Mr. 4 turned Mr. 5 over the weekend, and apparently, one of his brand spanking new wonderful gifts to everyone is a shiny new outlook on mornings. On Monday morning his tummy hurt so he couldn't get out of bed, his legs hurts so he couldn't put on his pants, and his socks were bumpy. Mr. 5 cried, whined, and threw himself on the floor like never before. Fantastic. On Tuesday morning he couldn't see anything cause his eyes were broken and the lights were too bright, he couldn't put his pants on because they were itchy, and again... his socks were bumpy. Wonderful. This morning... was quiet. No tantrums, no crying over the lights or legs, things were great... until those fucking socks.

Mr. 7 on the other hand is once again the child I fell in love with. He's sweet, overly affectionate, and slightly obsessive compulsive... just the way I like him. Together we have been learning how to make our own toast in the mornings... sometime we get a little over zealous with the butter, but we can handle that. After leaving Mr. 7 to eat his toast I ventured off to pummel my morning breathe with the toothbrush of doom. With a mouthful of foaming goodness I could hear Mr. 7 calling to me urgently, yet... very very softly. I walked towards him, toothbrush hanging out of my mouth, foam about to run down to my socks, and I noticed Mr. 7 wasn't moving. He was motioning to the floor with his eyes, and once around the corner I spotted it.

Happy was out of the cage and standing beside the stove, perched on his tail, and eyeballing every movement I made. I tried to rearrange my massive mouthful of foam and get a firmer grip on my toothbrush... and with stealth I reached around the corner to grab some of the brightly colored tubing they usually run through. I creeped towards the stove and laid the tubing down, and immediately Happy crawled in. I jumped the gun. Gerbils can go just as fast backwards as they can forwards and I didn't let him go far enough into the tube, and now he's onto me, and now it's going to be a fucking mind game to get this little shit back in the cage with his brother.

Happy would dash out from under the stove, wave at me briefly and resume the duck and cover operation. I would shift the tubing, and wait for him to return. He would scurry out, wink at me, and parade around flinging gerbil poop all over the kitchen. I had to do something before I lost an eye, or my toothbrush. So I did. I grabbed Happy by the tail. He wriggled around as if stuck in a hula-hoop. Lifting him to eye level he stared at me as if to say "please sir... "

Okay, okay... so it wasn't really that dramatic... but I had a fucking toothbrush in my face, isn't that enough!?!?!?