like to call the "foodle gene". (This one seems to have skipped a generation with my husband & brother-in-law. Either that, or they've learned to compensate for it; I can't really tell.) If a Clark with a Y chromosome needs to be someplace, or do something, they will be late or cannot get started promptly because they must foodle. They seem to be genuinely compelled to make a phone call, or find a pair of socks off the floor or take a trip to the potty. All the pleading, hollering or jumping up and down makes absolutely no difference whatsoever.

So, what shall we do with a kid who seems to think that "we are leaving in 10 minutes" means "go hide in the bathroom with your iPod"? Or "go to the car now" means "leisurely find your shoes in your disaster of a bedroom and refuse to come out"? 

This is a actual question. I've tried giving 10 minute, 5 minute warnings, I've begged, I've yelled, I've discussed the concept of consideration for others. None of that seems to have the slightest impact. So, yesterday, I left the kid and went on my way. Leaving him home alone, unsupervised, to watch useless TV and/or eat all the sugar in the house. Brer Rabbit comes to mind in that scenario....not really the extinguishing effect I'm going for, ya know?

Anybody got any ideas?!



* to the tune of "What Shall We Do With a Drunken Sailor?"

UPDATE: I got an apology today regarding this incident. Rapidly followed by an insistence that he cannot read cursive writing and therefore did not empty the dishwasher or pull up the bins as my note instructed.

I'm gonna go have a cocktail now.